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Book 1, Chapter 6
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in V for Vendetta, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Freedom and Anarchy
Bigotry
The Power of Symbols
Vendettas, Revenge, and the Personal
Fatherhood, Mentorship, and the State
Summary
Analysis
At Westminster Abbey in December 20, 1997, a group of bodyguards, along with Dennis (the Bishop’s assistant), are drinking to the New Year. Since the explosion of Parliament, Almond has ordered that all authorities are to be protected by bodyguards at all times. Dennis mentions that “His Grace” is currently enjoying his time with “that girl with pigtails,” and the bodyguards laugh.
We see that Lilliman’s sexual hypocrisy is equally the hypocrisy of the entire Norsefire society: everyone seems to know that Lilliman is a pedophile, and yet nobody does anything about it.
Themes
Inside Westminster Abbey, “His Grace” Anthony Lilliman is trying to seduce Evey on his bed. Evey asks if she can open a window, and Lilliman allows her to do so. Evey asks him to read her “something religious,” and Lilliman obliges, going to the next room to read from the sermon he delivered that morning. As he does so, V attacks the group of bodyguards, easily disarming them with his daggers.
In this transitional section, we see Evey assisting V with his attack on Bishop Lilliman. It’s not clear exactly what V has told Evey to do—or if he’s told her what he’s going to do to Lilliman. Nevertheless, Evey has “made a deal” with V: presumably to assist him in any way he says.
Themes
As Lilliman finishes his sermon reading for Evey, he asks her to remove her dress. When he leans in to do so himself, Evey hits him with a heavy lamp and runs away. The Bishop yells and calls Evey a “filthy whore.” Suddenly, V is standing in front of him. He quotes from the Rolling Stones song “Sympathy for the Devil” as he drags Lilliman out of the room.
Here Lilliman receives an ironic, brutal comeuppance. V, ever the wordsmith, quotes from the Rolling Stones—presumably another banned musical group—and takes on the form of an ironic “devil,” attacking and delivering justice to the supposedly and moral Bishop.
Themes
