55 pages • 1 hour read
Brian SelznickThe Invention of Hugo Cabret
Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 2007A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Part 1, Chapters 5-8Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 1, Chapter 5 Summary: “Hugo’s Father”
Hugo runs back to his apartment in the train station. He lights some candles and reveals a hiding place in the wall, from which he takes an automaton. Hugo’s father owned a clock shop and helped tend the clocks at a museum. He found the automaton in the museum’s attic, though it was rusty and in disrepair. The machine is a man sitting at a desk, and when turned on with a key, it can write a message using its ink pen. Hugo’s father told Hugo about the automaton, capturing the boy’s interest and imagination. No one knew who made the machine or where it came from, but Hugo’s father explained that magicians often start as clockmakers and use their machinery knowledge to create their shows’ automatons. Hugo encouraged his father to fix the automaton, though his father believed it was too worn down and was missing pieces.
A few nights later, Hugo and his father went to the museum to look at the automaton. Despite its appearance, Hugo thought it was beautiful. He asked his father, “Don’t you want to know what it can write?” (117); though his father warned Hugo that work took priority, he began making numerous drawings in several notebooks of the machine’s many pieces and how they fit together. Hugo’s father gave him one such notebook on his birthday. One night, the museum guard accidentally locked Hugo’s father in the attic. A fire swept through the museum, killing him. The next day, Hugo’s only living relative, Uncle Claude, arrived to collect Hugo. He told Hugo to forget about going to school; Uncle Claude tended the clocks at the station, and Hugo was to live with him and be his apprentice.
While Hugo loved his work on the clocks and enjoyed staying hidden behind the station walls, he was always hungry and often had to steal food. His uncle was also unkind and an alcoholic. He would disappear for hours at a time, leaving Hugo to take care of the clocks twice a day alone. One day, Uncle Claude disappeared. After three days of waiting, Hugo left the station. He wandered through the freezing streets and ended up at the museum’s wreckage. Hugo saw the automaton and took it back to the station to fix using his father’s notebook.
Three months have passed since, and Hugo has made good progress on the mechanical man. He worries that the Station Inspector will catch him and arrest him for living alone. He believes that if he fixes the machine, the message it writes will answer all of his questions and help him escape his miserable life. Hugo must have his notebook back to continue his work.
Part 1, Chapter 6 Summary: “Ashes”
At dawn, Hugo approaches Georges as he opens his booth. The old man hands Hugo a tied handkerchief, and Hugo opens it to find a pile of ashes. He begins to cry and charges at the old man, but Georges deflects him and asks why the notebook is so important to him. Hugo doesn’t respond but sees that Georges has tears in his eyes. Georges says, “Please just go away. It’s over” (138) and Hugo flees.
Hugo thinks about turning himself in to the Station Inspector since he has lost hope of fixing the automaton and seeing its message. Hugo realizes he’ll lose the machine if the Station Inspector sends him away, so he returns to his work on the clocks. As he sits at a café table inside the station the next morning, a note appears: “Meet me at the bookseller’s on the other side of the train station. […] Your notebook wasn’t burned” (143).
Part 1, Chapter 7 Summary: “Secrets”
Hugo enters the bookstore and is flooded with memories of school and his two best friends. He sees Isabelle across the room. She tells Hugo that Georges still has the notebook and asks what’s in it. Hugo says it’s a secret. Isabelle borrows a book on photography from the bookseller and leaves.
Hugo returns to Georges at the toy booth and tells Georges he doesn’t believe he burned the notebook. The old man tells him to leave; Hugo returns every day to ask Georges about the notebook. After several days, Georges hands Hugo a broom and tells him to be helpful. After he sweeps the floor around the booth, Hugo asks for his notebook. Georges gives Hugo some coins and tells him to buy him a croissant and a coffee. Hugo also buys them for himself, and the two sit silently as they eat. When they finish, George hands the mechanical mouse Hugo broke in Chapter 1 when he tried to steal it. He demands Hugo fix it, and Hugo does. Georges sees Hugo’s talent and asks again about the notebook, but Hugo refuses to answer until he has it back. Georges then tells Hugo that if he wants his notebook back, he must come to the toy booth daily to work off the debt of everything he has stolen.
Part 1, Chapter 8 Summary: “Cards”
After Hugo’s morning rounds with the station’s clocks, Hugo goes to the toy booth, ready to work. He sweeps, organizes boxes, untangles wires, repaints toys, and fixes mechanical toys. Surrounded by mechanical parts, Hugo can’t resist the temptation and steals a few that he needs for the automaton. As Hugo works, Georges does tricks with a deck of cards, mesmerizing the boy. The next day, Hugo returns to the booth with his deck of cards and asks Georges to teach him some tricks, but Georges only responds by demanding Hugo get to work. Georges continues to do tricks, as if performing for Hugo. When Georges falls asleep, Isabelle appears and tells Hugo to meet her at the bookstore in 10 minutes.
At the bookstore, Isabelle tells Hugo she’s been looking for his notebook, and at Hugo’s urging, she promises not to look in the notebook if she finds it. A young man with an eyepatch named Etienne enters the bookstore, and Isabelle introduces the boys to each other. She tells Hugo that Etienne works at a movie theatre near her apartment. He sneaks her into movies because Georges doesn’t want her watching them. Hugo then tells them how his father used to take him to the movies on his birthday. Etienne asks Hugo to come to the theatre next week, and Hugo reluctantly agrees. Isabelle leaves the store to look for something, and Hugo wanders around the bookstore. He finds a book about card tricks and magical illusions and puts it in his jacket. Etienne sees it’s a book about magic, so he pulls a coin from behind his eyepatch, saying it’s “the only magic trick [he knows]” (187). He gives the coin to Hugo and tells him to buy the book.
Part 1, Chapters 5-8 Analysis
This section fills in a lot of the mystery surrounding Hugo’s father, Uncle Claude, and the notebook, exploring the themes The Power of Family and Overcoming Loss. Selznick reveals that Hugo lives alone in the train station because his father died in a fire and his Uncle Claude has disappeared. Hugo fears the Station Inspector because he will take Hugo to an orphanage away from his automaton. Thus, Hugo stays invisible and makes it appear as if Uncle Claude is still working on the station’s clocks. This revelation also explains why the notebook is so important to Hugo. Not only was it a gift from Hugo’s father before he died, but Hugo also sees the notebook as the key to his freedom. This is one way Hugo copes with the death of his beloved father; he thinks the automaton’s message will be a personal note to him—perhaps written by his father—so he must fix the automaton to find that message. Hugo also feels a powerful connection to his father through the notebook since his father is the one who made all the drawings. When Hugo’s father found the automaton, he became obsessed with fixing it, filling multiple journals with drawings of parts and how they fit together. The notebook is one of Hugo’s last remaining connections to his father and the magical machine that fascinated them both.
This section also introduces the motif of clocks, which is a major component of the theme of Invention, Technology, and Magic. Selznick explains that Hugo’s father was a clockmaker who owned his own shop. Likewise, Uncle Claude works on the train station’s clocks, so knowledge of clocks is part of Hugo’s family legacy. Until Hugo sees the automaton, he wants to become a clockmaker like his father, but once he sees it, he wants to become a magician. Hugo still has this dream even in the present day, as shown by his interest in the book of magic tricks at the bookstore. Hugo’s experience with clockmaking gives him the mechanical knowledge he needs to fix the automaton and create magical illusions. Hugo has a genuine passion for clocks and feels a deep connection to them, utilizing them to support his inventive imagination and his dreams of becoming a magician.
Selznick also uses clocks metaphorically to explain Hugo’s mental state. Selznick describes “the cogs and gears in [Hugo’s] head” (150), typically when Hugo is thinking quickly or trying to come up with a solution to a problem. He writes that Hugo “remembered hearing the blood beating hard in his ears, like the rhythm of a clock” (124) when Uncle Claude told him of his father’s death. These metaphors simultaneously emphasize Hugo’s deep connection to clockwork and machinery and illustrate their importance to the story’s plot.
Magic and technology further link Georges and Hugo, just as the notebook and the automaton drawing did in the first four chapters. In this section, Georges acknowledges Hugo’s talent with mechanical objects; when Hugo begins to work at his booth to pay off his debt, Georges proves that he, like Hugo, has some talent for magic and illusions. When Hugo asks him about the card tricks he does, Georges claims he “wasn’t paying attention” and tries to dismiss Hugo (167). Though he is not yet ready to open up to Hugo, Hugo suspects that Georges is performing specifically for him, which is a sign of their deepening bond.
Finally, this section introduces the symbolism of the automaton. Hugo’s father found the automaton in a museum’s attic, and it instantly grips Hugo’s imagination and dreams. He hides it in his station apartment and sees it as a symbol of freedom and escape from his current situation. Because the automaton is sitting at a desk and can write, Hugo believes the automaton is his ticket out of the station. It is his driving motivation. He must fix the automaton so it can write out its message, which will give Hugo all the answers he needs to find a better life. This explains the jars of toy parts introduced in the early chapters; Hugo does not steal them for fun or profit, he is simply so desperate to fix the automaton. Because he was caught stealing, and because he refuses to tell Georges about the automaton’s existence, he finds himself working for Georges to make up for his thievery. This puts even more stress on young Hugo, who already works hard by himself to tend to the station’s clocks.
The automaton also represents an enduring connection between Hugo and his dead father. Hugo can’t leave the broken automaton when he finds himself at the museum’s wreckage. Instead, he takes it to the train station to fix it. Hugo manages to fix the automaton, but when he repaints its damaged face, the expression Hugo creates reminds him of his father. Thus, when he looks at the automaton, Hugo sees both a symbolic and a physical connection to his father, the last adult who showed him love and kindness. This provides comfort for Hugo as he struggles to better his life.
