Similarities Between Sweat And The House On Mango Street

In the short stories covered this semester, there were similarities between them. The works that were studied were “Sweat” by Hurston, “The Storm” by Chopin, and “The House on Mango Street” by Cisneros. Amongst those works there was one common goal, which was to escape the current situation that they were in. This is supported throughout all the short stories.
In “Sweat”, the protagonist Delia Jones works as a wash woman at home. Her husband, Sykes is against her working because she has to fold white people’s clothes. In this piece, no one likes Sykes. He cheats on his wife without shame or discretion and the whole town knows him as a womanizer. Everyone dislikes his so much that the men of the town talk about hanging him. Delia wants to escape the abusive relationship that she is in. The story ends with Sykes being killed by the rattlesnake that he put in the house to scare Delia. While he is dying, she watches him suffer, almost in a satisfied type of way.

The husband and son are stuck at the local store because there is a big storm coming and they would not make it home in time. Meanwhile Calixta is at home sewing and when she gets news of the storm she prepares herself. She then sees an old boyfriend on the road and invites him in for shelter. By now, both are married and while the two are together, old flames are reignited and they make love. When the storm is over, he leaves before her husband returns. When they return, she is in a better mood compared to what she is usually in and the story end with everyone being happy. It seems as though Calixta was trying to escape from the boredom of her marriage and by getting intimate with her ex-boyfriend she did. Even though it was only for one night, the encounter brought about a new flame in