Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Parenthood
Time, Mistakes, and the Past
Friendship, Family, Love, and Bravery
Reputation and Expectation
Death and Sacrifice
Summary
Analysis
Delphi takes Albus and Scorpius, who are still bound, to the Hogwarts Quidditch pitch. Scorpius realizes that Delphi plans to return to the third Triwizard Tournament task—which was a hedge maze on the Quidditch pitch—to try to alter time once more. Delphi explains that she wants to ensure Voldemort’s return. She will force Albus to humiliate Cedric and make the world as it should be.
Delphi’s desperation to carry out the plan to save Cedric and ensure that Voldemort rules, even knowing the way it will wreak havoc on the future, marks her as the villain of the play and shows once again how dwelling on the past can have disastrous consequences on the future.
Themes
Albus refuses to do Delphi’s bidding, until she turns her wand on Scorpius and shouts “Crucio,” causing Scorpius to yell out in pain. Albus begs her to stop, when suddenly, another student named Craig runs up to them and says everyone is looking for them. Delphi shouts “Avada Kedavra!” killing Craig instantly.
Craig’s unnecessary death, coming only because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, mirrors Cedric’s death and further ties Harry and Albus together as they both have to deal with the fallout of not being able to save their peers and their inability to always live up to their expectations of themselves as the heroes.
Themes
Delphi says that it took her a while to discover Albus’s weakness—she thought it was pride, but it really was friendship, like Harry. If Albus doesn’t do as he’s told, Scorpius will die, just like that “spare” Craig did. She quotes a prophesy: “When spares are spared, when time is turned, when unseen children murder their fathers: Then will the Dark Lord return.” She pulls Albus and Scorpius towards her and sets off the Time-Turner. Time warps once more.
While Delphi suggests that friendship is a weakness in Harry and Albus, the fact that this is coming from the villain of the piece suggests that the play actually argues for the opposite: friendship is crucial and provides people with strength and bravery. Additionally, Delphi’s mention of the word “spare” even more directly illustrates the parallels between Cedric and Craig, and thus also between Harry and Albus in being unable to save their peers.
Themes
