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MOTTO: “I am going to tell you a story about a girl who didn’t want to belong” (who had never had a house…only one she dreamt of, a home of a heart; who doesn’t want to inherit her great-grandmother’s place by the window)
SETTING:
- Mango street (family); family is introduced: family relationship is highlighted (in the chapter named: Hairs); relationship between siblings (in Boys and Girls);identity is revealed by the explanation of the meaning of the name Esperanza and the link with the family ancestors.
The fact that Esperanza’s family moved so many times could be the consequence of racial steering (that is when real estate brokers guide prospective home buyers towards or away from certain neighborhoods based on their race); all those living in the neighborhood are racially segregated.
Some of the inhabitants from Mango Street develop ethnic economics (in the chapter called [i]Gil’s Furniture Bought and Sold[/i])
THEMES:
- Family life seen through the eyes of a teenager: looks, names (that she would like to change); social living conditions, emigrants
- She is old enough to realize that they are poor and that she has wishes that concern the social status: “I knew then I had to have a house. A real house. One I could point to.”
- She wants to change her name from Esperanza hoping that that will bring a change (they say that the name you are given at birth influences your life, behavior, career, etc.). She doesn’t really want to be a person that lives entirely on hoping for something her whole life. Instead, Marin (from the story with the same title) should be called Esperanza as “Marin, under the streetlight, dancing by herself, is singing the same song somewhere. I know. Is waiting for a car to stop, s star to fall, someone to change her life.”
Some of the characters are living the urban legend (that is the urban fairy tale): “Since you always get to look beautiful and get to wear nice clothes and can meet someone in the subway who might marry you and take you to live in a big house far away.”
- Discrimination: “She can’t play with those Vargas kids or she’ll turn out like them ”. “Rosa Vargas’ kids are too many and too much. (…) They are without respect for all living things, including themselves” = an allusion to gipsy families, perhaps. And they do not stand a chance to live in this world would they dare to dream of a better life, she is denied to become:”(…) Angel Vargas learnt to fly and dropped from the sky, (…) just like a falling star, and exploded down to earth without even an Oh.”
- Poverty: shoes issues- she gets a new dress for her cousin’s baptism ceremony but no shoes:”Everybody laughing except me because (…)I am wearing the old saddle shoes I wear to school, brown and white, the kind I get every September because they last long and they do.”
- Prisoners : of husbands (Rafaela who drinks Coconut and Papaya Juice “(…) gets locked indoors because her husband is afraid Rafaela will run away since she is too beautiful to look at.”)
- Abused by husbands and fathers (Linoleum Roses, Minerva Writes Poems, My Name “Sally got married. (…) Sally says she likes being married (…)she gets to buy her own things when her husband gives her money. She is happy, except her husband gets angry and once he broke the door where his foot went through (…) except he won’t let her talk on the phone (…)he doesn’t let her look out of the window. (…) She sits at home because she is afraid to go outside without his permission.” “Alicia, whose mother died, (…) who inherited her mama’s rolling pin and sleepiness (…) is afraid of nothing except four-legged fur. And fathers.”)
INTERESTING - poetry in prose
Dialogues are not marked by inverted commas – this is called Free Indirect Discourse (take into consideration Jon Gingerich’s article on this issue ) “The effect of indirect discourse is that of adding an extra layer of distance between what the person actually said and how it was heard and then later repeated” as the author herself admits in the Introduction: “The language in Mango Street is based on speech. It’s very much an antiacademic voice- a child’s voice, a girl’s voice, a poor girl’s voice, a spoken voice (…) I wrote these stories that way, guided by my heart and my ear.”
- Some of the stories can be read as poems. See some examples:
From the chapter Hairs we could extract some sentences, that, if put together (in a clever way) could resume the whole of it:
Everybody in our family has different hair. My Papa's hair is like a broom, all up in the air.
And me, my hair is lazy. It never obeys barrettes or bands. Carlos' hair is thick and straight. He doesn't need to comb it. Nenny's hair is slippery—slides out of your hand. And Kiki, who is the youngest, has hair like fur.
But my mother's hair, my mother's hair, like little rosettes like little candy circles all curly and pretty because she pinned it in pincurls all day, sweet to put your nose into when she is holding you, holding you and you feel safe, is the warm smell of bread before you bake it, is the smell when she makes room for you on her side of the bed still warm with her skin, and you sleep near her, the rain outside falling and Papa snoring. The snoring, the rain, and Mama's hair that smells like bread.
The poem reads:
My hair is lazy. It never obeys barrettes or bands.
Nenny's hair is slippery—slides out of your hands.
My Papa's hair is like a broom, all up in the air
Like little rosettes, all curly and pretty my mother's hair.
Poem from chapter called The Family of Little Feet
There was a family. All were little.
And their height was not tall
And their feet very small.
The Grandpa slept and snored through his teeth
His feet were fat and doughy like thick tamales.
The mother’s feet, plump and polite
Descended like white pigeons
Down down the wooden stairs
Over the chalk hopscotch squares.
Today we are Cinderella because our feet fit exactly
But the truth is it is scary
The shoes talk back to you with every step
Your mother knows you got shoes like that?
Now you know to talk to drunks is crazy
But who can blame her, she is young and dizzy
If I give you a dollar will you kiss me?
And he looks in his pocket for wrinkled money.
Poem from the chapter called Papa Who Wakes Up Tired in the Dark
Your abuelito is dead, Papa says early one morning in my room. Está muerto, and then as if he just heard the news himself, crumples like a coat and cries, my brave Papa cries. I have never seen my Papa cry and don't know what to do.
I know he will have to go away, that he will take a plane to Mexico, all the uncles and aunts will be there, and they will have a black-and-white photo taken in front of the tomb with flowers shaped like spears in a white vase because this is how they send the dead away in that country.
Because I am the oldest, my father has told me first, and now it is my turn to tell the others. I will have to explain why we can't play. I will have to tell them to be quiet today.
My Papa, his thick hands and thick shoes, who wakes up tired in the dark, who combs his hair with water, drinks his coffee, and is gone before we wake, today is sitting on my bed.
And I think if my own Papa died what would I do. I hold my Papa in my arms. I hold and hold and hold him.
... and the poem reads:
Your abuelito is dead, Papa says early one morning in my room
They will have a black-and-white photo taken in front of the tomb
I will have to explain why we can’t play
I will have to tell them to be quiet today.
My Papa, today is sitting on my bed
Your abuelito is dead (he said).
Poem from the chapter Born Bad
Just remember, keep writing, it will keep you free
I want to be like the waves on the sea
I’ll shake the sky like a hundred violins
And then we began to dream the dreams.
_________________
Monika Bandi
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