ipl-logo

In The Time Of The Butterflies Entrapment Analysis

989 Words4 Pages

In Julia Alvarez’s In the Time of the Butterflies the theme of entrapment is seen multiple times throughout the book, mainly to represent the authoritarian regime of Trujillo. There are several different types of entrapment in the book but the main three are the discovery of entrapment, physical entrapment and the roles of women holding back the women from fulfilling their destinies. These three point mainly surround Minerva, who can be considered the bravest sister for being the first one to get involved with the revolution, but the other sisters deal with entrapment as well. In in the Time of the Butterflies, Alvarez writes about entrapment, even at the beginning she starts to introduce symbols and quotes that hint at the huge theme throughout the book. Minerva is the first sister to discover this in the book. For example, her rabbits were a symbol but she had no idea. “Sometimes, watching the rabbits in their pens, I’d think, I’m no different from you, poor things. One time, I opened a cage to set a half-grown doe free. I even gave her a slap to get her going. But she wouldn’t budge!” (Pg. 11) This quote talks about the symbol of rabbits. The rabbits are trapped but they have don’t want to leave and this confuses Minerva. All she wants to do it leave her farm and go to school. What she doesn’t realize is the rabbits don’t know any …show more content…

As butterflies, even if they don’t live for very long, they represent coming across as delicate and pretty to look at but actually being incredibly strong and free. Minerva did face many of the main difficulties with law school, being the first sister to become active in the revolution and just by being as strong-minded as she was but all of the other sisters faced entrapment whether it was their relatives in jail or being a women that held them

Show More
Related
223 Words | 1 Pages

Maya Angelou’s excerpt from “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” will imaginatively take a reader away from their deskbound position to envisioning the stage of a play ornamented with fashioned rabbits, buttercups, and daisies, hearing children as they actively perfect their performance, and stimulate the readers’ appetite with the expressive words she uses to describe sweet whiffs of cinnamon and chocolate from the food samples being prepared. From Angelou’s portrayal of the play an individual will be capable of picturing white rabbits crafted from construction paper and cotton balls modelling puffy tails, together with, yellow and pink card board cut outs resembling buttercups and daisies decking a stage. The person who reads this excerpt

Read More
1642 Words | 7 Pages

In the Time of the Butterflies by Julia Alvarez is a historical fiction novel about the tragedy of the late Mirabal sisters. Though the book is acclaimed by parents, students, and teachers for it’s fictional adaptation to the historical moments of that time, sadly it was challenged due to its diagram of how to build a time bomb. Port Washington is a school district with a goal of furthering students intelligence through literature and ensuring the safety of their students and families. A school in that district, Paul D. Schreiber High, had this novel on the list of books to be read in sophomore English class in 2000, the book was voted to be banned because of its easy descriptions of malice. This book is an opportunity to enrich the student's

Read More
1029 Words | 5 Pages

Julia Alvarez’s In the Time of the Butterflies is a work of historical fiction set in the Dominican Republic that focuses on the four Mirabal sisters who bond together to rebel against the corrupt leader of their country, Rafael Trujillo. The four Mirabal sisters, Patria, Dedé, Minerva, and María Teresa form closer relationships with each other as they figure out a way to bring down the tyranny of Rafael Trujillo. Although they have a mutual goal, each of the Mirabal sisters has different feelings and thoughts throughout this time period. The theme of coming-of-age and identify is best exemplified through the character of María Teresa, known as Mate, through the ways she matures throughout the novel and becomes her own person who stands up for what she believes in.

Read More
392 Words | 2 Pages

In the novel, “Speak” by Laurie Halse Anderson, there is a young high school girl that is named Melinda, she has something to hide from people that she know and love but eventually she will reveal her dark secret. I believe that symbolism plays a major role in the novel because many of the symbols represent how Melinda sometimes acts at times. Throughout the novel, Unarmed is used to symbolize Rabbits, Prey, and Fear in relation to how Melinda develops. I believe that Rabbits represent Melinda as an unharming animal who can’t defend herself from problems in life. This symbol also represents Melinda in a way that she can’t fight back, all she can possibly do is hide like a rabbit in her closet or run away from Danger.

Read More
540 Words | 3 Pages

Courage Courage is strength in the face of pain. Julia Alvarez portrays different types of courage in her novel, In the Time of the Butterflies. The novel is set during the time of Trujillo's dictatorship in the Dominican Republic. As a result, some of the Mirabal sisters; Minerva, Maria Teresa, and Patria, to take a step in joining a revolution against him.

Read More
430 Words | 2 Pages

A symbol that Alverez includes for this purpose is the butterfly. Butterflies are often viewed as harmless and delicate, they are commonly seen as a symbol for freedom. Through the fragile nature of butterflies, Alverez suggests that that the girls are not viewed as a significant threat at first. As women, they don’t seem to pose a threat to Trujillo.

Read More
631 Words | 3 Pages

Catherine owns a number of caged birds in her chamber. The birds symbolise freedom and the cages she keeps them in symbolises lack of freedom. “I told all this to the cages of birds in my chamber and they listened quite politely. I began to keep birds in order to hear them chirping, but most often now they have to listen to mine”. Symbolism helps show how her perspective changes as she matures.

Read More
910 Words | 4 Pages

Calamity in the D.R. Latin American writer Julia Alvarez, was born in New York, but her parents later returned to their homeland, in the time of President Trujillo’s regime. Her family got into trouble and had to flee the country before the worse was to happen to them. Alvarez explains in her biography the transition she had to make when arriving in America at the age of ten. She had to shift from speaking Spanish to English, so as to avoid being bullied by her classmates. In turn, this helped her to become a better writer since she paid keen attention to the language.

Read More
951 Words | 4 Pages

Just as humans try to understand why other humans do what they do, readers try to understand why characters do what they do while reading a novel. Psychological Criticism, derived from Sigmund Freud’s theories of psychology, allows readers to understand character behaviors and events in terms of psychoanalytic concepts. Freud believed events in a person’s childhood influenced his or her unconscious, which in turn affects his or her behavior: the idea that “human beings are motivated, even driven, by desires, fears, needs, and conflicts of which they are unaware” (Brizee). Freud says “[...] repression doesn’t eliminate our painful experiences and emotions [...] we unconsciously behave in ways that will allow us to play out [...] our conflicted

Read More
1006 Words | 5 Pages

Like the bird, she had to break her own cage before she found freedom. Like Chopin and Gilman before her, Glaspell uses an irrational character to illustrate the way men often rejected and looked down upon women, especially in the 19th and 20th

Read More
458 Words | 2 Pages

Butterflies Reflection In The Time of the Butterflies I am exposed to many different viewpoints. An important one being Minerva Mirabal. This novel takes me through the crazy lives of the Mirabal’s. This family is in a personal war against El Jefe Trujillo.

Read More
893 Words | 4 Pages

In the Time of Butterflies reflect the confinements surrounding the life of a woman during time periods not even 400 years of one another. Gender roles portray women as inferior to men and limit individual ability to control their own life. A woman's expectation to shadow a submissive and obedient homemaker often results in conformity under dominant male figures, stripping them of the possibility to serve a meaningful purpose.

Read More
391 Words | 2 Pages

In Edward Abbey writings he talks his descriptive encounters with nature in the deserts mostly about the snakes that he is watching. Abbey has a love for the deserts and this is why he writes about “The Serpents of Paradise”. In this story he used a lot of detail to make it feel like you know what is constantly going on, it almost felt like I was their and could imagine in my mind every moment I read. The way Abbey writes only makes me want to just keep reading. Abbey uses his senses to describe what he is seeing like the greasy wings of the ravens and what they sound like pretending to talk to him.

Read More
728 Words | 3 Pages

The beast hands her a white rose when she and the father enter the house. She starts tearing apart the white rose as she watched her father gamble her life away. The white rose represents the protagonist. The father is tearing her apart because he is betting all his money away and losing everything he owns. A flower is usually seen as a symbol of feminist

Read More
777 Words | 4 Pages

The Mirabal sisters were revolutionaries who opposed the dictatorship of Rafael Trujillo. During the revolution, they were given the code name “Las Mariposas”, or “the butterflies”. The term “mariposa” suits each sister in a different way. Patria, Dedé, Minerva, and Mate Mirabal each have their one reason to be compared to a butterfly. The nickname “mariposa” shows who the Mirabal sisters are; they transformed from domestic, innocent mothers and wives into brave, defiant martyrs for national freedom.

Read More

More about In The Time Of The Butterflies Entrapment Analysis

Related Topics

Open Document