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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
Sephy is sitting on a swing in the backyard when Mother shouts for her. Mother is clearly in a mood as she tells Sephy to go put on her expensive navy dress. Sephy is shocked; she’s only supposed to wear the dress with Mother’s permission, it’s that expensive. It’s the middle of July—there are no birthdays to celebrate. Mother won’t tell Sephy why she has to wear the dress. As Sephy heads upstairs, she sees Mother down two glasses of wine, one after the other.
Sephy is curious as to where Mother is taking her, but her emotional distance from Mother means that Sephy doesn’t feel comfortable asking what’s going on. And at this point, Sephy is so desensitized to Mother’s drinking that it doesn’t necessarily read as a red flag to her that Mother downs two glasses of wine so quickly—but this suggests that something bad is going to happen.
Themes
Minnie doesn’t know what’s happening either. Sephy figures it’s something official, though, when she opens the front door and spots Mr. Hadley’s government Mercedes in the drive. Thrilled to see her dad, Sephy rushes for the car and pulls the door open before Karl can—and Mr. Hadley snaps at her to act like she’s “been brought up, not dragged up.” It would hurt less if he slapped Sephy. She carefully sits as far away from him as possible and doesn’t ask where they’re going.
Sephy doesn’t try to figure out what Mother is so upset about because these days, Sephy doesn’t find her mother interesting. But Sephy adores Mr. Hadley and wants to impress him, so him speaking to her in this cruel way feels like a huge betrayal. And this makes Sephy act more like a child: she pouts and ignores the rest of her family.
Themes
The car pulls up outside the Hewmett Prison at 5:50. Crosses are pulling up in cars, and noughts—all dressed in black—enter through the pedestrian entrance. This is so confusing: why does Sephy have to wear her fancy dress to go to a prison? Sephy follows her family to a courtyard, which is filled with seats. There’s a scaffold on the other side of the courtyard. Sephy notices that all the noughts are either crying or glaring hatefully at the Crosses. She’s surprised to see Callum in the crowd. Suddenly, a voice booms out and announces that this is the execution of Ryan McGregor—his appeal has been denied. Sephy finally understands, and she’s appalled.
Sephy presumably knew that Ryan was found guilty, so the fact that she didn’t seem to realize his execution was coming—even when she’s at the prison—makes her look even younger and more naïve. The noughts’ hateful glares indicate that they blame the Crosses for Ryan’s death; they don’t believe at all that Ryan’s trial was fair or balanced. The fact that Sephy is again in a fancy dress at a somber event (as she was at Lynette’s funeral) also makes her look privileged and out of touch, even if internally she’s upset and thinks this is wrong.
Themes
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Mother and Mr. Hadley are grim and somber as guards lead Ryan out. Nobody is speaking. Sephy looks around and then meets Callum’s eyes. She shakes her head and mouths, “I didn’t know.” She never would’ve come had she known. Furiously, Sephy tells Mother she wants to leave and gets up to go, but Mother slaps Sephy’s face. Sephy sits down and decides she just won’t watch—but she finds that she has to watch. She looks at Callum again, who, like all the other noughts, looks like he wants every Cross to die. Sephy will never forget that look. The clock starts to strike five as guards put a hood on Ryan’s head and the noose around his neck. Ryan shouts, “Long live the Liberation Militia.”
For Sephy, it’s essential that she convey to Callum that she isn’t at all okay with attending his dad’s execution. But Mother’s slap quickly and violently puts Sephy in her place—any rebellion will not be tolerated, at least in public. It’s also a shock for Sephy to see Callum looking just as angry as all the other noughts. Though Sephy sees Callum as her friend and as an individual person, she now has to confront the fact that Callum is a nought—he suffers like all noughts in this society, and he is livid about it.
Themes
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