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The Anatomy Lesson: Chapter 9
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in On Beauty, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
The Nature of Beauty
Politics in Academia
Race and Identity
The Value of Family
Summary
Analysis
At 16, Katie Armstrong is one of the youngest students at Wellington College. She was the best student at her high school in Indiana, and now she isn’t sure whether she wants to be an art history major or an English major. She is naturally shy and afraid of some classes, in particular Howard’s class. Still, she sticks with it because she thinks Rembrandt was a genius.
The introduction of the new character Katie provides an outside perspective on why someone from the younger generation might be drawn to Howard and his classes. As this introduction reveals, Katie is still relatively naïve, unsure about what she wants to do with her future, and even afraid of Howard, who is not an especially imposing figure.
Themes
Katie struggles with understanding what Howard is saying about Rembrandt, and even after she looks up words like “liminality,” she doesn’t understand what Howard means when he uses them. Katie is impressed by almost all the other students in the class, including Victoria, although she doesn’t like Zora much.
This passage suggests that perhaps Howard isn’t such a great lecturer and that he might be hiding behind jargony terms like “liminality” to project an air of intelligence. The irony is that his overreliance on abstract terms causes him to fail at the practical task at hand: educating his students.
Themes
After class, Christian tells Howard that, as recommended, he’s been doing research on the limits of political speech and hate speech on campus. Howard is too distracted by Victoria, whom he feels is more stunning than any other student he’s had in his class in 20 years of teaching.
Earlier, Howard tried to defend himself to Kiki by saying that at least his affair was with an older woman (as opposed to a student). Now, as Howard ogles Victoria—who wasn’t even born when Howard started teaching—he begins to lose even that flimsy defense.
Themes
When Howard leaves the classroom, he finds Victoria there, asking to speak briefly with him. They talk at first about how heavily it’s snowing outside. Eventually, Victoria says she’s part of Emerson House, which is having a dinner that she’s supposed to invite three professors to. She invites Howard to come. Howard hesitates at first, wanting to know if Victoria checked with Monty first, but Victoria says Monty already has plenty of invites. Howard accepts, on the condition that the event can’t involve a glee club performance.
Like Harvard, Wellington seems to have different houses that students are affiliated with (with Emerson House likely named after the famous philosopher and poet Ralph Waldo Emerson, who in real life lived not far from where the fictional Wellington would be). This dinner between Victoria and Howard could confirm that Howard’s interest in Victoria isn’t one-sided, although at this point it isn’t clear if Victoria has a sexual interest in Howard or just an academic one, like Zora’s interest in Claire.
Themes
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Claire feels that each student only writes variations on one poem, with Ron focusing on sex, Daisy focusing on New York, Chantelle focusing on Black struggle, and Zora sounding like “a random word-generating machine.” Regardless, Claire is always enthusiastic about new poems from her students.
Claire’s style as a professor combines both the jaded attitude of a veteran teacher with a bit of optimism. While Claire can see how her students seemingly struggle to change the types of poems they write, she nevertheless remains enthusiastic about trying to “refine” them. Her bias against Zora comes through in the scathing comparison of Zora to “a random word-generating machine.” The description also suggests that Zora is trying too hard to make her writing sound interesting or complex.
Themes
Claire often tries to connect her students to poets from the past in flattering ways. Carl, however, always denies that he knows anything about poets of the past. Claire keeps trying to get him to write a sonnet, but Carl puts it off until the fourth session of class. Although Carl himself is unsure about his sonnet, everyone in class praises it.
Claire shows that she is willing to resort to flattery to maintain her status as a popular professor. Additionally, particularly in the case of Carl, Claire’s comparisons to the past seem to be a way of situating her students in the same tradition of poetry as Claire. Carl’s reluctance to engage with the past (and with it the whole cannon of poetry Claire knows) underscores Claire’s fears of irrelevance.
Themes
After class, Claire talks with Zora about an upcoming faculty meeting. It will be huge, and everyone knows it will be the one where Howard raises objections to Monty’s lectures. Claire tells Zora that there are also other issues at stake—some people at the university don’t want “people like Carl” to be able to take classes like Claire’s. She wants Zora to say some words about how she feels she’s benefited from having Carl in class.
While Claire and Zora have had their differences, in this passage, Claire sees that, just as Zora wants Claire on résumé, Claire can gain some benefits by having Zora on her side. Claire uses language to hint that Carl’s exclusion from the class may be a racial justice issue, trying to give Zora a reason to latch on to the issue herself.
Themes
Zora agrees. She feels that an institution as big as Wellington should be eager to use its ample resources on Carl and non-students like him. Claire allows Zora to write her own speech.
Claire and Zora each see how they can use the other for personal gain, with Claire’s cause giving Zora a chance to shine on campus and Claire getting to take some of the credit for inspiring Zora.
Themes
