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Chapter 4
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Age, Development, and Identity
Reputation, Gossip, and Scandal
Expectations and Acceptance
Support and Caretaking
Summary
Analysis
At 20 years old, Benjamin looks the same age as his 50-year-old father. The year is 1880, and he now works with Mr. Button at Roger Button & Co., Wholesale Hardware. The two men are often mistaken for brothers—especially when they appear at high society dances, like the one they attend one evening in August at a fancy country house in Baltimore. It’s at this dance that Benjamin first falls in love, laying eyes on Hildegarde Moncrief, the daughter of one of the most powerful men in town.
Although Benjamin’s condition makes it difficult for him to do things like go to college, he manages to lead a somewhat normal life by the time he turns 20. This is because the difference between his numerical age and his physical appearance is no longer quite so pronounced. As a 20-year-old, he’s old enough to work alongside his father, and the rest of society doesn’t interfere with this because there’s nothing out of the ordinary about the sight of a middle-aged man working at a hardware company. Benjamin can therefore be himself for the most part—he no longer has to act younger than he feels to please his father, nor does he have to act older than his actual age to conform to society’s expectations.
Themes
Benjamin asks Hildegarde to dance and then spends the majority of the evening eagerly awaiting his turn on her dance card. As he waits, he watches her younger suitors, finding them all unbearably annoying. When it’s finally his turn, though, all of these thoughts drop away. As he and Hildegarde move easily along the dance floor, Benjamin feels so dazzled and excited that it’s almost as if his life has just begun.
“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” is fundamentally a coming-of-age story. Of course, Benjamin’s aging process happens in reverse, but the story still traces his life’s arc. Moreover, the events that take place roughly in the middle of his life are pretty typical. Dancing and falling in love with a young woman like Hildegarde, for example, is the exact sort of thing a 20-year-old would do. As he nears middle-age, then, Benjamin’s developmental stage gets closer and closer to his actual numerical age, making it easier for him to lead a straightforward, average life uninfluenced by the social constraints of his condition.
Themes
Literary Devices
Hildegarde thinks Benjamin and his father are brothers, and Benjamin doesn’t correct her because he wants to avoid the kind of intolerance he experienced at Yale. She also goes on about how she prefers older men, saying that her young suitors are all immature. Fifty years old, she says, is the perfect age. She would rather marry a 50-year-old who would take care of her than marry a 30-year-old who would need her to take care of him. On the ride home that night, Benjamin is so smitten that he can’t even hold a conversation with his father.
At least at this point in the story, Hildegarde seems like the perfect match for Benjamin, since she prefers dignified older men over immature younger men. As ideal as this match might seem, though, Benjamin’s decision not to tell Hildegarde sets them up for trouble down the road—after all, if Hildegarde likes older men, she’ll be in for a surprise when Benjamin just keeps getting younger. Her expectations have already been set: she assumes (reasonably enough) that Benjamin will always be the dignified, mature older man she wants him to be. And this, in turn, sets Benjamin up for yet another difficult relationship in which he’ll have to constantly try to be someone he’s not.
Themes
Literary Devices
