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Themes are the fundamental and often universal ideas explored in a literary work.
The Need for Nostalgia
One of the recurring themes in Woolf’s story is the need for nostalgia. As they stroll through the garden, the characters reminisce about their past lives, and this remembrance forms a crucial, if not central, point of their story: the past is the past, although it relates to and affects the present. Simon’s nostalgia, vividly recalling details such as Lily’s bouncing toe and a fluttering dragonfly, triggers memories of her rejection. Yet, he seems to embrace this event, recognizing its role in shaping his current reality with his wife and children. When he tells Eleanor about his thoughts, her response reflects no hints of jealousy. Instead, she points out that it is natural to get nostalgic in a garden. She keenly observes how the other people in the garden—people creating memories of their own—act as “ghosts of the past,” reminding them of the days left behind. The old man displays nostalgia over the dead, longing to communicate with them, and his fantasy about Uruguay suggests a connection with real memories of and longings for the past. Even the ponderous woman and her friend, although the details of what they are saying are obscure, gossip about conversations they’ve had with family and friends in the recent past, as well as meals they’ve eaten. Most of the story’s characters, prompted by the garden setting and their leisurely stroll through it, find themselves drifting into nostalgic thoughts, highlighting the connection between the past and the present. In essence, nostalgia becomes a lens for the characters to contemplate their lives and the passage of time in the tranquil setting of the gardens.
The Power of Human Empathy
“Kew Gardens,” although its structure and approach are experimental, touches on distinct themes around the power of human empathy. The characters, including a passing snail, move through the garden without receiving narratorial judgment, offering glimpses into lives with which readers can empathize. The story of Simon and Eleanor, for example, presents tales of love lost and unfulfilled potential. He dwells on Lily, while Eleanor dwells on an unexpected kiss she received as a child. Both merit empathy for what they have lost, although Simon, at least, seems to be happy. The elderly eccentric is a broken man with a broken mind, perhaps driven from sanity by his awareness of the war or a lost love. As is true of human grief, he denies loss, clinging to the idea that the dead are not gone but instead remain available to the living. Both Trissie and her partner inspire empathy. She sees value in the garden, longs to explore it further, and objects to any suggestion that the visit would not be worth the cost. He, on the other hand, is aware of how little money he has and drags her off for tea, not in anger or frustration over their disagreement, but in excitement over the fact that he will spend the only coin he has. The stories hinted at in Woolf’s brief glimpses are dramatic and poignant, fostering empathy for each character the narrator introduces.
The Beauty of Nature’s Visual Spectacle
The short story is filled with descriptive, almost poetic imagery that creates a visual spectacle revealing the beauty of nature represented through both color and living things. It opens with a vivid description of the flowerbed, which includes flowers of different shapes and colors that play with each other in the summer breeze to create a wonderfully dynamic assortment of shades. Other natural elements reflect these colors, increasing emphasis on this spectacle. These include pebbles and raindrops, enhanced by the falling sunlight, “which expanded with such intensity of red, blue and yellow the thin walls of water that one expected them to burst and disappear.” The use of colors also extends to dynamic and highly descriptive views of animate life across the scene. White and blue butterflies zig-zag in the air, echoing the irregular movement of the people in the garden, and even Simon’s memory includes a dragonfly that “went round and round,” without settling on a leaf. The snail, especially, is treated with visual precision that creates a sense of the magnitude of its journey. Its shell reflects shades of red, blue, and yellow from the nearby flowers, as it navigates the path, encountering a green insect along the way. The path itself is surrounded by brown cliffs and green lakes of grass. Woolf’s narrative, from beginning to end, is filled with colorful imagery that directs an awareness of nature’s visual beauty.
