Theme

Theme

Theme: Section 1.

     Now the main theme in most of the sections is the theme of freedom. That it's okay to be a spiritual person and that you're allowed to live your life at a certain aspect. If you are caged and held back, there is no point in having a life if you can't experience it. I'll explain why.
     When Cecilia comes to the hospital after her attempt, she tells the doctor "Obviously, Doctor. You've never been a thirteen year old girl." (Eugenides 7). Even at a young age, Cecilia can tell her life is going nowhere. At thirteen, most of us did feel that we were on a leash, that we were never going to do what we wanted. Cecilia feels like she wont grow out of it. It has to go with how she dresses after the suicide attempt. "She always wore a wedding dress and her bare feet were always dirty." (Eugenides 17). After her failure, she tries to play- what I think- is playing dress up. Pretending she is someone else, maybe in her own world somewhere else. Even when the Lisbons' throw a party for Cecilia she is "Though all this Cecilia remained on her stool." (Eugenides 28). Even though everyone is having fun, she sees nothing enjoyable. Because she sees it as a façade, that its only temporary that her parents are making for her. "Mr. Lisbon kept trying to lift her off, gently, but even in our ignorance we knew it would be hopeless and that despite Cecilia's open eyes and the way her mouth kept contracting like that of a fish on a stringer it was just nerves and she had succeeded, on the second try, in hurling herself out of the world." (Eugenides 31). Saying she " hurdled herself out of the world," just shows she tried to get the freedom she couldn't get out f her world.

Theme: Section 2.

     Section two is more about learning about people instead of judging them and we see this when the boys find Cecilia's diary.  "We knew what it felt like to see a boy with their shirt off, and why it made Lux write the name Kevin in purple magic marker all over her three-ring binder and even on her bras and panties, and we understood her rage coming home one day to find that Mrs. Lisbon had soaked her things in Clorox, bleaching all the "Kevins" out." (Eugenides 43).  How this conveys the theme, is that the boys saw the girls a beautiful creatures, as something made to be analyzed and looked at. But after reading about the girls and actually getting to know them is some way, the start to understand the girls. "We felt the imprisonment of being a girl, the way it made your mind active and dreamy, and how you ended up knowing what colors go together." (Eugenides 43). You now see that they empathize with the girls, that they have feelings, that they do think, and not that they're just breathing and passing by life.

Theme: Section 3.

     For section three, the theme is more about trust and who you should trust. Mostly by introducing Trip into the story and when Trip and Lux engage in sex. "I walked home that night. I didn't care how she got home. I just took off." Then: "It's weird. I mean, I liked her. I really liked her. I just got sick of her right then." (Eugenides 139). Lux had loved Trip, and Trip got bored of her and stopped being with her. Lux liked him and trusted him so much, she gave her virginity to him, and what he did was walk away.
      The effect that happens after that, is that there is now trust issues with Mrs. Lisbon. "The old bitch had locked them up again." (Eugenides 139). Because of Lux missing curfew after her mother let her have a bit of freedom and trust her with this freedom, her trust is destroyed. And that's what causes her to lock up all her girls in the house.

Theme: Section 4.

    Section four brings back the theme of freedom again. "She had post cards taped up inside. Weird stuff. Couches and shit." (Eugenides 142). In Mary's locker when they clean it out, they see different places inside. Showing that she wants to leave and visit, minimum. When Lux pretends to be sick to get a pregnancy test, you can see the strictness that she is under and the only way she could leave. "Why all the commotion? Why the ambulance?"
"Only way I could get out of the house." (Eugenides 153). It shows how strict the house is, how the only way she can leave is to act sick. Asking people why wouldn't you want to leave? "Unable to go anywhere, the girls traveled in there imaginations to gold tipped Siamese temples, or past an old man with a bucket and leaf broom tidying a moss- carpeted speck of Japan." (Eugenides 169). Pretending to be somewhere else, just shows that they can not leave so they've made themselves believe they were in these places they could never visit. They also use the boys obsession to their advantage to leave. "We understood that we were only pawn," (Eugenides 212) They know the Lisbon girls are just using them in their plan to leave. And since they love they girls, they'll let this happen.

Theme: Section 5.

    Since the girls killed themselves. The last section talks more about how you shouldn't forget as the theme. That you don't always move on from things that affected your life so greatly. "Many of us continued to have dreams in which the Lisbon girls appeared to us more real than they had been in life, and when we awoke certain that their scent of the next world remained on our pillows." (Eugenides 238).Even though the girls are dead, they still think about the girls. Or even still love them. Unable to forget.