49 pages • 1 hour read
Judy BlumeAre You There God? It's Me, Margaret
Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 1970A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 11-15Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 11 Summary
December rolls around, and the rules start to change for the Four PTS meetings. The girls no longer use their secret names, and the Boy Books fall by the wayside because the girls never list anyone other than Philip Leroy. However, Margaret starts to wonder if Janie and Gretchen actually like Philip Leroy or if they are only saying that because he’s “so good-looking” and the girls are actually “ashamed to write who they really liked” (78), just like Margaret. One day, Gretchen sneaks her father’s anatomy book over to Margaret’s house, and the girls marvel at the diagrams and illustrations of the male body. The girls are amazed and a little disgusted by what they see, and Janie declares that she never wants to walk around naked, not even when she’s married. Nancy says that Janie will change her mind once she grows, and she’ll want people to look at her body, just like the girls in Playboy. Nancy urges Margaret to find one of her father’s issues of Playboy, and the girls are shocked to see a naked girl who is only 18, just six years older than they are. The girls are impressed by the model’s breasts, and although Margaret tries to point out that the girl looks “out of proportion,” like there’s “something wrong with her” (81), the girls are so inspired by the model’s body that they end their meeting with 50 rounds of “We must—we must—we must increase our bust!” (81).
Chapter 12 Summary
Grandma leaves for her annual Caribbean cruise, and Margaret and her parents go to see her off. Margaret’s mother becomes “frantically busy” with sending out Christmas cards, or as she calls them, “holiday greetings” (83), since the family doesn’t celebrate Christmas. Margaret’s mother grew up using holiday cards to keep in touch with family and friends, but this year Margaret is surprised to see that her mother sends a card to her parents, Margaret’s grandparents whom she has never met. Margaret doesn’t mention it to her mother because she suspects it was meant to be a secret. At school, Mr. Benedict’s class is chosen to be the choir for the school’s Christmas-Hanukkah pageant. Before the pageant, a Jewish student tells Mr. Benedict that he can’t sing the Christmas songs, and a Christian student says that she can’t sing the Hanukkah songs: Both students explain that doing so would be against their religions. Once again, Margaret ponders religion, and she wonders if she should try to celebrate Christmas or Hanukkah this year. The pageant takes place on the last day of school before winter vacation, and when Margaret gets home from school, she discovers that a letter has come for her.
Chapter 13 Summary
Margaret has no idea who might have sent her a letter, and she is excited and intrigued. However, she quickly discovers that it’s an invitation to Norman Fishbein’s party, which confuses her. After all, Margaret thinks Norman is a “drip,” and she “never even talked to him” (89), so she doesn’t understand why he would invite her to his house for a party. Still, she decides that her first real party in Farbrook is worth getting excited about, and she gets a call from Nancy, who has also been invited. Janie and Gretchen also received invitations, and Nancy discovers that Norman has invited their entire class. Margaret, Nancy, Janie, and Gretchen spend the day of the party in a whirlwind of preparation, choosing the perfect outfits, doing their hair and nails, and trying to look their best. Before the party, Margaret looks at her body in the mirror. She prays to God again to help her grow, reminding him that she has “waited patiently” (92). She decides to put a few cotton balls inside her bra, and she tells herself that “probably other girls [do] it too” (93).
Chapter 14 Summary
Nancy’s father picks up Margaret, and the PTS head to Norman Fishbein’s party. Upon arrival, they discover that most of their class has arrived, and they gather downstairs at the Fishbeins’ house. The children immediately separate themselves into gendered groups, and Mrs. Fishbein tells the group that she “expect[s] [them] to behave like ladies and gentlemen” (99) when she isn’t around. Nancy gets into an altercation with Freddy, and he accidentally rips the pocket off of her dress. Mrs. Fishbein is furious and warns the partygoers to behave, or she will tell their parents about their antics. Once Mrs. Fishbein leaves, Norman suggests they play a game. They decide on Spin the Bottle, but when it becomes clear that no one wants to kiss anyone on the lips, Margaret is relieved. Jay suggests a new game called Two Minutes in the Closet, where the kids draw numbers and have to go into the bathroom in pairs for alone time. Margaret watches as the couples go into the bathroom, and to her shock, Philip Leroy calls her number. In the bathroom, Margaret is so nervous that she can’t stop giggling. Philip kisses Margaret on the lips—“a really fast kiss” that “[isn’t] the kind you see in the movies where the boy and girl cling together for a long time” (105). He kisses her a second time, then leaves the bathroom. When it’s Margaret’s turn to call a number, she ends up with Norman, who tells her he likes her and gives her a quick kiss on the cheek. Later, Nancy calls Margaret “the luckiest girl in the world” (106) because she got to kiss Philip Leroy.
Chapter 15 Summary
Margaret decides to go to church with Nancy on Christmas Eve, and although she loves the long choir performance, she later prays to God and admits that she “didn’t really feel” God’s presence in the church, and she’s “more confused than ever” (108). Grandma returns from her cruise and leaves for Florida, where she plans to spend the next few months, but she calls Margaret often and sends her postcards. One day at school, the sixth-grade girls are pulled out of class to see what Nancy refers to as “the big deal sex movie” (109), which is a film about menstruation. During the film, the girls are giggly, and Margaret notices that the information is ambiguous and leaves many questions unanswered. Gretchen gets her period a week later, and the other PTS members beg her to share all the details. They find her report underwhelming, and Nancy is stunned that she wasn’t the first in the group to get her period. Margaret starts to fixate on getting her period and worries that she might be the last PTS to get it. One weekend, Nancy and her family go out of town, and Margaret receives a postcard from Nancy that simply says, “I GOT IT!!!” (116). Margaret is overwhelmed with jealousy, and she continues to pray to God to hurry up and let her have her period because she desperately wants to be like everyone else.
Chapters 11-15 Analysis
Magazines like Playboy have been around for decades, and similar publications have come under fire for creating a distorted perception of female bodies. In Chapter 11, Margaret and her friends are shocked to see the Playboy model who is only six years older than they are, and the girls are overwhelmed with worry. They want to look like this girl because she—and her body type—are what men supposedly want, according to Playboy. Even Margaret’s father, who appears to be a happily-married man, is tempted by the images of the young Playboy girls. Details like this explain why Margaret and her friends feel intimidated by girls like Laura Danker. Even though Laura is not liked by the boys because she is too tall and intimidates them, the girls are jealous of Laura because she looks so much more grown-up than they do. Through no fault of her own, Laura’s developed body makes the other girls envious because they have not developed yet, which again demonstrates the theme of Self-Image and Jealousy. This jealousy manifests into gossip, and Margaret has already formed an opinion about Laura before ever speaking to her. Objectification of women sparks unnecessary jealousy, and this objectification trickles down to younger boys and girls who are still learning about themselves and their bodies.
Norman’s party serves as a rite of passage for Margaret and her friends, reflecting the Pressure to Grow Up and “Become a Woman” theme. The PTS invest lots of time and energy into looking their best for their first real party, and the children practice dressing up like grown-ups to impress their classmates. Margaret adds cotton to her bra, highlighting how the bra symbolizes the expectation to appear more grown up. For the first time, the kids are left mostly unsupervised, and they quickly go for a series of games that are somewhat sexual in nature. There is lots of kissing, and Norman even suggests a game that involves the boys touching the girls in the dark. The partygoers may all be in the sixth grade, but they are all curious about those of a different gender. The party is their first chance to explore and experiment with romantic relationships and small acts of physical intimacy away from the watchful gaze of their teachers and parents. Still, Margaret reveals that there is a lot of nervousness among the partygoers, and many of the participants aren’t prepared to take these early steps into young adulthood just yet.
Margaret and the other girls are so desperate for more information about periods that they practically interrogate Gretchen when she gets her period. Although Margaret’s school (and many schools like it) teach a rudimentary lesson about the technical details of getting one’s period, they leave out things that describe the experience. For example, the girls are not told about cramps, premenstrual syndrome, mood swings, or what it will feel like when a girl gets her period. Margaret notices that the “lesson” provided by the school feels like a big commercial for sanitary products, and when Nancy asks about tampons, the presenter’s response—that young girls shouldn’t use them—carries overtones of purity culture. In this regard, not much has changed since the book’s initial publication in 1970. For years, the belief that tampons are sinful and inappropriate has been widespread, and to this day, stories of parents forbidding their young daughters from using tampons because they are too similar to sexual intercourse abound. Misinformation like this is harmful and can cause a lifetime of shame and confusion around menstruation and period products, and Margaret and her friends are already beginning to feel this way. Margaret also begins to fixate on the idea of going through puberty and getting her period, and she believes that she won’t be “normal” until she gets it: even though she is still young, and the window for getting periods can be wide and unpredictable.
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