Facing Maturity Maturity is reaching to the point where one asks themselves who they are as a person and who they want to be. It’s when one starts searching for the answers. Maturity is when one becomes their own best friend, their own priority. It’s when one knows what is and who is good for themselves and to protect them. In the novel The House on Mango Street, by Sandra Cisneros the narrator, Esperanza, reveals her story about how she tries to find her true self. As she enters womanhood, she develops her identity and changes drastically as she gets a better understanding of her sexuality, heritage, and her as a person. In Cisneros’ House on Mango Street, Esperanza evolves from an insecure girl to a mature young lady as she becomes …show more content…
When Esperanza wears the shoes, she gets comments from boys and men for the first time of her life, which shows her pleasure of wanting people to notice her. Overall, Esperanza changes from being self-conscious to confident.
Esperanza also evolves as she becomes aware of her responsibilities. In the beginning of the story, Esperanza was only concerned with her own desires. This is displayed in the vignette “The House on Mango Street” when she wishes for a “real house that would be [theirs]...[their] house would have running water...real stairs...like the houses on TV…[their] house would be white...a great big yard…” (4) This portrays the American Dream. The way Esperanza describes the house she dreams of having one day, displays her insecurity at being poor since she has never lived in a house where there was running water or more than one bathroom. Moreover, dreaming of this house shows how desperate she is to escape her neighborhood because she does not want to be identified with, in her eyes, an ugly house. Esperanza is so invested in having a beautiful house instead of an ugly house, that she isn’t thinking about anyone but herself. However, Esperanza’s maturity becomes evident when she starts to accept the responsibilities of a woman. For instance, in the vignette “Mango says Goodbye Sometimes” she says that “[she] [has] gone away to come back.
Have you ever felt like the place you belonged to didn’t belong to you? In The House on Mango Street, this is how the main character, Esperanza, felt. The author, Sandra Cisneros, did a good job in portraying a girl who couldn’t find her place. She had a problem accepting where she was from, The House on Mango Street is heartfelt novel and is great to pass the time. In this story, you will be shown the lives of Esperanza, her sister Nenny, their two best friends Rachel and Lucy, and the many people who lived on Mango Street. This book is about a girl who went from denying her place to accepting it.
Judgement is a very frequent occurrence in today’s world. It usually isn’t an encouraging judgement though. Throughout the book, The House on Mango Street, the message of judgement of others being cruel is revealed. This isn’t just in Esperanza, the main character, but everyone in the book. It is important that everyone in the book progresses and matures as a person because, it causes everyone to become more together. This all proves the claim of, The House on Mango Street portrays an aspect of maturity by showing that what people imagine about others is often not how they truly act and are as a person, how they grow as a person, and what they strive to become.
With all of the bad things going on around Esperanza, she was very optimistic and made the best of everything she could. For example, in chapter one, Esperanza explain how she and her family had always grown up poor and that they always had dreams of one day owning a big beautiful house like the ones that they saw on television. One with a back yard and a basement. When Esperanza's family was forced to move her parents had purchased the first house that they could afford so they wouldn't have to continue paying rent. The house was nothing like what they had spoke of or dreamt about. But Esperanza states, "I then knew I had to have a house. One I could point to. But this isn't it. The house on Mango Street isn't it. For the time being, Mama said. Temporary, says Papa. But I know how those things go.." Within this paragraph it shows that Esperanza isn't exactly happy about where she is living but she is going to make the best of it and do what she has to do to get out of there and have a house of her own. One that she can point to.
Esperanza, a strong- willed girl who dreams big despite her surroundings and restrictions, is the main character in The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros. Esperanza represents the females of her poor and impoverished neighborhood who wish to change and better themselves. She desires both sexuality and autonomy of marriage, hoping to break the typical life cycle of woman in her family and neighborhood. Throughout the novel, she goes through many different changes in search of identity and maturity, seeking self-reliance and interdependence, through insecure ideas such as owning her own house, instead of seeking comfort and in one’s self. Esperanza matures as she begins to see the difference. She evolves from an insecure girl to a
In the novel, The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros, the theme of growing up is prevalent throughout the book. Throughout the novel, a young mexican girl named Esperanza goes through experiences as she matures that involve her friends, society, dangers that expose her to the outside world and help her to realize what the real world is like.
Throughout the course of Mango Street, Esperanza’s relationship towards her house change. As time passes her feelings about the house itself change and the emotional impact of the house of her changes as well. Esperanza’s house on Mango Street symbolizes her Mexican culture. For so long she has wanted to leave it. She envisions a different type of life than what she is used to - moving from house to house. “this house is going to be different / my life is going to be different”. One can look at all the things she envisions - the "trappings of the good life" such as the running water, the garden etc. as symbols for the new life.
This relates to the theme of the struggle for self definition, because at first Esperanza was under the impression she could change a man, but as she’s exposed to these horrible encounters she comes to the conclusion that boys and girls live in different worlds.
For example as stated on page 4, “ Our house would be white with trees around it, a great big yard and grass growing without a fence. This was the house Papa talked about when he held a lottery ticket and this was the house Mama dreamed up in the stories she told us before we went to bed. But the house on Mango street is not the way they told at all.”.When the reality of her parents expectations didn’t go the way hoped it created the initial reason for Esperanza’s dream about leaving Mango Street . If their house wasn’t that much of a downgrade to what they have wanted ,Esperanza may not have felt the need to dream about a whole new house of her own. As her character continues to grow, her reason of wanting her own house becomes much more meaningful . Essentially, Esperanza's house will not only show her taste in real estate, but her true self . In other words , her house will act as a safe haven , the place she can escape to express herself and show her true nature. Illustrated on page 87 ,” One day I’ll own my own house, but I won’t forget who I am or where I came from. Passing bums will ask,Can I come in? I’ll offer them the attic, ask them to stay, because I
Everyone who matures has a family and that family shapes that person into who they come to be. The main character, Esperanza from The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros, is an excellent example of that; Esperanza is an insecure young Latina girl who is shaped by her family as she grows up. In the novel, Esperanza has the perspective of life from the experience of living in poverty. Esperanza dreams of a perfect home with amazing flowers and enough rooms that everyone in her family would each have one. However, she moves to the house on Mango Street, and reality is so different from what she has dreamt of. She receives a tiny run-down house with bricks that are broken down in numerous places around the house. Throughout the
The House on Mango Street is the tale about a young girl named Esperanza who is maturing throughout the text. In it Esperanza documents the events and people who make up Mango Street. It is through this community that Esperanza’s ideas and concepts of the relationships between men and women are shaped. She provides detailed accounts about the oppression of women at not only the hands of men who make up Mango Street but also how the community contributes to this oppression. As the young girls and women of Mango Street try to navigate the world they must deal with a patriarchal society that seeks to keep them confined. Sandra Cisneros’s vignettes demonstrate through Esperanza’s experience of growing up on Mango Street and witnessing the oppression
Esperanza is a shy but a very bright girl. She dreams of the perfect home now, with beautiful flowers in their luscious garden and a room for everyone to live in comfortably all because of the unsatisfied face the nun made that one afternoon--when she moves to the house of Mango Street. She thinks it’s going to be a “grand house on a hill that will have a bedroom for everyone and at least three washrooms so when they took a bath they would not have to tell everybody.” (Cinceros 4) Reality is so different for her when her dream is shot down in a heartbeat when she
Esperanza's mother threw everything away because she was embarrassed of her physical appearance. She is a very talented woman who is bilingual, sing, fix a t.v., and more. Now, her mother's job is just to take care of her children. She doesn't want Esperanza to be like her because she was embarrassed of who she is. Esperanza needs a good education, so she doesn't have to be the person her mother is
The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros uses many rhetorical devices to push her viewpoint of how sexual maturity and individuality come with age and experience. Cisneros’ effective use of symbols, syntax, and tone convey and persuade Esperanza’s upbringing.
In The House on Mango Street, by Sandra Cisneros, a little girl from a Latino heritage is given birth to. Not literally, but in the sense of characterization. Esperanza is a fictional character made up by Cisneros to bring about sensitive, alert, and rich literature. She is the protagonist in the novel and is used to depict a female’s life growing up in the Latino section of Chicago. Cisneros creates the illusion that Esperanza is a real human being to communicate the struggles of growing up as a Latina immigrant in a modern world, by giving her a name, elaborating her thoughts and feelings, and illustrating her growth as a person through major events.
Everyone has challenges in their life, their feelings behind their actions make them who they are. In the novel The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros there are many conflicts which explore the characters, to get to know them closer. The internal conflict is used to discover the identity of the main character, Esperanza.