Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Notebook, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Love and Destiny
Wealth and Fulfillment
Memory, Pain, and Mortality
Comfort and Logic vs. Passion and Instinct
Summary
Analysis
The next morning, back in Raleigh, Lon, another lawyer, and the judge in the case they are arguing sit together in chambers. Lon makes an unusual request to postpone the trial for a day—he has an urgent matter to attend to. The judge asks the other lawyer how he feels about the move, and the other lawyer says his clients are willing to postpone. The judge says that while he doesn’t like Lon’s request, he knows Lon is a good man—and such a request must mean he has something very important indeed to deal with. The judge agrees to adjourn court until Monday. Lon, relieved, thanks the judge. Lon heads straight to his car and begins driving to New Bern.
Lon instinctively knows that something is wrong—and in this scene, he shows that he, too, is able to put aside logic and protocol in order to chase his passion for Allie. Lon’s impending journey to New Bern represents a threat to Noah and Allie’s blissful happiness—though they have surrendered to their passions, they cannot ignore the real world and its pressures for much longer.
Themes
