Sandra Cisnero's The House On Mango Street

Sandra Cisnero’s The House on Mango Street: Not a Typical Tale
A typical fairy tale portrays the valiant hero rescuing a young, beautiful, and innocent girl who, by no fault of her own, has lived in poor, unfair circumstances all her life. This is not wholeheartedly the case in Sandra Cisnero’s The House on Mango Street. Esperanza, a young, beautiful, and innocent girl who lives in poor, unfair circumstances, has one defining difference from that of a typical girl in a fairy tale: nobody is going to come to her rescue. In fact, all around her are examples of women trapped by their circumstance with no rescue in sight. However, it is evident that Esperanza’s ability to understand the restrictions placed on her class, ethnicity, and gender

are what allows her to be rooted in reality. Further, there are signs in the text that show she will create her own destiny where she saves herself instead of waiting for someone else to rescue her. This, in turn, will give her the strength to one day return to Mango Street and be the one who rescues other women from their imprisonment.
One battle that Esperanza must face and overcome is the restriction she encounters based her social standing in life.

For instance, during the vignette, “A Rice Sandwich”, Esperanza has to explain to a nun at her school where she lives. Upon receiving the reply, “That one? She said, pointing to a row of ugly three-flats, the ones even the raggedy men are ashamed to go into?” (45) Esperanza cries because she “always cries when nuns yell at me, even if they’re not yelling” (45). This incident, according to Diane Klein in her article “Coming of Age in Novels”, shows how “House and narrator become identified as one, thereby revealing an ideological perspective of poverty and shame” (23 qtd in Olivares 1988). As a result, Esperanza is not just ashamed of her house, she becomes ashamed of herself as well because she understands the restrictions class will have on her life. If she is to make anything of herself, she will have to take strides to better her social

standard.
Another obstacle Esperanza faces is the limitation placed on her by her ethnicity and cultural heritage. Early on, in the vignette “My Name” she says, “In English my name means hope. In Spanish it means too many letters. It means sadness, it means waiting. It is like the number nine. A muddy color... It is the Mexican records my father plays on Sunday mornings when he is shaving, songs like sobbing” (10). Here, Esperanza is emphasizing how in Spanish her name is too complicated whereas in English it has a simple, positive definition of hope; this duality of her name makes her feel out of place – like she belongs nowhere. Additionally, Esperanza is named after her great-grandmother who was also born during the same Chinese year of the horse which Esperanza says, “is supposed to be bad luck if you’re born female – but I think this is a Chinese lie because the Chinese, like the Mexicans, don’t like their women strong” (10). Further, Esperanza states that she doesn’t want to be like her grandmother who was controlled by her husband and only able to look out the window at the life she wanted. However, at the end of the same vignette she proclaims, “I would like to baptize myself under a new name, a name more like the real me, the one nobody sees” (11). This proclamation of a new name suggests that Esperanza is going to do more with her life than women like her grandmother who was oppressed by her husband and culture; as a result, she beings to embrace the strength she needs to be in control of her own life.
One of the last things that Esperanza begins to understand is the complicated issue of her sexuality and gender. In particular, the vignette, “The Family of Little Feet”, shows Lucy, Rachel, and Esperanza, after they are given a pair of heels, suddenly becoming women who “have legs…all our own, good to look at, and long” (40). Incidentally, they all feel the empowerment as they notice men cannot take their eyes off them. This idea of “beauty as a girl’s most valuable asset” (385) is argued in Marcia Leiberman’s article “Female Acculturation Through the Fairy Tale” as one of the primary components of a typical fairytale. At first, this seems to be the case for the three girls; however, they soon learn the dangers of exhibiting their beauty after meeting the bum who nearly kisses Rachel. The fact that they run home by going “up Mango street, the back way, just in case” (42; emphasis added) and that Esperanza relays that no one complains (50) when Lucy’s mother throws the shoes away indicates that they all understand that beauty and sexual power are actually more dangerous than they originally understood. With this in mind, it is evident that Cisneros uses this event to subvert what Lieberman claims to be the system of rewards in fairy tales where being beautiful leads to being chosen, and then ultimately leads to wealth (387). So to the contrary, instead of beauty leading to wealth and happiness as in a typical fairy tale, the girls on Mango Street discover that it can actually lead entrapment and subjugation.
Further examples of this type of danger are seen from various women living in the barrio i.e., Mamacita, Rafaela, Sally, Minerva, and Esperanza’s own mother.

According to Klein, “Esperanza is guided by examples of mentors she does not want to emulate” (24). For instance, Mamacita moved to Mango Street to be with her husband but is trapped by a language barrier. Rafaela is trapped in her house and only able to look out the window at the life she wants. Minerva and Sally all married in order to escape domineering dads or lives in poverty but, in turn, are still trapped by their abusive husbands. Finally, Esperanza’s own mother is trapped by her unfulfilled dreams that she “could’ve been somebody”

(90).
As a matter of fact, each of these women becomes the victim of their surroundings because they believed in the fairy tale promise of a happy ending. According to Lieberman, “Marriage is such a constant event in the [fairy tales], and is central to their reward system, [but] few marriages are indeed shown in fairy tales” (394). So while marriage appears to be the ultimate way to save oneself from hardship, in reality, it does just the opposite for these women. Since Esperanza is able to vicariously experience the imprisonment of these women’s lives, she still has a chance to change her own destiny.
Additionally, Esperanza experiences the lie intertwined in the happily-ever-after promise when she is sexually assaulted during the vignette “Red Clowns”. Interestingly, Esperanza is not entirely angry with just the boy who forced himself on her but also angry with Sally for abandoning her as well as other women who “all lied. All the books and magazines, everything that told it wrong” (100). Although the perpetrators are clearly at fault, Cisnero is suggesting here that women are also responsible because of their inability to keep one another safe. Similarly, Esperanza observes the contradiction of sexuality during the vignettes “Sire” and “the Earl of Tennessee”. Esperanza’s own mother criticizes Sire’s girlfriend, Lois, when she says, “those kinds of girls, those girls are the ones that go into alleys” (73); however, nothing is said about Earl who clearly has prostitutes visiting him frequently. Consequently, young girls are neither educated nor protected from the dangers of sexuality but left to find their own way.
Not only is Esperanza able to be rooted in the reality of her life on Mango Street, she is also able to overcome the challenges presented. It is clear from the early vignette, “Four Skinny Trees” that Esperanza’s determination will help her overcome the struggles of her situation. Like those skinny trees who “send ferocious roots beneath the ground…and never quit their anger. This is how they keep” (74), Esperanza will also flourish. She will keep reaching because when she is “too sad and too skinny to keep keeping” (75) she looks to those trees who grew despite being planted in concrete.
Another sign of her ability to overcome the hardships of her life occurs during the vignette “Born Bad”. Until this vignette, Esperanza had never considered that her writing might be what helps her leave Mango Street. Although at the time, “she didn’t know what [Aunt Lupe] meant”, she was, nonetheless, the first person to support Esperanza’s writing and give her the idea that it “will keep [her] free” (61). To add to this, Esperanza also meets three sisters at a funeral who tell her she has a good name, she’s special, and will go far (104). Like her aunt, these women believe in her and tell her, “When you leave you must remember to come back for the others… You will always be Esperanza. You will always be Mango Street. You can’t erase what you know. You can’t forget who you are” (105). Because of this, Esperanza begins to believe in herself and in her own power to escape the confinements of Mango Street.
Lastly, Alicia’s powerful words, which echo the three sisters, “Like it or not you are Mango Street” (107) during the vignette “Alicia & I Talking on Edna’s Steps” convince Esperanza of her potential to in not only her life but the lives of others in her community. According to Klein, this coming of age novel is one that “celebrates the search for the real self and cultural responsibility in the face of different oppressions” (26). It is in this moment that Esperanza finally understands the connection between herself and Mango Street, and it is in her realization during the last vignette “Mango Says Goodbye Sometimes” that she says, "One day I will pack my bags of books and paper. One day I will say goodbye to Mango. I am too strong or her to keep me here forever. One day I will go away...they will not know I have gone away to come back. For the ones I left behind. For the ones who cannot out" (109). It is evident that only someone like Esperanza with a realistic view of life on Mango Street can help rescue those are trapped here.
So while the portrayal of Esperanza may be a typical depiction of a young girl coming of age in a Bildungsroman novel, her firm understanding of reality allows her to reject the oppression of her class, heritage, and gender. This rejection allows her to instead navigate and overcome the imprisonments of her situation. She not only begins to understand the obstacles in front of her but also gains a greater understanding of how to help those around her. Further, Esperanza decides what is her happily-ever-after in place of waiting for someone else to decide for her. Finally, with her new empowered sense of being, she is able to escape the poverty and oppression of her community by not playing the role of the damsel in distress but instead playing the role of the heroic savior herself.