Carrie Part 1, Section 5 Summary & Analysis

Summary: Part 1, Section 5

“You must be crazy.”

At Tommy’s house Sue tells him she wants him to ask Carrie to the prom. She thinks it will bring Carrie out of her shell, and the gesture will make up for Sue’s role in the locker room incident as well as a lifetime of teasing. Tommy points out that younger kids naturally lack empathy. Sue counters that a lot of people don’t become better as they get older, they tend to get better at doing unkind things. Tommy tells Sue he loves her, and agrees to ask Carrie to the prom. Tommy is nervous when he approaches Carrie in study hall. He looks at her and sees that she is far from ugly and notices her full lips and strong calves. When he asks her to prom, she looks at and him and blinks and he gets a strange feeling that quickly subsides. She says she does not like to be tricked, and Tommy sees the dignity she possesses. She accepts his invitation, even as she thinks it will be a “nightmare.”

An excerpt from The Shadow Exploded examines Tommy’s role in the destruction of Chamberlain, questions whether he knowingly participated in the events that led to it, and debates the truth of Sue’s claim that Tommy’s invitation was a gesture of atonement. Scholars who doubt Sue’s claim believe that adolescents don’t typically feel the need to atone for anything. The paper’s author refutes Tommy’s “dumb jock” image, noting his excellent grades, social consciousness, and independence from his peer group. It also notes that there are twelve survivors from prom night.

Instead of Woolworth’s, where she usually goes, Carrie goes to an upscale store to buy fabric for her prom dress. She is intimidated but the experience titillates her because she knows she could rain destruction on the other patrons. At home she practices flexing and marvels at the girlhood memories she is suddenly able to recall, including early episodes of flexing, the rain of stones, and her mother holding her father’s butcher knife while threatening to cut out Carrie’s eyes.

At dinner, Carrie tells Margaret that Tommy asked her to prom and she accepted. Margaret throws her tea in Carrie’s face and attempts to manhandle her toward the closet, jabbering about boys who come sniffing like dogs, roadhouses, and whiskey. She raises her hand to strike Carrie and Carrie stops it in midair, sends the teacup into the wall, and screams that she is going. More calmly, she tells Margaret she doesn’t want to fight but she is going to live her own life. Later, when she is alone, Carrie is uneasy about her reactions but thinks that this feeling is better than the closet. She also thinks about how Tommy’s invitation must be an attempt at atonement for something, a concept she is familiar with. She ponders whether her gift is one of light or of darkness and realizes she does not care either way.

Analysis: Part 1, Section 5

In Section 4, Sue began to hold herself accountable for her role in the locker room incident; in Section 5, she begins to act as if she holds herself solely responsible for righting the wrongs against Carrie, and not just the recent ones. She holds Tommy in such high esteem that she thinks a single, platonic date with him will somehow transform Carrie into a normal, outgoing girl, and that her tortured soul will begin to heal during a dance in a high school gym. Sue’s hubris is on full display when she proposes the scenario to Tommy, not only because she thinks it will work but because she thinks he will agree to it. The fact that he does is a testament to his feelings for Sue, not to his confidence in her plan. It is unclear whether his nervousness as he approaches Carrie is due to his feelings about the plan’s success, or the worry that she might refuse his invitation. When he looks at her and realizes that she is not ugly, he might be the first person since Estelle Horan to consider her beauty.

By the time Carrie goes to the store to shop for fabric for her prom dress, she is fully aware of the scope of her powers even though she has done little more than experiment with moving household objects. Even though it is not easy for her to do new things, she steps outside of her comfort zone to go to a different store. Recalling childhood memories is also a new experience for her, and she has only begun to connect the dots in her past between the rain of stones, her mother’s rage, and her father’s butcher knife. When Carrie tells Margaret that she is going to prom, Margaret immediately begins outlining her view of what will become Carrie’s future by yelling about what she believes is the inevitable trajectory from blood to boys to sin.

The scholars quoted in The Shadow Exploded doubt Tommy’s motives for asking Carrie to prom, but both Carrie and Sue believe that it is a gesture of atonement. Sue is certain of Tommy’s motives because the invitation was her idea, and Carrie has been familiar with the concept of atonement since childhood because Margaret frequently forces Carrie to atone for her sins. This practice has made it easy for Carrie to imagine that Tommy’s invitation is an attempt at atonement, though she doesn’t specify whose sins or what sins would be atoned. While Sue and Carrie don’t know it yet, this mutual understanding of the nature of Tommy’s gesture is not the first perception the two of them will share.