Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Cat’s Cradle, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Science and Morality
Religion
Governance, Politics, and Nationhood
Absurdity and Meaninglessness
Summary
Analysis
Life on the island remained “short and brutish and mean.” But the legend of Bokonon made “the happiness of the people grow.” Over time, the situation made both McCabe and Bokonon unstable. At this point, McCabe really did start killing people on the hook. McCabe understood that without “the holy man to war against, he himself would become meaningless.” “Papa” gets this too. According to Julian, “Papa” ceremoniously kills one person every two years on the hook. Julian says “busy, busy, busy,” and admits that he, too, is a Bokononist—and that John will become one.
The performance turned into a genuine vendetta, and McCabe and Bokonon began to lose sight of what is real. This seems to suggest that conflict is the natural state of humankind, no matter its original good intentions—a distinctly cynical view of the idea of progress.
Themes
