What is the theme in Sweat by Zora Neale Hurston?

Sex and Love make up another theme in the book. The prominence of phallic snake imagery, as well as the infidelity and the sexual power struggle in the story, makes sex a key theme in "Sweat." When Hurston writes in the opening of the story that "something long, round, limp and black" fell on Delia's shoulders, she is playing a prank on the reader in somewhat the same way that Sykes is playing a trick on Delia. This phallic reference is purposefully shocking so it can begin to ask questions about sex and love in the context of the Jones' s marriage.