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Chapter 4
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Childhood’s End, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Science and Mysticism
Benevolent Dictatorship and Freedom
Utopia and Creative Apathy
Individuality, Globalization, and Progress
The Fate of Humanity
Summary
Analysis
Twenty years later, the day has arrived for the Overlords to emerge from their ships. The whole world waits in anticipation. Humans discovered the day prior that there had only ever been one real ship floating over the Earth: Karellen’s. Though supply ships did actually come and go, all of the ships that had hovered over every major city turned out to be nothing more than an illusion that had lasted an entire generation. They had promptly dissolved into thin air. Karellen had “thrown away his psychological weapons.”
Now that the generation of humanity that was holding on to its memories of freedom has died and been replaced by a generation that has never known life without the Overlords, humanity is ready to accept them as rulers without the looming threat of retribution hanging over every city. The ships, like the viewing screen in the conference room, were simply a ruse, a form of passive power. Now that that power is solidified, they are no longer necessary.
Themes
Karellen’s ship moves westward to an empty plot of land and descends to Earth. Thousands of people and cameras follow him. An opening appears in the ship and a gangway extends down to the ground. Karellen’s voice emanates gently out, requesting that two children come up the gangplank to meet him, and two plucky young ones do, drawn up the gangplank by some type of gravitation well.
Even though the present generation has lived its whole life with the Overlords on Earth, Karellen knows that his appearance will still be a shock. To soften that image, he first gains the trust of two children—who by nature are naturally more trusting in spite of appearances.
Themes
After twenty seconds, Karellen steps out into the sunlight, a child sitting on each arm. The people watching are momentarily terrified, and a few faint, but the terror does not last. Karellen is horned, black-skinned, leather-winged, barb-tailed, and holding children.
The appearance of the Overlords is ironically fitting: the Overlords effectively put an end to religion and humanity’s devotion to God, fulfilling the classic role of the Devil or Anti-Christ, and ultimately shepherd humanity towards its own destruction, fulfilling the mythological Devil’s apocalyptic function as well.
Themes
