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72. Alfred
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Salt to the Sea, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Agency, Willpower, and Fate
Storytelling and Fantasy
Memory and Survival
Family and Community vs. Selfishness
Summary
Analysis
The next morning Joana and her group leave the movie house for the port. Joana feels guilty because she has a letter from the doctor she used to assist, verifying that she is a skilled nurse. Joana feels she will benefit from preferential treatment, and believes it is unfair that her skill will make her a priority passenger. Eva jokes that a letter “saying you’re good at dealing with blood and guts” isn’t something she’d “call an opportunity.”
Joana continues to feel guilty that she sometimes receives preferential treatment. This stems from her guilt at having escaped Lithuania when other people, just as deserving of life and freedom, were left behind. However, Eva rightly points out that she isn’t receiving preferential treatment; instead, she is trading a useful skill for safe passage.
Themes
Eva continues that Joana doesn’t have time to be moral. Personally, Eva was happy to meet Joana and the others, but now “I don’t need a group. I need my belongings and I need a ship.” At this moment Joana looks down and sees Alfred Frick digging through a pile of luggage for valuables.
Eva, unlike Joana, cares primarily about herself and feels no survivor’s guilt. As she says explicitly, she has suffered little emotional fallout from the trauma of her evacuation. She just wants to survive, and to bring her belongings with her.
Themes
