Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Jurassic Park, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Chaos, Change, and Control
Sight and Insight
Flawed Human Nature
Technology
Summary
Analysis
Tim Murphy comes back to consciousness. He seems to have suffered a concussion. Slowly, he realizes that he—and the Land Cruiser—lie tangled in the branches of a tree near the road. Moving carefully, he manages to open the rear door and climb out of the vehicle. As he makes an awkward and painful descent from the tree—he’s at least 20 feet above the ground—the car tumbles after him. Tim falls the last 10 or 12 feet to the ground, injuring his shoulder, but at least he’s not crushed. Luckily, the night-vision goggles survived the crash, and they help Tim find the wreckage of the second vehicle. But he sees no sign of Grant, Malcolm, or anyone else. Scared and alone, he plops onto the muddy road and begins to cry.
Up to this point, the park’s victims have been workers, inconsequential in a personal sense to John Hammond. But his grandchildren’s presence potentially raises the personal stakes for Hammond, although at this point it remains to be seen if this will break through his wall of selfishness and greed. By aligning readers’ perspectives with a small child at this point, the book emphasizes the smallness and weakness of humanity in the face of nature’s fury and power. Tim survives his encounter with the tyrannosaur but nevertheless incurs injures.
Themes
Muldoon walks back into the control room, carrying a case of emergency radios. Because they weren’t plugged in, they need to be charged first. But then they can try to use them to communicate with anyone still alive in the park.
The park operators’ lack of foresight extends to their surviving but useless backup systems. The fact that no one thought to charge the emergency radios suggests an arrogant assumption that the park’s main systems would not or could not fail.
Themes
Henry Wu enters the Fertilization Lab to search the records for frog DNA, although he doesn’t know what Grant is looking for. DNA is so ancient and foundational to life on earth that living creatures share most of their genetic codes with each other. A human being and a bacterium share about 90% of their DNA. Thus, Wu sees DNA as a blank, malleable substance that he can use interchangeably or rearrange as necessary. But when the computer returns the results of his search, it confirms Grant’s hypothesis. The genetic code of all the breeding species incorporates frog DNA.
As Wu finally searches his records to figure out what may have given the dinosaurs the ability to reproduce, readers can see the extent of his arrogance and limited knowledge. Assuming that he not only understands but is completely in control of DNA, Wu takes on god-like powers in his manipulation of DNA. Clearly, however, he missed something, although the book refuses to spell it out for readers at this point. By keeping readers in the dark as well, the book makes them complicit with Wu’s ignorance.
Themes
