Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Son of a Trickster, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Dysfunctional Families, Responsibility, and Maturity
Love vs. Violence
Escapism and Confronting Problems
The Environment and Human Destruction
Summary
Analysis
Some cultures believe that the universe exists on the back of a turtle. Others describe the dark star at the center of the galaxy as Kali, an Odin-eating wolf, or a massive black star. This black hole collects space and time into a singularity, and it becomes a door to other universes. People can’t travel from a three-dimensional universe to a nine-dimensional one—it’s like pouring out a glass of apple juice into an ocean. Universes are usually very separate, unless you are a Trickster.
The image of the world existing on the back of a turtle derives from Hindu, Chinese, and Indigenous North American mythology. This idea again reinforces how human spirituality and mythology often involve a deep connection to nature. The references to Kali (the Hindu destroyer goddess) and Fenrir (the wolf in Norse mythology that can eat worlds) are different ways of depicting the chaos at the center of our universe—or the black hole, as the chapter notes, which connects all of time and space.
Themes
