Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Six of Crows, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Greed
Friendship and Difference
Trauma, the Past, and Moving Forward
Identity, Values, and Growing Up
Summary
Analysis
Jesper is going stir crazy on the boat, and he still has six more days to go. If he’d wanted to be in the quiet outside of a city, he could’ve just stayed on his father’s farm. He entertains himself by annoying Wylan, who insists he doesn’t belong with the other criminals. (Kaz insists Wylan does, though, based on his exceptional drawings of the Ice Court.) Wylan suggests that Jesper doesn’t belong here either, since they don’t need a sharpshooter to carry out Kaz’s plan. As their barbed conversation continues, Wylan admits he feels like he won’t ever know enough about anything—such as how Jesper’s revolvers work, or where the water that feeds the ice moat at the Ice Court comes from. Jesper insists he isn’t curious about any of those things, and he’s surprised that he’s sad to notice that Wylan is disappointed to hear that.
Jesper and Wylan’s relationship is growing. Though it remains adversarial, both begin to express genuine curiosity and regard for each other. Additionally, Kaz now values Wylan for more than his relationship to Van Eck; his drawings are an essential part of the planning process for this heist. And Jesper also seems to care about what Wylan is curious about, even if he himself doesn’t wonder about these things, pointing to their growing relationship. Wylan also has a point, as it’s not clear what Jesper’s role in the heist will be. But this is a question the novel will answer later.
Themes
When Jesper goes to check on Inej one morning and finds her awake, he’s overjoyed. Nina is trying to get Inej’s rubber slippers on. Scolding Inej to take it easy, Nina allows Jesper to escort Inej to the deck to walk. Inej observes that on the deck, Nina stays as far away from Matthias as possible. From the captain’s wheel, Kaz doesn’t return Jesper’s exuberant wave. But to Inej’s surprise, everyone she passes is happy to see her alive and thanks her for her help getting out of the harbor. Jesper grudgingly admits to Inej that Kaz didn’t visit her at all when she was asleep, though he did go “a little crazy.” Inej scoffs that Kaz was just anxious because he needs her to climb an incinerator shaft; she’s essential to the plan.
That Inej is surprised when so many people thank her for saving them says a lot about how cold Kaz is: he doesn’t show Inej appreciation, at least not in a way that’s meaningful to her. Again, this creates distance in their relationship. More distance appears between them as Inej discusses Kaz’s plans for her to climb the incinerator shaft. As she sees it, she’s only valuable to Kaz for what she can do for the heist, and he doesn’t care about her as a person, friend, or potential partner.
Themes
Jesper asks Inej what she knows about why Wylan left Van Eck’s house. She doesn’t know much: he turned up near the Slat three months ago, and all she was able to learn from the Van Eck servants is that Wylan was caught with one of his tutors. Van Eck writes weekly, always the same thing—that he wants his son to come home—but Wylan doesn’t read them. Then, they discuss why they’re both on this job. Jesper admits that he asked his father for a loan to finish school, but it’s actually to cover his gambling debts. His father doesn’t know he’s not still a student. Inej sighs, tells Jasper that he’s a terrible gambler and a good friend, and then asks him to distract Nina so she can find her knives.
What’s actually going on with Wylan is a mystery, but it seems tragic: he and Van Eck are at odds, and they seem unable to forgive each other for whatever perceived offenses they committed. Jasper seems to also have a difficult relationship with his father. He’s keeping shameful secrets from him, and as a result, Jesper has gotten pulled deeper and deeper into the Dregs.
Themes
