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Chapter 5
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Tar Baby, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Systemic Racism and Power
Expectations of Womanhood
Colonialism and Enslavement
Toxic Masculinity
Innocence and Guilt
Summary
Analysis
On the day before Christmas Eve, Margaret is cooking for Christmas dinner. Michael, Dr. Michelin, and Michael’s former professor are all supposed to come soon. Valerian urges Margaret to cook the olieballen (a traditional Dutch doughnut) that his grandmother used to make, but Margaret isn’t familiar with the dish and is reluctant to do the extra work. Ondine isn’t excited about not cooking the meal, and she’s sure that whatever Margaret does will be unsatisfactory. She’s also not happy that Jadine has been spending so much time with Son. Sydney says that whatever is happening between the two of them isn’t serious, and Ondine shouldn’t worry.
Valerian again displays his tendency to control Margaret as he pushes her to make a dessert that she’s not familiar with to satisfy his own nostalgia. The fact that Margaret is cooking at all signals how much she is looking forward to Christmas dinner, particularly because Michael is planning to come (or so Margaret hopes). Those high expectations build yet more tension: what if the fear Margaret expressed earlier—that Michael won’t come, after all—comes true?
Themes
None of the guests show up for Christmas. They can’t get ahold of Michael to find out why he hasn’t come. Margaret abandons her cooking plans, and Ondine has to take over at the last minute. Valerian invites Ondine and Sydney to eat Christmas dinner with him, Margaret, Son, and Jadine. That day, before the dinner, Son sees Margaret suntanning. He initially intends to apologize to her for hiding in her closet but ends up laughing at the image she has of him as someone who wanted to rape her. Margaret doesn’t know what to make of Son’s laughter and steers the conversation toward Michael. She says that he’s been working with teenagers on Native American reservations where there are high rates of teen suicide. Everyone loves Michael, she says. He could have been the president of the candy company, but he wanted a life with value, not just money.
Margaret’s comment that Michael wanted a life of value rather than just money points to some of the main themes and tensions of the novel. Michael finds meaning in helping others, while Son focuses on the value of community. That similarity between Son and Michael further establishes the idea that Son is, in part, a stand-in for Michael throughout the Christmas proceedings. The novel contrasts Son and Michael’s values to those of Valerian and Jadine, both of whom are fixated on material things and believe that money will give them power and happiness.
Themes
At Christmas dinner, Valerian says that he fired Gideon and Thérèse after he caught them stealing apples. Son fumes as he thinks about what Valerian has done, and he can’t believe Valerian’s callousness. The man built a fortune paying next to nothing for cocoa and sugar—essentially stealing it—from islands like the one he now inhabits. On that island, Valerian paid people paltry wages to build a house and do work he could not do himself, and then when those people wanted apples for their own Christmas dinner, he fired them without a second thought. And Son can’t believe that Jadine defends Valerian. At the table, Sydney, referring to Son, notes that when other people steal, they get to sleep in the guest room.
This passage builds on the novel’s biblical imagery, further subverting the biblical narrative of the Fall. Gideon and Thérèse steal apples, an allusion to Adam and Eve eating from the tree of knowledge. In the bible, God forbade Adam and Eve from eating the tree’s fruit, and he punished them after they defied him, a scene echoed when Valerian fires Gideon and Thérèse, symbolically banished them from the paradise he has built. As Son points out, though, Gideon and Thérèse are not the guilty ones: their theft of apples pales in comparison to Valerian’s complicity in the systemic exploitation of Black people on the island. Their punishment, or banishment, then represents not just the height of Valerian’s hypocrisy, but also the injustice of the prevailing power structures.
Themes
Son asks Valerian if he would have given Gideon and Thérèse apples if they had asked. Valerian says of course he would have. Instead, they tried to steal all the apples, which the U.S. consulate had gone to great lengths to acquire. Son says Valerian isn’t the one who went out of his way to get them, just like he didn’t go out of his way to check on Margaret the night she found Son in her closet. Valerian tells Son to leave his house immediately, and Son says he doesn’t think he will. Ondine enters the argument and is upset that no one told her that Gideon and Thérèse had been fired. Ondine says she deserves just as much respect as Margaret, if not more, since she’s the one who cleans up Margaret’s messes. Jadine tells Ondine to be careful about what she’s saying. Ondine says Margaret isn’t fit to be in her (Ondine’s) kitchen.
Valerian has previously appeared to be a god-like figure, characterized by his apparent benevolence and complete control over what happened at L'Arbe de la Croix. But Son’s defiance of Valerian’s orders punctures that veneer. Son and Valerian essentially argue about the role that money should play in relation to labor. According to Valerian, money gives a person justified power and privilege. Son, in contrast, argues that labor, rather than money, should grant a person that kind of power. Son supports his argument by showing how people like Valerian have accrued money, and therefore power, through systemic exploitation of people who work for them.
Themes
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Valerian tells Ondine to leave and says that she’s fired. Ondine says that if she isn’t around to feed Valerian, he’ll die in a week—which would be a good thing because then at least he could get away from Margaret. Margaret throws a glass at Ondine. Ondine slaps Margaret across the face with the back of her hand and calls her a “baby killer.” Margaret repeatedly calls Ondine a slur. Ondine says that when Michael was a child, Margaret cut him, stuck pins in him, and burned him with cigarettes. Ondine sobs and says that she would comfort Michael and that the abuse happened so often that eventually Michael stopped crying when it did. Sydney walks Ondine out of the room. Margaret says that she has always loved her son.
After Son openly defies Valerian, Ondine follows suit. Both characters implicitly challenge the engrained hierarchy and power structures that have defined life at L’Arbe des Chevaliers and, by extension, American society generally. Notably, Ondine’s revelations about Margaret’s abuse of Michael come just after Son confronts Valerian about his exploitation of Black people. The novel places the indictments of Valerian and Margaret side by side to draw comparisons between the horror of both instances of immorality and to show the sinister abuse that lies beneath the surface of Valerian and Margaret’s wealth.
Themes
Jadine takes Son’s hand and says that what happened at dinner was awful. They leave the dining room together and go to Jadine’s bedroom. Jadine says she doesn’t know why Ondine never told anyone about Margaret’s abuse of Michael. Son says Ondine was either a “good servant” or didn’t want to lose her job. Jadine says that she wants Son to stay with her that night and sleep in her room, but she doesn’t want to have sex. Son says he won’t do anything that Jadine doesn’t want him to.
Son’s assertion that Ondine either wanted to be a “good servant” or didn’t want to lose her job highlights the novel’s exploration of power, abuse, and complicity by showing how people who have been victims of unjust power structures can become complicit in the abuse of others. In this case, Ondine’s potential desire to be a “good servant” would signal willful complicity, while her fear of losing her job would show how he power imbalance between Ondine and her employers coerced her into becoming complicit in Margaret’s abuse of Michael.
Themes
