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Chapter 1: Quoyle
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Shipping News, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Love and Family
Redemption, Courage, and Happiness
Life and Death
Resilience and Survival
Modernity
Summary
Analysis
When Quoyle meets Petal Bear at one of the local government meetings, he is immediately smitten. She’s as petite and alluring as he is gigantic and off-putting. But she sleeps with him anyway, because she is willing to—and does—have sex with just about anyone. For a month, they’re happy: Quoyle because he thinks that a beautiful woman loves him, Petal because of the size of his genitalia. They quickly marry, and they quickly become miserable. Petal grows to hate Quoyle for his spinelessness, and she continues to run around and have sex with other people, even after their daughters Bunny and Sunshine are born in quick succession.
The only people with whom Quoyle has had a healthy relationship are Partridge and Mercalia. Because the other people who were supposed to love him—his parents and brother—treated him badly, it’s not surprising when he falls in love with the wrong woman and Petal continues the cycle of abuse his family started. Notably, the thing that most bothers her about Quoyle is his inability to stand up for himself. This becomes a major aspect of his transformation across the novel, and readers should be alert for signs that he’s learning to do so.
Themes
Quoyle takes care of Bunny and Sunshine with the help of a babysitter named Mrs. Moosup, who spends the days watching television in the living room of Quoyle’s rented house. Petal suggests that Quoyle find himself a girlfriend. She suggests that they divorce. But Quoyle can’t stop adoring her, and he refuses. He tries to suffer in what he thinks is noble silence, to show her how much he loves her. But it’s pointless.
The book portrays Quoyle as so broken by his miserable childhood that he can’t imagine anyone loving him. And he clearly doesn’t believe that he deserves happiness or stability—he knows, deep down, that his attempts to prove his love are fruitless, yet he cannot stand up for himself and tell Petal that he deserves better.
Themes
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