Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Howl’s Moving Castle, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Destiny vs. Free Will
Appearances and Assumptions
Family
Magic and Coming of Age
Summary
Analysis
Sophie decides to show Howl that she’s a great cleaning lady—and she’s relieved that there are only a few rooms to clean. Michael and Calcifer watch, horrified, as Sophie gets to work. As she cleans, a little girl knocks on the Porthaven door and asks Michael for her dad’s safety spell for his boat. The girl notices Sophie and asks if she’s a witch—Sophie cackles that she is. Normally, Sophie would be embarrassed by her behavior. But as an old woman, she finds she doesn’t care. When Sophie notices Michael hiding the girl’s payment, Michael and Calcifer explain that Howl is awful about spending too much money. They try to keep a store hidden, just in case.
As an old woman, Sophie is fearless. It’s no issue for her to make Michael and Calcifer get out of her way so she can clean, and she doesn’t think twice about telling the little girl that she’s a witch. This new persona is, in many ways, giving Sophie a new freedom to experiment with her identity and how she wants to interact with other people. She also continues to learn more about Howl and what kind of a person he is. That he’s bad with money supports Calcifer’s earlier insistence that Howl is self-absorbed, as Calcifer and Michael seem to imply that they need to hide money in case finances get really tight.
Themes
Sophie gets to work on the cobwebs near the main door so she can inspect the square knob. She’s now seen three sides used (which lead to the hills, Porthaven, and Kingsbury), but where the fourth black side leads is a mystery. Howl emerges from the bathroom and tells Sophie to leave the spiders alone. When she asks where the black door leads, he scolds her for being nosy and refuses to say. He opens the door onto the hills, ignores Michael asking when he’ll be back, and tells Sophie to not kill a single spider. Then, he takes his guitar and leaves. Figuring he’s off hunting young girls, Sophie angrily scares off all the spiders and scrubs the floor. Both Michael and Calcifer cower out of the way.
Though Howl is ostensibly supposed to be teaching Michael how to use magic, he seems far more interested in pursuing his own interests—leaving Michael to figure things out on his own. Especially since Sophie thinks Howl is off hunting girls so he can eat their hearts, this contributes to her perception of him as an evil, callous figure. Sophie settles for gaining power where she can: by making Calcifer and Michael move so she can inspect as much of the castle as she can.
Themes
When Howl gets home that night, Calcifer and Michael regale him with complaints about how Sophie is ruining everything with her cleaning. Howl confirms that Sophie didn’t kill any spiders, and Sophie asks if they’re the girls whose hearts he ate. He laughs, says they’re just spiders, and goes upstairs. Still irritated with Sophie, Michael pulls out a folding bed for her and sets it up under the stairs. He notes that this doesn’t necessarily mean Howl will let Sophie stay—it took Howl months to notice Michael was in the castle.
Now, Michael starts to suggest that Howl isn’t very perceptive when it comes to his surroundings. He just lets things change and only notices that things are different much later. But if Howl is right that the spiders are just spiders, it suggests that Sophie has misjudged him. Indeed, caring about the spiders’ wellbeing would suggest that Howl is unusually compassionate to creatures that can’t advocate for themselves.
Themes
Over the next few days, Sophie scrubs every inch of the castle, much to Michael and Calcifer’s chagrin. She figures that at some point, she’ll find a hoard of girls’ souls or something that helps her figure out what Calcifer’s contract is. Howl doesn’t seem to care much when Calcifer and Michael complain about Sophie. Now that Howl’s customers know of Sophie’s existence, they begin to bring her gifts, which Sophie uses to decorate her area under the stairs. Finally, Sophie decides to tackle the bathroom. She inspects the shelf of packets and jars, but even the ones labeled EYES and HAIR don’t seem to contain girls. Rather, they’re just cosmetics.
At this point, Sophie is convinced that Calcifer and Howl’s contract has something to do with the way Howl pursues girls. It’s not at all clear if she’s right to think this, so it may be clouding her ability to see what the contract is actually about. As Howl’s customers get to know and love Sophie, she becomes a fixture in the castle. This gives her the courage to investigate the bathroom and its odd cosmetics—but rather than being proof that he’s evil, the cosmetics just suggest Howl is preoccupied with his looks.
Themes
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That night, Calcifer complains that he drained a hot spring for Sophie to clean the bathroom—when will she get to breaking his contract? Sophie notes that she needs to spend more time with Howl before she’ll be able to figure things out, and Calcifer explains that Howl is only out so much when he’s pursuing a woman. After the bathroom, Sophie moves on to Michael’s room. He rescues a box of treasures from her, and from the contents she can see, Sophie ascertains that Michael has a sweetheart. But she doesn’t ask Michael about her, and instead, she burns so much dust and garbage from his room that Calcifer chokes that Sophie is “as heartless as Howl.” Michael, meanwhile, complains that whatever girl Howl is pursuing is being unusually difficult.
Calcifer suggests, essentially, that Sophie isn’t going to get to spend much time with Howl until he’s finished pursuing his latest love, and there’s no telling when that will be. Put another way, Sophie is going to have to find new methods of discovering what the contract is. For that matter, Michael implies that this will happen again, since he suggests that Howl is almost always pursuing women. It’s interesting that Calcifer has now twice referred to Howl as “heartless.” A single use might not have meant anything, but this is, perhaps, a clue that Sophie ought to pay attention to.
Themes
It’s raining in Porthaven the next day, so Sophie can’t clean the backyard (which is part of the Porthaven house). Instead, she spends the next few days whitewashing the main room’s walls and ceilings. When Howl steps inside one day and remarks that it’s brighter in the castle, Michael whispers to Calcifer that Howl’s latest girlfriend must be giving in. By now, all that’s left for Sophie to clean is Howl’s room. She’s avoided it out of fear of Howl, but she realizes now she was silly to fear him: Calcifer performs all the magic, Michael does all the grunt work, and Howl exploits them both while he spends his time snaring girls. He’s no different from Fanny, and Sophie detests him.
Michael’s implication here is that as Howl gets his way with his latest love interest, he becomes more perceptive about his surroundings. This might not bode well for Sophie, now that she’s decided to tackle Howl’s bedroom. However, Sophie now thinks that she knows exactly who and what Howl is: an exploitative jerk. This doesn’t make him frightening; instead, it just makes him pitiful and small in Sophie’s eyes.
Themes
However, Howl is standing in the doorway of his room when Sophie gets there. He says pleasantly that he likes it dirty. Sophie is shocked; she saw Howl leave the castle. Howl reminds Sophie that he is a wizard who can do magic, no matter what Calcifer may have said. Annoyed, Sophie says that no matter what Howl is, his castle is disgusting. She can see that his room is covered in dust and garbage, though she can’t see a pile of girls’ hearts (they’re probably under the bed). But Howl swings a trailing sleeve in front of Sophie’s face, tells her to stop being nosy, and sends her to go find something else to do. Sophie argues that she can’t help being a neat old woman, but Howl argues that she can.
A big difference begins to emerge between Howl and Sophie in this passage: Howl believes he can dictate what happens in his world, while Sophie insists that she essentially has to do what she’s told. This passage links Howl’s ability to do magic to his belief that he can change things (or, in this case, insist that things don’t change, such as his messy room). And he tries to get Sophie to see that she’s not powerless: she can decide to stop being a “neat old woman” if she wanted to.
Themes
Sophie is shaken, but she’s surprised Howl didn’t throw her out. She decides to clean the yard, but as soon as she starts sorting trash, Howl appears and tells her to leave the yard alone. Certain there’s a box of hearts in the yard, Sophie shouts at Howl, but he tells her to go do something else before he gets angry, since he hates being angry. At this, Sophie accuses him of being a “slitherer-outer,” someone who hates unpleasant things and goes out of his way to avoid them. Howl backs Sophie into the house, ripping a sleeve as he does. When Sophie offers to mend it, Howl fixes the rip with a wave of his fingers—he really is a wizard. Inside, Sophie asks Michael why Howl hasn’t kicked her out. Michael observes that Howl follows Calcifer’s lead; most people either don’t notice Calcifer or are terrified of him.
Howl may act as though he can change his environment to suit his whims, but Sophie nevertheless picks up on the fact that Howl does this for a reason: he goes out of his way to avoid unpleasant things. In this case, opening himself up to Sophie (or accepting that his castle might need to be cleaned) is unpleasant, so he’s going to push back on Sophie and forbid her from doing it. Still, Michael implies that this disagreement with Howl isn’t enough to convince Howl to kick Sophie out. Because Sophie shows Calcifer kindness, she’s passed a sort of test and can stay.
Themes
