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Chapter 1
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Stardust, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Youth, Aging, and Maturity
Love and Ownership
Home and Belonging
Rules
The Value of Literature
Summary
Analysis
When Tristran Thorn is eight years old, the Faerie market comes again to the meadow near Wall. Tristran is sent to stay with relatives, while his little sister, Louisa—who’s six months younger—gets to go. This bothers Tristran immensely. Not long after, a farm cat gives birth to three kittens. One is blue, with color-changing eyes. Tristran loves the cat, but one night, she escapes and bolts through the gap in the wall (the rules say nothing about keeping cats out). Tristran’s father, Dunstan, tries to tell Tristran that the cat will be happier “[w]ith her own kind.” His mother Daisy, as usual, says nothing. Louisa teases him mercilessly about this, his ears’ odd shape, and the strange things he sometimes says, such as that the clouds are sheep.
Readers may immediately pick up on the fact that Tristran and Louisa are only half-siblings, given that they’re only six months apart in age. Clearly, Dunstan and Daisy don’t worry about their fully mortal daughter in the way they worry about Tristran, suggesting that he represents the unknown to them and that, if possible, they’d like to keep him tethered to the mortal world. The cat’s escape to Faerie, where Dunstan suggests she belongs, is an early indicator that within the world of the novel, there’s a set place where each person or animal belongs, and that they’ll inevitably wind up there in the end.
Themes
Tristran receives his education from Mrs. Cherry at the village school. He loves when the peddlers come to the village selling “penny dreadful” stories or song sheets. At 14, Tristran learns about sex, and the following year, he breaks his arm falling out of a tree when he tries to spy on Victoria Forester. By the time Tristran and Victoria are 17, she’s considered the most beautiful girl in Wall. Though Victoria insists on working as a pot-girl for Mr. Bromios, her mother, Bridget, forbids it, and her father, Thomas, backs Bridget up.
From a young age, Tristran is steeped in both classic literature (which Mrs. Cherry introduces him to) and popular literature, which is what the “penny dreadfuls” were. This grounding in stories and fantastical happenings seems to only increase Tristran’s youthful optimism and naivety. And, like his father did years ago, Tristran falls madly in love as a teenager, suggesting that Tristran, like Dunstan, might experience some problems with love.
Themes
Every boy—and many older, married men—in Wall are in love with Victoria. One day, Victoria is sitting with Louisa and three other girls in the apple orchard. Louisa notes that even the old shop-owner Mr. Monday admires Victoria. Victoria notes that he’s ancient, at age 45, and another girl adds that he’s already been married. But another girl suggests that marrying a man who’s already been married might be nice: “someone else would have removed the rough edges,” and maybe he wouldn’t be so lusty. And further, the last girl notes, marrying Mr. Monday would mean getting to live in a big house and travel. The girls giggle.
To teenagers, Mr. Monday seems impossibly old and, by implication, unattractive and unsuitable as a potential husband. But as the conversation progresses, the girls come up with several positive qualities that might come with age—Mr. Monday’s supposed lack of lustfulness, for instance, contrasts immensely with Tristran trying to spy on Victoria in her bedroom. And, of course, an established businessman like Mr. Monday can offer any spouse luxuries that a younger man just beginning his adult career cannot. Youth, in this sense, has its drawbacks.
Themes
Seventeen-year-old Tristran is neither a boy nor a man. He spends his time daydreaming, usually about leaving for America. On days when the wind blows from beyond the wall, though, Tristran daydreams of fantastical things like mermaids. Staring at the stars is the only thing that calms his mind. He helps Dunstan on the farm on the weekends and spends his days working at Monday and Brown’s, the village shop. Late in October, Victoria enters the shop with a list of supplies Bridget would like Mr. Monday to purchase on his next run to the city. He scans the list and tries to make conversation. Just then, a wind blows in from Faerie, and suddenly courageous, Tristran asks to walk Victoria home. She agrees.
The novel’s occasional references to mermaids are nods to Stardust’s epigraph, John Donne’s poem “Song: Go and catch a falling star.” Stardust has, thus far, made it very clear that in its world, mythical and magical things are real—contrary to what the speaker of the poem might suggest. Tristran’s sudden bravery when wind from Faerie reaches him is an early indicator that he’s perhaps better suited to living there than in Wall—even if his current crush resides firmly in the mortal world.
Themes
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Tristran walks with Victoria to her family’s farm. He asks to kiss her, and she refuses. At the top of a hill, they stop to look at Wall. Tristran takes her hand, and Victoria asks if Tristran saw the falling star. Tristran didn’t, and he continues to ask if Victoria will kiss him like she did when she was 15—or if she’ll marry him. Victoria is incredulous, but Tristran says she should marry him because he’ll travel the world and bring her back all manner of riches. He says he’ll bring her the fallen star if she’ll kiss and marry him. Victoria agrees: if Tristran brings her the star, she’ll kiss him and give him “[a]nything [he] desire[s].” She laughs as Tristran heads back down the hill.
Tristran’s overwhelming love for Victoria comes off as somewhat naive, in addition to making him less observant of the world around him. He doesn’t see the star fall, and yet he promises her what seems like the impossible: he’s going to go catch it. This, again, is another nod to John Donne’s “Song,” the first line of which asks the reader to go and catch a falling star. Victoria, for her part, seems unconvinced that Tristran will accomplish this task—and readers should consider what her reasons are for sending Tristran on a wild goose chase.
Themes
Tristran runs home and ignores Daisy when she asks how he got so dirty and bedraggled. He announces to her and Dunstan that he’s leaving Wall and will be gone a long time. Seeing the look in Tristran’s eye, Dunstan sends Daisy to the other room and asks where Tristran is going. He knows, when Tristran says “East,” that he means through the wall. When Tristran assures his father he’s coming back, Dunstan tells Tristran to pack. He’ll walk him to the gap.
Dunstan seems totally unsurprised by Tristran’s insistence on going to Faerie. He—unlike Tristran—knows that Tristran is part faerie and was born beyond the wall, so he seems to believe that like the cat with color-changing eyes, it’s necessary for Tristran to explore the place where, perhaps, he belongs more than he belongs in Wall.
Themes
Tristran has no idea how Dunstan is going to get him past the guards. When they arrive at the gap, Harold Crutchbeck and Mr. Bromios are on duty. Dunstan chats with them for a bit, and then he asks the men if they know where Tristran came from. Mr. Bromios nods and Harold suggests it’s all rumor, but Dunstan says it’s true—and it’s time for Tristan to return. Tristran doesn’t understand any of this, but Dunstan slips something into his hand and tells him to go.
Tristran has been raised to believe that the rules guiding the gap in the wall contain no nuance or room for interpretation. It is worth noting, though, that Tristran is only allowed through because he was born beyond the wall—he's allowed through for a very specific reason. Tristran, however, doesn’t know the truth about his birth, so the reasoning here remains mysterious to him.
Themes
The night grows warmer as Tristran walks, and soon he notices the moon. It’s now full, where it was a crescent in Wall. Tristran stops to inspect the glass snowdrop that Dunstan gave him. Suddenly, Tristran realizes how silly this all is: he’s traveling in Faerie in search of a fallen star. He can still see Wall, and he knows that nobody will fault him for turning back. But he thinks of Victoria’s eyes and laughter. Putting the snowdrop in his buttonhole, Tristran enters Faerie, “too ignorant to be scared, too young to be awed.”
Even though Tristran has his doubts about his journey, he is, at heart, youthful and naive. He wants to impress Victoria—and that’s the end of his thought process. The description of him entering suggests that Tristran should indeed be scared and awed, but because of his youth, he’s blinded to the reality of what he’s walking into.
Themes
