Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Zoot Suit, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Racism, Nationalism, and Scapegoating
Self-Presentation and Cultural Identity
Public Perception and the Press
Advocates vs. Saviors
Summary
Analysis
When the play resumes, El Pachuco waxes poetic about how pachucos are forced to fight a domestic war while the country fights abroad. He briefly notes that marines and sailors will soon invade Los Angeles like Nazis, declaring “Zoot Suit wars” against the Chicano community. However, he adds that this will all happen later in the play. For now, Henry and his friends are locked up in San Quentin prison.
Again, El Pachuco calls attention to the fact that the audience members are watching a play. By commenting on how everything unfolds, he once more takes on a certain kind of self-conscious awareness that illustrates just how cognizant he is of the ways in which he and the other Chicano characters present themselves and are perceived by others—an awareness that permeates everything he does, reminding viewers that he sees the pachuco lifestyle as a grand performance of identity.
Themes
