52 pages • 1 hour read
Monique TruongThe Book of Salt
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2003A 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 21-24Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 21 Summary
Lattimore tells Binh that the Mesdames are about to embark on a journey back to America. However, Binh has known this for a month. He is surprised that Stein lectures as well as writes and that word of the women’s trip is in the newspapers. Binh and Lattimore sit for their photograph together. Binh sees Lattimore’s deep interest in the literature of Stein as proof that Lattimore is his scholar-prince.
The women bring Binh a letter from Anh Minh on a silver tray, but Binh assumes they are formally firing him for his theft of the notebook. They seem surprised to see his actual name written out on the envelope, which again underscores that they don’t see Binh fully as a person, but rather as their servant first.
Anh Minh’s letter urges Binh to come home: “No matter what he may have said to you, he is our father, and he is going to die” (229). Binh acknowledges that he has been saying all along that his father was dead already because the only way Binh could sleep at night was by imagining the Old Man in his coffin. Anh Minh writes that Binh’s father has suffered a stroke and that their mother has passed away. This confirms what Binh already knew in his heart since having the vision of the pigeon.
Binh feels some relief on his mother’s behalf—she is now free from Binh’s father. He longs to reunite with her one day and feels she was brave in her death.
Chapter 22 Summary
It’s Sunday, and Binh has been nervous all week about the women discovering his theft of the notebook. In preparation for their trip and due to all the press coverage of it, they seem to always be looking for something in their cabinet or cupboards. More accurately, Toklas searches and retrieves anything Stein has requested; Toklas is fine with fetching things for Stein.
Binh goes to be with Lattimore only to find his lover has left Paris. Binh finds a note that reads, “Bee, thank you for the Book of Salt. Stein captured you, perfectly” (238). Also included is the receipt for the photo at the photography studio.
Chapter 23 Summary
The last time Bao and Binh were together, Binh demonstrated how Chef Bleriot had taught him to tuck his penis between his legs and pretend to be a girl.
Binh goes to the photographer’s studio, where he finds out Lattimore only paid for half of the picture. Binh sees a photo on the wall and realizes it’s the man on the bridge. He asks the man’s name and is told he was a skilled photo retoucher named Nguyen Ai Quoc, a name Ho Chi Minh used to use, which means “patriot.” Binh decides to purchase the photo of the man on the bridge and offers to let the store clerk keep the photo of Binh and Lattimore.
The narrative then flashes back to Binh on the ship. Binh had written Anh Minh’s name on a slip of paper so Bao could look up Binh’s brother when next in Saigon. Later, Binh discovered that Bao stole the red packet filled with gold leaf. Binh imagines a more pleasing scenario: Bao goes to see Anh Minh and hands Anh Minh the red packet, telling him it’s a gift from his youngest brother, Ho Chi Minh.
Binh tells his imagined father that The Old Man had less love and redemption than anyone Binh knew. To his mother, Binh says that her gift was her unending affection. Nonetheless, Binh, like the son in the story of the hyacinths and basket weavers, ventured out to find something else; Binh only went to sea because his father had thrown him out and he had nowhere else to go. He hadn’t understood how long they’d be on the ship or where he’d go after that. Surprised, he says, “I never meant to go this far” (250).
Chapter 24 Summary
In a first-class cabin aboard the train with his Mesdames, Binh admits he has always dreamed of such a trip. Toklas repeatedly brings up that on the lecture tour in the US, there will be oysters and honeydew at each meal. This confuses Binh because he’s never known Stein to be particularly fond of either. He realizes that these foods will let a nervous Stein eat without chewing, simplifying her life.
The trio is set to take an ocean liner to America. The number of journalists waiting for them on the deck surprises Stein and Toklas. While the buzzing of photographers surrounds them, Toklas asks Binh to sew a button onto Stein’s shoe because Toklas cannot be photographed bending down. Binh does this, and his act is captured by the photographers.
Binh’s previous ocean travel was nothing like the luxury Stein and Toklas are about to enjoy. In total, Binh spent three years aboard several ships, only getting 40 nights on land during that time. Afterward, in Paris, he bounced from job to job for a year, his fingers damaged from cutting and covered by gloves whenever possible. Then he met the man on the bridge, and although Binh knew the man was leaving, Binh decided to stay: “The man on the bridge was a memory, he was a story, he was a gift. Paris gave him to me. And in Paris I will stay, I decided. Only in this city, I thought, will I see him again” (258).
Binh always knew he wouldn’t go to the US with Stein and Toklas, but he wanted to accompany them to the ship. Stein and Toklas ask if he wants a return ticket or cash. He opts for cash because he is unsure of where to go—a ticket is an actual decision.
Binh admits to heavy, midweek, post-midnight drinking binges in Paris in the weeks leading up to the women’s departure. He drinks himself broke, echoing his father’s behavior.
Binh decides Lattimore shouldn’t feel guilty since neither woman ever realized the notebook was missing and since Toklas typically has three copies of everything anyway. In any case, if the Book of Salt was about him then it’s his story. Mentally, he says to Stein, “You’re welcome” (261).
Binh looks at the two photos he has of Stein and Toklas: one from the train and the other on the ship, where his back is to the camera while he sews on the button. He thinks back to the question posed by the man on the bridge—what keeps Binh in Paris? Binh knows that “just your desire to know my answer keeps me” (261). Binh imagines the man’s smile and looks up as if someone has called his name.
Chapters 21-24 Analysis
Letters of revelation and finality play a large role in the novel’s final chapters. Instead of confronting each other face to face, characters edge away from each other, communicating through the distancing medium of paper. Anh Minh writes to Binh, revealing that the Old Man has actually been alive all this time and is only now dying—dispelling a self-deluding lie that Binh has been sticking to throughout the narrative. Lattimore also writes to Binh, breaking up with him in a note that dwells more on Lattimore’s greedy excitement over the stolen manuscript than any regret about the end of their relationship.
Adding to this sense of documentation are pieces of paper ephemera—scribbled notes, receipts, and railway tickets—together with the letters, they are a record of fleeting lives and a way of keeping people apart. Binh writes down his brother’s address for Bao, but Bao never connects the siblings—instead, he steals Binh’s gold leaf and vanishes. Rather than leading to a memento of a cherished relationship, the photography studio receipt only demonstrates that Lattimore didn’t think highly enough of Binh to spring for the cost of the photo. This betrayal makes Binh want to tear Lattimore out of their photograph before abandoning it at the shop altogether. Finally, though Binh chooses against accompanying Stein and Toklas to America, he cannot decide whether to return to Vietnam to what’s left of his family. Given the option of cash, or a train ticket that could build a bridge home, Binh asks for cash to forgo having to make a choice.
Although the novel offers no pat conclusions, ending before we learn whether Binh ended up going back to Vietnam, it does give us a few moments of forgiveness and peace-making. This emphasizes the theme of The Power of Stories. These are mostly internalized: Though Binh disconnects from all of the characters in the novel in the end, in his thoughts, he heals some of the seemingly irreparable relationships he’s described. Rather than dwelling on Bao’s betrayal, Binh recasts his shipmate’s departure, imagining a world in which Bao found Anh Minh and gave him Binh’s gold leaf. Though he never meets the man on the bridge again in real life, Binh does encounter him in a photograph and learns about one of his many identities. Idealizing him a version of his mother’s scholar-prince, Binh alternately wants to be with him (and so buys the photograph) and to be him (and so, in his imagination, Bao tells Anh Minh the gold leaf is from Ho Chi Minh). Finally, Binh lets go of the emotional baggage he’s been carrying about his parents. In his mind, he tells the Old Man that his emotional bankruptcy wasn’t enough to ruin Binh; he tells his mother that even though her love and affection weren’t enough to keep him at home, he is happy for her to finally be free from her unhappy life.
These stories create a reality Binh can live with that will help him move forward as he embarks on a new life stage and identity. The uncertainty over his fate is balanced by the peace of mind achieved through his self-determination. This is a metaphor for the struggles Vietnam will face in the coming decades as it gains independence from France and the autonomy to shape its own future.
