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Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in On Beauty, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
The Nature of Beauty
Politics in Academia
Race and Identity
The Value of Family
Summary
Analysis
On the first day of spring, Kiki wakes Zora up and tells her that Dean French wants to speak with her right away, even though it’s Saturday. Howard offers to come with Zora, but she turns him down. Zora gets ready and goes to the university, where Lydia tells her she can go meet everyone who’s gathered in the dean’s office.
The fact that the dean wants to meet on a Saturday suggests that something important is going on. This opening passage seems to foreshadow that Howard and perhaps also Monty may finally face consequences for their misconduct.
Themes
Zora enters the dean’s office and finds Dean French, Monty, Claire, and Erskine, all standing up. Dean French starts a long speech, but Claire interrupts him to say they believe Carl may have stolen a valuable painting from Monty’s office. They ask Zora questions about when she saw Carl the previous night, and she tells them he left the party around 9:30, which fits with their timeline.
In an unexpected twist, meeting is really about a stolen painting. The fact that everyone blames Carl, with even his former supporters like Claire and Erskine sitting in, suggests how quickly academic opinions can change, while perhaps also hinting that Carl is suffering discrimination due to his lower social status.
Themes
Monty’s ideas about meritocracy cause him to have a particular prejudice against Carl, who, as someone who doesn’t come from a privileged background, must somehow deserve it in Monty’s philosophy.
Themes
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Kiki’s spring cleaning is further evidence that she is starting a new phase of her life. Nevertheless, she still shows deference to her family, getting Jerome involved before throwing out any of his old things.
Themes
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Jerome and Kiki go to clean Levi’s room, which is full of posters, mostly of Black women in bikinis and rappers who have died. All of a sudden, Kiki sees something that causes her to hyperventilate: the Hyppolite painting of the naked woman. Kiki gets furious and goes to Levi, demanding that he explain where he got the poster.
The posters in Levi’s room provide an interesting counterpoint both to the Rembrandt paintings Howard studies and to the Hyppolite painting that united Carlene and Kiki. The diversity of these different types of media show that it is possible to capture beauty in a variety of different forms.
Themes
Levi tries to explain that he and a friend (Chouchou) took the painting, but they don’t consider it stealing since the painting never really belonged to Monty. Kiki is still angry, saying she knows for a fact that the painting really did belong to Carlene and that she had it even before she got married.
Levi’s argument, while delivered clumsily, is essentially an argument in favor of reparations. While there is perhaps a moral argument for what he and Chouchou did, Kiki doesn’t want to even consider this possibility because it would reflect badly on Carlene.
Themes
Kiki accuses Levi’s new Haitian friends of being a bad influence on him. Levi continues to tell her that she doesn’t understand what things are like in Haiti. He thinks the painting should be sold and sent back to Haiti with the money. Jerome interrupts to say that he knows economics and that’s not how the world works. Levi dismisses this and says Chouchou had a plan about how to sell the painting and redistribute the money.
This passage is ultimately a conversation about who beauty really belongs to. Levi has radical ideas, inspired by his activist friends. Jerome’s comments about how it doesn’t make economic sense to take the painting recalls Levi’s response earlier when Howard suggested Levi try direct action in his workplace. In a way, Levi’s theft of the painting is just a continuation of Howard’s advice to try direct action, even if stealing the painting probably isn’t what Howard had in mind.
Themes
Kiki says Levi is going about solving problems the wrong way. Levi accuses Kiki herself of underpaying their cleaner Monique because she’s a Haitian immigrant. All of a sudden, Jerome begins to pull on part of the painting. Kiki tells him not to tear it, but it turns out he’s just removing a note that Carlene left, where she tells Kiki that she hopes she enjoys the painting and that it deserves to be loved by someone like her.
Although Kiki is generally more honest than Howard, Levi correctly points out one of the ways that Kiki’s own behavior has been hypocritical (which also helps explain why Kiki has never been comfortable around Monique since the very beginning of the novel).
Themes
Zora and Howard make it back from Wellington. Howard comments to Zora that it seems like her mind has been elsewhere recently. Zora says she has a bombshell to drop at the next faculty meeting: Monty has been having sex with Chantelle, one of the discretionary students that he’s been trying to get rid of. Howard is excited to use this information against Monty, but then Zora asks him if there’s any truth to the rumors about him and Victoria.
This passage shows Howard at the height of his hypocrisy—ready to pounce on Monty for a crime that Howard himself has committed. Zora herself already knows about Howard’s affair with Victoria and seems to mention Chantelle specifically as a test to see if Howard will be inspired to bring up his own affair.
Themes
Just moments after Howard thought he had finally defeated Monty, Howard sees his own family life about to blow up after news gets out about his affair with Victoria. This passage hints at the cost Howard has paid for his yearslong grudge and questions whether any of it was actually worth it.
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