《芒果街上的小屋》中的女性形象(3)

2. The Typical Traditional Female Images in the book

In this part, the four characters, Mum, Aunt Lupe, Marin and Sally they all will be analyzed in detail. In The House on Mango Street, these two kinds of people just can represent the traditional women image“La Virgen de Guadulupe” in Mexican culture and the revolted women image “La Malinche” respectively. “La Virgen de Guadulupe” and “La Malinche” are two typical female image in mexican culture and history, “La Malinche”, which is totally opposite to the “La Virgen de Guadulupe”. They two have totally different personality and quality. In this section, we will do some detailed analysis of their personality, and give some examples to find out what they have in common and how their personality affects their life.

2.1 A Brief Introduction to Mum and Aunt Lupe

In the book, The House on Mango Street, Esperanza’s Mum, is a key figure who appears almost the whole book, at the book’s very beginning, its middle paragraphs etc. We can even come to the conclusion that the heroine herself regard her mum as the example to follow during her growth period to some degree. In her eyes, her mum is as holy and warm as the virgin Mary. We can find the evidence from the description of mum’s hair in the book. It says,

“But my mother’s hair, my mother’s hair, like little rossetes, like little candy circles all curly and pretty because she pinned it in pincurls all day, sweet to put your nose into when she is holding you, holding you and you feel safe, is the warm smell of bread before you bake it,is the smell when she makes room for you on her side of the bed still warm with her skin, and you sleep near her, the rain outside falling and Papa snoring. The snoring, the rain, and Mama’s hair that smells like bread.” (Cisneros, 2006: 155-156)

From the words quoted from the book, we can feel Esperanza’s strong emotions and mighty love for her mother. And that’s because her mum is an understanding wife and loving mother, she is dedicated to the whole family, taking care of all the family members. She play a good role of wife and mum in her husband and children’s mind. However, in Mum’s own deeply heart, she is not willing to live like this, she could not live like this, “I could’ve been somebody, you know?”; She can speak two languages. She can sing an opera. She knows how to fix a TV.(Cisceros,2006:258)

All these mentioned above are what Mum herself told Esperanza,from these words, we can feel

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the real desire in Mum’s mind. She dreams to live a life which is totally different from reality. And she possibly could be able to have a wonderful and free life. But in fact, She has lived in this city her whole life. But she doesn’t know which subway train to take to get downtown. (Cisceros, 2006: 258) Mum still live a life like other Mexican-American women on the Mango street.

In addition, aunt Lupe is a figure who seems similar to Mum. In Aunt Lupe’s youth, she is a vibrant, beautiful swimmer, but now she is old, blind, and bed-ridden. Her name was Guadalupe and she was pretty like my mother. (Cisceros, 2006: 217) In mexican culture, there is a well-known female stereotype “La Virgen de Guadulupe”. The author name Esperanza’s aunt Lupe on purpose to remind us readers of the “La Virgen de Guadulupe”. And not only the name, but also the reaction to Esperanza’s poem “That’s nice. That’s very good. She said in her tired voice. You just remember to keep writing, Esperanza. You must keep writing. It will keep you free.”(Cisceros, 2006: 221) From these behavior and words, we can feel how desperately Aunt Lupe yearn for freedom and independence. Unfortunately, till the end of her life, she never live the life she really wants to live and never experience the free she told Esperanza.

2.2 The similarities between Mum and Aunt Lupe

After the brief introduction of the two female in book, Mum and Aunt Lupe, we can make a summing up of the similarities between them. These two figures are suit for the female stereotype “La Virgen de Guadulupe” in mexican culture. As we all know, “La Virgen de Guadulupe” is a mexican icon, it’s called our lady of Guadulupe or the virgin of Guadulupe. The icon is Mexico’s most popular religious and cultural image, bearing the titles: the Queen of Mexico (Marys-touch.com) Apart from religious significance, it also has a certain political and cultural significance. All in all, in terms of its representative female images in Mexico culture, “La Virgen de Guadulupe” is a model of female traditional virtue which including virginity, diligence, patience, obedience, self-sacrifice etc. Mum and Aunt Lupe in book exactly meet these qualities or standards of the “La Virgen de Guadulupe”, especially the figure Mum in book. Therefore, we can draw the following conclusions, the two figures we discussed in this paper, the mother and aunt. They both representes the typical traditional Mexican women image who is suffer from the oppression of patriarchy. They have the awareness of pursuing for one’s own value, but they didn’t put into effect.

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2.3 A Brief Introduction to Marin and Sally

Just like name aunt Lupe Guadulupe, the author give the girl Marin the name “Marin” consciously. Why? That’s because the “Marin” in book follow the same track with “La Malinche” of Mexican culture. Marin lives with her aunt in Puerto Rico. She get away from her parents, and dreamed to find a job like white collar so that she can be well dressed to come across some rich man. And then the rich man will buy a big house for her. In order to live a happy life she defined, she always dressed herself well even though she is just in charge of taking care of her cousin. From the description of the book, Marin knows lots of things about gender differences, and she is the first teacher of Esperanza on sex to a large extent. However, next year, Marin was sent back to her mother for causing so much trouble to her aunt. But she never give up waiting for a man to let her get rid of poverty. Just like in the end of the section which on Marin, the writer wrote, “Marin, under the streetlight, dancing by herself, is singing the same song somewhere. I know. Is waiting for a car to stop, a star to fall, someone to change her life”. (Cisceros, 2006: 179)

Sally is another “La Malinche” in the book, but there is a radical difference between her and Marin. That is the reason why they become the “La Malinche”. We have just discussed about Marin, and we can say that she behaves like the “La Malinche” in order to achieve her own dream, to be a lady who can enjoy a luxurious life with the help of men. But Sally is the victim of patriarchy. She suffers great mental pain everyday. She is controlled by her father who think that her beauty is trouble. We have mentioned before that the female stereotype “La Virgen de Guadulupe” in mexican culture. The model of female traditional virtue which including virginity, diligence, patience, obedience, self-sacrifice etc. especially the virginity. Because Sally’s father is extremely strict in his religious belief, and he is afraid of Sally going bad for her outstanding appearance. He rules Sally not to dance, even not to go out except to school. And not only her father, but also the people around Sally, what they did and said do hurt Sally. When Esperanza shows her admiration on Sally’s black shoes, her mother tell her it’s too young to wear black, it will be dangerous. And the girls in school are not willing to make friends with Sally, the boys talk about Sally in despising way. All these gossips and prejudices make Sally go towards the wrong direction her father wish she would not to. Sally start to live a doubled-life, when she is at school, she make herself as pretty as she can, to the contrary, she behave as an obedient and quit daughter when she’s home. But she

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cannot meet her father’s standard, she is hit hard by her father when she is caught talking with some boy. Poor Sally is titled with “La Malinche” by others for her beauty. It seems that she is cursed by her appearance. Then she escapes from her abusive father by marring a marshmallow salesman, but her situation get worse, she is oppressed by her husband. He lock her at home in order to avoid she escaping from him.

2.4 The similarities between Marin and Sally

What has been discussed above points to the fact that Marin and Sally well represent the “La

Malinche” in Mexican culture. About “La Malinche”, in the Mexican history, she is a controversial figure. She is born into a noble family, her father is an indian tribal leader. But after her father’s death, her mother remarried and she is selled to be a slave. In the process of being a slave, she learn several indigenous languages and spanish. Because of her language talent, she is appreciated by the Spanish colonist Heman Cortes. With her help, Cortes conquest the Mexica. Therefore, she is the embodiment of treachery in Mexica. However, because she is abandoned by Cortes in the end, she is still regarded as the quintessential victim. All in all, in Mexican’s eyes, \the women who is discriminated, such as:bitchy woman, enslaved woman. So do Marin and Sally. They both are bitchy and enslaved in the eyes of people around them. Maybe we can say that they both are the victim of the patriarchy. They all live a miserable life and want to change it, but they do not choose the right way. Marin, all she think is to depend on men, she never think about changing her life all by herself. And Sally she is controlled by his father when she is a girl, but the way she try to against her father is totally wrong. They two have the awareness to change their life and take some actions, but they fail because of wrong methods.

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3. The study of Esperanza from the Perspective of Feminism

This part mainly talk about the heroine of the book Esperanza from the Perspective of Feminism. Firstly give a brief introduction of her personality and experience, then analyze her three awakenings and how these awakenings affect her and help her succeed. Then we can make some conclusion on “Esperanza” female image.

3.1 A brief introduction to Esperanza

As the novel's heroine and narrator, a Mexican-American girl, Esperanza is a budding writer who wishes for a home of her own. The House on Mango Street chronicles a year in her life as she matures emotionally and sexually. Esperanza is the clue of the story, the whole book is just like her diary, she records her life and the people, the things around her on the Mango Street. She witness the changes on the Mango Street and the Mango Street witness her changes. The name Esperanza means “hope” in English, but too many other meanings in Spanish, most of which are not good. She does not like her name and want to rename herself. She is pure that she pay money to buy bike in order to make friends with other girl; she is sensitive that she feel shameful about her house, her name etc. Or in other words, she feels inferior for she is a Mexican-American girl, which means poor, sexism discrimination etc. Fortunately, she has the gift of writing and she keep writing as her aunt told her. She learn from the lessons other girls make and finally make her life different and own a house of her own or we say find her real identity.

3.2 Three Awakenings of Esperanza

As Esperanza matures during the year that makes up The House on Mango Street, she experiences a series of awakenings, all these awakenings make her be independent and different from others.

3.2.1 The Sexual Awakening

The first important awakening is a sexual awakening. At the beginning of the novel, Esperanza

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