The Borrowers Themes

Borrowers don't like humans, humans don't like borrowers, and "borrowing" in one world is "stealing" in the other. Ugh. Can't we all just get along? The inability of big and little people to get pa...

Arrietty lives for freedom. She craves it the way Shmoop craves burritos (which is to say, a lot). But the weird thing is, when freedom is mentioned in The Borrowers, it often sounds like a bad thi...

We're all familiar with the typical factors that determine class—money, education, background, yadda yadda yadda. But what about whether you live over the mantle, behind the harpsichord, or under...

Kids get a bad rap. Adults think they are lazy or stubborn or, worse, naughty, and in a fight between parents and children, the parents almost always win. Totally unfair, right. Right. And The Borr...

There's a whole boatload of things to be afraid of in The Borrowers. Giant eyeballs, rat poison, cats, mean people, and, of course, the unknown. But the biggest thing to fear in this novel seems to...

Growing pains are… well… a pain. But they're a normal part of growing up. And once a character emerges from his or her cocoon to become a butterfly, it all seems worth it. Arrietty seems to do...

You've probably heard of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. You know, the Great Pyramid of Giza, the Temple of Artemis… the list goes on. But for Arrietty and the other borrowers, the leg of...

Do you believe in magic? More importantly, don't you want to? There's a part of all of us that, despite evidence to the contrary, still want to see magicians pull rabbits out of hats and believe th...