Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Where the Crawdads Sing, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Survival, Necessity, and Violence
Independence vs. Human Connection
Education, Coming of Age, and Adulthood
Prejudice, Intolerance, and Acceptance
Summary
Analysis
Tate visits his father’s grave in the cemetery. For the past few months, he has been focusing only on Kya, which is why he didn’t notice the decline in Scupper’s health. Instead of recognizing that his father’s heart was getting weaker, he fixated on his own form of heartbreak. Speaking to his father’s grave, he apologizes for not paying more attention to Scupper’s health. As he says this, he understands that his father would forgive him, since Scupper always said that a true man is someone who will “do whatever it takes to defend a woman.” Scupper, Tate thinks, would understand Tate’s devotion to Kya.
As Tate visits Scupper’s grave, it becomes clear that Sheriff Jackson wasn’t arresting him in the marsh—he was informing Tate that his father had died. While grieving, Tate thinks about how thoroughly he has committed himself to Kya, realizing that his fixation on supporting her has blinded him to other important matters. And yet, he knows that Scupper would approve of this, ultimately managing to feel good about his unflinching dedication to the woman he loves.
Themes
Tate walks back to his car and finds a rare feather on the driver’s seat. Immediately, he makes his way to Kya’s shack. When he arrives, he calls her name and she steps outside. After she walks to him, he envelops her in a hug and says that he loves her. She reminds him that he left her like everyone else in her life, but he promises that he’ll never do that again. “I know,” she says, and when he asks if she loves him—pointing out that she has never said these words—she tells him that she has always loved him.
Even when Kya finally decides to let Tate back into her life, she reminds him that he wronged her. And though it’s clear that she’s willing to move on from this, it’s also clear that she will never forget that even the people she trusts the most are capable of hurting her. In this way, she embraces romance and human connection while preserving the sense of cautious independence that she was forced to cultivate as a child and teenager living on her own.
Themes
