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Chapter 4
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Where the Crawdads Sing, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Survival, Necessity, and Violence
Independence vs. Human Connection
Education, Coming of Age, and Adulthood
Prejudice, Intolerance, and Acceptance
Summary
Analysis
After searching the area around the fire tower for clues, Sheriff Ed Jackson asks Dr. Vern Murphy to go tell Chase’s parents that their son has died. As for Benji and Steve, Sheriff Jackson instructs them not to make new footprints, not wanting them to make it harder to discern what, exactly, happened the night before. In response, they ask Sheriff Jackson if he thinks that somebody murdered Chase, but he doesn’t answer. When Deputy Joe Purdue arrives on the scene, the two colleagues discuss the situation, wondering why there are no footprints and why there doesn’t seem to be any evidence that somebody covered them up, either. Finally, an ambulance arrives, and the men lift Chase into a stretcher to take him to a coroner.
The clinical aspect of this kind of investigation starkly contrasts the preceding chapters, which detail the naturalistic life Kya leads 17 years prior to Chase’s death. And yet, there is a link between Kya’s interest in nature and Chase’s demise, since the latter is evidence of the most natural thing of all: death. After all, nothing anyone does will ever change the fact that all people are destined to die. Although humans are quite adept at finding ways to survive or overcome various obstacles, there is a limit to this resilience, as evidenced by Chase’s untimely death.
Themes
Once Chase’s body has been collected and Steve and Benji have been sent home, Ed and Joe climb the fire tower. At the top, there are a series of hatches that have to be pushed up in order to fully mount the tower. Once Ed and Joe do this, they notice that one of the other hatches has been left open, realizing that it’s the one Chase fell through. This strikes Ed as odd, since this particular hatch is almost never left open—people often forget to close the one right above the stairs, but the one Chase fell through is always closed. For this reason, he wonders if somebody opened it and then pushed him through it. Beneath, there is a beam that Chase must have hit on his way down, and the two men decide to use ropes to inspect it more carefully.
As Ed and Joe continue to examine the scene, it seems less and less likely that Chase’s death was an accident. Consequently, the possibility of violence creeps into the narrative, though it’s too early to say how, exactly, this factors into the larger story regarding Kya and her struggle to survive in the marsh as a child.
Themes
Two hours later, Ed and Joe are still at the fire tower. They talk about who would want to kill Chase, and though Ed can’t think of a reason for anyone to kill the most well-liked man in town, Joe points out that Chase was quite promiscuous, even after marrying his wife, Pearl. This means that there could be a number of women who might have been angry with him.
When Ed and Joe realize that Chase may have been murdered, they try to come up with a reason why anyone in town would want to kill him. As they think about this, they reflect upon the fact that he was something of a philanderer, ultimately suggesting that certain forms of human connection—especially those that transgress various social boundaries—can lead to violence and animosity (a fact that Kya herself learned early in her life).
Themes
