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Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Good Omens, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Good and Evil
Human Nature
Destiny vs. Free Will
Humor and Absurdity
Friendship
Summary
Analysis
Newcomers are always interesting to Adam’s gang, which is known around town as the Them. But Pepper has impressive news about the most recent newcomer: she’s a witch, she gets a witch’s newspaper in addition to other papers, and she moved into Jasmine Cottage. Wensleydale, the most mature member of the gang, insists that there’s no such thing as witches, while Brian doesn’t see why witches shouldn’t have their own paper. Pepper tells him to shut up. If anyone else had said this, it would’ve incited a scuffle, but Pepper has always been a vicious fighter—and the 11-year-old boys are starting to feel weird about fighting girls.
Adam and the Them are 11 years old. They’re on the brink of puberty and are probably at different stages of development, hence why Wensleydale is all for shutting down talk of witches but Pepper and Brian are willing to buy it—and why the boys are starting to feel uncomfortable about sparring with girls. But despite these differences, it’s clear that the four are close friends.
Themes
Pepper became a fighter to prevent people from mocking her full first name, Pippin Galadriel Moonchild. The only people who call her this are her mother and the rival gang, Greasy Johnson and the Johnsonites—but only when they’re out of earshot. Greasy Johnson is the same age as Adam (within a few hours, in fact), and his parents have never told him that he’s adopted.
The fact that the Them and the Greasy Johnsonites are rival gangs suggests that they’re engaged in a mutually fulfilling fight for power. This, in and of itself, is a sort of friendship—one that’s based on how much they like to fight each other. Moreover, the detail that Adam and Greasy Johnson are so close in age—combined with the fact that Greasy is adopted—heavily implies that he’s the American Attaché’s biological son who was switched at birth with Warlock.
Themes
Adam sits and listens to the others argue, waiting for something to latch onto. Brian insists that his Sunday paper said there are thousands of witches in England who worship Nature, eat health food, and dance naked on Stonehenge. Wensleydale maintains that his aunt isn’t a witch, even if she does try to talk to her dead husband—but Brian says that God sends people to hell for that. Adam shifts and notes that witches aren’t so bad, which prompts Pepper and Brian to detail all the bad things that witches do. Wensleydale insists witches don’t exist, since science has been invented, and vicars burned all the witches during the Spanish Inquisition. Brian says that they should find out if the newcomer is a witch and then turn her over to the vicar. Adam suggests they mount their own Spanish Inquisition instead.
Again, the Them’s age means that they have a questionable grasp of how the world around them works. Brian, for one, seems to be confusing a health food craze with witchcraft as it’s often portrayed in art and literature—and he suggests that witchcraft is, on the whole, bad. This whole conversation seems designed to make readers laugh at how ill-informed the children are, even if what they’re laughing about is no laughing matter. The Spanish Inquisition, for one, was a horrifically violent historical period. But to young kids with little understanding of what actually happened, it seems interesting and worth exploring.
Themes
The Spanish Inquisition convenes after lunch. Adam is the Chief Inquisitor, while Pepper will be the Head Torturer. Brian and Wensleydale are guards because they don’t speak any Spanish. They decide to fetch the first practice witch, Pepper’s little sister. Pepper’s little sister admits right off she’s a witch, even though she’s supposed to deny it until Pepper tortures her. The witch thoroughly enjoys the torture, a makeshift medieval ducking stool. It’s a hot day, so Adam lets the witch off with a warning so that someone else can have a turn.
The children have the capability to be both kind and cruel. They clearly don’t entirely understand how horrific witch trials were for the accused—to them, this is just a convenient way to experiment with power structures and cool off in the pond. Adam’s choice to let the witch go also shows that despite being the Antichrist, he’s not evil. He has no interest in actually killing Pepper’s little sister with a ducking stool (which were used to dunk witches underwater, or even drown them, as punishment).
Themes
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Later that afternoon, Mr. Young bans Adam from watching TV as punishment for destroying Pepper’s little sister’s dress in the pond. Now, Adam slouches down the dusty lane with Dog slouching along dutifully. As Adam grumbles about his punishment, Dog thinks that he didn’t expect the last days before Armageddon to be like this—but he’s enjoying them anyway. He’s been taken over by “intrinsic small-dogness” and so has enjoyed chasing rats and cats. Suddenly, Adam realizes that he’s walking past Jasmine Cottage and that someone is crying. He hesitates and then peers over the hedge at Anathema, who’s young and without warts—so she’s clearly not a witch.
It’s telling that Dog is enjoying the last days in his new form as a small dog. The novel suggests that Dog is becoming who he was destined be when it suggests that he’s overcome by “intrinsic small-dogness.” With this, the novel shows that due to Dog’s relationship with Adam, he’s perhaps not supposed to be the fearsome hell-hound that Crowley expected him to be. Meanwhile, the fact that Adam decides so quickly that Anathema isn’t a witch based solely on how she looks is humorous; it suggests that Adam believes he should be able to identify evil outright.
Themes
To Anathema, Adam looks like a Greek god or a Biblical illustration, aside from the grubby sneakers. Adam introduces himself and is thrilled that Anathema has heard of him—she’s heard to avoid him and the Them. Adam asks why she’s crying, and when Anathema says that she lost a book, Adam offers to help look for it and says that Anathema can read the eight-page book he wrote, which will cheer her up. He decides that he adores Anathema when she compliments his book but refuses his help. She explains that two men kind of stole the book. Privately, she can’t shake the feeling that Adam is odd.
In this passage, Adam seems like a normal child—he’s happy that people know who he is, he’s eager to be helpful, and he wants praise for his work. All of this suggests that he’s not as evil as his being the Antichrist might suggest. However, this isn’t to say that he doesn’t seem divine in some ways—it’s surely no accident that Anathema thinks he looks like a deity or a Biblical illustration, and that she finds him odd.
Themes
Anathema explains to Adam that the book is called The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch. Back when the book was written, “nice” meant “precise.” She thinks of how beautiful Tadfield is—it’s depressing that this is where Armageddon is going to happen, according to Agnes. Fortunately, Anathema still has the file cards. She explains to a disappointed Adam that the book doesn’t have any spaceships or robots in it, and then she offers him lemonade. Before Adam accepts, he asks if Anathema is a witch. She says that she’s an occultist, and Adam insists that he knows what that means. With the matter settled, Adam tells Dog to follow him inside. Dog refuses, but Adam forces him in. With this, “a little more of Hell burn[s] away.” Meanwhile, in London, Aziraphale continues to flip through The Book.
Anathema, like Aziraphale, seems to pick up on the fact that Tadfield is beautiful and seems like an odd place for Armageddon to take place. Adam again comes off as a normal child when he seems to imply that any book without spaceships and robots isn’t worth reading, let alone getting upset over. Most important, though, is the novel’s description of Dog’s passage into Jasmine Cottage. The phrase “a little more of Hell burns away” suggests that Dog is gradually shedding his evil origins as the hell-hound and becoming the normal dog Adam wants him to be.
Themes
In Jasmine Cottage, Anathema tells Adam what the devices on her table are. Adam is enthralled. His family isn’t spiritual at all, so Adam laps up everything Anathema has to say about ley-lines, whales, bikes, rainforests, and recycled paper. He only interrupts once, when she shares her view that nuclear power plants should be done away with, to say that the nuclear power station he visited was boring. Meanwhile, Anathema finally realizes what’s wrong with Adam: he has no aura. This is perplexing, given how happy he seems. She eventually sends him home with copies of New Aquarian Digest. It changes Adam’s life—and many other things in the world. He stays up past midnight, reading, eating lemon drops, and wondering how to make Anathema happy.
It sounds like Adam has had a rather mundane upbringing when it comes to religion—so Anathema opens up a whole new world for him by introducing him to spiritual practices. However, it’s also worth noting that she introduces him to environmental issues, which have nothing to do with the occult and everything to do with trying to improve the state of the planet. The fact that this is what changes Adam’s life (and, apparently, other aspects of the world) suggests that as the Antichrist, Adam might not be motivated by evil thoughts—he might try to make the world better.
Themes
At 3:00 a.m., in the control room of Turning Point power station, alarms go off. The chief engineer looks at his dials and controls, which say that megawatts are leaving the station despite there being nothing to produce them. After three hours, the engineer has permission to open up the nuclear reactor. It’s empty, save for a lemon drop.
This is the first indicator that Adam is starting to draw on his superhuman powers as the Antichrist—the lemon drop at the bottom of the nuclear reactor links Adam to the nuclear material’s disappearance. Adam might not know what he’s doing, but Armageddon is clearly drawing closer.
Themes
