Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Memory and Meaning
Love and Vulnerability
Freedom
Art, Creativity, and Expression
Wonder and Knowledge
Summary
Analysis
Paris, France. July 29, 1724. It’s nearly nighttime. Addie walks through the streets holding a stolen basket. She’s wearing men’s clothing, so nobody bothers her. Luc claimed he’d given her freedom, but in this world, only men have true freedom. It’s now been four years since Luc has visited her, and tonight, Addie wants to celebrate her freedom. She has decided to climb to the top of Notre Dame to have a picnic. She’s assembled a basket of luxuries for the occasion, including a jar of honey.
Four years have passed since Luc stood up Addie. Given the date—July 29, their anniversary—it’s reasonable to guess that Luc may now appear to explain—or gloat—about letting Addie down before; after all, it’s his style to disrupt Addie’s plans the minute she thinks she has everything under control, and her plans to have an elaborate picnic certainly exude a belief that she has control over her life, if only for this night.
Themes
Just then, a young man walking with his friends runs into Addie. The collision sends Addie’s precious jar of honey flying, and it shatters when it lands. “You fool,” she snaps at the apologetic man—then she realizes that her high voice has blown her cover. The man isn’t mad at being fooled, though, and he motions for his friends to continue without him as he stays behind with Addie. He leads Addie to a café.
Thus far, the novel has gone back and forth between Addie’s past and present, implicitly drawing parallels between significant events that have occurred through Addie’s life. Given that the previous chapter was about Addie’s hopefulness that she may have a connection with Henry, it’s reasonable to predict that this chapter will be about another time she dared to be so hopeful with another kind and interested soul—and when perhaps things didn’t pan out as she wanted them to.
Themes
In the café, the man orders coffees, and then he and Addie sit down at a corner seat. The man introduces himself as Remy Laurent. Addie decides to call herself Thomas. Then, Remy becomes distracted by a man seated across the room, Monsieur Voltaire, who is very well-known. Addie hasn’t heard of Voltaire, so Remy produces a booklet from his coat. Addie admits she can’t read well. Remy calls it “a crime” that society doesn’t teach women as it teaches men. How can a person go through life without poetry, novels, or philosophy? Addie hasn’t heard of novels before; Remy explains that a novel is a long fictional story about love or adventure.
Voltaire was a real-life key figure of French Enlightenment culture. That Addie should learn about him now develops one of the novel’s main themes: the importance of wonder and the pursuit of knowledge, and the way these things motivate Addie to continue living out her curse, even in moments of overwhelming sadness and suffering. Without realizing it, Remy is opening up a whole new way for Addie to quench her thirst for knowledge: the world of books.
Themes
Remy tells Addie that he comes from a family of printmakers. His father sent him to school, though, and now all Remy wants to do is live in Paris among the thinkers and dreamers. Addie observes aloud how ideal and easy life seems to be for men. Remy admits that this is true. Addie’s stomach grumbles just then. She remembers her picnic and asks Remy to join her.
In the present, Addie is overly cautious about letting herself grow attached to anyone, knowing all too well that doing so is only postponing the inevitable heartbreak she will feel once they forget her. Now, though, in 1724, she is not so jaded, and so she lets herself prolong her night with Remy.
Themes
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