Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Loneliness and Isolation
Communication and Self-Expression
Racism, Inequality, and Injustice
The Individual vs. Society
The American South
Summary
Analysis
Jake runs through town, attempting to ignore the nausea rising in his throat. A riot has broken out at Sunny Dixie, and he is fleeing the violence unfolding there. After stopping to vomit in an empty alley, he continues running. Nobody could have stopped the fight that broke out today between two young men—one white and one black. Jake blames alcohol, the heat, and the tensions that have been simmering beneath the surface of Sunny Dixie all summer.
As a race riot breaks out, Blount flees rather than helps. This is the ultimate physical illustration of his ideology—he wants change and revolution in the abstract, but doesn’t support the cause or show up as an ally when he’s needed most.
Themes
Though Jake tried to stop the fight, even throwing himself into the fray at one point, he himself got hit hard in the head and retaliated, lashing out with his fists even as he kept his eyes closed tight. At least one young black man died in the fray while Jake was momentarily unconscious, knocked to the ground by a strong blow—and upon seeing the dead body, Jake fled.
Jake was willing to participate in the fight up to a point—but became too frightened for his own life to stay and fight or support the people he claims to be behind.
Themes
As Jake continues jogging through the streets away from Sunny Dixie, he runs into Simms preaching on a street corner. Simms spots Jake and shouts at him, warning him that God can see all of his transgressions—and will remember them when judgement comes. Jake taunts Simms and moves along, ignoring Simms’s entreaties for him to return for a sermon that evening and get “saved.”
Simms continues preaching, unaware of the violence unfolding just a few minutes away. His ignorance—accidental or willful—reflects Jake’s own failures to listen or act, as well as the novel’s broader theme of the wide chasm that often stretches between ideology and action.
Themes
As Jake wanders onward, he thinks of Singer’s death, and of how sad and angry it has made him. He feels, in the wake of Singer’s death, that all the private thoughts and feelings he shared with the man have evaporated. Now that Singer is dead, Jake is alone in the world.
Again, McCullers shows how Singer’s death has left his visitors and friends feeling hopeless, alone, and defeated.
Themes
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Jake runs back to the room where he’s been staying and gathers up his things, packing his clothes and socialist pamphlets into his bag. He wonders where he will go next—he knows he won’t leave the South, but admits that he is going to defy Copeland’s advice to never attempt to stand alone. Jake has come to believe that he is better off alone. Jake laments that he quarreled with Copeland—the two of them, he believes, are two of the few men in the world who know the truth, and he is sad that they could not find a way to work together. Jake decides to go to Copeland’s house to make amends before skipping town, and after packing his bags, he walks there—but finds the shutters drawn and the house abandoned.
Jake refused to listen to Copeland when it mattered, and nowhe has lost his chance to connect and organize with the man forever. Jake seems determined to continue on his path and try to keep sharing the truth throughout the South—but he hasn’t learned anything about community or togetherness and remains intent on standing alone in spite of Copeland’s warnings. Even in this situation where Jake explicitly realizes that he and Copeland should have been able to work together, isolation still persists as the defining force in these characters’ lives.
Themes
Though going by the Kelly house—the place where Singer killed himself—gives Jake a bad feeling, he heads there next to ask Portia where her father is. Portia tells him that her brothers and grandfather took Copeland out to the country earlier in the morning, but refuses to give Jake the address. Copeland was so sick after their last fight, Portia says, that he nearly died. She begs Jake to leave her father alone and let him live in peace. Jake dejectedly leaves.
This passage confirms that Jake has shattered his black comrades’ faith in him by failing to listen to them or act on their behalf when they most needed him.
Themes
A heavy rain begins to fall as Jake makes his way to the New York Café. Biff Brannon greets him happily, stating that he had a premonition Jake would arrive with the rain. Brannon offers to clean and press Jake’s wet clothes for him, but Jake says all he wants is some food. Brannon gets Jake some meat and a drink. As Jake begins eating, he tells Brannon that he’s never going to be able to pay him back all he owes him. Brannon says he doesn’t care. He tells Jake he’s read about the riot at Sunny Dixie in the paper, and reveals that Lancy Davis was one of the two young men killed. He also says that the paper cited “labor agitation” as the reason for the outbreak of violence.
Brannon’s somewhat coy communication of the newspaper’s headlines to Jake shows that Brannon wants Jake to admit to his involvement in the riot—but Jake, of course, is unable to do so even though he is, as the headlines suggest, the cause of the riot.
Themes
Jake tells Brannon he’s skipping town, and Brannon says doing so is probably a good idea. He offers to shelter Jake for the night, but Jake insists on setting out right away. Even as he says he wants to leave, however, he wishes deep down that he could stay in the safe warmth of his favorite booth at Brannon’s café. Jake rests his head on his arms and, without realizing it, falls asleep. He wakes up some time later and realizes Brannon is shaking him out of a nightmare in which he was wandering through a sweating crowd of people, searching for a place to put down a heavy basket.
Jake’s dream reflects his fear and sense of exhaustion at the prospect of moving on to a new town full of new people and new challenges. Jake is weary of traveling alone—but he can’t seem to get his act together to ever stay in one place.
Themes
Jake combs his hair and bids Brannon goodbye. Brannon once again tries to get Jake to stay a little while longer, but when he can’t get Jake to budge, he simply offers him some money. Jake thanks Brannon for his generosity and walks out of the café. He walks through town, hating everything he sees, feeling glad to be leaving the dilapidated, poor little city. As he wanders down the highway, he is uncertain of where he'll end up—but again thinks to himself that he is determined to remain in the South.
Even though Jake has a palpable hatred for the South and what it stands for, he’s determined to stay within its bounds. A part of him, perhaps, still believes he can affect change in the community—even as he ignores the ways in which he’s failed to implement change and growth within himself, and even though he’s seen first-hand how that failure has kept his attempts at reform from taking root.
Themes
