Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
The Enduring Impact of Trauma
Shame and the Stigmatization of Pain
Projection and Denial
The Vicious Circle of Isolation and Social Awkwardness
Summary
Analysis
The GP gave Eleanor time off work, which feels odd to her, as she’s worked—with no days off—since the week after she finished college. The doctor diagnosed Eleanor with depression and recommended a combination of therapy and medication. Eleanor worries she’ll become reliant on medication like she did with vodka but agrees to see a counselor. Today is her first therapy session with Maria Temple.
Agreeing to take time off work means that Eleanor is beginning to come to terms with the fact that she’s not as fine as she wanted to believe she was. Maria Temple’s name seems to be another Jane Eyre reference—Ms. Temple is the name of Jane Eyre’s mentor at boarding school.
Themes
Maria Temple’s office is located in the city center. The building is gray and gloomy, and it reminds Eleanor of the many institutions she became familiar with as a child. Eleanor knocks on Temple’s door, and Temple invites her inside. Eleanor is stiff with the therapist at first, insisting on being called Ms. Oliphant instead of Eleanor and answering vaguely when Temple asks whether Eleanor has received counseling before. Maria Temple reminds Eleanor that she can feel safe and comfortable in her office. Eleanor says nothing in response.
In comparing Maria Temple’s building to the state institutions she was exposed to as a child, Eleanor attaches a negative connotation to Temple, thereby implicitly expresses her skepticism toward therapy. It makes sense that Eleanor would be on guard in Maria Temple’s office, given the negative experiences she had with social workers and the legal system as a child.
Themes
Temple consults her notes, acknowledges the GP’s depression diagnosis, and asks Eleanor how she’s been feeling lately. Eleanor responds stiffly, admitting to feeling “a bit sad.” She continues to maintain her distance from Temple but agrees to Temple’s repeated request to call her Eleanor. Temple asks Eleanor to tell her about the events leading up to her diagnosis, and Eleanor downplays them, again, insisting that things just got a little out of hand. Temple urges Eleanor to tell her why she was feeling sad, and Eleanor realizes she wants to cry.
Eleanor downplays her depression because she still isn’t comfortable admitting to the fact that she’s struggling and to the shameful feelings she attaches to mental illness and loneliness.
Themes
Eleanor tries to talk about her infatuation with the musician casually, describing it as “boring,” and merely a failed romance. Eventually, Eleanor admits that she never actually met the man before, which sparks Temple’s interest. Temple asks Eleanor if she’s ever been in a similar situation before, and Eleanor says she hasn’t.
Eleanor is ashamed of how carried away she got with pursuing the musician, so she tries to pass it off as a failed romance. Again, Eleanor is reluctant to admit the extent of her mental health issues or show signs of vulnerability in front of someone she doesn’t know well.
Themes
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Temple deconstructs Eleanor’s crush some more, framing her feelings for the musician as a “trial run” for a future, feasible romance. She asks Eleanor how her feelings for the musician ended, and Eleanor starts to open up, explaining that she actually did believe, “on some level” that the romance was real and that she and the musician had a future together. Her feelings ended when she realized, once and for all, that the entire thing had been a fantasy, a desperate attempt “to please M—” but she cuts herself off before she can finish. Maria tells her she’d like to talk more about Eleanor’s childhood, but Eleanor refuses.
Therapy won’t benefit Eleanor until she can be honest and direct with Maria Temple. Once Eleanor admits that she believed her romance with the musician was real, it triggers a domino effect that gets to the root of Eleanor’s problem. When she says she constructed the fantasy romance “to please M—” (that is, to please Mummy), Eleanor begins to better understand her motivations for feeding the fantasy. Eleanor’s refusal to talk about her childhood comes naturally to her after years of repressing the past.
Themes
Temple asks about Eleanor’s relationship with Mummy, and Eleanor says they have consistent contact, though it’s “complicated.” Temple pushes for Eleanor to elaborate, but Eleanor says it’s too difficult for her to discuss, and that Mummy wouldn’t want her to, either. Eleanor remembers what happened when she was a child and talked about Mummy to a teacher at school, noting that talking about Mummy to others “wasn’t a mistake you made twice.” The memory causes her to shake uncontrollably.
That talking about Mummy to others “wasn’t a mistake you made twice” seems to insinuate that Mummy had previously punished Eleanor for disclosing unsavory details about their home life. This perhaps implies that Mummy was physically, as well as emotionally, abusive. Once Temple forces Eleanor to confront this memory of talking about Mummy with the teacher, Eleanor breaks down, feeling all the pain she has tried to suppress.
Themes
Temple asks Eleanor to imagine that Mummy is sitting in an empty chair in the room, and to tell the chair everything she’d like to say to her. Still shaking, Eleanor turns toward the chair and says “Mummy…please […]. Please don’t hurt us.”
Addressing the chair as a stand-in for Mummy is the most directly Eleanor has been able to confront her past in quite some time. When she asks “Mummy” not to “hurt us,” the “us” it is further evidence that there is someone else from Eleanor’s past whom Eleanor has suppressed out of trauma and pain. The use of the word “hurt” is also more proof that Mummy was physically—as well as psychologically— abusive to Eleanor.
Themes
