Class
One of the major obstacles in Marianne and Connell's relationship is the difference in their class backgrounds, and therefore in their relationship to money. They initially become close because Connell's mother works as a cleaner for Marianne's family. As they get older, their diverging class backgrounds divide them both in terms of material opportunities and in terms of their manners, attitudes, and outlooks. Connell is considered popular in high school, while Marianne is resented in part because of her wealth. In college, surrounded by wealthy peers, Marianne fits in, while Connell stands out. His genteel classmates are eager to appear tolerant, but are judgmental of his taste and self-presentation. Moreover, he finds himself unable to affect the confidence and innate sense of self-worth that his wealthy friends display. Meanwhile, Marianne's relationship to money is largely symbolic. She sees the scholarships that enable Connell to afford college as a matter of intellectual validation rather than material necessity. Her wealth also allows her to preserve a certain idealism, and she initially rejects the idea of most kinds of work, repelled by the idea of trading her time for a wage. As she frees herself from her wealthy but abusive family, she develops an orientation towards money that more closely resembles Connell's.
Abusive Relationships
For Marianne, abuse is cyclical and constantly reproduces itself. She is abused by her father, and after he dies, her brother and mother continue to abuse her. Her brother Alan is clearly insecure, and uses violence against his sister to feel better about himself. This suggests that the cycle of abuse started by their father has been passed down to Alan. Marianne, rather than hurting others, instead turns this impulse inward and acts self-destructively. At home, Marianne detaches from her feelings and obeys her family at all costs in order to avoid their worst violence. Later, that impulse towards obedience expands into her other relationships, to such an extent that Connell fears his own power over her. Marianne also asks others, especially sexual partners, to act violently towards her. She does so not because she enjoys this experience, but because she feels that she deserves pain and punishment. Unable to limit this self-destruction only to interpersonal relationships, Marianne even punishes herself by refusing food during periods of emotional turmoil. In a sense, Connell (and his family) break this cycle of abuse for Marianne, both by offering her physical safety and refuge, and simply by acknowledging the harm that has been done to Marianne, thus helping her realize that she is not at fault for her family's actions.
Normalcy and Identity
At various points throughout Normal People, both Marianne and Connell experience fears of being abnormal or damaged. In high school, Marianne feels that she is alone and perhaps completely anomalous in her anger towards teachers and the education system as a whole. Connell, meanwhile, wonders if he is abnormal simply because of his attraction to Marianne. The subjective, meaningless nature of these designations becomes clear when they go to college: there, Marianne's personality and demeanor are the norm, and Connell, mostly because of his class background, is considered abnormal. However, as they grow as adults, Marianne begins to fear her own abnormality—a new fear for her, since her abnormality in high school bothered others, but was of little concern to Marianne. She is considered damaged and sexually deviant by others, and even fears that Connell will lose interest in her as a result. Meanwhile, Connell develops a debilitating depression, reinforcing his fears that he is deeply unlike "normal people." By following these two protagonists for a long period, across many social environments, Rooney questions the validity of normalcy as a categorization. If two different people can be considered both entirely normative and deeply abnormal at various points in their lives, the novel hints, then the signs and signals of normalcy must be meaningless.
Love and Sex
Both Marianne and Connell have traumatic sexual experiences with others: Connell finds casual sex deeply upsetting, and is nearly raped by a former teacher. Marianne pursues violent, dominating partners as a destructive coping mechanism for her emotional problems. Their sexual relationship with one another is deeply fulfilling, however. It allows Connell to overcome some of his constant anxiety and repression, and helps Marianne move past the detachment that she has developed in response to abuse. Yet at times their physical chemistry actually impedes communication, causing the protagonists to substitute sex for clear conversation. Some of their early conflicts come from a failure to actually discuss the broader importance of this chemistry, and, much later, Connell unsuccessfully tries to communicate empathy to Marianne through sex—an attempt that fails and upsets them both. A long period apart, during which Connell and Marianne communicate only over email, helps them learn to communicate and understand each other outside of sex.
Education
In this novel, Sally Rooney offers a sharp critique of both secondary-school and elite university educational norms. Connell and Marianne's high school places value on blind obedience and routine over actual learning. Though she is the best student in her grade, Marianne is disciplined for looking out of a window in class. She marvels at the fact that her teachers desire such control over her. Connell, meanwhile, does not discover his love of writing until long after high school, in part because his athleticism is valued far more than his imagination by the school's authorities. However, university has its own problems. There, Connell learns that upper-class manners are as much a focus as any academic discipline. Among his peers, social codes about how to dress, how to speak, and how to manipulate connections are of the utmost importance. In both cases, the characters deplore educational systems in which normalcy and social signaling are encouraged above intellectual risk-taking and moral growth.
Art and Politics
As Marianne and Connell get older, both start to wonder whether aesthetic and artistic taste bear any relationship to living a moral life. Marianne, for her part, is disturbed to learn that Lukas—who treats her cruelly and seems to lack empathy—has impeccable taste in art. She wonders whether it is possible to have good artistic taste but lack a sense of right and wrong. If so, she muses, then art may be pointless. Connell, meanwhile, fears that his writing is impotent as a tool of political resistance. He notices that his classmates often use literature, and vaguely literary aesthetics, as a way to appear cultured. Because this "culture" is so inextricably linked to wealth, Connell believes that literary accomplishment may be nothing more than a way to cement class divides. However, he is unable to resist the pull of literature, even though his political doubts remain. Just as Marianne must sacrifice some of her abstract principles in order to support herself with a job, Connell must sacrifice some of his political ideals in order to pursue the imaginative work that thrills and fascinates him.
Gender and Feminism
When Marianne is in high school, she is an object of disgust in part because she abhors traditional markers of femininity. She does not shave her legs or wear makeup, and her argumentative, assertive personality is at odds with the feminine ideal that reigns in her community. This refusal to conform renders her both unpopular and oddly powerful: as Connell suspects, people fear Marianne because she resists girlishness. Connell, meanwhile, outwardly conforms to his rural community's masculine ideals: he is conventionally attractive and athletic, and he doesn't express much emotion, though this last trait is rooted in anxiety rather than stoicism. As a result, others assume that he conforms to a caricature of masculine behavior in every way. His imaginative, emotional tendencies are entirely ignored, and people assume that he is sexually ravenous. This includes peers in high school, who believe that he is flattered rather than upset by a teacher's flirtatiousness. But it also includes peers in college. Marianne's friend Peggy, using a loosely feminist vocabulary, expresses a conviction that Connell is interested in having multiple partners. Though she says this as part of a clumsy attempt to have sex with him, she nonetheless makes the assertion within a gendered framework, arguing that all men are sexually insatiable. Peggy's feminist-tinged defenses of gender norms demonstrate that misogyny and gendered worldviews can thrive, not only in the traditionally-minded rural milieu of western Ireland, but also in the ostensibly progressive world of Dublin intellectuals.
