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Pictures represent Jacob’s connection (or lack of connection) to the past. Abe initially shows Jacob photos of the kids at Miss Peregrine’s as a way of connecting Jacob with Abe’s own childhood (particularly because Jacob is also peculiar, though he doesn’t know it at the time). Abe uses pictures as a conduit for stories about growing up at the children’s home. But as Jacob grows older and refuses to believe that the photos are real, he also rejects his former sense of connection to his grandfather’s past, believing that his grandfather was largely exaggerating the stories and lying about his upbringing.
Ultimately, Jacob recognizes that the pictures are connected to his grandfather’s past. As he sorts through an old trunk in Miss Peregrine’s home, he discovers similar pictures and then meets some of the children who appear in the photos. In doing so, he not only realizes Abe’s stories were true, but he also renews his personal connection to his grandfather’s past, even entering the world depicted in the photos as he learns more about his own identity as a peculiar.
At the end of the book, the children don’t take any photo albums with them as they set out from the house. Instead, Bronwyn takes Miss Peregrine’s camera and takes new pictures as they set out on three boats from the island. Jacob comments that perhaps he might one day “have [his] own stack of yellowed photos to show skeptical grandchildren,” suggesting that he intends to use future photos as a connection to his own past.
Pictures Quotes in Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children
The Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children quotes below all refer to the symbol of Pictures. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 11
Quotes
In the next boat, I saw Bronwyn wave and raise Miss Peregrine’s camera to her eye. I smiled back. We’d brought none of the old photo albums with us; maybe this would be the first picture in a brand new one. It was strange to think that one day I might have my own stack of yellowed photos to show skeptical grandchildren—and my own fantastic stories to share.
Then Bronwyn lowered the camera and raised her arm, pointing at something beyond us. In the distance, black against the rising sun, a silent procession of battleships punctuated the horizon.
We rowed faster.
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Get the entire Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children LitChart as a printable PDF.
Pictures Symbol Timeline in Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children
The timeline below shows where the symbol Pictures appears in Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Prologue
...two siblings who were very strong. Jacob’s grandfather pulls out an old cigar box with photographs of the kids. One depicts a suit with no person in it, a child named...
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The last photo is the weirdest: it shows the back of someone’s head, which reveals another face. Jacob...
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...fairies. Jacob counters that they are fairy tales for “babies,” and that he knows the photos and stories aren’t real. Jacob’s grandfather lets the matter drop, and Jacob feels like he's...
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Chapter 1
...frequently going on hunting trips. He sometimes even slept with them; Jacob’s dad has a photo of Grandpa Portman sleeping with a pistol in his hand. Jacob’s dad explained that he...
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Chapter 2
Jacob then goes to his grandfather’s bedroom and notices the old cigar box with the photos Jacob knows so well. Beneath the ones he’s seen are more photos that seem obviously...
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...the previous summer. Jacob is amazed, and his dad says that Jacob can take the pictures for a new bird book he’s working on. His mom asks sarcastically what happened to...
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...the island. Little has changed there, but it is calm. She asks for a recent picture if he has one and writes, “E misses you terribly.” The writer also includes an...
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...his grandfather once told him about a “bird who smoked a pipe,” and seeing the picture, he wonders if that means Miss Peregrine—whose name is that of a bird. He wonders...
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Chapter 4
...from 5 p.m. until nightfall, but his grandfather never came home. His grandmother took a picture of this incident, much to his father’s embarrassment.
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...house, a lot of which he didn’t explore. He hopes that he might find a photo album or diary, even though he’s terrified of what else he might find there.
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Chapter 5
...floor to the basement. Jacob can just make out the trunk, which did splinter, sending photographs flying everywhere. But then he realizes he has to go down to the basement to...
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...of place this actually was. Gradually Jacob finds the shattered trunk, and he collects the photos. To him, it looks like an old family album, but the photos have the same...
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...grandfather said about a boy with bees living inside him and concludes that his grandfather’s pictures came from this same trunk. It means that the photos really had come from the...
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...half a dozen kids peering down through the floor: all faces he recognized from the photographs. He looks up at a girl in a white dress who seems to have a...
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...never was a girl, or other children. He imagined them, conjuring them up from the pictures, and then blacked out. Any other explanation is impossible: the kids died many years ago,...
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Chapter 7
...for her to spend one minute on the other side, so he can take a picture—his phone doesn’t work in 1940. She agrees, and he takes her photo with his phone...
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...Before falling asleep, all Jacob can think about is Emma—even looking intently at all the photos he took of her to make sure that she’s real.
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Chapter 8
...Jacob realizes suddenly that Victor is Bronwyn’s brother; he remembers them both from his grandfather’s pictures. Enoch then appears in the doorway, suggesting he wake Victor up. Bronwyn begs him to,...
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...are long and sappy, and over time, they grow less frequent. Soon, they become just pictures rather than letters. In the last envelope his grandfather sent, he is holding a little...
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Chapter 9
...grandfather’s lawn, whom he thought was blind. Miss Peregrine then shows Jacob an album with photos of wights who lived in society—as a mall Santa or an oral surgeon, for example....
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Miss Peregrine is showing Jacob the pictures because she needs his help: he is the only one who can go outside the...
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Chapter 10
...let them out, but they don’t know where the man went. He only left a photo, in which he makes it clear that he’ll kill the women if they come after...
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Chapter 11
...he tells Jacob to be careful. After his dad has left, Emma gives Jacob a picture of her and Abe, hoping that this will provide some proof that she was real....
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...along with Miss Peregrine in bird form, set out in three rowboats, and Bronwyn takes pictures of them on an old camera. They take none of their photo albums—perhaps now they’ll...
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