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Chapter 9
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Phantom of the Opera, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
The Natural vs. the Supernatural
Love vs. Jealousy
Violence, Revenge, and Redemption
Beauty vs. Ugliness
Summary
Analysis
After receiving Christine’s letter, Raoul realizes that she might in fact be as innocent as he imagined. He wonders if she has fallen under someone’s pernicious influence, through the means of music. He realizes that the influence of an extraordinary singer could indeed explain Christine’s extraordinary transformation into a triumphant singer. Unsure of Christine’s true feelings, Raoul experiences a mix of pity and resentment for her.
Raoul goes through the same thought processes many times, seeing Christine alternately as a victim and a manipulator. However, his intuition that her strange behavior can be explained by music is correct, since Christine’s only attraction to the Phantom is based on his extraordinary voice and musical prowess, not on any romantic attachment.
Themes
That evening, Raoul wears a white hood and a mask. He waits for Christine as instructed, and a black hooded figure touches his hand, telling him to follow her. Confused by these circumstances, Raoul nevertheless realizes that he does not hate Christine, but is ready to show understanding and submission. As he follows Christine, he notices a mysterious figure dressed in scarlet and with a skull head calling himself the “Red Death.” When a man tries to touch him, a skeletal hand grabs the man and causes the man to cry out in pain. When Raoul sees this, he recognizes the skull he had seen at Perros-Guirec.
Raoul’s inability to establish a connection between the skull he saw in Brittany, Christine’s fear and confusing behavior, and the skull’s reappearance suggests that he is too overwhelmed by jealousy and confusion to see the other man as an actual threat—and not simply as an irritating rival. The Red Death’s skeletal hand confirms that this is probably not a mere disguise, but his true nature as a semi-human, skeletal figure bent on protecting his anonymity by causing pain to others.
Themes
Literary Devices
Raoul and Christine walk up a few floors and enter an empty box, where she tells Raoul to stay in the darkness. When Raoul suddenly sees the Red Death walk by, he tries to attack him but Christine holds Raoul back. Raoul then says that he is ready to unmask this mysterious figure he saw at Perros, Christine’s friend, whom she calls the Angel of Music.
Raoul’s boldness is usually admirable yet misguided, since he fails to actually protect Christine because he does not understand the true magnitude of the Phantom’s powers. His choice to act before reflecting keeps him from hearing the truth from Christine and taking her confessions seriously.
Themes
Christine then invokes their love and tells him to stop. Shocked by her admission of love, Raoul stops in his tracks. However, he concludes that she must be lying to him, because she had plenty of occasions earlier to reveal her feelings to him and must be trying to give the Red Death time to escape. He lashes out at her, calling her a liar and expressing his contempt for her, and begins to cry.
Once again, Raoul’s pain and jealousy keeps him from believing Christine’s own words, despite Christine’s efforts to show good will through her letters. His tears highlight his confusion and thus make him pitiable, but his unfounded accusations against Christine show a darker side of him, surprisingly similar to the Phantom’s, as both are sometimes willing to harm their beloved in order to express their pain.
Themes
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Christine then calmly tells Raoul that she will one day forgive him for these words. In an intensely emotional voice, she tells him that she will never sing again and that she came to give him explanations, but that he no longer believes her. Removing her mask, she tells Raoul that the situation she is in is tragic. Christine’s anguish, visible on her face, upsets Raoul, who asks her to forgive him for his harsh words. However, Christine walks away, telling him authoritatively not to follow her.
Raoul’s surprise at Christine’s despair highlights how little he has been paying attention to her emotions, since he has been too overwhelmed by his own jealousy to actually listen to Christine and understand the cause of her ambiguous behavior. Christine expresses her inability to communicate with him by walking away, knowing that she is on her own against the Phantom and that Raoul cannot help her unless he knows the entire story.
Themes
After running around to search for either Christine or the Red Death, Raoul finally sees Christine enter her dressing-room, and he quickly hides in her closet. There, he notices the despair on her face and, thinking that she must be upset about Raoul, is shocked to hear her say: “Poor Erik!” Indignant, Raoul cannot believe she has said someone else’s name. Christine then begins to write a letter, hiding it inside her dress, and beautiful music suddenly emerges from the walls. Christine then smiles, greets Erik, and Raoul is shocked both by the fact that no one is there and by the absolute beauty of the singing, which he finds imbued with divine grace. Raoul understands how Christine could have been seduced by such singing.
It remains unclear why Christine pities Erik—the Phantom’s real name—over herself in this moment, since she realizes that Raoul’s lack of understanding has left her alone, under the influence of someone more powerful than her. This attitude reveals Christine’s capacity to put others’ feelings before her own—sometimes, as in this case, to the point of putting her own life in danger. Christine’s joy at hearing the Phantom’s voice reveals that his singing has an intensely emotional effect on her—one that could perhaps be mistaken for love.
Themes
Literary Devices
As the Voice then sings verses from Romeo and Juliet: “Fate has united my heart for aye unto thine!” Christine walks toward the mirror, entranced. Raoul tries to grab her but suddenly witnesses a magical sight: the multiplication of Christine into various reflections, which swirl and suddenly vanish. Raoul rushes in, trying to understand what has happened, but he does not understand how she could have disappeared through a mirror. Overwhelmed by these events, he wonders if Christine will ever return, and whose heart claims to hold hers.
The Phantom’s singing of Romeo and Juliet is reminiscent of the night in which Christine triumphed on stage and later told Erik that she had given him her soul, suggesting that the powerful connection between them hinges on music. It also reveals the Phantom’s intention to make her his romantic partner at all cost, even if this leads to death and destruction. Christine’s disappearance, although apparently supernatural, is later explained by the Phantom’s talents as an illusionist and his expert knowledge of traps.
Themes
Literary Devices
