Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Ella Minnow Pea, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Totalitarianism, Complacency, and Resistance
Freedom of Speech
Betrayal vs. Solidarity
Blind Faith, Reason, and Logic
Summary
Analysis
Lyttle writes to Ella informing her that Mannheim is dead. He explains that Mannheim used an illegal letter in an interview with the L.E.B. after they saw him and Tom trying to break into the university. When they tried to transport Mannheim to exile, he and Tom fled, and the police shot Mannheim in the head. Lyttle apologizes for having to tell Ella this and he says he doesn’t know what happened to Tom.
This action by the Council shows its complete descent into totalitarianism: the state is now killing citizens without a trial simply because they refuse to be completely subservient to the government. This, it seems, is the ultimate consequence of not having stood up to the Council in the initial days of the statute.
Themes
Ella thanks Lyttle for the letter and for fighting for the statute that allows them to use “hear-twins.” She asks why he doesn’t fight to overturn all of the statutes so that they can restore the island to how it used to be. Lyttle replies, writing that Ella is asking for the impossible and that their only course is to find a 32-letter pangram.
Lyttle’s letter implies that the Council is so powerful and so corrupt that even its members are now essentially victims of its own oppression. Lyttle is only one of five Councilmembers and yet he seems powerless to do anything against its tyranny. Resistance is only possible through Enterprise Thirty-Two, the movement of the people.
Themes
A woman named Marigold Shropshire writes to Ella, announcing that she has Mannheim’s orphaned daughter Paula with her. She explains that she has too many foster children to look after, and so she is sending Paula to Ella because there are no other relatives for Paula to go to. Tom also writes a note to Ella, explaining that he is alive and well but that he is in hiding. He says Enterprise Thirty-Two is Ella’s responsibility now, with only a week left.
Ella is once again aware of the need to support others in this oppressive era when she is forced to become a foster mother to Mannheim’s young daughter. Where once the idea of taking in a stranger would have been a fearful prospect, now Ella cannot question it because she knows this young girl needs a home and there are too few people who can take care of her.
Themes
Ella asks Tanya if she has seen Georgeanne, as Ella has not heard from her recently. Georgeanne, learning of Ella’s concern, writes to say that she is fine and that she has started to paint her own body—she is making herself into a kind of abstract painting. Ella responds saying that it’s not healthy to paint her whole body and asks Georgeanne to be careful. The next day, Tanya writes that Georgeanne is in the hospital with lead poisoning—and that “Y” has fallen.
Painting, which was once a hobby for Georgeanne, painting has ultimately become an obsession as the only means of expressing herself, and this clearly has dangerous consequences for her health. This demonstrates that without freedom of speech, it becomes difficult to find a safe and effective method of expressing oneself.
Themes
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