“Twenty years ago, when the world was already half-convinced that our species had lost forever the power to reproduce, the search to find the last known human birth became a national obsession, elevated to a matter of national pride, an international contest as ultimately pointless as it was fierce and acrimonious.”

From the beginning of the novel, the themes of fatalism and pessimism are obvious. One of the author’s projects is to show a world where there is no point to anything, but people still persist in the petty pursuits of nationalism and competition.

“We can experience nothing but the present moment, live in no other second of time, and to understand this is as close as we can get to eternal life.”

At times, Theo has a calm understanding of the present, but the insight does not comfort him. Instead, the idea that if every moment is “the present,” then this is the only way to experience immortality makes him sardonic, cold, and self-interested. With no way to leave a legacy of himself in the world, Theo creates distance between himself and emotion.

“If from infancy you treat children as gods they are liable in adulthood to act as devils.”

Treated as more than humans, Omegas have left humanity behind and retreated into violent lawlessness that sometimes—as in the case of the Painted Faces—looks like bestial regression. Theo is not surprised that children treat them like gods begin to see themselves as beyond responsibility.