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Innocence In The House On Mango Street

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The House on Mango Street, is a broad interpretation of a Hispanic girl’s life and her coming of age. Throughout the course of the book, Esperanza, the narrator and protagonist, is constantly fighting a war between her autonomous mind and her forever changing sexual body. You, Esperanza, whose name means hope in English, how did you lose your hope? Your innocence? Your purity? Esperanza, after exploring her changing world profoundly and deeply, experienced a series of psychological changes (changes in her maturity, intelligence, and including personal degradation associated with pubescent teenagers) as she encounters men whom loudly express the negative, masculine stereotypes constantly argued for by feminists. Cisneros uses multiple symbols, …show more content…

Even though she stated beforehand that she was “to show up tomorrow saying I was one year older” (54), the dress may of given off a different impression towards the oriental man she encounters on her first day. Blue can evoke intelligence and sophistication, and again a sense of loyalty and submission, something Esperanza clearly confirmed when unwillingly kissed the man. The essence of the chapter truly the loss of innocence, but the colour blue is linked with the common theme of young submission and ignorance. In the chapter, “Born Bad” (58-61), Esperanza is further exposed to the realities of death. Esperanza, in an innocent tangent to show her death-struck aunt an illustration from a book, is told that “I [Esperanza’s aunt] can’t see it, she said, I’m blind. And I was ashamed.” (60) Esperanza truly didn’t completely understand sickness until then. There’s an important reference to colour in the chapter; “her legs bunched under the yellow sheets...The yellow pillow, the yellow smell” (58) demonstrates the repeated usage of the colour yellow, which the author uses to evoke a notion of importance to the colour yellow. The colour yellow could be elucidated as a colour provoking fear (her aunt might of felt fear of confessing her condition to the kids (61)). In some regions of Mexico, bright, marigold yellow can be seen as a symbol of

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The House on Mango Street is a novel written by Sandra Cisneros about a young girl named Esperanza and her family and friends that live on Mango Street. Esperanza had always lived in different crumbling apartments. Because of this she had always held on to the dream of living in the big white home that her parents had told her bedtime stories about when she was younger. She had always felt embarrassed by the shabby rented homes she had lived in, and when she finally moved to the red house on Mango Street, she felt ashamed of it too. It was not anything like what her parents had told her about.

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The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros tells of a willful young girl named Esperanza who dreams big despite her surroundings and restrictions. Throughout the book, she endures the trials and tribulations of growing up, illuminating her experiences through a variety of different symbols. One recurring theme that Cisneros applies to the story is the loss of innocence. Representations such as a house, high heels, and a garden help in giving insight to how Esperanza’s childhood was taken away from her too young too soon.

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The House on Mango Street is set in a poor, primarily Hispanic neighborhood. Author Sandra Cisneros creates an atypical, yet easily digestible world for the reader to experience while learning about Esperanza’s childhood. The culture of her environment influences Esperanza’s development as she becomes a young woman, and contributes to the book’s driving theme of self-empowerment. Mango Street is the source of Esperanza’s growth through her childhood, and it hides sadness and longing underneath stereotypes of Hispanic people. The characters that live in the broken-down neighborhood all seem to represent pigeonholed views of Latino individuals.

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In the book, The House on Mango Street, Esperanza is portrayed as a young innocent girl that drastically changes over the course of the book. Esperanza is new to mango street and encounters many challenges but also positive experiences that she is able to take away from mango street. In order for Esperanza to transform as a human it was inevitable for her to face the struggles on mango street. As Esperanza matures throughout the novel she experiences three major developments that shape her future through the awakening of maturity, responsibility and her awakening of her interest in poetry.

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“That’s the problem with the world, too many people grow up.” – Walt Disney. Growing up quickly is a dream for many girls. They will make countless attempts in hopes of becoming a woman faster. In Sandra Cisneros’s, The House on Mango Street, Esperanza becomes one of those girls who spends all of their precious time trying to grow up quickly.

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The House on Mango Street is a touching and timeless tale told in short vignettes. It tells the story of a young Latina girl growing up in Chicago. Her life, and the lives of the people around her, are laid bare to the readers in this touching novella. In the beginning, Esperanza is not accepting of herself. Her family’s poor financial situation, the sadness of the people around her, and the problems she faces in her daily life make her very cynical.

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She however is very reactive to this situation, she doesn’t tell anybody what happened, she steals late passes, hides in an abandoned janitor closet, and eventually ditches school. That example shows how irresponsible she is. House On Mango Street, by Sandra Cisneros, is about a young girl who moves into a new house with her family in Chicago Illinois in the early 1980’s. Esperanza is not a very happy person, especially after the year she had at the house on Mango Street.

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