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Chapter 2
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The House of the Scorpion, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Free Will vs. Predetermination
Scientific Ethics and Abuse
Language, Law, and Dehumanization
Abuse of Power and Corruption
Summary
Analysis
The next morning, Celia leaves for work and Matt waits for the children. Steven and Emilia arrive with Emilia’s little sister, María. María excitedly asks Matt if he wants to play. Matt is too stunned to speak. He tries to open the door, but it’s locked. Fearing the children will leave, he shows them a funny picture he has on his wall. When María does not understand the joke, Steven calls her an eejit.
María shows her characteristic friendliness and excitability in her introduction. Matt’s desperation to belong among the children continues as he tries to entertain them with a joke, but it is clear from their reactions that he is somehow different from them. Steven’s use of the word “eejit” as an insult shows that the children associate this term with stupidity.
Themes
Steven and Emilia begin to walk away, leaving María behind. Matt fears for María being left out alone in the dark, so he breaks open the window with a cooking pot. Steven and Emilia come running back. Matt tells them his name and repeatedly asks them if they want to play. Emilia and Steven begin to leave again, so Matt crawls out through the window, cutting himself on the broken glass and passing out from the pain.
Matt risks getting in trouble with Celia when he breaks the window to protect María, demonstrating that, despite his unfamiliarity with others, he can feel self-sacrificial empathy for a stranger. His reckless act of crawling over glass, as well as his repetition of his request to play, highlights how desperate he is to be accepted by his peers and to escape his isolation.
Themes
Matt wakes up to Steven and Emilia carrying him through the poppy fields, with María running behind them. Matt screams because he has never experienced pain like his cuts before. The children carry him to a house with many pillars, statues, and doorways. A carved outline of a scorpion sits above the central arch of the house.
Matt’s new experience of pain symbolizes the fact that he has now left the safe, sheltered environment he has always known. The detailed description of the Big House’s grandeur suggests the materialism and wealthy status of those who live inside it.
Themes
Maids help the children bring Matt inside the house, thinking he is Celia’s secret son. One maid, named Rosa, begins picking the glass out of his hands and feet. Matt is too dizzy to cry or scream. María notices that Matt has writing branded on his foot which reads “Property of the Alacrán Estate.” Suddenly, Steven’s father, Mr. Alacrán, appears and begins yelling at everyone to get the animal out of the house. He whispers something to Rosa, who hurriedly picks Matt up and dumps him on the front lawn of the house.
Matt’s label as “property” suggests that whoever branded him with this writing considers him an object which can be owned by the Alacrán family. Mr. Alacrán further dehumanizes Matt by calling him an animal, which allows both Mr. Alacrán and Rosa to justify treating Matt as less than human when they throw this injured child out on the lawn.
Themes
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