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Chapter 33
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Babel, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Colonization and Racism
Language, Translation, and Power
Race, Gender, and Intersectionality
Violence and Nonviolence
Complicity
Summary
Analysis
Victoire was born in Haiti in 1820. That year, King Henry Christophe feared a coup and died by suicide. Victoire’s mother was the queen’s maid and went with the exiled queen to Paris. Victoire doesn’t know how, but eventually she and her mother went to work for an academic named Professor Emile Desjardins. An illness took the lives of Victoire’s mother and Emile. Afterward, Victoire went through Emile’s papers and found information about the Royal Institute of Translation. She wrote to one of Emile’s friends at Oxford, who eventually said that they would like Victoire to attend Babel.
King Henry Christophe is a historical figure who was born in the British Caribbean and came to power in Haiti during the Haitian Revolution, which was a successful uprising by formerly enslaved people against French colonial rule in Haiti. After that revolution, Christophe became a self-appointed monarch in Haiti. He was an unpopular, autocratic ruler who utilized systems of forced, unpaid labor. Fearing a coup, he shot himself. The novel includes a mention of Henry Christophe to underline the extent of European colonization throughout the world, to show that colonial forces can be defeated, and also to show how the impacts of colonization continue even after countries have liberated themselves from colonial rule.
Themes
Now, after leaving Babel, Victoire is on the run. She doesn’t know where she’s going, but she knows that there is a base for the Hermes Society in Ireland. She thinks that revolution, by definition, must always be unimaginable because it “shatters the world you know.” She’s weighed down by silver bars in her pockets and silver knit into her dress. It feels too heavy to move. She tries not to think about Ramy, Robin, or Anthony. She cannot cry right now. She needs to keep moving. She has to find allies.
Victoire’s decision to go to a Hermes Society base in Ireland points to Ireland’s long history of conflict with and resistance to British rule. The ending of the novel also suggests that while Robin and the others have sacrificed themselves to bring down the British Empire, Victoire plans to continue to fight for greater justice and equity in the world.
Themes
