Ashley's view on the themes of the first six chapters of Beka Lamb

In the first six chapters of “Beka Lamb”, we are introduced to many different themes. Some of these themes are death, success and failure, poverty, politics, overcoming obstacles, maturity, racial discrimination and change. One of the first themes that were brought to my attention was that of change.

At the beginning of the first chapter, Beka’s grandmother says “But things can change fi true” and “And long befo’ time, you wouldn’t be at no convent school”. From these two statements we can see that there was some sort of improvement in school work, also because Beka won a competition, and passed her first term. At the end of chapter 2, we get more clarification as to what happened. Her mother is asking her if she can pass the next two terms of school and Beka in turn says that she will try. This shows that Beka is trying to change he attitude towards her schoolwork. Apart from schoolwork, Beka used to lie about things like doing chores. She started making an effort to stop lying and do more housework. This theme of change can also be classified as one of maturity because it is showing how Beka is changing her ways to become more mature. This is also shown when she starts asking her father about politics and asks him for a drink of coffee.

Another theme that is constantly shown in the first six chapters is death. Beka’s friend, Toycie, has died. The whole atmosphere of the environment is gloomy and depressing. Some of the description of the place are; “the insistent grumblings of frogs” and “the nervous continuous shrilling of every cricket”. She also tells us of flies, which is an insect you usually find around dead organisms. Even the houses were not in a good state. The following lines describe the state of the houses an give us a better idea as to how the place looked and how it contributes to the theme of death. “Many of the weathered wooden houses, built fairly close together, tilted slightly as often as not, on top pinewood posts of varying heights.”

We see two themes in Beka’s dream, racial discrimination and success and failure. When she is stuck on the bridge, the people below her are telling her things like “Jump, nigga gial, jump! We’ll ketch you!” This shows us that people are judged by their social status and rank in society. Beka doesn’t want to fall into the creak below because it is filthy. In her mind, the creak represents failure and the other side of the bridge represents success. Nobody likes to fail, so Beka is scared because she knows that if she falls in, she has failed.