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Chapter 4
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in These Violent Delights, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Factions, Feuds, and Forbidden Love
Retaliation and Justice
Imperialism and Greed
Moral Complexity, Betrayal, and Forgiveness
Power, Responsibility, and Monstrosity
Summary
Analysis
That afternoon, Juliette talks in her room with her cousins Rosalind and Kathleen. While talking, Juliette complains about Tyler. She then thinks about the bomb that went off in the Scarlet Gang’s servants’ quarters four years ago. That bomb killed several people. Afterward, Juliette found a white flower on a path. The flower had a note pinned to it in Russian that said, “My son sends his regards,” indicating that Lord Montagov, the head of the White Flower Gang, carried out the attack. Roma is his son. After that attack, members of the White Flower and Scarlet Gangs began to shoot one another on sight.
This passage begins to explore what led to the falling out between Juliette and Roma. Namely, while the note that the White Flower Gang left at the scene of the bombing four years ago suggested that Lord Montagov carried out the attack, that note also implicates Roma in the bombing, suggesting that perhaps Roma was involved in a deadly act of violence that murdered several people Juliette was close to.
Themes
Juliette leaves her room to meet someone who has arrived downstairs. On her way, she sees her parents, Lord Cai and Lady Cai, discussing the sickness that is spreading through the city. Lord Cai is convinced that the Communists are behind it, but Juliette doesn’t think that’s the case. Downstairs, Juliette sees Paul Dexter, who is Walter’s son. Paul renews the attempts to sell the opiate lernicrom to the Scarlet Gang. Juliette says the Gang isn’t interested. Paul then asks Juliette out on a date, and Juliette rejects him.
Lord Cai’s conviction that the Communists are behind the madness-inducing contagion spreading through the city points once more to the political climate of the 1920s in Shanghai. In that historical moment, the Communist Party is beginning to challenge the National Party for power. Juliette’s skepticism regarding her father’s ideas underlines the fact that, at this point, no one knows the truth, and people seem to be basing their opinions concerning the contagion on hearsay and speculation.
Themes
