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Part 2, Chapter 19
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Silent Patient, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Empathy, Identification, and Boundaries
Tragedy and Destiny
Honesty vs. Deception
Childhood Trauma
Silence vs. “The Talking Cure”
Summary
Analysis
Jean-Felix takes Theo to a storage room and unwraps several of Alicia’s paintings. The first depicts the car crash that killed Eva Rose: her mother’s spirit, shown in yellow and red, rises from the debris. Jean-Felix thinks the picture is “joyous,” whereas Theo sees it as unsettling.
In addition to reaffirming the profound impact Eva’s suicide had on her daughter, Jean-Felix’s debate with Theo hints at the difficulty of communicating via art. Though Alicia sends messages through her paintings, those messages are inherently open to interpretation—and sometimes, interpretations conflict.
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The next painting is of Gabriel as Jesus—with a rifle strapped across his midsection. And the third painting is of Lydia Rose. Theo notes that this picture is “cruel”: it shows Lydia as a giant woman on a tiny bed, her fat spilling everywhere. But Jean-Felix finds it “lovely.”
These two paintings reveal that Alicia often uses her artwork as a method of critique. The painting of Lydia mocks and demonizes the older woman, Alicia’s way of getting revenge at last. And the picture of Gabriel as Jesus, holding the gun Alicia hated, suggests that a measure of resentment is embedded in her worship of him.
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At last, Jean-Felix shows Theo the Alcestis. Theo feels that the painting is impossible to interpret, and Jean-Felix argues that that is the point: Alicia’s entire message is her silence. To better understand, Jean-Felix encourages Theo to read the play Alcestis by Euripides. Looking closer, Theo notices that the bowl of apples in the background is covered with maggots. Jean-Felix sighs that the painting is beautiful, while Theo thinks that it only shows Alicia’s pain.
Theo asks about Alicia’s suicide attempt, and Jean-Felix explains that she had always hated her father; when he killed himself, it set her completely off. Theo wants to know more, but Jean-Felix accepts a call from someone he refers to as “baby.” Theo begins to dislike Jean-Felix, but he cannot pin his finger on why.
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Before he leaves, Theo asks Jean-Felix if he has ever heard about the doctor Alicia saw after her suicide attempt; Jean-Felix says he has not. As a parting gift of sorts, he encourages Theo to give Alicia paints and paintbrushes: “that’s the only way she’ll talk to you. Through her art.” Theo wonders if Jean-Felix is in love with Alicia, but then quickly comes to understand that what Jean-Felix wants is the art, not the woman behind it.
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