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
On the mainland, the government treats the survivors well. But they have questions. They want to know how Grant knew Hammond, what he knew about the project, why he had gone to the island, and what had happened there. Grant forms the distinct impression that the Costa Rican officials are waiting for something, but he doesn't know what.
When things went awry on the island, Hammond looked for other people to blame. The Costa Rican authorities also want to assign blame for the Jurassic Park fiasco, but all the responsible parties are dead.
Themes
Then, one day, Dr. Guitierrez approaches Grant and introduces himself. Grant expresses his impatience to get back to his dig before the snow flies in Montana—it happens early at that high latitude. Guitierrez asks if Hammond sponsored northern digs because the cold climates were more likely to support the conditions for DNA preservation. Grant replies that he assumes so. But since Hammond is dead, no one will know.
Both careful and attentive scientists, Grant and Guitierrez can infer more about Hammond and his plans even after all the evidence has been lost by piecing together the messages left behind in the vestiges of his actions. Like the amber that preserved the dinosaur DNA, people’s knowledge about the InGen incident will continue to yield insight through careful study.
Themes
Finally, Guitierrez explains to Grant why the Costa Rican government hesitates to let him and the others go. Strange things have happened in the rural hinterlands, where some unknown animals passed through a few months ago. They traveled in a straight line, as if they were migrating. And they only ate beans and chicken. This catches Grant’s attention, because these foods contain a lot of lysine. No one knows where these strange animals went. But the government, feeling anxious over the possibilities, wants to keep the scientists around, just in case. Neither Guitierrez nor Grant is going anywhere soon.
The book closes on Malcolm’s notion that life will find a way to evade attempts at control, no matter what people like Hammond, Arnold, and Wu believe. Events on the island showed the failure of Wu’s attempt to sterilize the dinosaurs; events on the mainland suggest that his attempt to engineer animals that couldn’t survive in the wild also failed. Dietary supplements on Isla Nublar aren’t the only source of lysine, and those animals clever or lucky enough to discover rich natural sources of it seem to be thriving. And if the escaped dinosaurs prove that the only constant is change, the best humans can hope to do is pay attention and adapt themselves to meet the future.
Themes
