Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Time Traveler’s Wife, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
The Here and Now
Love and Absence
Free Will vs. Determinism
Language and Art
Self-Love
Summary
Analysis
Wednesday, August 12, 1998 (Clare is 27). Clare has gone home to be with Lucille during her last hours. For days, Lucille has become untethered from reality, talking to herself and her deceased parents. Clare sits in the room as her mother sleeps, choosing to watch the sunrise instead of looking at all the medical equipment scattered around her mother’s room. When Clare gets up to turn off the air conditioning, she finds that Lucille has died. She holds her mother’s body and feels a sense of calm knowing her mother is no longer suffering from the cancer. Etta comes in the room, and Clare tells her Lucille has passed.
Lucille, as Henry foretold, does not die by suicide but of cancer. Though Clare has the opportunity to be at her mother’s deathbed, her grief at the anticipation of Lucille’s impending death makes it difficult for her to be in the here and now, as her impulse to watch the sunrise to distract herself from all the medical equipment illustrates. She knows how much pain she will feel once her mother is gone, acutely feeling her love for someone who is no longer with her.
Themes
Saturday, September 12, 1998 (Henry is 35, Clare is 27). Henry remembers how deeply Lucille loved her garden. He and Clare would always find her out back, even when she was ill, whenever they came to visit. Henry knows that Clare’s relationship with her mother had been fraught, but he remained very fond of his mother-in-law until her passing. Henry reflects on how much he misses Lucille, though he notes his sadness is nothing compared to his wife’s. Clare is so stricken with grief that she is lost in her own mind. She eats and responds when people address her, but she does so without emotion. Henry does miss Lucille, but he realizes he misses Clare—as she was—far more.
Knowing in advance how Lucille would die, thanks to Henry’s foreknowledge, doesn’t seem to have lessened the pain of Clare’s grief. This calls into question the ethics of Henry’s choice to reveal details about the death to Clare. Meanwhile, Clare’s grief, which has transformed her into practically a different person, gives Henry some perspective on how Clare herself feels every time Henry is away on his time travels.
Themes
Wednesday, November 26, 1998 (Clare is 27, Henry is 35). Clare returns to Lucille’s room and is relieved that the hospital bed and medical supplies have been removed. She tries to get into her mother’s desk, but it’s locked, and she can’t find a key. Clare goes downstairs to get Henry’s help. Once he manages to pry open the desk drawers, he gives Clare privacy to sort through her mother’s papers. Clare reads through pages of notes, lists, doodles, and drafts of Lucille’s poetry. Clare finds one poem from the year Lucille lost a baby and attempted suicide. Another poem, addressed to Clare, is filled with Lucille’s moving observations of her daughter.
Clare, in reading her mother’s poetry, gains insight into Lucille’s inner life, learning about all the emotion Lucille wasn’t able to express aloud. Learning that Lucille, too, lost a baby perhaps helps Clare to feel closer to her mother, showing her that they had more in common than their strained relationship while Lucille was still alive would suggest. This passage adds to the novel’s focus on the transcendent nature of art and words.
Themes
Henry comes back upstairs to find Clare surrounded by a spread of white papers of Lucille’s desk. Clare shows Henry the poem she found. Henry finds it so beautiful that it eases some of his remaining anger at Lucille’s sometimes cruel treatment of Clare. Henry can see in Clare’s face that she now knows for certain that her mother loved her. The poem is the first concrete proof Clare has of her mother’s love. Clare, who hasn’t cried since Lucille died, begins to weep freely. Henry holds her and feels like Clare has returned to him.
Though Lucille is dead, she lives on in her poetry, underscoring the transformative power of art. Reading Lucille’s poems brings Clare the closure and comfort she couldn’t get while Lucille was alive. It allows Clare to take comfort in knowing, without a shadow of a doubt, that her mother did love her despite sometimes treating her cruelly.
Themes
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