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Kipps and Belsey: Chapter 12
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
Summer ends in Wellington, and fall comes abruptly. Zora begins her sophomore year. She wants to be bolder this year, so she changes the style of her clothes, but she still isn’t sure what other students see when they look at her. She also starts swimming regularly for exercise. When she swims, she picks other women to compete with, although they never realize it.
This passage highlights Zora’s insecurities and struggles with identity. She doesn’t know how she is and worries about how others perceive. Not knowing exactly what she believes in, she relies on superficial details like her style of dress to project the “bold” personality she wishes to have.
Themes
One day, a young man accidentally takes Zora’s goggles. He is athletic, Black, and the fastest person in the pool that day. He tries to give her the goggles back but drops them in the pool. Zora tries and fails to get them, so the young man dives down. When he gets up, suddenly he recognizes Zora from a Mozart concert. She realizes he’s Carl.
Continuing the theme of Zora’s focus on superficial details, she dismissed Carl when she just saw him as a random boy in a hoodie listening to hip-hop. But when she sees him in the setting of her college and realizes that he’s athletic and attractive, she begins to form a totally new opinion about him. This shows how a person’s environment shapes their identity—or at least, how other people see them.
Themes
Carl says he never actually saw Levi after the Mozart concert, even though they both planned on it. Zora asks if Carl is on the swim team, but Carl says he isn’t even in college yet, since he’s just 16. He is impressed when he hears Zora is a sophomore at Wellington. He begins telling Zora about how he sampled part of a Mozart requiem on one of his recent songs, but Zora doesn’t recognize it.
Both Zora and Levi see Carl as being authentically streetwise. While there is some truth to this—Carl certainly comes from a less affluent background than the Belseys—it also reduces him to a stereotype. In fact, Carl’s interests are widespread, and his identity is more complex than Zora and Levi are making it out to be.
Themes
Carl says he’s been waiting to tell Zora about his Mozart song for a while. Zora finds this strange, since she barely knows Carl, but Carl says he has a very good memory. Zora suggests that if Carl likes poetry and classical music, he should meet Jerome. Carl mentions how he showed up at the anniversary party but Howard implied that Carl was unwelcome.
Carl’s genuine passion for music and spoken word contrasts with Zora’s more strategic interest in academics and putting together a good résumé. This explains why Zora struggles to understand why Carl is so excited to tell her about his new Mozart song.
Themes
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Carl asks if Howard is really Zora’s dad. She says yes and that she likes her dad most of the time, but things have been difficult since he had the affair. Zora gets distracted as she thinks of an upcoming meeting with Dean French and worries about what will happen if she doesn’t make Claire’s poetry class for a second time. Carl says he has to go, but he lets Zora know the next time he’ll be performing spoken word at the Bus Stop.
Despite Zora’s desire to be like Howard as an academic, she nevertheless still has some reservations about him as a person. Although Zora and Howard have similar ambitions—or perhaps because of it—they often view each other critically, perhaps because when they look at the other person, they see their own faults.
Themes
