Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Reckoning, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Guilt and Legacy
Morality, Survival, and Perspective
Sexuality and Shame
Body Image and Publicity
Indifference vs. Feeling
Summary
Analysis
To distract herself from Peter’s health, Margaret got a job at a fruit stand. At first, Magda was afraid she was losing her mother as well as her father. Soon, however, she came to enjoy visiting the market and listening to the banter of the women who worked there. Once, Magda noticed a strange tattoo on one of the woman’s arms. The woman told Magda that the tattoo was “her number” and that she received it from an evil man who wanted to kill her because she was a Jew. The other women lifted their arms to show Magda their numbers. Magda didn’t know what a Jew was or why someone would want to kill these nice ladies.
From the perspective of someone too young to have experienced war or learned about it in school, the Holocaust is utterly confusing. Magda is particularly struck by the senselessness of the violence these women suffered. Even before she has really become curious about her parent’s past, Magda senses the huge shift in perspective between those who have experienced a war and those who have not. To put oneself in a veteran’s shoes is a nearly impossible task.
Themes
After leaving her job at the market, Margaret worked at a power tool factory. Margaret enjoyed the company of her coworkers, most of whom were English migrants. After her shift, Margaret would pick Magda up from school, and the two would walk home, cracking jokes. Margaret—an expert at the vast possibilities of the Scottish accent—was very funny. No one could compete with her wit, although once, Magda made her mother laugh with a clever one-liner; it felt like a rite of passage.
This scene foreshadows Magda’s career as a comedian and actor. Magda’s mother not only enjoyed humor but prized it as a mark of one’s character and worth, leading Magda to feel that she was “allowed entry” into Margaret’s graces only through excellent humor.
Themes
Since Margaret, Peter, Barb, and Chris left early in the day, Magda had the house to herself in the morning; she enjoyed doing what she wanted, but the isolation also made her feel like an outsider. At school, the teachers critiqued Magda’s accent. Magda knew that learning to speak with an Aussie accent was the key to acceptance, but it wasn’t until she was in her 20s that she mastered it. Embarrassed that she couldn’t speak Polish despite her Polish name, Magda set about teaching herself Polish from a book she found in the den. Peter hated Magda’s wish to learn this “useless language,” and he lost his temper when Magda asked him for help with pronunciation.
Magda is twice removed from Poland—her ancestors’ native land—and therefore feels doubly the outsider at school: she does not speak with an Australian accent nor the language that her last name indicates that she should speak. For the first time, Peter and Magda reveal starkly different attitudes toward the past. This suggests that those who experience devastation of native land firsthand tend to want to move forward, while those in the next generation pick up the task of recovering their identity and history.
Themes
Peter determinedly assimilated to Australian culture; however, he persisted in wearing tiny shorts, which were stylish in Britain. This (and his blunt honesty) embarrassed Magda. Since her father didn’t support her choice to learn about Poland, Magda searched for a Polish role model. She landed on Marie Curie—whose Polish name, Maria Skłodowska, was similar to Magda’s. Bored by school, Magda dedicated herself to private medical study, just as Marie Curie had done; she and Chris once dissected sheep eyes from a local farm. They left the jar of rotting eyes under the bed for Margaret to find.
Magda’s selection of Marie Curie as a role model suggests that it was difficult for her to find a place for herself among her immediate surroundings. Instead of subscribing to the way other people learn things, Magda defines for herself what “scientific study” means and conducts it at home. In this way, Magda foreshadows her future struggle to find a place for her eclectic personality among preset definitions with which she doesn’t identify.
Themes
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The Szubanskis loved books; Magda used to think that Peter liked spy novels for the escapism they offered, but it occurs to her now that he must have recognized his own life in the stories. Intent on preparing to be a doctor, Magda pored over the names of organs and bones in Peter’s anatomy book. Autopsies fascinated her; once, she re-enacted a dissection at a party of her parents’ friends.
Usually, people enjoy spy novels for the fantasy and escape that they provide. Therefore, Peter’s interest in spy novels for the opposite reason—their realism—is unsettling; not only does Peter fall into an unconventional category of person, but he views violence as reality.
Themes
Peter forbade Magda to read Dni Powstania (Days of Uprising), a book about the Warsaw Uprising that he sometimes looked at with friends. Once, when Magda was home alone, she took the book from its paper wrapping. The pictures confused her; they showed people with machine guns, bombed buildings, kids screaming, and a Swastika flag. Magda couldn’t believe that this ruined land had been her father’s home. However, she also envied the drama and the camaraderie the photos depicted.
At the root of Magda’s reaction to the images is frustration that she is separated from the experience the photos depict. Whether it is something horrible or something admirable—like camaraderie—Magda can never feel more than a bystander’s distant shock or desire. This complicates her ability to understand her father, who has witnessed similar acts of violence directly.
Themes
While flipping through Dni Powstania, Magda came across a picture of a bundle of clothing with a hand attached; a disembodied head lay nearby. Frightened, Magda slammed the book shut. Periodically, she would will herself to look at the pictures of the strange bodies. When Magda asked Peter why the bodies looked like that, he said that they were dead and rotting. When Peter snapped that it was just a picture, Magda felt ashamed of her fear.
On the one hand, Magda’s reaction to the pictures of dead bodies does demonstrate fear and a lack of resilience. On the other hand, Peter’s indifference demonstrates inhumanity. In this way, the experience of death and violence makes a person brave and realistic, but it comes at the price of their humanity.
Themes
One day, Margaret got a third-degree burn from throwing blazing cooking oil out the door. Excited to witness her first real injury, Magda asked Peter if she could watch while he changed Margaret’s bandage. When Peter pulled back the bandage, however, the rotten smell and the messy look of Margaret’s wound sickened Magda; Peter, meanwhile, remained calm and numb.
To fulfill her dream of being a doctor, Magda has to aspire to the same indifference to human pain that a person naturally achieves during war. However, Magda finds that the sight of pain and wounds deeply affects her. In order to pursue her dream, Magda must decide whether she is capable of indifference or whether she can’t overcome her emotional response to human suffering.
Themes
