The Perfect Divorce

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of graphic violence, physical abuse, and emotional abuse.

The Morgan Foundation is a symbol of public image. In the wake of Adam Morgan’s trial and conviction, Sarah Morgan leaves her job at the law firm and starts the foundation. The organization takes on formerly incarcerated individuals’ cases and helps them to re-enter society. The foundation is therefore Sarah’s way of presenting a palatable front to the world, contributing to the novel’s exploration of The Tension Between Private Identity and Public Image. Indeed, in Chapter 3, she acknowledges that the “words charity and Morgan in the same sentence must sound odd, an oxymoron of sorts” (14). She has historically been associated with Adam’s murder trial and conviction, and suspicions have surrounded her name and family for some time. She uses the foundation as a way to reset the public’s potentially negative regard for her: It is a representation of the more sanitized, “good” version of herself that she wants others to believe.

Working with and for the foundation is also Sarah’s way of hiding from her past, intersecting with the theme of The Impact of the Past on the Present.