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Boxing for Sovereignty
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Night Watchman, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Power, Solidarity, and Community Action
Oppression and Supposed Good Intentions
Humor and Pain
Sex, Violence, and Gender
Agency and Exploitation
Summary
Analysis
It was so unfair, Patrice thinks. Even though Patrice is the best worker, Valentine had been given the promotion. And she won’t stop talking about it. On top of that, Mr. Vold took away the coffee breaks and never reinstated them. The next day, Mr. Vold puts Betty Pye at the workstation next to Patrice. They start talking, and after Betty Pye talks about her plans to meet up with her boyfriend, Patrice says she’s never had anyone explain to her the details of “what happens.” Betty tells her she’ll explain everything, and the two plan to meet for coffee.
The tension between Patrice and her supposed best friend, Valentine, continues, as does the abuse of authority carried out by Mr. Vold. Since he has been designated as the one with power, he is able, and willing, to make decisions that impact hundreds of people without any sense of how those effects will be felt within those individuals’ lives.
Active
Themes
At coffee, Betty Pye tells Patrice how to get away from men she doesn’t like and how to find out if a man likes her. She talks with detached practicality while describing positions that make Patrice put her head in her hands, laughing. She also tells Patrice how to have sex and not get pregnant. Betty asks Patrice who she’s going to have sex with, and Patrice says she wants the information just in case, that she doesn’t have a specific plan. Betty also explains prostitution to Patrice, saying there are men who come to the reservation, tell women they’ll get married, then they abandon the woman and “sell her to someone who puts them out for sex.”
