Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Eleanor and Park, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Adolescence and Shame
Love and Intimacy
Poverty and Class
Family and Abuse
Summary
Analysis
Park, Eleanor, and Mindy are sitting on the couch watching TV one evening—Josh and Jamie are out. Mindy complains that she doesn’t feel like cooking, and suggests Park use his driver’s license to take Eleanor out for dinner and a movie. Park and Eleanor can hardly believe their luck. Mindy gives them some money for their date and fixes Eleanor’s hair up in a bun, then urges them to hurry out and have fun.
Mindy knows that both Eleanor and Park could use some more joy in their lives—Eleanor especially—and she wants to help them find more time together after seeing how happy they make one another.
Themes
Eleanor and Park are giddy as they start driving through Omaha, and though the fear of Richie seeing them—or Jamie finding out that Park is driving—cloud over the evening, they are full of excitement. Eleanor is impressed by Park’s driving and feels like she’s about to “swoon” as he drives them towards the lights of Omaha’s downtown area.
Even the negative things in their lives can’t drag Eleanor and Park down as they head out on the town for the first time. Every new experience they share brings them closer together, and going out on a real date allows them to explore a new chapter of their relationship.
Themes
As Park shows Eleanor around downtown and takes her to the record store, the Old Market, an ice cream parlor, and a comic book shop, he can hardly believe that they are out on their first real date together. Eleanor, too, is stunned by how happy she feels—and how dreamlike the whole evening is. While feeding swans at a lake in a small park, Park invites Eleanor to go to prom next year. Eleanor accepts, even though she secretly worries that she won’t be allowed to go even in a year’s time.
In spite of the happiness of the evening, Eleanor still feels nervous when she considers what her future looks like. This passage foreshadows the difficulties and twists of fate that still lie ahead for Eleanor and Park.
Themes
As Eleanor and Park continue talking about their dreams for prom and exchange banter about their outfits, Eleanor gets the sense that Park is insecure about his looks. When she prods him to talk about it, Park complains that Asian men are stereotyped as effeminate and asexual, and that he’s never felt particularly masculine or desirable in his life. Eleanor insists she’s deeply attracted to Park because of how he looks, not in spite of it, and Park is cheered by her kind words.
Eleanor’s lack of self-confidence in her appearance is palpable, but she works hard to assert her individuality and lean into the ways in which she’s different. For Park, though, his otherness isn’t something that can be escaped by changing clothes or hairstyles—and he confides in Eleanor for the first time about the ways in which he’s been made to feel different and undesirable all his life.
Themes
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When Eleanor and Park walk back over to the Impala, it is only 8:30 p.m. They get into the car and hustle into the backseat. As Park kisses and touches Eleanor, he thinks that he’ll never be able to “get enough of her.”
Everything Eleanor and Park have shared tonight, from their fun and frivolous romp downtown to their very real personal feelings, has brought them even closer together, and they express this surge of intimacy physically as the night draws to a close.
Themes
