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
Villon-sur-Sarthe, France. July 29, 1854. The woods of Villon have been cleared to make room for new fields, and there are now more houses and roads. Addie can hardly recognize the place. When she finally finds the old yew tree that marks the path to her house, her heart lurches. A new family lives in her home now. Addie closes her eyes and tries to remember her home as it was, but she can’t. One of the boys who lives there now sees her and asks if she’s lost. Addie tells him she’s a ghost.
It’s important to note that while everything about Addie’s childhood home has changed, the old yew tree has remained the same. Given that trees represent freedom in the novel, one may speculate that the tree’s unchanged state suggests that absolute freedom is unattainable outside of nature. The minute one enters into society (as represented by Villon), one’s obligations to others take over, diminish one’s personal freedom, and take one further away from the ideal, absolute freedom of nature. In a sense, Addie has become the tree she’s always longed to become: she remains free and unchanged as Villon withers and grows old around her. But now, seeing how Villon has moved on without her, she seems to question whether this total freedom is really all it’s cracked up to be.
Themes
Next, Addie visits the cemetery. The tree Addie planted on Estele’s grave years before has grown into an impressively large tree. It’s a concrete measure of growth and time. Addie sits against Estele’s grave and tells Estele about all the changes she has seen. Estele might not be here, but Addie knows what she’d say: “everything changes, foolish girl. It is the nature of the world.” Addie realizes that Estele would believe that even cursed Addie is capable of change. Addie wanders through the woods surrounding Estele’s house. As dusk falls, she hears a branch crack behind her, and when she turns, she sees Luc.
The size and strength of the tree Addie planted on Estele’s grave is a testament to Addie’s newly discovered ability to use ideas to make her mark. Addie can’t document her existence in any conventional ways, but she can plant ideas—in the earth, or in others’ imaginations—and watch them take root and form lives of their own. Also note: this section frames change—including death and decay—as a natural part of life. So far, Addie seems to believe that having power and control over her own life is essential to securing her freedom, but this scene suggests that the opposite is true: that there’s something freeing about accepting one’s inability to control one’s destiny and finding beauty in nature running its course.
Themes
Luc asks Addie why she keeps returning to Villon. Addie thinks it’s “nostalgia,” but Luc thinks it’s “weakness.” Weak people “walk in circles,” Luc says, while strong people find new paths to walk. Then he asks Addie if she’s finally tired and ready to surrender. Luc could bury her next to Estele. It would be quick and easy. But even when Addie is low and dreams of death, she always wakes in the morning, sees the sunrise, and is grateful for what lies ahead. “Tired?” she asks Luc. “I am just waking up.”
Luc is suggesting that it’s a negative thing to be bound to a place and to others—that prioritizing oneself and one’s personal freedom over all else is the only way to maximize power and live well. Addie might have agreed with him before—it was her single-minded desire for personal freedom that cursed her in the first place—but now, her perspective seems to have shifted, and she understands the importance of sharing one’s life with others. Finally, Addie’s retort that she is “just waking up” reaffirms a key aspect of her character: her curiosity about the world around her, and the way this curiosity inspires her to push forward in the face of adversity and uncertainty.
Themes
