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Book 2, Prelude
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
It is January 5, 1998. Evey stares, delighted, as V performs a magic trick, making a caged rabbit disappear. V then makes the rabbit reappear, without her cage—or, as V puts it, her “home.”
V again takes on the attributes of a father to Evey—while at the same time teaching her about freedom. As with the rabbit, when a cage becomes familiar enough, it seems like home. The people of England are oppressed by a dictatorship, but it’s not yet clear how much they want to be freed from it.
Themes
After the magic trick, V and Evey dance together. Tentatively, Evey brings up something that’s been troubling her. She’s noticed that V seems not to “fancy her.” She wonders, aloud, if it’s because V is gay. V suggests that Evey thinks that he’s “her father.” Evey is shocked—this is exactly what she’s been thinking. V stops dancing with Evey and fetches a blindfold for her. He tells her to put it on, and she does so.
V leads Evey out of the Shadow Gallery to the streets of London. It is cold, and Evey is uncomfortable. She stresses to V, who seems to be leading her ahead, that she won’t kill anyone else. Frustrated, she takes off her blindfold, finding herself in an abandoned street. Evey sees V standing a few feet away from her. V tells Evey that he’s not her father. Evey pulls V toward her, begging to go home. To her great surprise, however, “V” falls apart: V has gone, replacing himself with a dummy, mask, and tape recorder. Evey is standing alone in the middle of the street.
V has used masks and technology—essentially theatrics—to deceive the leaders of Norsefire, and here, he turns these tactics on his ally, Evey, tricking her into leaving the Shadow Gallery. Again, we’re not sure why V is doing this. At the same time, Moore hints that V is trying to cleanse Evey of her need for a father-figure—indeed, some of V’s last words to Evey are “I’m not your father.”
Themes
