Trick or Treat (Themes)

Themes

Sexuality

Sexuality is a central theme in Powell's short story. Jimmy, at twelve years of age, is beginning puberty, a time when the human body matures from childhood to adulthood. An important aspect of this maturation is that the body readies itself for reproduction. Teenagers, full of new hormones from puberty, become interested in sex. Jimmy's pursuit of an older woman is daring and unusual, but his thoughts about sex, while still immature, are not. Since the story is told largely from Mrs. Hollingsworth's point of view, the reader does not learn directly why Jimmy is attracted to the housewife who is old enough to be his mother.

Contemporary society does not condone sex between adults and minors — people under the age of eighteen. Mrs. Hollingsworth deliberates whether to enter into a relationship with Jimmy, but she barely considers the question of pedophilia, a deviant behavior in which an adult engages in sex or sexual activity with a child. She recalls worrying about it with her own children but lets that thought go immediately and does not dwell on it. Mrs. Hollingsworth, in the final scene of the story, sees Jimmy as mature in some ways which in her view makes it okay for them to enter into a sexual relationship. Dissatisfied with her life and her family, including her husband, she looks forward to a relationship with Jimmy, "with some comical but not ungratifying sex mixed in."

Ennui

Ennui (pronounced awn-WEE), a word borrowed From French, denotes a feeling of continual weariness or melancholy which is not easily relieved. In Powell's short story, the character of Mrs. Hollingsworth exhibits ennui. Mrs. Hollingsworth attributes her sense of ennui to her boring husband and children as well as to her troubled relationship with the South. This ennui about the South is identified at the beginning of the story: "It loves me, it loves me not. I love it, I love it not." Mrs. Hollingsworth wears ridiculous clothes when she goes grocery shopping in an attempt to shake off her melancholy. But it is Jimmy Teeth who rescues her with his underage bravado and unusual — and risky — proposition. Although the end of the story pushes the boundaries of socially acceptable behavior, it is weirdly uplifting within its own terms because the point-of-view character, Mrs. Hollingsworth, is finally fighting to be free of her ennui.

Machismo

Machismo (pronounced ma-KEYS-mo), a word borrowed from Spanish, denotes an exaggerated sense of masculinity. Jimmy Teeth overcomes his young age with machismo to appeal to Mrs. Hollingsworth and attract her attention. He tries to talk to her (and thinks of even dirtier things to say that he believes are grown up perhaps because they are crass) but comes across as smart-mouthed. He mows her lawn as a way to spend time with her and get her to notice him but has to run away when the police come to reclaim the stolen lawnmower. Last, he appears on her doorstep dressed in a suit and fedora, like an old fashioned movie star, but the costume is really just a disguise to hide from his father and older brother. With confidence borrowed from machismo, Jimmy stuffs the disguise into the trash compactor and sits down at Mrs. Hollingsworth's kitchen table. This last visit finally wins her over as Jimmy appears to her to be more than just a boy from the neighborhood.

Escape

Escape is sought by both Mrs. Hollingsworth and Jimmy Teeth. Mrs. Hollingsworth is dissatisfied and bored and wants some kind of change, although she does not directly face and try to solve her problems. Instead, she turns outward from her dissatisfaction with her family life and toward a neighborhood boy. Jimmy Teeth wants to escape his youth and be grown up enough to date older women like Mrs. Hollingsworth. This combination of desires makes Jimmy's proposition of a sexual relationship to Mrs. Hollingsworth possible rather than ridiculous. Together, in their illicit union, Mrs. Hollingsworth and Jimmy anticipate being able to escape temporarily from the confining aspects of their separate lives. But escapism never provides a permanent resolution from the problems one avoids.