Personality and growth
This novel features dynamic characters undergoing some of the most intense moments that history has to offer a historical novel such as this. These characters are defined by their dynamic or static nature. Because some people are more willing to change than others. The personality dynamic is most clear in the protagonist who not only admits to ethical lapses in her own life, but through growths through suffering (despite the pain of suffering) into someone who can sacrifice her own tenacious desire for power in order to be an excellent mother to a child who is not even hers by nature.
Family and community
The novel is also a portrait of the elements of family, as embedded in community. The community gives a field of people who are better than strangers, but not as important as family members. This leaves Pelagia in a position to select a husband, but her eager appetite for new experience makes her hastily commit herself to someone with whom she does not feel the familial connection that she might feel toward her father, for instance. She grows into a pillar of family by learning from these mistakes and by enduring the horrors of WWII in Italy, which are probably enough to bring even the most stubborn children into adult responsibility.
Warfare and chaos
In the domain of order, human life is defined by success and failure, but in the domain of chaos, human life is defined by survival or horrifying agony and death. That is especially true in times of war, like this. Italy is a major example of what WWII does in the history of Europe, because whatever corner Western civilization managed to turn during the war, Italy made that turn in an exacting and authoritative manner. The Italian decision to depose Mussolini and join the Allied Forces is imagery that suggests a major shift in the tone of history.
Childhood and potential
As a child, Pelagia's experience of self was one of explosive potential, because she was raised by an excellent and informative father who stoked her curiosity, teaching her anything she wanted to learn. That showed her her own potential. Then, look at the way she behaves as an adult herself. The child on her door is a symbol for that special moment in young adult life when suddenly, the adult realizes that their journey of "becoming" has ended, and their new journey is to help a new person to "become." As she decides to become a mother after the model of her father, she demonstrates an awareness for the way potential works at the abstract level.
