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Chapter 16
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Noughts and Crosses, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Racism, Division, and Tragedy
Awareness and Privilege
Love, Lust, Power, and Violence
Friendship
Youth, Innocence, and Growing Up
Family
Summary
Analysis
There’s nothing on TV, so Sephy settles for the news. A banker has been imprisoned for fraud, and three nought robbers stole millions’ worth of jewelry. Why did the newscaster only call out the noughts for their race? The banker was a Cross, and that wasn’t mentioned.
Sephy is becoming more aware of all the little ways in which her world is racist. Not calling out the Cross’s skin color suggests that being a Cross is, in this society, normal—and only deviations from normal, like noughts, need to be called out.
Themes
Minnie suddenly appears in Sephy’s doorway, asking who beat her up—she wants to kill whoever did it. This is somewhat comforting, but Sephy is in so much pain that she just wants to be alone. Sephy shrugs as Minnie asks questions about the incident. Then, Minnie says that nobody can get away with this—soon, someone will try to beat her up. Sephy shouts for Minnie to go away. Once Minnie is gone, Sephy thinks of Callum. This isn’t comforting. Everyone has turned their backs on Sephy. This is all the noughts’ fault. Maybe Sephy and Minnie have more in common than Sephy thought.
At first, Sephy thinks that Minnie is trying to be supportive and make her feel better. But Sephy quickly discovers that Minnie is being selfish: she doesn’t want to suffer for being Sephy’s sister. This makes Sephy feel increasingly alone, especially since the last time she saw Callum was during their fight on the beach. Sephy’s loneliness (and her privilege) makes her feel like this is the noughts’ fault—a sign that despite Sephy’s good intentions, her beliefs are still basically racist.
Themes
