46 pages • 1 hour read
Robinne LeeThe Idea of You
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2017A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Summary
Background
Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Character Analysis
Themes
Symbols & Motifs
Important Quotes
Essay Topics
Tools
BetaSymbols & Motifs
Art
Author Robinne Lee uses art throughout the novel to convey Solène Marchand’s deep passion for art and to highlight a greater message about society’s treatment of women. As a gallery owner who promotes the work of primarily women artists, Solène details throughout the novel the various art works featured in her gallery. Solène attributes her love of art and her career as the cause of her marriage’s demise. Her choice to pursue her career rather than submit to her ex-husband Daniel’s demands to focus on motherhood characterizes Solène as an independent woman who is unafraid to rebel against society’s expectation of women. The artwork she features in her gallery highlights this same subversion of expectations. One particular piece by Ailynne Cho entitled “Unclose Me” features a nude woman in a seductive scene. Hayes purchases the piece for Solène after she describes how much she loves it. Lee creates this piece as Hayes’s gift to Solène to convey his support of Solène’s passion and to juxtapose him to Daniel. The piece also emphasizes a woman’s sexuality, which mirrors Solène’s own journey of self-discovery through her sexual relationship with Hayes. While society pressures women to hide their sexuality once they are past the age of traditional objectification, the visual art imagined Lee’s work celebrates every element of womanhood regardless of age. Another piece created by Lee is by the fictional artist Anya Pashkov entitled “Invisible,” which features “a series of portraits of women middle-aged and older, spliced with media images and common advertising tropes” with “a soundtrack [layered] above of real women speaking about their experiences, their fears, their insecurities” (222). This engenders deep discussion from Solène and her friends from the art world, who discuss their connection to the piece and its important message about society’s disregard of aging women. Lee incorporates the details of this piece to fuel the conversations between characters and to offer commentary on society’s treatment of older women.
Fandom
Throughout the novel, Solène encounters mobs of fans seeking the attention of Hayes and August Moon. Lee repeatedly features these crowds in the novel to emphasize the incredible celebrity of Hayes across the world and to represent the physical, emotional, and mental danger faced by celebrities and their loved ones. They are one of the major narrative obstacles in the way of the pair’s love. The crowds fascinate and terrify Solène as she grows closer to Hayes and attempts to forge a deeper connection with him despite her reservations. Unable to escape the reminders of Hayes’s fame, Solène grapples with the ways Hayes’s acclaim threatens her physical, emotional, and mental well-being. After a trip to Aspen marked by Solène’s first time expressing her love for Hayes, she encounters “over a hundred girls squealing with cell phone cameras and throwing themselves in his path attempting to take selfies and yelling his name and falling down and crying, and it was terrifying” (298). Despite her attempts to overcome her insecurities regarding Hayes’s celebrity and their significant age difference, Solène faces the relentless reminders of Hayes’s role as a fantasy for teenage girls across the world, including her own daughter. The passing terror she feels in these moments transforms into an insidious fear that whittles away at Solène’s health. She rapidly loses weight and struggles to feel comfortable in her own home as “even when [she] turned on the patio lights, [she] could not be certain someone was not there lurking” (317). Lee uses her depiction of the mobs of fans to symbolize Hayes’s overwhelming celebrity. Despite Hayes’s best efforts to protect himself and Solène, the mobs of fans threaten to upend any progress they make in their relationship and, ultimately, contribute to Solène’s decision to step away from Hayes’s life of celebrity.
Unfolding Flower
The image of the unfolding flower represents Solène’s growing vulnerability with Hayes. Early in their relationship, Hayes compares Solène’s willingness to share about her deepest desires to a flower opening slowly. Typically associated with women, flowers embody the fragility and vitality associated with womanhood. Known for their beauty, flowers follow a natural process of blooming that cannot be forced. Lee uses the image of the unfolding flower to symbolize Solène’s slow embrace of her own vulnerability, which allows her to enjoy a short but passionate love affair with Hayes that irrevocably changes her. The association of flowers with short-lived blooming also prefigures the transitory nature of Solène and Haye’s relationship. Lee employs the word “unfold” when first using the flower image and repeats this technique throughout the novel as a reference to Solène’s journey toward emotional openness. She repeatedly uses it when describing sexual acts between Hayes and Solène, signaling the importance of Solène and Hayes’s sexual relationship in supporting Solène on her journey of self-discovery.
