The Penderwicks on Gardam Street

Sisters and Sacrifice serves as a motif of The Importance of Honesty and Loyalty. Jane’s play tells the tale of Rainbow, an ancient Aztec woman whose sister, Grass Flower, is chosen as a ritual sacrifice. Rainbow’s selfless loyalty to her sister and her community moves her to take Grass Flower’s place: “I will spill my blood to bring the rain to grow the maize to feed our people” (155). The play explicitly emphasizes the loyalty between sisters, reflecting the loyalty between Jane and Skye as they exchange writing assignments to help each other complete them successfully. Much of the novel’s humor and moral lessons stem from the spiraling consequences of the sisters’ dishonesty about the play, particularly the script’s selection for the sixth-graders’ production. Skye’s stage fright over playing the lead in ‘her’ play is a far greater punishment than the penance her father devises for her at the end of the novel, underscoring the importance of honesty—the novel’s central moral lesson.

Despite its deceitful origins, the play inspires genuine moments of honesty and loyalty from the sisters, such as the many occasions Jane helps Skye rehearse. Birdsall weaves many literary allusions into her stories about the bookish Penderwicks, and the novel’s metatextual elements multiply further as the characters Jane creates influence her actions. For example, asking herself, “[W]ould Rainbow fear Miss Bunda?” bolsters Jane’s resolve to tell her teacher the truth about her science essay (254). Like Skye and Jane, Martin “[makes] one false step, then [finds himself] mired in deception” (261). His daughters’ honesty about the play inspires him to make his own confession about Marianne, reestablishing trust between himself and his daughters and paving the way for the story’s happy ending.