Cujo

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1981

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.

Download PDF

Summary

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Pages 1-61

Pages 61-113

Pages 113-175

Pages 175-250

Pages 250-304

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Tools

Beta

Discussion Questions

Symbols & Motifs

Frank Dodd

The specter of Frank Dodd that recurs throughout Cujo is an essential motif in that King opens with it to set the novel’s tone. The opening narrative describes serial killer Frank Dodd as a monster who terrorized Castle Rock. Even after his death by suicide, Dodd remained a cultural reference that pervaded the small Maine town. Some parents even employed Dodd’s name to quiet children, “telling them that Frank Dodd would get them if they didn’t watch out, if they weren’t good. And surely a hush fell as children looked toward their dark windows and thought of Frank Dodd” (3). Frank Dodd’s very name carries significant horrific power, creating an atmosphere that signals that all isn’t well in Castle Rock.

The frightening force of his memory in the town casts a powerful shadow over the novel’s core characters: He haunts Tad’s closet and at several points is linked to Cujo’s rabies episode, as when the dog attacks George Bannerman: “For a moment, staring into those dark, crazed eyes, a swoony kind of horror came over him and he thought, Hello, Frank. It’s you, isn’t it? Was hell too hot for you?” (272). Dodd thus links to all expressions of evil witnessed by residents of Castle Rock. His pervasiveness, evident in Cujo’s violence and in the novel’s opening, illustrates the function of this motif: Dodd speaks to the novel’s thematic interrogation of the monster, as a tool for King to explore the different forms through which the monstrous manifests. In symbolizing the supernatural monstrous, Dodd transcends the corporeal human form: After his death, he remains present in multiple ways, points of time, and locations. Frank Dodd’s continuous presence throughout Cujo represents King’s foundational opening concept: “The monster never dies” (4).

The Monster Words

The Monster Words are a particularly cruel symbol in King’s novel, representing Vic’s absence in the life-threatening scenario that Tad and Donna endure—and ultimately symbolizing Vic’s failure to protect his son’s life. The Monster Words are a poem-like passage Vic wrote to ease his son’s fears of a monster in his closet: “Monsters, stay out of this room! You have no business here. Nothing will touch Tad, or hurt Tad, all this night” (60). Tad loves the Monster Words and clings to them—and his father—for safety. He’s so convinced of their effectiveness that he becomes nervous before his father leaves on his work trip because he fears nobody will be there to read the words aloud before bed. However, the book begins by explaining that the monster is real, implying the immediate ineffectiveness and ultimate futility of the Monster Words. When Tad is later trapped in a hot, locked car because of the real terror of a rabid dog, simple words on a page offer no protection.

In their failure to protect Tad, the Monster Words link to the novel’s theme on the fall of innocence—but operate with more specificity than this theme: The Monster Words have a specific symbolic weight, as they represent the deep father-son relationship between Tad and Vic. In Tad’s mind, the Monster Words intrinsically link to his father, as is evident when Tad’s takes his copy of the Monster Words with him because he feels anxious about leaving for the Camber yard. Before taking them off his wall, Tad looks at them with love: “He knew them by heart. He liked to look at them, read them by rote, look at his daddy’s printing” (124). Tad takes the Monster Words with him because they represent his father’s love and protection—and he believes that through the Words, his father has the power to protect him. In Vic’s absence, the Words become Tad’s stand-in father during the episode with Cujo. The fragile paper on which the Words appear emphasizes Vic’s absence. When Vic finds the forgotten Monster Words in the car after Tad’s death, he observes, “The sheet was crumpled and ripped in two places and badly stained with sweat; along the deep creases it was nearly transparent” (294-95). Vic breaks down after seeing the Monster Words because of their symbolic weight: His four-year-old son had clung for protection to a torn, limp piece of paper that had no value at all.

Sharp Cereals Advertisements

Vic and Roger’s Sharp Cereals advertisements are a subtle yet important symbol in Cujo. The Cereal Professor ads represent Vic’s desire to protect childlike innocence, both for the customers of Sharp Cereals and in his own son. In reflecting on Vic and Rogers’ inspiration behind creating the Cereal Professor, the narrative explains that the Professor’s iconic line “‘Nope, nothing wrong here’” (27) stemmed from the desire to convey that eating Sharp Cereals products was “the final, total comfort, a complete security blanket. I’ll never hurt you, it implied” (27-28). In a cruel twist of fate, the faulty batch of cereal directly contradicted such claims. This plotline foreshadows Vic’s failure to guarantee that “security blanket” for his own son, Tad. Vic’s advertisements symbolize his core goal of ensuring safety and security but also represent a darker element: Vic’s continuous failure to protect. Just as he can’t provide the protection that his advertisements proclaimed, he can’t protect his son from death.