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Book 1, Part 2: History
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Theory of Flight, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Individual Aspiration vs. Group Belonging
Colonialism and Postcolonialism
Love, Family, and Selfishness
Gender and Sexuality
Beauty
Summary
Analysis
Valentine. Valentine Tanaka, observing The Man Himself, notes that while The Man’s bulk once denoted vigor—much like “his predecessor, Emil Coetzee”—it now makes him look exhausted. Yet The Man’s eyes twinkle, full of “mischief, malice, mayhem,” such that Valentine can imagine him as a schoolboy trying to get the attention of an indifferent British teacher.
When Valentine compares The Man Himself, a postcolonial political leader, to Emil Coetzee, the prior, white-dominated government’s spymaster, he implies a continuity in the unethical, oppressive tactics that the pre-independence and post-independence governments use. His attribution of “mischief, malice, mayhem” to The Man Himself hints that The Man is as irresponsibly destructive as a schoolchild.
Themes
The Man Himself places a “precious and beautiful something” on the table and explains that it’s the reason for their meeting. He asks whether they are friends and whether Valentine can be trusted. Valentine, uneasy, says yes. The Man explains that the “something” was found on the Beauford Farm and Estate, where war veterans have been squatting for years. He says that while the government respects the veterans’ service, their squatting needs to end; he also says that the property technically belongs to Beatrice Beit-Beauford. Valentine says he understands.
When The Man Himself asks whether Valentine is his friend, Valentine becomes uneasy for good reason: it’s an odd question for a political leader to ask a subordinate, implying a demand for personal loyalty outside the bounds of professionalism. The interest The Man Himself shows in the “something” and his desire to evict squatters from the farm suggest that he wants to search it secretly for more “somethings.”
Themes
Kuki. 81-year-old Kuki, cognitively intact but (to her displeasure) aged in appearance, enters The Princess Margaret Retirement Home carrying a package of biscuits. Greeting the staff, Kuki recalls that they used to be entirely white and now are entirely Black. Kuki believes she’s not a racist, just a “frustrated liberal”—having converted to liberalism in 1981 when she married her last husband—but still thinks that Black people have ruined the country.
Kuki believes that marrying a liberal man makes her liberal. Her internalized sexism has convinced her that women just absorb the political ideas of the men in their lives. She’s wrong: despite her supposed liberalism, her thoughts are racist, illustrating the persistence of anti-Black attitudes in the postcolonial period.
Themes
Kuki enters Beatrice’s room. When Beatrice recognizes Kuki, Kuki—still perturbed by Beatrice’s Alzheimer’s—reminds herself that the visit could go bad. Beatrice apologetically criticizes her fingernails and mentions that Genie hasn’t come yet. Kuki praises Beatrice’s appearance, brandishes the biscuits, and offers to make tea. When Beatrice says she wants to see Genie, Kuki reminds her that Valentine Tanaka from The Organization is coming to discuss the farm, but Beatrice insists she needs beautification.
The passage suggests that Genie either does Beatrice’s fingernails or takes her to a salon to have them done, but it doesn’t make clear how Genie knows Beatrice. Beatrice’s fixation on her fingernails illustrates how beauty standards can be pernicious, distracting people from more important issues around them.
Themes
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When Beatrice entered the nursing home, Kuki arranged for Genie to take Beatrice to a salon twice a month. It seems “more than a twist of fate” to Kuki that Genie is daughter to Golide, who shot down Beatrice’s plane; Genie and Beatrice have much in common, e.g. a passion for sunflowers, and are now friends across racial and generational lines.
Beatrice and Genie’s friendship is based at least in part on their love of sunflowers, which symbolize shared history and are beautiful objects in themselves. Thus, the novel is suggesting that a shared history—or a shared love of beauty—may be a sufficient basis for a friendship, despite divisions along fraught demographic lines (e.g. race and age).
Themes
Valentine enters and tells Kuki and Beatrice that the Organization wants to evict the veterans squatting on the Beauford Farm and Estate. When Kuki asks why they decided to perform the eviction now, Valentine evades the question and explains they need the deeds from Beatrice. Beatrice reveals that she doesn’t have them: she sold the farm to The Survivors for a dollar.
It is clear, from Valentine’s avoidance of Kuki’s question, that the government’s interest in the farm is suspect and perhaps corrupt. The novel has not yet made clear who “The Survivors” are—but their ownership of the farm means they may fall afoul of the government.
Themes
Genie. When Genie learns of the “precious and beautiful something” being discovered, she immediately decides to cease her medication regimen without letting Vida know. After that, she plans to send Marcus a 1965 atlas, Krystle a Victoria Falls postcard, and Minenhle and Mordechai a bird; she also plans to take Beatrice to the spa.
Readers haven’t yet learned what medication Genie has been taking, who Vida is, or what exactly the “something” is. Yet the “something” clearly means enough to Genie to propel her to action. The items she sends to various people are associated with imagination and aspiration: the 1965 atlas she sends to Marcus is the one they used to inform their childhood travel game in the abandoned car, the Victoria Falls postcard recalls Golide’s story of all the elephants crossing the Zambezi once the first elephant had showed them they could, and the bird evokes flight imagery symbolic of individual aspiration. Genie’s final resolution—to take Beatrice to the spa—implies that while beautification isn’t the most important thing, it can be meaningful and good.
Themes
