Chocolat

“We lit a candle for every room, gold and red and white and orange. I prefer to make my own incense, but in a crisis the bought sticks are good enough for our purposes, lavender and cedar and lemongrass […] for ten minutes we stamped around every room, shouting and singing at the top of our voices—Out! Out! Out!—until the outraged ghosts fled.”

Harris explores The Importance of Spirituality, specifically ritual and stories. She shows how these things can create or shape meaning in human lives—for example, by establishing a feeling of home or driving away sadness, as Vianne and Anouk do here. The colors of the candles are warm and luxurious, creating an atmosphere of safety and comfort. The details of the colors and the scents build vivid sensory imagery. The ambiguity of the ghosts, which could be literal or could reflect Anouk and Vianne’s uncertainties in a new, dark place, is typical of the magical realism genre.

“I look to you to teach me communication. Teach me hope.”

Through this statement by Reynaud to his père, Harris reveals that his mysterious père is in a teaching or guiding role to Reynaud and that Reynaud feels dependent on him. It evokes pathos, highlighting his social isolation as he turns to an unresponsive patient for communication. It suggests a fatalistic state of mind—he lacks hope, laying the ground for his increasing desperation as the novel progresses. Reynaud is aware of his troubles with communication and wants to do better, lending him a more sympathetic quality that makes his antagonism complex. However, Harris implies that this is doomed to fail: He is trapped by the past, turning to a figure who cannot teach him anything.

“She told me in the confessional yesterday, in that breathless girlish tone which goes so ill with promises of repentance.”

This statement explores Reynaud’s relationship to his parishioners, specifically Caroline Clairmont, and exposes his unreliability as a narrator. His lack of respect for her is clear, and he attributes this to her flippancy about repentance. However, his language reveals that his attitude is also informed by his fear, hatred of sensuality, and misogyny. “Breathless” has sexual undertones, and “girlish” refers to her femininity. He doesn’t punctuate these descriptors with a comma, so they pour out of him in a flow, suggesting that he is overwhelmed by his feelings and echoing his lengthy descriptions of Vianne and her chocolate. Harris exposes his unforgiving attitude, which is antithetical to the spirit of the confessional.

“Turning from the doorway to receive the congregation I catch a movement from with-in. Try me. Test me. Taste me.”

This quotation illustrates that Reynaud is developing an obsession with Vianne’s chocolate shop: His senses are attuned to it. To him, the sensory pleasure encapsulated by the shop represents a turning away from the church: He sees it as he is literally turning outward from the church doorway. He is drawn to the shop, personifying the chocolates and imagining them calling out to him. They speak in short, direct statements—personal challenges to his faith. The alliteration of the soft “t” consonants (rather than a harsh plosive) heightens the allure of the chocolate.

“‘Maman, don’t cry.’

I am not crying. I never cry.”

This quotation shows the adult role that Anouk is sometimes forced to take on. Just as Vianne was to her mother, she is her only constant companion, so Vianne depends on her for support despite her young age. Harris shows the way Intergenerational Influences pass down. Vianne’s insistence that she never cries shows that, like Reynaud, she represses her emotions, developing a thick-skinned independence as she travels without forming meaningful connections with anyone else. However, later on, she cries when Armande reveals her plan to die, remembering her mother. Harris anticipates that character development from this moment, able to process her past and to accept her complex feelings about it.

“I put my arms around Guillaume. For a second he tenses, unused to female contact. Then he relaxes. I can feel the strength of his distress coming from him in waves. […]

‘It’s alright to feel this way,’ I tell him firmly. ‘It’s allowed.’”

Harris explores the loneliness and guilt that Guillaume faces around his feelings: He gets tense when Vianne tries to comfort him, and what he most needs to hear is permission for his feelings. This comes partly from Reynaud, but Harris also suggests a gendered element to this, as he isn’t used to female contact. Frequently, especially in socially conservative societies, patriarchal norms dictate that men are discouraged from showing emotion or physical affection. Harris shows the power of kindness and acceptance to counter this: Guillaume relaxes into Vianne’s hug, and as the novel goes on, he forms connections with Anouk, Josephine, Vianne, and Armande.

“‘What did she buy?’

‘I take it you mean Josephine.’

‘My wife.’ He gave the words an odd intonation, a kind of flat finality.”

Muscat’s belief that he is entitled to know everything Josephine does, and that she does not have financial independence, exemplifies his abuse. When Vianne calls her Josephine, Muscat corrects this to the possessive “my wife,” suggesting that he defines her primarily by her relationship to him. His “odd” and “flat” tone of “finality” gives him an aggressive air since it suggests that the status quo cannot be challenged.

“The fear of loss—Death. The fear of displacement—the Tower. The fear of transience—the Chariot.”

Vianne is torn over the significance of the tarot cards: whether they are tools allowing people to map their universal human concerns onto them or whether they hold innate spiritual power. This ambiguity exemplifies the magical realism genre. The fears she describes are universal but also relate to her specifically: She fears the loss of Anouk, she is growing dissatisfied with the displacement of traveling constantly, and she feels transient. Harris explores, through the tarot cards, the power of stories and ritual to take on personal meaning, influencing the characters’ understanding of their own lives.

“The guilding has tarnished with the smoke from the candles […] and prayer, which came as such a blessing, such a source of joy in the early days, is a burden, a cry on the side of a bleak mountain.”

Harris suggests the uplifting potential of spirituality, as prayer was once a “source of joy” to Reynaud. However, his faith has been tainted by what he has done in its name and the betrayal of his père. The beautiful statue of Jesus, which should represent hope and salvation, has become “tarnished” by smoke specifically, recalling his act of arson. The “bleak mountain” echoes Jesus’ time in the wilderness, tying into the temporal setting: It is Lent at this point in the book. This shows the enormous pressure that Reynaud is placing on himself in his search to do adequate penance to redeem himself and his père, trying to follow in Jesus’ footsteps.

“God forbid that a chocolate shop should sell Easter eggs at Easter […] I’m sure there’s room here for both of us.”

Harris explores the connection between Christianity and the pre-Christian pagan festivals from which Christian celebrations are derived. The egg was a symbol of rebirth, a theme central to Easter and many non-Christian spring festivals. Vianne’s suggestion that there should be room for everyone recalls early pagan and even early Christian attitudes toward spirituality in the late antique period, in which a multi-theistic society was accepted and different religions were not seen as competing. As Christianity grew and formalized, it became more concerned with being the dominant or only religion, as Reynaud wants to achieve in Lansquenet.

“The dandelions are spreading, their bitter leaves pushing up the black earth, their white roots forking deep, biting hard. […] I will walk home via the river, père, to observe the small floating city which even now grows.”

Reynaud presents the dandelions as a malevolent force through his use of harsh language: “bitter,” “forking,” and “biting.” This reflects his view of outsider or non-Christian influences in the village, specifically the growth of the Romani community he notes in the next sentence. Although the main color associated with dandelions is yellow, the colors Reynaud associates with them are stark black and white, showing his harsh view of the world—where others would see beauty, he sees a threat. His description of the roots “forking” recalls the forking hand gesture used against him by Vianne and Roux to ward off evil. The dandelions’ determination to survive mirrors Vianne and Roux’s determination to stay in the village in defiance of him.

“Roux grinned. There was no trace of self-consciousness in him tonight. He was good-humoured, filling and refilling the mugs with wine and cider, touchingly pleased to be the host.”

This quotation gives depth and roundness to Roux’s character. His warm personality in his own environment juxtaposes with his defensive manner in much of the rest of the novel, in which he faces prejudice and mistrust. Just as Josephine blooms in the safety of Vianne’s shop, Roux embraces joy and company in an accepting environment. Harris highlights The Power of Community and shared sensory pleasures—his good humor relates to filling the mugs of companions with drinks. Hosting gives him the agency society often seeks to deny him.

“There is danger in all of this, I tell myself desperately; in using these almost forgotten skills I enhance my otherness and make it all the more difficult for us to stay.”

Vianne considers suppressing parts of herself and her beliefs in order to fit in better. Her fear of using the skills passed down by her mother recalls the social politics of early modern witch hunts, in which the skills or expertise of women in particular could swing from being valued to being distrusted. The village wise woman might provide medical or caring services, but magic, or skills that seemed like magic (such as herbal knowledge or comforting rituals), was often divided into the high arts (associated with men) and low magic (associated with women, witchcraft, and the devil).

“Automatically I reached for her thoughts, so open a moment ago. I need to know if I made her do it, if I forced her in spite of my good intentions. But for the moment her thoughts are formless, smoky.”

Harris creates complexity and depth in Vianne’s character by exploring her flaws. Vianne’s fear that she may have accidentally manipulated Josephine magically fits with the magical realism genre; it is also a metaphor for persuading someone to something that may not be the right thing for them. This illustrates how “good intentions” may not reflect a person’s genuine best interests, just like Caro’s interference in Armande’s life or Guillaume’s horror at the idea of having Charly put down. Worried she has impacted Josephine’s agency, Vianne does not back off but intrudes on her private thoughts further. She acts without thinking and imposes her concerns on Josephine. She is also unsure what the accurate version of events is: Harris suggests that she, to a lesser extent than Reynaud, may not be a reliable narrator.

“Death should be a celebration, she told me. Like a birthday. I want to go up like a rocket when my time comes, and fall down in a cloud of stars, and hear everyone go: Ahhhh!”

Vianne’s mother’s attitude toward death mirrors Armande’s, highlighted by her envisaging of it as a “birthday,” the day on which Armande chooses to say farewell. The metaphor of a firework evokes the transience of human life and its potential to be beautiful and vivid in that short time. Her desire for “everyone” to go “Ahhhh!” reflects the desire to witness or mark death—for example, through a funeral or ceremony—but unlike Armande, Vianne’s mother had no community around her to do this, having fled from permanent connections all her life.

“It is not she, but I, who have been blind. The red-ribboned walking-stick, the tentative gestures, the unfinished tapestry, the eyes shadowed beneath a succession of hats…”

Vianne realizes that despite her apparent magical skill at reading people, she has failed to spot the signs of Armande’s diminishing sight. Her eyes being “shadowed” are her literal attempts to hide them, but this also symbolizes the encroaching darkness of her death. The “unfinished tapestry” recalls the Greek myth of the three Fates weaving the thread of a life, which is cut when it is time for the person to die. Metaphorically, Armande is able to finish her tapestry, choosing to close her life with her party.

“It has taken so little to bring her to this state. A little warmth, a few borrowed clothes and the security of a spare room […] Like a flower she grows towards the light.”

The visual metaphor of a flower encapsulates how Josephine has blossomed since leaving Muscat; it has connotations of beauty and brightness. The comparison also highlights the importance of care from Vianne and the broader community—just as a plant requires light, water, and nutrients to flourish, so Josephine’s newfound community has given her the few tools she needed to grow. Josephine’s innate optimism, repressed by her relationship, is expressed: She is inclined to the light.

“For a dreadful second the old memory hits home […] Opening the door, heart trip-hammering in my throat, fists clenched, eyes wide…and seeing on the floor in front of me the pallid arching beast, its proportions half-familiar but bizarrely doubled, two faces raised towards me in frozen expressions of rage-horror-dismay.”

Harris creates an abrupt reveal of the full details of Reynaud’s past, which interrupts his present narrative as he has a flashback. The memory takes over his thoughts so suddenly that it removes him from the real world around him. He is thrown into the physical sensations, such as his hammering heart and his tense fists. The visual images of his mother and his père having sex are described in vivid detail, like a series of snapshots. This suggests that Reynaud is intensely traumatized by this. The way he says that the “old memory hits home” implies that he usually suppresses it. The imagery that Harris uses to describe the scene reflects his horror: He dehumanizes both people, seeing them as a “beast” and using the pronoun “its” rather than “their.” His shock is evident: The word “bizarrely” indicates that he struggles to understand what he’s seeing, and his note of their “frozen” expressions creates the impression that time has slowed down for him.

“The faded sign which has read Café de la République for the last thirty-five years has at last been pulled down. In its place, a bright red-and-white awning—the twin of my own—and a hand-painted sign from Clairmont’s yard which reads Café des Marauds.”

Josephine’s redecoration and renaming of the café is a symbol of her carving out her new identity and new life in the wake of her abusive relationship. The old sign’s faded quality reflects its joylessness; she replaces it with a brightly colored awning that mirrors Vianne’s shop, representing her connection with Vianne. The sign from Clairmont’s yard reflects the acceptance of Josephine by the broader community, even socially conservative followers of Reynaud such as Georges and Caro. “Café de la République” refers to the republic formed after the French Revolution and is a common name for public spaces and shops or cafes in France. It has connotations of patriotism and the establishment, reflecting Muscat’s exclusion of outsiders, whereas Josephine’s choice of “Les Marauds” celebrates the informal housing area that her husband looked down on and that the traveling community moored in. It has connotations of a group of outsiders facing down the establishment, and it reflects the newfound community by which she is supported.

“A gout of flame flared alarmingly and I dropped the card onto the boards […] I felt jubilant. Who rings the changes now, Mother?

And yet tonight I cannot rid myself of the feeling that I have somehow been manipulated.”

Vianne struggles with the different forces impacting her choices. Up until this point, Vianne has used the recurring motif of fire for cooking (pancakes) and for light and rituals of comfort (lighting candles). Here, she uses fire destructively, just as her narrative foil, Reynaud, has done in the past; she has been pulled into his framework of hostility. Burning the Hermit tarot card gives her a feeling of control initially, but she also feels “manipulated.” Her choice has pushed her into the role that Reynaud has imagined for her—that of a witch using magic against others. This juxtaposes with her preferred use of magic to offer unconditional gifts via her chocolate. The unexpected flare, causing her to drop the card, suggests she is not fully in control. This mirrors how Reynaud’s arson also had consequences he did not foresee—the deaths of two people. Harris points to the dangers of turning to destruction to solve a problem.

“The tablecloth is damask, with a fine lace border, and smells of the lavender in which she laid it after her marriage—a gift, never yet used, from her own grandmother.”

Harris reveals Armande’s backstory—she has always loved sensory pleasures, keeping this beautiful cloth in lavender, but in the past, she has held back from enjoying them right away, preserving this cloth for many years rather than enjoying it. Her decision to take it out for the party reflects her new attitude: enjoying life in the present rather than living for an imagined future. Her relationship with her grandmother echoes hers with Luc—just as her grandmother gifted her a beautiful cloth, so Luc gifts her a luxurious slip. She has also gifted him the Rimbaud poetry book and helped him learn to enjoy sensory pleasures in life, such as the chocolate they share and the flowers he plants for her. Harris presents a positive picture of the enrichment and joy that Intergenerational Influences can nurture.

“We lay for a long time, Roux and I, until our sweat cooled, and little insects ran across our bodies, and we smelt the lavender and thyme from the flowerbed at our feet as, holding hands, we watched the unbearable slow wheeling of the sky.”

Harris uses vivid imagery for the sensory experiences that Vienne and Roux share in this scene. The physical sensations of the sweat, the insects, and the scent of the plants create an impression of heightened sensations. Harris focuses on this more than the sex itself—their connection in this moment is not really about sexual attraction but about being alive and able to experience sensory pleasure in the face of the mortality that looms over them after Armande’s party. The description of the sky “wheeling” recalls the idea of fate, often represented as a wheel, and evokes the inevitable progression of time. The word “unbearable” suggests the helplessness of humanity in the face of time and mortality. However, Vianne and Roux hold hands, symbolizing the hope and comfort that human connection can bring in the face of these forces.

“This too is a kind of magic, one that my mother never understood, and yet I am more certain of this—this new miraculous, living warmth inside of me—than of anything I have done before.”

Harris leans into the genre of magical realism: Vianne is aware of a new life inside her immediately after having sex with Roux, something that shouldn’t be possible. The magic she describes is ambiguous: It is unclear whether it is literal or a metaphor for the act of creating a child or the fulfilment that sex can bring. Harris suggests further the idea that Vianne’s mother is not her biological mother, as she never experienced this feeling. The word “miraculous” relates the themes of new life and rebirth to Easter and pagan spring festivals. Where Reynaud hopes that his past will be restored and his père will awaken, Vianne looks to the future and to the creation of something new. This new life arrives within her as Armande dies, evoking the hopeful idea of a circle of life.