Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Farming of Bones, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
The Power of Memory
Dreams vs. Reality
Language and Identity
Death, Grief, and Hope
Home, Family, and Belonging
Summary
Analysis
Amabelle and Yves discuss Yves’s farming; he claims that nothing has emerged from the ground yet. Amabelle tells him that she wishes to go to the fields with him one day, to see his father’s land. Yves changes the subject and informs Amabelle that there are justices of the peace who listen to survivors’ stories and write them down. He explains that Trujillo has not taken responsibility for the slaughter, but has agreed to give money to those affected.
The justices of the peace embody and symbolize the act of memory. They physically preserve the experiences of the survivors through writing, so their suffering will not be forgotten. At the same time, the Dominican Republic’s dictator Trujillo refuses to be accountable for the violence, which he incited by stirring up prejudice between two groups of people with differing cultural identities. In other words, Trujillo will not admit that the boundaries between the cultures—boundaries he worked to maintain—led to violence.
Themes
Amabelle tells him that she wishes to visit the justice of the peace, and Yves tells her that he cannot be sure she will receive money. He speculates that the government will try to keep it for themselves, or ask her to bring proof or papers that prove her story. Amabelle is not interested in money, however; instead, she seeks information about Sebastien.
In Yves’s opinion, the justices of the peace are not truly helping to preserve cultural memory. Rather, they plan to manipulate the survivors’ memories, or hide them away so that the next generation of Haitians and Dominicans will forget the past. Yves’s fears reveal how important memory is to the future. He worries that without a proper means of recording memory, the story of Amabelle’s (and other survivors’) pain and suffering will disappear, and future generations will not be to remember history accurately or avoid repeating its mistakes.
Themes
The next day, Amabelle and Yves go to visit the justice of the peace. More than a thousand people are waiting outside to see him and as the day goes on, the crowd grows larger. People begin to share their stories with one another, as if practicing for their recitation in front of the authorities; some people recount how they have traveled miles to join the crowd. Amabelle imagines how to tell her story, and wonders if she and Yves should combine their perspectives into one tale.
The crowd’s growth is symbolic of the increasing weight and burden of memory. The crowd’s collective stories, which they share with one another, turn into larger, communal tales of survival and strength. As these tales are shared, the presence of memory expands: the crowd is physically demanding that the justices safeguard their stories, while also relying on each other to accomplish the same goal.
Themes
The justice of the peace comes out of the building to say he is done for the day; the crowd jeers at him. The last woman who spoke to the justice stands before the crowd, and Yves asks what the authorities did for her. She tells him that she did not receive money, but that the justice writes down a person’s name and says he will take their story to the president of Haiti. The justice also lets the speaker cry, and asks if they have papers to prove people have died.
The justice’s acts—writing down a name, offering to share a story, and making space for emotion—are representative of how memory works. Memory saves a person’s legacy, and then shares that legacy with others. The president is symbolic of a nation’s historical record, so it’s as if these memories being inscribed in the country’s history.
Themes
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Amabelle and Yves continue to visit the justice for fifteen days; the crowd of people waiting grows and shrinks. Eventually, Man DeniseSebastien and Mimi’s motherjoins the crowd. At day’s end, the justice does not address the crowd, and it is announced that “no more testimonials” will be taken. The justice had escaped the building “when no one was looking,” as he knew that the crowd would be angry. As the news spreads, the crowd begins to protest.
Once again, the crowd and the justice of the people illustrate lessons about memory. The crowd—symbolic of the Haitian nation—grows and ebbs day by day, illustrating how memory is perpetually changing. On some days, memory is strong and enduring, just like the crowd’s drive to share their stories; on other days, it dwindles. The justice—the physical preserver of memory—disappears one day, however, showing that memory is always somewhat fallible and limited. The justice’s disappearance is a warning about how quickly memory can vanish, if it is not properly recorded and protected.
Themes
The soldiers guarding the building shoot bullets into the air as a warning, but the group stampedes into the station “looking for someone to write their names in a book.” The crowd is searching for someone to confirm that what they “lived through did truly happen.”
This clash between the crowd and the military is symbolic of how memory—represented by the crowd—can overpower oppressive forces that seek to erase the past or suppress the Haitians’ stories. The crowd’s desire for witnesses demonstrates how memory requires an audience in order to persist. The crowd’s stories are being shared, but in order for those stories to truly last, they must be validated by others. The crowd’s fury also suggests that this kind of validation is a basic human need.
Themes
The crowd steals a “giant official photograph” of Haiti’s president out of the building. In the photograph, he is wearing a medal given to him by Trujillo; the medal is a symbol of “friendship” between Haiti and the Dominican Republic. The crowd sets the photograph on fire, and the medal is the first thing in the photograph to be burned up.
The portrait depicts a medal that is symbolic of the superficial cross-cultural ties that link Haiti and the Dominican Republic. In reality, however, the countries are not unified; rather, they are divided by cultural identities and racist social norms. This portrait is destroyed, and the medal—a false image of cultures transcending borders—is the first image to burn. This destruction reveals how the two countries still cling to the strict cultural divisions that lead to tension and violence, even though the results are disastrous.
Themes
Yves and Amabelle leave the crowd of protestors and take Man Denise back to her house. Yves leaves for his mother’s house, but Amabelle stays with Man Denise overnight. When she wakes up the next morning, she sits outside Man Denise’s house with nearby vendors, who speculate whether or not Sebastien and Mimi have “disappeared” in the “country of death.” Amabelle then answers Man Denise’s call for water, and tells her that she knew Man Denise’s children in the Dominican Republic.
Amabelle contributes to preserving the siblings’ memory by connecting with Man Denise. By telling the siblings’ mother that she knew them in the Dominican Republic, she is sharing stories of their lives with someone who will safeguard those memories into the future. It’s also notable, however, that Amabelle doesn’t tell Man Denise this right away; she seems to sense that these memories could bring pain as well as joy.
Themes
Man Denise tells Amabelle the story of their family’s upheaval: Sebastien’s father was killed in a hurricane, and he also lost his cage of pet pigeons. Their house was taken by the Yankis—North Americans—so Sebastien and Mimi left to make money. The house was eventually returned to the family. Man Denise then says that Sebastien’s name comes from Saint Sebastien, who died twice. She named him this because she thinks death comes quickly, and a man should have “two deaths,” just in case.
Man Denise shares the story of her family, thereby passing on their history to a new witness. Sebastien’s name, which comes from a saint who survived death, reveals how deep an impact death has left on his family. To his mother, death is so formidable that even her son’s name (which is a lucky charm to avoid death) is a tribute to its power.
Themes
Man Denise then tells Amabelle that people have informed her of Sebastien and Mimi’s deaths. She tells Amabelle that those who die young are “cheated,” because they die before they are able to come home. She claims that when a person knows that they are going to die, that person knows to move closer to the “bones of [their] own people.” She says her children died too young to know this, and experienced death before they could understand “what it was.” She then tells Amabelle to leave, so she can “dream up” Sebastien and Mimi.
Man Denise believes that her children are dead, and laments how they lacked a sense of belonging before they died. To Man Denise, death is intertwined with the idea of home: she believes that death instills a sense of connectivity, and propels a person towards their homeland. But death took her own children before they could feel this calling; in this way, death is sometimes so powerful a force that it robs someone of their home entirely. Man Denise then acknowledges that she must resort to dreams in order to cope with her reality. Since death has taken away her children, she will conjure them in her fantasies to avoid her grief.
Themes
