Despite the sinister truths that emerge in its final segment, The Lords of Discipline is also a book about the powers of friendship and brotherhood among young men. Most notably, Conroy’s novel traces the deep yet unlikely bonds that emerge among four roommates with radically different backgrounds and personalities—Will, Tradd, Mark, and Pig. Their closeness is the product of shared trials (plebe year) and shared moments of triumph (gatherings at the St. Croix house, the county fair, the Ring ceremony). But the concept of brotherhood is meant to extend well beyond this quartet of characters: the members of any given Institute class or Institute regiment are meant also to regard one another as brothers. Though the discovery of The Ten tests Will’s sense of fellowship with the other seniors, the young men who have most intensely regarded Will as a friend and brother—Mark, Pig, and even Tradd, in his immensely flawed way—do their best to offer him support and solace.

The theme that appears in the very title of the book, discipline structures life at the Institute, guiding both the military activities of the students and the worldview that Institute men are meant to absorb.