The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo

Chapters 20 and 21 focus on Evelyn grappling with her sexual identity. As she embraces Celia for the first time, she realizes the full extent of her desire and how natural it feels to her: “[Y]ou lose yourself in the scent, taste, and feel of another person—it was all the same” (127). This allows Evelyn—albeit temporarily—to accept her attraction to Celia. The chapters also demonstrate what little autonomy women held at this time, particularly in Hollywood. However, by leaving Don, Evelyn reclaims some agency from her abusive husband and finds empowerment in choosing a life for herself, and a major part of this life is Celia.

This adds to the narrative a consciousness of the challenges and dangers the LGBTQ+ community faced during this time. In the late 1950s, gay activity was not only socially condemned but illegal. Therefore, these chapters begin the book’s study of the queer community within Hollywood and how many were forced to live secret lives to survive. Though Evelyn does not know yet what’s in store for her and Celia, she chooses her over Don anyway. Her hesitancy to accept this decision, however, reflects the marginalization and potential violence the queer community was subjected to. Despite these fears, Evelyn choosing Celia demonstrates the text’s theme of Reconciling with One’s True Self; slowly, Evelyn is discovering who she is outside of her public identity, and—even more slowly—accepting that. 

The novel positions Monique and Evelyn as parallels, particularly in Chapters 22 and 23 as Monique considers her pending divorce alongside Evelyn’s many. Monique is bothered by Evelyn’s casual attitude toward divorce because she has yet to accept her own. However, in interacting more with Evelyn, she becomes a bit more like her. This is first demonstrated when Evelyn’s view of divorce as simply “a piece of paper” surprises Monique; she wonders “why [she] needed Evelyn to tell [her] that” (141), suggesting that her own pain toward her divorce has been misguided. Rather than heartbreak, Monique is feeling failure, exactly as Evelyn felt after her marriage to Don.

Chapter 23 reemphasizes the connection between Monique and Evelyn as Monique becomes more assertive; in first demanding a promotion and then demanding some flexibility from Evelyn, Monique demonstrates her new sense of self as confident, capable, and deserving of recognition. Similarly significant, the end of Chapter 23 uses a tonal shift when foreshadowing the real connection between Evelyn and Monique; when Monique realizes that Evelyn wants something badly enough from her to compromise her own wishes, Monique becomes suspicious and afraid. This, then, alludes to a secret Evelyn harbors that will directly affect Monique—or a darker explanation for why she chose Monique to tell her story.

Chapter 24 uses the news motif to convey how public perception of Evelyn and Celia’s relationship differs from their reality. Though they are happily together, their fear of being outed comes across as the end of their friendship: “[I]cy Evelyn didn’t say a single word to her old best friend. She avoided Celia all night” (150). The press resorts to reductive stereotypes of women (as catty or cold) to perpetuate the narrative that one woman cannot cope with another’s success. This report starkly contrasts with reality because Evelyn’s joy for Celia’s success is represented by the broken tooth she earns for kissing the television set; for someone who has crafted a persona based upon her appearance, she is entirely unbothered by the damage. The chapter also emphasizes the intentional organization of Hollywood to be exclusionary as Evelyn watches the show. Her acknowledgment of the show’s intention to make the viewer feel like an outsider speaks to the human desire to attain the unattainable.