Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Stargirl, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Individuality and Conformity
Human Nature
Seeing, Visibility, and Invisibility
Friendship, Love, and Social Pressure
Summary
Analysis
Archie Brubaker lives in a house filled with bones—he’s a paleontologist. He’s collected many of the bones for himself, all over the American West. He used to be a college professor, but he moved to Arizona after his wife, Ada Mae, died. He chose his house, in part, because of the towering cactus, “Señor Saguaro,” that stands in the backyard. Señor Saguaro is almost dead, and elf owls nest inside him. Archie talks to the cactus like a person.
Archie sounds rather like Stargirl in his unconventionality and whimsy. And, like Leo, he’s an outsider to Mica. That outsider status, in this case, makes him appealing to the kids—likely because he’s completely outside of the Mica High social world.
Themes
Archie befriends the students of Mica. On Saturday mornings, kids of all ages flock to hear Archie talk about “everything from toothpaste to tapeworms,” and he calls the group the Loyal Order of the Stone Bone, giving each kid a homemade fossil necklace. He insists that they call him Archie.
Again, Archie is an example of strangeness being loved and sought after instead of feared and resisted. He also meets the kids on their level, making them feel valued and accepted.
Themes
That day, Kevin and Leo visit Archie. They find him rocking on the back porch, reading in the sunset. The boys greet him, salute Señor Saguaro, and take seats in the adjacent rockers. They explain that they’ve come because of Stargirl and are surprised to learn that Archie already knows her. Smoking his pipe, Archie admits that Stargirl is indeed “different.” Kevin says she’s like “another species.” Archie counters that, actually, Stargirl is “who we really are.”
Because Archie is already established as an unusual character, his association with Stargirl seems fitting. He also seems to understand her more readily than her peers do—to recognize who she is and to see kinship there, rather than something alien.
Themes
Archie explains that while Stargirl was being homeschooled, her mother brought her to Archie’s one day a week. Kevin asks if Stargirl’s behavior is just an act. Archie says no—“if anybody is acting, it’s us.” She’s as real, he says, as Barney—a little rodent fossil sitting on the porch. He adds that Stargirl has changed her name many times over the years—before Stargirl, she’s been Pocket Mouse, Mudpie, and Hullygully.
Archie, who’s attentive to the origins of things by profession, sees Stargirl’s authenticity. He is able to recount her history almost as if he’s describing the history of one of his beloved fossils—yet, like the fossils, he doesn’t objectify her, but sees her as a friend.
Themes
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Leo and Kevin ask what Stargirl’s parents do. Archie explains that Mrs. Caraway designs costumes for movies, and Stargirl’s father, Charles, works at MicaTronics, like most people in town. Stargirl originally came from Minnesota, but Archie calls her rara avis, a rare bird. Archie seems approving when Kevin tells him that Leo is reluctant to put Stargirl on Hot Seat. In closing, he tells them, “You’ll know her more by your questions than by her answers.”
Stargirl’s strangeness doesn’t seem to originate with her parents, with aligns with Archie’s view that, in a certain way, she descends from something more primal and rare. He also suggests that Stargirl is a kind of litmus test for her peers. By reacting to Stargirl, they’ll ultimately discover more about their own human nature than about her.
Themes
