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Book 1, Chapter 1
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Dawn, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Humanity, Evolution, and Genetics
Motherhood and Leadership
Consent and Autonomy
Sexuality and Gender
Summary
Analysis
Lilith expects this Awakening to be like the last ones, with the captors asking more questions, but this time, as she is on the verge of falling asleep, she’s surprised when she hears someone call her name. It’s a thin, old man wearing similar clothes to the new ones she just found. He says that he doesn’t want to hurt her and that he’s going to take her outside. Lilith doesn’t trust him and asks who he is. He explains that in fact, he’s not a human, but he can show her what he really is. He mentions that Lilith is one of the few English-speaking humans who never considered that her captors might be extraterrestrials, but Lilith says she considered all possibilities—she just didn’t tell her captors.
After a mysterious first chapter, this passage finally reveals the main premise of the novel, which involves encounters between humans and aliens. This passage initially presents the first alien as being relatively similar to humans, with Lilith even mistaking him for a thin, old man. As the chapter goes on, however, Lilith begins to realize that the figure she’s speaking to is truly alien, in spite of his perfect English. The fact that Lilith suspected she may have been in alien captivity but never said anything reflects her private nature and hints at how the aliens might not understand humans as well as they think.
Themes
The lights brighten in the room, and Lilith sees that the creature is tall, slender, and humanoid, with gray skin. Lilith asks about gender, and the alien says he’s male. She thinks at first the alien has hair, but he explains that it’s actually sensory organs. When Lilith tries to touch it, the “hair” writhes around like snakes.
This passage shows the divide between Lilith’s human way of thinking and the alien. Lilith thinks the alien has “hair” because she’s thinking in human terms, but it turns out to actually be something unfamiliar. The comparison of the sensory organs to snakes, a potentially dangerous animal, shows how Lilith is afraid of the unknown.
Themes
Lilith asks the alien why he speaks English fluently without an accent. He says he began learning many languages from humans back when he was young. He explains that Lilith is on his home, or what also might be called a “ship” in English. The aliens collected as many human survivors as they could after the war. Although Earth was in ruins, the aliens are trying to restore it, which Lilith doesn’t understand.
This passage establishes the culture of the aliens and how they have more advanced technology than humans. This technology, plus the alien’s ability to learn English so fluently suggests high intelligence, but the novel will continue to question whether the aliens are actually as wise as they seem.
Themes
Lilith asks the alien his name, and he says it’s Kaaltediinjdahya lel Kahguyaht aj Dinso, with Jdahya being his personal name and the rest just related to his family. He explains that he and his species debated whether it was ethical or not to prevent humans from destroying themselves. They managed to save a few of the human survivors, and now it’s Jdahya’s job to get Lilith acclimated to the aliens. He reveals that she has been asleep for 250 years, in part because something went wrong the first time she Awakened, and she had to go back to sleep.
The fact that the alien’s personal name is so short compared to its family names suggests that family structures are critically important to this species of aliens. Although Jdahya and his fellow aliens have helped the human race to survive, there are already suggestions of how they view humans as inferior beings they need to protect, similar to how humans might talk about trying to preserve an endangered species of animal.
Themes
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Jdahya says some surviving humans tried to kill him just for talking to them, while others tried to kill themselves. Jdahya’s species started putting humans together to stop suicidal feelings. This reminds Lilith of the boy who was with her, whose name was Sharad. Jdahya says he doesn’t know how Sharad is doing but can find out—he thinks Sharad is well, although he may no longer be a boy. A new voice from above announces that Sharad is well—he is still young and asleep with his parents now. Lilith wants to see Sharad, but Jdahya says she needs to learn how to get used to Jdahya and his appearance so that she can eventually go outside her isolation room without panicking at what she sees.
Jdahya’s comments on the violence of humans toward him illustrates humankind’s fear of the unknown. As the novel explores, humans aren’t just afraid of literal aliens—they’re also even afraid of other humans who differ from themselves. Jdahya’s inability to understand why humans might become suicidal when placed in isolation is another example of how for all his intelligence, he can’t see fundamental truths about human behavior. His explanation of why Sharad was added to Lilith’s room has the tone of a scientist explaining an experiment with lab rats, reinforcing that idea that the aliens have a paternalistic attitude, even if they do claim to want to help humans.
Themes
