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Part 4, Chapter 8
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Memory and Meaning
Love and Vulnerability
Freedom
Art, Creativity, and Expression
Wonder and Knowledge
Summary
Analysis
New York City. March 18, 2014. Henry forgot all about Bea’s latest thesis proposal. But now, having met Addie, it all makes sense to him. He confronts Addie about it on their way to the Artifact, and Addie confirms that she was, indeed, the subject of all three works. Henry asks how this is possible—hasn’t the curse made it so she can’t leave a mark? Addie explains that though she can’t tell her story or make people remember her, she can’t control their ideas, and “art is about ideas.”
Addie makes explicit that her ability to be the subject of artworks has to do with the fact that “art is about ideas.” She seems to suggest that the artists for whom she posed weren’t capturing her exactly as she was, but their impressions of her. There’s a difference between subjective interpretation and objective reality, and Addie has used this difference as a loophole to circumvent the constraints of her curse.
Themes
