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Part 3, Chapter 2
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Lieutenant, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Language, Communication, and Friendship
Violence and Rationality
Individuality vs. Communality
Imperialism, Racism, and Morality
Storytelling and Truth
Summary
Analysis
The natives don't return for a week, and Rooke is almost angry, but when the little boy barrels down the path towards Rooke, his anger leaves him. The women leisurely saunter down with their babies and start a fire, and the boy, Tagaran, and the other shy girl from before come into the hut. The boy shouts at Rooke, as though volume is the thing keeping Rooke from understanding. Rooke points to his ear and asks him for his word for it, but the boy just laughs. The girls talk to each other and Tagaran reaches for Rooke's sextant. Rooke stops her from touching it and she draws back. He tries to tell her what it is, and then mimes peering up to the sky.
For the little boy, a friendship of sorts isn't necessarily contingent on sharing language, hard as he tries. This shows again that friendship is built on experiences and openness as much as it's built on shared language. Further, for the boy, the language barrier isn't frustrating, it's hilarious—being in Rooke's company is something exciting and funny, and sharing language or experiences isn't emotionless or purely rational (like Rooke thinks about learning language).
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Rooke points to himself and says his name, and then points to Tagaran and says her name. He gestures to the boy and the other girl. The other girl is very shy, and Rooke wonders if he's frightening to her. Finally, the girl murmurs something, and Tagaran slowly repeats it: the girl's name is Worogan. The boy is fearless and says his name too fast. Rooke finally catches that the boy's name is Boneda. Rooke writes down the names and Tagaran watches closely. Rooke offers her the pen, and she draws several marks on the page.
It's worth noting that when Rooke records the Cadigal language in writing, he's divorcing it from inflection, tone, context, and body language—all things that are essential to understanding what's truly being said. With this in mind, it suggests that Rooke's notebooks won't be an entirely truthful account of the language, as it necessarily leaves out much of what makes language work (and also undercuts Rooke’s previous beliefs that only scientific transcription, rather than storytelling, can convey truth).
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Rooke points to his head and makes a curious face. Tagaran understands immediately, and begins pointing to different parts of her head and face and offering words. Boneda and Worogan soon become bored, so Rooke picks up a piece of bread and mimes eating. Tagaran immediately throws out a word, and when he hands her the bread and motions for her to eat, she offers a different form of the verb. Rooke realizes the language is conjugated (meaning its verbs have different forms depending on who is performing the action and when). He is thrilled at his discovery. He and Tagaran smile at each other.
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Rooke begins acting out other verbs, which sends all of them into fits of laughter. Even shy Worogan laughs, and Boneda can barely catch his breath. Rooke thinks it's strange that as an adult, he's finally learning how to be silly. Rooke takes off his jacket to escape the fleas and the heat of the afternoon. The children grab his jacket and pinch one of the fleas. Rooke mimes a flea jumping, and Tagaran gives the word "burudu." She picks up the jacket and seems to ask what it's called. After Rooke answers, she mimes taking off a jacket and seems to ask why he took it off. He says "burudu," and Tagaran exclaims "burudin." Rooke realizes that she said something to the effect of "because of the fleas," and marks it down in his grammatical forms.
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Rooke takes his jacket back, puts it on, and takes it off again. Tagaran copies the motions of shrugging off a jacket and offers a word. She stops Rooke from writing it down and splits the word into two parts as she mimes: the first part refers to putting the jacket on, while the second refers to taking it off. Rooke is thrilled. Tagaran says something slowly, and Rooke recognizes both the word for "mouth" and one of Silk's words, which means "good," and believes that Tagaran praised him. As the sun begins to set, the women gather the children. Rooke gestures at Tagaran and asks her to come the next day. He can't tell if she understands, but they call "goodbye" to each other as the natives head up the path.
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When Rooke takes his shoes off later, he realizes his feet are extremely dirty. He then realizes his feet are dirty because of the shoes, and that the natives' feet, though barefoot, are always clean. As he heats water to wash his feet, he marvels that having shoes requires one to be able to wash one's feet, while the natives' culture doesn't require such things. He wonders what the word for "foot" is.
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