Previous
Chapter 18
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Burmese Days, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Imperialism and Hypocrisy
Status and Racism
Class, Gender, and Sex
Freedom of Speech, Self-Expression, and Loneliness
Friendship and Loyalty
Summary
Analysis
Toward the end of April, Mr. Lackersteen has gone alone to the jungle (where he is reportedly living in debauchery). Meanwhile, Elizabeth and Verrall have begun to ride together every evening. Elizabeth loves horses, and she loves listening to Verrall talk about horses—much as she loved listening to Flory talk about hunting. Though a terse conversationalist, Verrall seems to her manly, military, and romantic, and because he too loathes anything “highbrow,” he never annoys her as Flory used to. (Whenever she thinks of Flory now, which isn’t often, she remembers his birthmark.) One evening, Verrall lets Elizabeth ride his white Arabian horse, whom no one else has ever ridden; that same evening, he kisses her for the first time.
Elizabeth loves talking to Verrall about riding just as she loved talking to Flory about hunting—a parallel that suggests she is less interested in either man individually than she is in securing a conventional and high-status husband. Her new perception of Flory’s birthmark, which has symbolized his alienation from and disaffection with British imperial society, suggests that she now perceives his difference from the other British people in Kyauktada in a way she didn’t before.
Themes
Flory—lonely and longing for Elizabeth—decides to return to Kyauktada. He plans to bring her the leopard skin he was having a prisoner cure for her and to explain himself at length. Traveling all night, he arrives in Kyauktada around 10 a.m.. He goes to Dr. Veraswami’s and asks about the leopard skin only to learn that the curing process has ruined it: the prisoner who was so good at curing skins is Nga Shwe O, who escaped with U Po Kyin’s assistance, so there was no one at the jail who knew how to do it right.
As the leopard skin previously symbolized Elizabeth’s positive perception of Flory as manly and competent, its ruination symbolizes her new, negative perception of him as low status and socially estranged. Additionally, the fact that U Po Kyin’s machinations indirectly led to the ruination of the leopard skin may foreshadow that U Po Kyin will play some negative role in Flory and Elizabeth’s relationship going forward.
Themes
Regardless, Flory bathes, shaves, and takes the leopard skin to the Lackersteens’ around 4:00 p.m. Mrs. Lackersteen greets Flory. She fetches Elizabeth but whispers to her to get rid of Flory as quickly as possible. When Elizabeth enters the room where Flory is waiting, he’s so overcome by her beauty that he backs into a side table, knocking over and breaking a vase. He apologizes, hugely embarrassed, and shows her the skin—but is even more embarrassed when she recoils from the smell of the bad curing. She thanks him with excessive cheer and makes small talk about the weather. Flory internally urges himself to speak about important things but can’t manage it.
As the leopard skin symbolizes Elizabeth’s perception of Flory, its bad smell emphasizes her new, visceral disdain for him as a lower-status, socially alienated man in contrast with her high-status new beau, Verrall. At the same time, Flory’s inability to speak about serious topics with Elizabeth emphasizes his loneliness and his alienation from her.
Themes
As Elizabeth shows Flory out, he awkwardly invites her hunting again. She tells him she’s very busy in the evenings lately—for example, riding with Verrall. Flory asks whether she rides with Verrall a lot, and she says that she does—he has a lot of polo ponies. When Flory flatly replies, “And of course I have no polo ponies,” Elizabeth is annoyed. She shows Flory out. Afterward, Mrs. Lackersteen enters the room, smells the leopard skin, and orders the servants to burn it.
Flory’s comment about having “no polo ponies” indicates that he thinks Elizabeth prefers Verrall because Verrall is richer. He is, perhaps, coming to see that his “romance” with Elizabeth is as intertwined with economic concerns as his liaison with Ma Hla May was. Elizabeth’s annoyance suggests that, while economic concerns dictate her romantic choices, she doesn’t like having others explicitly acknowledge these concerns. Finally, Mrs. Lackersteen’s burning of the leopard skin, which symbolizes Elizabeth’s perception of Flory, reminds readers of her role in estranging Elizabeth from Flory.
Themes
Get the entire Burmese Days LitChart as a printable PDF.
Afterward, Flory loiters outside in his garden to spy on Elizabeth and Verrall starting their ride. He sees them, very close together, riding into the jungle. About an hour later, an itinerant bookseller approaches Flory. Flory is rifling through the bookseller’s wares for a distracting thriller when he sees Elizabeth and Verrall’s ponies walk riderless out of the jungle. As Verrall is such a good rider, Flory concludes that Verrall and Elizabeth weren’t thrown but rather dismounted together and were distracted enough to let the ponies escape. Flory vividly pictures what he believes occurred between them, storms inside, and gets very drunk. Ko S’la, trying to be helpful, procures Flory a sex worker, but Flory just ends up crying on her shoulder.
Flory is assuming that Elizabeth and Verrall dismounted their ponies to have sex in the jungle and that they were so distracted during sex that their ponies were able to escape. Flory’s decision to get very drunk—something he \ tried to stop doing when he first met Elizabeth—shows his regression into extreme loneliness and alienation, as does his crying on the shoulder of the sex worker Ko S’la procures for him.
Themes
