65 pages • 2 hours read
Tahereh MafiShatter Me
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2011A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
The Impact of Physical and Emotional Isolation
In Shatter Me, Mafi explores the themes of both physical and emotional isolation. When Juliette’s parents learned that her touch could be lethal, they isolated themselves from her and abused her both verbally and physically. Thus, parental care is something alien to Juliette. She doesn’t know what it’s like to experience “the warmth of any kind of embrace,” and her body hurts from “the inescapable ice of isolation” (11). Instead of trying to understand Juliette’s condition, her parents not only physically isolated her but also blamed her for ruining their dream of having a perfect family. This led to Juliette isolating herself emotionally to prevent herself from hurting her parents even more.
Moreover, Juliette has felt separate from others for so long that she finds it hard to believe that she can be an integral part of a community. Since Juliette has been ostracized since an early age, she finds it hard to trust other people and to become open to them. Fear and repulsion that her parents and peers showed toward Juliette damaged her self-image and forced her to believe that she was unworthy of love and care. However, as the plot progresses, Juliette manages to overcome the consequences of her ostracization and regains her self-confidence.
In the novel, Mafi explores the theme of isolation on multiple levels. Apart from a personal level, manifested predominantly in Juliette and the psychological toll that isolation takes on her, the author also foregrounds the emotional isolation of other people around Juliette. Since the new totalitarian regime has taken control over the country, people stopped talking to each other and stopped smiling. Although they are not necessarily physically isolated from each other, they are detached emotionally. Yet when Juliette arrives at Omega Point, she notices that “people look up when they see [them], some wave, smile, delighted” (305), and this suggests that those who find the strength to resist the regime also maintain healthy social connections.
The Importance of Resisting Tyranny
The society in the novel is devastated by wars and pollution and ruled by a totalitarian regime called The Reestablishment. This new government strives to control every aspect of human life, from creating a new language to regulating what and how much people eat, and the oppressive details of Juliette’s years of imprisonment emphasize the fact that The Reestablishment functions by spreading fear and misinformation and isolating anyone it deems to be a threat. Juliette herself suffers endless injustices and is made to question her own mental health when she is faced with Warner’s devious attempts at manipulation and outright gaslighting. However, each section of the novel finds different ways to foreshadow the fact that there are those who manage to resist the endless injustices that this new order perpetuates. In both implicit and explicit ways, many people oppose the totalitarian rule that threatens to crush their spirit, and they actively work to preserve their humanity despite the myriad hardships of their dystopian existence.
Adam, for example, initially maintains the illusion of supporting the dominant order but fights against the regime on a personal level. Despite growing up with an abusive father, he does not become a violent or vindictive soldier. Instead, he uses his position in the army to undermine the efforts of The Reestablishment from within. Even in the midst of his subterfuge at the novel’s beginning, when he is obligated to pose as a fellow cellmate alongside the imprisoned Juliette, his slowly softening demeanor in her presence suggests that he holds depths that make him more than just a subject of the system.
Most importantly, however, Juliette’s agonized struggle and eventual transformation are deeply infused with the need to resist tyranny, for no matter what tactics Warner uses to suborn her free will and undermine her integrity, she refuses to succumb to his will. On a subtler level, she also resists the attempts of the new regime to destroy all books and cultural artifacts, for she actively keeps a notebook and writes down her thoughts, thereby preserving both her language and the freedom of her mind. Similarly, Castle and other members of Omega Point combine their individual efforts of resistance to create an empowered force that works to undermine The Reestablishment. This development emphasizes the ability of the collective human spirit to resist the dehumanizing efforts of totalitarian regimes even under the yoke of total control.
Embracing Hope as a Form of Defiance
In addition to focusing on the physical realities of living under a totalitarian regime, Shatter Me also examines the long-term psychological and emotional damage that citizens suffer amid a society crippled by fear, manipulation, and control.
Juliette’s own background reflects the deeply ingrained injustices of the dystopian society that Mafi has created. When she commits an act of kindness and makes physical contact with the boy in the supermarket, the unintentionally disastrous results of her gesture cause her community and even her parents to regard her with fear and condemn her to an isolated life without love, respect, or the least shred of human regard. Faced with the dire circumstances of being imprisoned in a psychiatric institution for years on end, Juliette must find small ways to defy those who have stolen her life and her freedom because of an ability that she did not want and does not understand.
To this end, her act of keeping a notebook and writing down her thoughts about herself and her society represents one of the few ways in which she can maintain control of her inner world and exert her will on the external world in some small form. In this way, she manages to hold on to hope amid the external pressures of confinement and manipulation. Within this context, her strikethroughs illustrate the difference between what she thinks and what she chooses to share with others, but this small form of resistance is insufficient to allow her to preserve the full extent of her spiritual strength and independence.
As the novel unfolds, Juliette’s battle of wills against Warner and her growing attraction to Adam emphasize the fact that finding a source of hope and determination is as vital for human survival as food and shelter. Even though the broader state of human civilization depicted in the text is designed to exude a sense of hopelessness, Juliette’s experiences bring her in contact with those who find the strength to fight for a better future, whether their forms of resistance are covert or overt. For example, Castle, the leader of the resistance, tells Juliette at the end of the novel that his group has been “planning, organizing, [and] mapping out [their] strategy for many years” (306). This admission demonstrates the fact that despite dire conditions, people have made the effort to transcend the scrabble for short-term necessities and are actively nurturing their hope to fight back against societal injustice. This revelation highlights the power of human resilience even in the midst of social and political upheaval.
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