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Summary
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Lightning Thief, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Identity, Heroism, and Normalcy
Family
Friendship and Belonging
Godliness vs. Humanity
Summary
Analysis
Percy admits that he didn’t want to be a half-blood. He warns the reader that if they recognize themselves in the story to follow, they should stop reading immediately—danger is right around the corner. Percy introduces himself: he’s 12 years old and a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a school for troubled kids. Though Percy has always been “troubled,” things get really bad on the trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff. Percy has high hopes, since Mr. Brunner, the cool Latin teacher, is leading the trip. Percy seems to always get in trouble on field trips, but he vows to be good. He ignores Nancy Bobofit’s bullying—she throws sandwich bits at Grover, Percy’s best friend.
Though Percy calls himself “troubled,” he nevertheless wants to fit in. While fitting in could mean a number of different things for different people, for Percy, it means wanting to do well in school— and, he shares later, wanting to have friends. This suggests that at this point, Percy feels like he’s fighting an uphill battle just to get through the day without feeling totally alone—and he doesn’t understand at this early stage that this is because he’s not entirely human.
Themes
Mr. Brunner leads the class through the galleries. They stop at a stele (a grave marker), and Percy tries to listen to Mr. Brunner’s explanation, but kids talking make it hard to hear. The evil math teacher, Mrs. Dodds, gives Percy a look whenever he tells a kid to shut up. She’s hated Percy since she arrived midway through the year, and Percy suspects she’s not human. Nancy continues to talk and finally, Percy tells her loudly to stop. Everyone laughs, and Mr. Brunner asks Percy to explain the pictures on the stele. Percy explains that it’s the Titan Kronos eating his kids, but someone hid baby Zeus and when Zeus grew up, he tricked Kronos into vomiting up the other children. Then there was a fight and the gods won.
Here, Percy shows that he’s not a bad student. He clearly pays attention in Mr. Brunner’s class and wants to do well, but the other kids and even some of the teachers at Yancy make it hard for him. This suggests that it’s not Percy’s fault that he’s not doing well—in a variety of ways, he’s been set up to fail. Though the story of Kronos eating his children seems like just a story for Percy at this point, it’s important background information for the reader. It introduces the idea that the Greek gods don’t have an entirely healthy family dynamic.
Themes
When Nancy mumbles loudly that none of this applies to real life, Mr. Brunner asks Percy to explain why it does matter. Percy doesn’t know. Disappointed, Mr. Brunner finishes the story of what happened: Zeus and the other gods defeated Kronos, sliced him up, and threw him into Tartarus in the Underworld. Then, Mr. Brunner sends everyone outside for lunch but calls Percy back. Mr. Brunner insists that Percy must learn why all of this is important for real life. Percy wants to be angry about how hard Mr. Brunner pushes him, since Percy has dyslexia and ADHD and struggles to memorize and spell. Percy mumbles that he’ll try harder.
Even if Percy chafes under Mr. Brunner’s pressure, Mr. Brunner’s desire for Percy to do well nevertheless is good for Percy, since it makes him feel as though someone believes in him. Though it’s unclear at this point why, exactly, Mr. Brunner is eager to convince Percy that Greek, this has important implications for all readers. Greek mythology and culture has influenced Western culture in major ways. While the stories themselves may be entertainment now, they nevertheless are important to understanding Western culture.
Themes
Outside, there’s a big storm brewing—Percy figures it’s global warming. He gladly gives Grover his apple and thinks longingly of Mom, who lives close by. As Mr. Brunner parks his wheelchair and starts eating, Nancy walks by and dumps her lunch in Grover’s lap. Percy tries to control his temper but somehow—he doesn’t remember how—Nancy ends up in the fountain. Mrs. Dodds appears immediately, and kids whisper that the water grabbed Nancy. Mrs. Dodds asks Percy to come with her. Grover tries to insist that he pushed Nancy, but Mrs. Dodds just smirks. Percy turns to Grover and when he looks back, Mrs. Dodds is at the top of the stairs. Percy figures this is just part of his ADHD; lapses like this happen often.
It’s worth taking Percy’s narration with a grain of salt, given that he’s an unreliable narrator because he filters everything that happens through his very biased point of view. However, the way he tries to justify what he does and doesn’t see is noteworthy. Although there’s clearly something odd going on, as Mrs. Dodds seems to climb an entire flight of stairs in the blink of an eye, Percy believes that this kind of occurrence is his ADHD playing tricks on him.
Themes
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Mrs. Dodds leads Percy to an empty Greek and Roman gallery. She makes a weird noise and tells Percy that he’s giving them problems. With an evil look, she says that they’ve found him out—and if he confesses, he’ll suffer less. Percy has no idea what she’s talking about. Then, Mrs. Dodds transforms into a shriveled hag with bat wings, fangs, and glowing eyes. Mr. Brunner appears and throws Percy a pen, which turns into a bronze sword. As Mrs. Dodds flies at Percy, he swings the sword and Mrs. Dodds dissolves into powder. Percy finds himself alone, holding a pen. He heads outside. Nancy hisses that she hopes Mrs. Kerr was awful to Percy—but Percy thinks that they don’t even have a teacher by this name. Confused, Percy asks Grover where Mrs. Dodds went, but Grover claims he doesn’t know who Mrs. Dodds is. Mr. Brunner asks for his pen back and, when Percy asks, says there’s no Mrs. Dodds at Yancy.
Something incredibly bizarre has clearly happened—and yet, everyone in Percy’s life insists that it didn’t. This makes Percy feel even more like he doesn’t fit in at Yancy Academy or in the real world. Especially when Grover, Percy’s best friend, doesn’t validate Percy’s experience, it makes Percy feel even more alone and abnormal. As far as Percy is concerned, he’s going crazy—and given that he’s already struggling in school, it’s likely that this self-doubt will have even further negative effects on his ability to function at Yancy.
Themes
