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Book 3, Chapter 4
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
Once Lilith feels confident that Curt is no longer an immediate problem, she Awakens Gabriel and Beatrice. Tate wants to Awaken new people even faster, but Lilith believes it’s important to do only a couple at a time, allowing the new arrivals time to acclimate. Tate eventually sees the logic. After a couple days, Tate pairs with Gabriel.
Lilith and Tate represent different styles of leadership. While Tate is brasher and more willing to take risks, Lilith reveals herself to be more cautious and pragmatic. Tate’s deferral to Lilith shows how Lilith is beginning to grow into her own as a leader.
Themes
Lilith continues Awakening more people. While there are sometimes disagreements or even fist-fights, Lilith mostly manages to keep the peace. A big woman named Jean Pelerin tries to demand meat in her diet and lead the others to rise against Lilith. Lilith has to knock her unconscious. Lilith keeps a regular exercise schedule, to be ready if others attack her.
The pace of the novel quickens as Lilith gets into a routine and each new Awakening becomes less noteworthy for Lilith. The fight that Jean starts over meat is yet another reminder of how important food is to humans and how the Oankali don’t understand this well enough to accommodate the humans on their ship.
Themes
After Jean’s attack, Joseph comes to Lilith, saying a rumor is going around that Lilith must be a man to have won that fight. Lilith laughs but finds that people are serious and that this could be a problem for her. She and Joseph have begun sleeping together. Tate thinks Lilith can do better and that Joseph is old and ugly, but Lilith likes him.
The rumors that Lilith is a man relate back to social conventions and expectations about women. Lilith is strong, both physically and as a leader. Strength is often associated with being masculine, and so the people in Lilith’s group don’t know how to reconcile their previous prejudices with the new society that Lilith is trying to build, which illustrates how some people resist change and the unknown.
Themes
Later, when they’re together, Joseph suggests that maybe Lilith should follow Tate’s advice and Awaken a lot more people at once. It would potentially take negative attention away from Lilith and speed up the process of getting to Earth. The next step, after Lilith has 40 Awakened humans, will be for them to go to a part of the ship that simulates an Earth forest for training. Joseph also warns Lilith that if the humans see the Oankali for the first time and are afraid, they might turn against Lilith. Lilith agrees to consider all of this. She has heard rumors that Joseph is sleeping with her to get special privileges but doesn’t put much stock in them. She agrees with his suggestion to Awaken more people.
Lilith continues to show her strength as a leader by realizing when she gets good advice and adapting her strategy. He relationship with Joseph, which becomes sexual, offers her something that she has been lacking her entire time in isolation and that not even Tate could fulfil for her. While the intimacy Lilith finds with Joseph helps motivate her to continue in her work, it also reminds her of all the things about human relationships that the Oankali don’t understand and have deprived her of up until this point.
Themes
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