Content Warning: This section discusses anti-gay bias, wartime violence, death, and war trauma.

“Both boys, The Preshutian assured him, had died gallant deaths. Just like every other Preshute student who had been killed so far in the War.”

In the opening lines of the text, Gaunt and Ellwood read the titular “In Memoriam” pages of The Preshutian. The words “The Preshutian assured him” will come to have an ironic meaning throughout the text: When Gaunt and Ellwood are on the front and see the many ways that soldiers die, it becomes clear that The Preshutian memorializes their deaths in a way that convinces other young men, like Gaunt and Ellwood, to join the war seeking the same gallantry while hiding the ugly reality.

“‘I’m sorry, I know it makes you uncomfortable when I talk about him,’ [Ellwood said]. It did. From everything Ellwood told Gaunt about Maitland, and from what Gaunt could see for himself, Maitland was only a step removed from a Renaissance prince. He was handsome and talented and brilliant, and yet Ellwood didn’t want him.”

Winn often uses the limited third-person point of view to convey dramatic irony—where the reader knows something that the characters do not. Here, Ellwood recognizes that discussing Maitland upsets Gaunt and apologizes for it but doesn’t understand why. Conversely, Gaunt thinks of how Ellwood is not romantically interested in Maitland—a thought that shocks him. However, each character fails to realize the truth: that their secret love for each other is the reason for both circumstances.

“Your father’s under scrutiny at the bank because of it […] You must enlist, Heinrich. If we have a son in the army, no one will dare say we are not patriotic.”

Gaunt’s mother’s words introduce the theme of Personal Desire Versus Societal Expectation, as she tries to convince him to join the war to dispel rumors that their family sides with Germany due to their heritage.