Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Al Capone Does My Shirts, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Disability, Dignity, and Shared Humanity
Friendship and Community
Family
Growing Up and Doing the Right Thing
Summary
Analysis
Moose feels awful: Jimmy and Annie are going to get in trouble, but Moose is certain that his own dad won’t be mad if Moose explains everything to him. He follows everyone to the parade grounds, and then they all follow Natalie down to the dock to retrieve her buttons. Annie and Moose kick a can around, while Jimmy builds a machine and offers Natalie rocks. Moose tries to kick the can backward, but it goes the wrong way and lands in Natalie’s button box, which then spills all over her elaborate grid. Even as Annie, Jimmy, and Theresa help to put the grid back, Natalie curls into a ball and lies down. For a half hour, until Mom runs up, everyone just sits with Natalie, keeping her company.
While Moose has previously described Natalie’s button grids as a quirk that only pleased Natalie, here, as Jimmy offers Natalie stones, it becomes more of a communal effort—Jimmy gets something out of participating. He also shows Natalie respect by just accepting that building these grids is what Natalie does, and supporting her in that. When Natalie becomes unresponsive, then, all the children show her they love and care for her by keeping her company until she’s ready to come back to them.
Themes
Mom asks what happened and why Natalie has her buttons at all, and then she icily says to “[g]et them out of here,” meaning the other kids. Moose insists that Annie, Jimmy, and Theresa are here because they like Natalie, but Mom insists she doesn’t want Natalie to be “a spectacle.” Annie hurries Theresa and Jimmy away while Moose fetches Dad from the electrical shop. Dad carries Natalie home, tucks her in bed, and then sends Mom to rest. They’re both asleep when Mr. Trixle arrives to talk to Dad.
Mom has spent years having people stare rudely at Natalie; with this in mind, it becomes more understandable why she wants to send people away whom she believes are treating her daughter like a curiosity. She misinterprets the situation, though, and this denies Natalie support from her wider community.
Themes
Dad comes back inside after speaking to Mr. Trixle and angrily tells Moose to follow him. He asks Moose if Moose knew about the scheme, but Moose just says he didn’t sell laundry and didn’t earn any money. When Dad says he could lose his job for this sort of thing, Moose notes they could go home then. Snorting, Dad says someone has his old job and someone else lives in their apartment. Their home is here now, and he can’t lose his job. Shouting now, Dad says he wants Moose to tell him this sort of thing when it’s happening, not after the fact. He’s going to take Moose’s baseball equipment for a while, but Moose says this isn’t fair. “Back home,” not everything depended on him.
Here, readers learn how Moose became so responsible: Dad has taught him, likely from an early age, to be honest and to do the right thing. Doing so, Dad suggests, is essential, as that’s how he’ll keep his job and therefore be able to support Moose, Natalie, and Mom. But Moose, his internal monologue shows, just feels like he’s being asked to take on too much—that right now, caring for Natalie and being so honest and responsible is too much to ask of him at once.
Themes
