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The Beginning
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Night Watchman, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Power, Solidarity, and Community Action
Oppression and Supposed Good Intentions
Humor and Pain
Sex, Violence, and Gender
Agency and Exploitation
Summary
Analysis
Patrice locks herself in her room and tells herself to wake up when it’s pitch dark. When she wakes up, she finds her bag, her shoes, her coat. When she opens the door, she sees Jack slumped against the wall, his legs stretched straight out. His eyes roll back in his head like a slot machine. Patrice makes her way to the hotel next door and then to Wood Mountain’s room. As they leave to go to Bernadette’s, Patrice tells the attendant at the hotel that Jack from next door is dying in the alley. When they reach Bernadette’s she gives them some food and they take Vera’s baby with them before taking the train back home. Patrice tells the baby that she’ll take care of him until Vera comes home.
At this point, Patrice knows that Jack has been lying to her and that he put her in a situation that, if she hadn’t found a way to escape, could have killed her. Still, when Patrice sees him in the midst of a potential overdose in the hallway, she alerts someone who might be able to help him, showing that she is willing to go out of her way to help others even when those people wouldn’t help her. At the same time, Wood Mountain has gone out of his way to try and support and be there for Patrice, and both of them will care for Vera’s baby, illustrating in another way how essential solidarity is for the characters in the novel to survive.
Themes
