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Chapter 39
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Something Wicked This Way Comes, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Good vs. Evil
Age, Time, and Acceptance
Love and Happiness
Fear, the Supernatural, and the Unknown
Summary
Analysis
So, Jim asks, does the carnival “buy souls?” No, Charles explains, they “get them for free.” “The carnival is like people, only more so,” he says. The rides and fun are “like a narcotic that makes existence worth the day,” so when young boys are eager to be men, and middle-aged men mourn the loss of time, the carnival offers an escape. “Is…is it…Death?” Jim asks.
“No,” Charles answers again. “But I think it uses Death as a threat.” According to Charles, death “doesn’t exist. It never did, it never will.” People believe it to be a thing or “entity,” but death is “nothing,” “a stopped watch.” That is the brilliance of the carnival, Charles explains. It “wisely knows we’re more afraid of Nothing than we are of Something,” so the carnival offers the carousel. But, Charles says, if you are “miserable” at one age, you will be “miserable” at another. “Changing size doesn’t change the brain,” he concludes. If Jim does ride the carousel, he will be a boy in a man’s body, and he won’t fit in his life. Then, Charles warns, the carnival will keep you in “bondage.”
Again, death is the ultimate threat and fear because it represents the unknown. Instead of something tangible, death represents a great void, or merely “nothing.” Of course, Charles is afraid of Mr. Dark and the other freaks, but he is more afraid of death, and the carnival “wisely knows” this. Charles’s comparison to death as a “stopped watch” further reflects Bradbury association between clocks and life and mortality; when someone dies, their clock no longer ticks.
Themes
“Oh, poor Miss Foley,” Will cries. Charles agrees. “They’ve probably thrown her in with the freaks,” he suggests. As Will and Jim consider ways to destroy the carnival, including silver bullets and holy water, the door to the library opens. “Hide,” Charles orders the boys.
Charles’s warning that Jim will be “miserable” even if he does choose to ride the carousel is reflected in Miss Foley’s tragic fate. It is only Miss Foley’s body that is young; her mind is still fifty.
Themes
