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Chapter 2
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Tiger Rising, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Freedom and Consequences
Emotion, Repression, and Healing
Friendship and Support
Good, Evil, and Balance
Religion, Beauty, and Wonder
Summary
Analysis
At Rob’s school, nobody wears dresses like this girl is wearing. Norton and Billy tease the girl that “This ain’t a party bus,” and she finally sits down near the middle of the bus. When asked, she says her name is Sistine, “Like the chapel.” As Norton and Billy switch seats to torment Sistine, Rob gets lost in thought about the Sistine Chapel. The librarian has a fancy art book that includes a picture of the Sistine Chapel’s ceiling, which portrays God and Adam touching fingers. Rob thinks it looks like they’re playing tag. As the bus continues to school, Rob thinks about God, Sistine, and the tiger, keeping everything else shut away in his “suitcase.”
Sistine offers Rob an escape in two ways. First, she attracts the bullies’ attention, giving Rob a break. Then, she reminds him of the Sistine Chapel, a Renaissance-era church in Vatican City that’s highly decorated with religious paintings and sculptures. Rob’s thinking on the Sistine Chapel’s artwork indicates his appreciation for Christian teachings. The specific ceiling painting Rob mentions, “The Creation of Adam,” is perhaps the Sistine Chapel’s most famous artwork. Rob perhaps focuses on it so much because the idea that God—a higher power—can create beautiful things on Earth is comforting to him.
Active
Themes
