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Like Water For Chocolate Character Analysis

Decent Essays

Brutal abuse, the true love that cannot come into fruition, and not allowed to think for oneself a normal or un-strong person would have crumbled under these situations. In the book Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel takes us on a roller coaster of emotions beautifully inscribed by the many themes in this book. Theme is defined as the “main idea or an underlying meaning of a literary work.” Throughout the book we are encountered with examples of violence or abuse that leads to the strengthening of the character Tita. The true love that characters Pedro and Tita are denied and when they do find it, it lasts only for a mere moment. Lastly the emotional repression that the character Tita experiences within the pages of the book. As …show more content…

These quotes represent the sheer abuse that Tita had to deal with and lead to her mental demise. Similarly, Dr. Joseph S. Volpe a B.C.E.T.S. (Board Certified Expert in Traumatic Stress) states in his research that those who suffer from domestic violence or abuse “may become withdrawn, non-verbal…and [have] sleep difficulty” (Volpe). All traits that Tita suffered at one point or another in the book for example, the case of insomnia Tita developed “and so she worked on the bedspread and wept furiously, weeping and working until dawn… for as long as she lived” (Esquivel 19). As is show by both author and trauma expert Tita was so far pushed by her mother that she ended up breaking.
Furthermore, Esquivel builds up Tita and Pedro’s characters through the theme of true love by denying that love to them. As an example, this is displayed to the reader almost immediately in the book when Pedro comes to ask Mama Elena for the hand of Tita in marriage but is immediately denied that request by Mama Elena. Pedro is then forced to accept her counter offer of marrying her sister Rosaura “When you’re told there’s no way you can marry the woman you love and your only hope of being near her is to marry her sister, wouldn’t you do the same” (15). As well as when Gertrudis, Tita’s sister, is lifted naked and rides on top of a horse as both Tita and Pedro watch Gertrudis and the rider make love “Like silent spectators to a movie, Pedro and Tita began

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