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Chapter 18
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Body, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Loss of Innocence
Fate, Luck, and Chance
Confronting Mortality
The Power and Limitation of Friendship
Making Meaning through Stories
Summary
Analysis
Gordie wakes up in the middle of the night to Vern squeezing him tightly and pleading with God. Chris crouches in a wary, listening stance staring into the dark woods. Then, Gordie hears the sound that woke the others, an otherworldly scream. Teddy thinks it’s Ray Brower’s ghost, but he still offers to investigate. Gordie and Chris stop him. The boys hear another scream, maniacal laughter, then silence. If they’d been closer to home, say in Vern’s field where they told their parents they’d be, Gordie knows they would have run away. But out here, there’s nowhere to go. They take turns standing guard, with Vern going first.
The terrifying, ghostly noises in the woods represent the boys’ third test. They show the extent to which they’re all still boys and still afraid of the dark. All four stand their ground. In part, this is because they have no choice: they’re too far from home to go back. Likewise, they’re too far into the rite of passage to turn back now. They can’t back out of this life-changing experience. But luckily, none of them face it alone. They’re together and they can rely on each other as friends and comrades.
Themes
Gordie falls back asleep and into a nightmare. He and Chris are swimming at White’s Beach. Their meanest elementary school teacher, Mrs. Cote, drifts past on a raft and orders Chris to recite Robert Frost’s poem “Mending Wall” from memory. Treading water, Chris makes it through the first line before starting to go under. Gordie looks down to see Teddy’s and Vern’s naked, drowned corpses clinging to Chris’s ankles. Desperately, Gordie looks around for help. There’s none to be found, and instead of offering Chris his own hand, he swims desperately toward the shore. A hand grips his ankle and starts to pull him under. Then Teddy shakes him awake for his turn standing guard.
Gordie’s dream arises more or less completely from the conversation he had earlier with Chris. The fact that he’s dreaming it suggests that he’s taking ownership of the uncomfortable truths Chris exposed. Gordie may not yet be willing to consciously admit it, but subconsciously, he knows Chris is right. Importantly, however, his dream has a twist. It’s not Gordie being held back, but Chris. And Gordie’s shame over leaving Chris to his fate in the dream has important implications for the future of their relationship.
Themes
