Previous
Chapter 9
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Cloudstreet, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Chance, Choice, and Personal Responsibility
Family vs. Independence
Trauma and Guilt
Religion and the Supernatural
Shared Humanity
Summary
Analysis
Life goes on at Cloudstreet, and summer comes again. Rose spends plenty of time with the baby (Harold Samson Lamb) at the beach, and everyone in the house adores him and spoils him at every opportunity. Lon and Pansy have their baby as well, and Pansy gets pregnant again very soon afterwards, to Oriel’s silent disapproval. Dolly starts inviting bingo friends over on some nights and Rose starts helping in the shop, quickly becoming attached to it. Rose still loves Oriel, but she admits to herself that Oriel’s kindness and competence feels harsh. Oriel always knows the right way of doing things, and her superhuman competence and trustworthiness is exactly what makes her dislikeable in some ways. Regardless, the two of them get along better than ever.
The Lamb and Pickles families continue to grow closer over their shared love of the new baby and the happy union of Quick and Rose. While the house is still technically divided, the families no longer make efforts to distinguish themselves from each other. Their strengthening bonds reinforce the theme of shared humanity, but Rose’s feelings about Oriel add a layer of complication to this happy period. Rose’s reliance on Oriel is still a source of insecurity and mild resentment, but these negative feelings aren’t nearly as strong as they once were. This is a sign of character growth for Rose, as she’s now more honest with herself about the causes of her resentment.
Active
Themes
Sam continues working at the mint, where he’s become something of a minor celebrity among the workers after working there for so many years. His bad luck at the races carries on as always, but his coworkers have a hard time believing he’s really that unlucky. They don’t bother checking his pockets at the door on his way out of the mint anymore, but he still only smuggles out an occasional coin or two in his mouth. It’s been almost 20 years since the Pickles first moved into Cloudstreet, and when 20 years are up, the house can be sold. Sam thinks about selling the place and using the money to retire somewhere nice, but he doesn’t tell Dolly about the idea yet.
Sam’s story begins to come full circle as his luck becomes legendary at his workplace. His coworkers’ opinions about his good luck prompt the reader to reflect on where his supposedly terrible luck has landed him after all is said and done. He owns a large house with tenants, has a happy family and a steady job, and even Dolly is warming up to him again. Getting an outsider’s perspective on Sam’s life highlights just how lucky he’s been over the years, even if most of his gambles don’t pay off.
Active
Themes
The killer’s trial would have easily made the front page of the newspapers if not for Kennedy’s assassination. Rose and Quick receive notice that their house is ready and that they need to move in soon, but they hesitate and decide to move out of Cloudstreet when they feel ready. Later, the two of them celebrate at the kitchen table upon hearing that the killer has been sentenced to death by hanging. Lester and Oriel get upset with Quick as they overhear this; Lester says that the killer is only a man, and Oriel insists that “an eye for an eye” is a barbaric philosophy. Quick wonders why they seem to have such sympathy for the murderer, and Lester tells him that Oriel still tries to hold onto her Christian beliefs about loving thy neighbor as thyself.
Active
Themes
One morning, Lester dresses for a fishing trip but secretly heads to a cathedral instead. He feels a kind of homesickness as he watches the religious ceremonies, and he quietly wonders what he really believes. Quick has a brief encounter with his old girlfriend Lucy Wentworth as he visits her florist shop to buy flowers for Rose’s birthday. He feels relieved that Lucy doesn’t seem to recognize him. At night, Oriel still sometimes wonders why she doesn’t sleep in the house, even after it’s recently started to feel lighter and friendlier inside. She can’t figure it out, but she still feels like she can’t go back yet.
Active
Themes
Get the entire Cloudstreet LitChart as a printable PDF.
"My students can't get enough of your charts and their results have gone through the roof." -Graham S.
Quick lets himself relax and take it easy during his patrols, until he spots the facedown body of a child floating on the river, near the shore. Two crying children have already spotted it, and Quick rushes out and hauls the boy onto dry land; it seems like the boy has been dead for an hour already. Quick tries not to cry as more officers are summoned and he looks at the boy’s lifeless face, remembering the accident with Fish and wondering if this kind of thing will keep happening to him forever. Later, at the station, the sergeant lets Quick know that the boy was one of the killer’s sons. Quick is deeply shaken by this news, as it forces him to imagine the killer as not just a monster, but a man with children and “old twisted hopes.”
Active
Themes
That same morning, Lon calls in sick from work. As Oriel and the other Lambs pack up the truck for the shop’s deliveries for the day, Elaine hears Lon’s baby crying upstairs. Oriel goes to investigate, and when she opens Lon’s door, she finds Lon and Pansy having sex; their baby is crying nearby with a dirty diaper. Unfazed, Oriel orders Lon to be downstairs to help with the truck in 10 minutes. Furious, Lon stacks crates in the truck bed haphazardly, and when he refuses to redo the job properly and tells Oriel to go to hell, Oriel swats him with a plank in full view of the gathering crowd, then delivers a strong punch when he starts a fistfight with her. She tells the crowd to help Lon restack the crates properly, as payment for their entertainment.
Active
Themes
Quick returns home to find Rose spinning a butterknife on her dresser. He tells her to ask the knife if it’ll give him a holiday, and he admits he badly needs a break from work after today’s events. He tells Rose about the boy he found, and how the murderer was just a man who had become cold and twisted. He still knows that there’s good and evil in the world, but he tells Rose that there are no monsters; only people who’ve gone bad. Quick imagines that he could have easily become a terrible person himself if things had been any worse for him, and these revelations bring him to tears. Rose comforts him and implores him to be happy.
The police sergeant gives Quick a week off work, as Quick seems tired and burnt-out. He and Rose discuss their vacation plans, and Rose insists that they don’t go fishing this time. She suggests that they should simply go driving out in the country and make it up as they go along. Meanwhile, Lester drives up to the new house that’s been built for Quick and Rose. He drops to his knees and prays by the side of the empty house, trying to ignore the kookaburra in a nearby tree, whose calling sounds like mocking laughter.
Active
Themes
On his way home from voting, Sam encounters a Black man standing across the street from Cloudstreet. Sam asks the man if he voted, but the man only smiles in response. He asks Sam if that’s his house and Sam explains that he’s planning on selling it, figuring that it’ll be bulldozed and replaced by a newer, uglier building. The Black man warns him against selling it, telling him that places are powerful and important. The man’s intense stare strangely reminds Sam a bit of his father. He asks the man again how he voted, only for the man to walk away, shaking his head.
Active
Themes
One morning, Dolly is out of bed earlier than Sam for a change. She feeds magpies in the backyard; this has recently become a regular pastime of hers. Sam joins her in the yard and tells her he’s been thinking about selling the house, as they’d make a lot of money from it and it’s such an old place anyway. Dolly is firmly opposed to the idea, reminding him that the house was a gift from Sam’s brother Joel, and that it’s unlucky to turn down a gift. Sam tells Dolly she hates the house, but she admits she doesn’t know about that. She tells him that it’s really Oriel who’s been keeping them alive and well all these years.
Active
Themes
Oriel arranges for both families to have a huge dinner on the night before Quick and Rose leave for their vacation. Oriel knows that the two of them will be moving into their new house after they come back from their trip, and she secretly hates the thought of losing them, so she feels she deserves this one last night of seeing them. Every member of the Pickles family and the Lamb family gathers for the meal, and Lester says Grace with genuine thankfulness in his voice.
Active
Themes
Literary Devices
During the dinner, Oriel tells Sam she heard he’s planning on selling the house. To his surprise, she says that there’s nothing to be done about it if that’s what he decides to do, as “it’s only a house.” However, she admits that she’s grown attached to the old house despite its difficulties, and she feels like it isn’t the same place it was before. She figures that they’ve all made their mark on Cloudstreet, and even Dolly admits that the house has a hold on them now. Sam decides to stay, and Lester raises a toast to both families and to their big old house at Number One, Cloud Street.
Active
Themes
As Quick packs the car for the trip at dawn the next morning, Fish asks him repeatedly if he can go with them on their vacation. Quick tries telling him no and brushing him off, then goes upstairs to tell Rose about it. To his surprise, Rose tells him to let Fish tag along. Quick objects and insists that Fish would cause problems for them, but Rose scolds him for being so callous towards his brother. She knows that both she and Quick will feel terrible if they don’t let Fish come with them, and she wants to enjoy herself on this trip without Quick falling into one of his gloomy moods. Reluctantly, Quick agrees with her.
Active
Themes
Quick and Rose set off on their holiday without a plan, just as they planned. With both Harry and Fish in tow, they try to figure out where to go first, eventually deciding on the small town of Southern Cross, which Quick had always been curious to see. Fish mistakes heat ripples for water as they ride through the plains. Southern Cross turns out to be a dull place, but Quick compares it to other wheat towns he lived in, and he tells Rose about his kangaroo-hunting days. Rose teases him about his Pickles-ish impulse to look for someone he knows in this town he’s never visited, and they drive on to look for a place to camp for the night.
Active
Themes
Unable to find a proper campsite, Quick and Rose find a space to make camp near some trees away from the road. They lie under the stars and Fish happily calls the stars “all the water.” His face seems to glow with moonlight, but there isn’t a moon in the sky to be seen. After Fish and Harry fall asleep, Rose admits to Quick that she can’t imagine moving out of Cloudstreet. She tells him that she no longer wants to be independent, if being independent means being alone. She was once miserable around her family, but things have changed. She wants to keep living in the old house, as she feels like she belongs there. Quick admits he’s been wanting to tell her the same thing for months. The two of them are brimming with happiness.
Quick wakes up in the middle of the night with pale moonlight on his face, but he soon realizes that the gentle light is actually coming from Fish himself, who’s also awake and kissing Quick on the cheek. They hear a rustling in the nearby wheat, and Quick assumes it’s a herd of kangaroos. Fish gasps happily as they behold a strange sight: in the wheat, countless numbers of naked children seem to rise from the earth itself and walk silently and calmly towards something in the distance. Rose and Harry watch the army of children walk by as well, but no one says anything. The walking figures swirl around them like a vortex, and eventually the four of them fall asleep again. The strange children in the wheat take all night to pass by.
Active
Themes
Thrilled and ecstatic, Quick and Rose drive back home to Cloudstreet with Harry and Fish laughing in the backseat. When they arrive, Quick jumps out of the car and surprises Elaine, who’s beginning to open up the shop for the day. Quick and Rose stir up a commotion in the house as they announce to everyone that they’re staying at Cloudstreet indefinitely, and Quick adds that they’re having a picnic to celebrate. Oriel drops the shop shutter in surprise when she realizes that they really mean it. Sam skips work for the day and Oriel closes up the shop, immediately ordering everyone to pack up the truck so that they can have a proper picnic by the river.
Active
Themes
The Lambs and the Pickleses have a loud and joyful picnic by the riverside, sprawled on blankets in the shade of the trees. The killer is hanged that morning, and his request to be buried next to his son is denied. The world goes on, but the two families of Cloudstreet are in their own bright and happy world that day by the river. Sam watches Lester play the accordion and feels the breeze on his face, feeling like the luckiest man in the world. They eat, laugh, dance, and sing like one enormous family, united at last.
Active
Themes
Fish Lamb runs down the jetty, grinning and laughing like a delighted child. He leans over the edge and gazes into the water, marveling at his own reflection and the colorful shimmering on the surface. Quick cries out and runs after Fish, but he makes himself stop running before he even reaches the jetty, and he’s already crying. Fish has fallen forward into the water, and the river swallows him whole. For a moment before he drowns, he becomes a man, and he sees the entire story of his family unfold before him. Fish Lamb transcends to become who he really is as he dies. Some time later, in a backyard that’s no longer split in half by a tin fence, Dolly helps Oriel Lamb pack up her tent for good. Both of them carry it inside the big old house at Number One, Cloud Street.
