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EFFECTS OF ENVIRONMENT ON LITERARY CHARACTERS.

Discusses the characters of two Chicano novels. Sandra Cisneros' THE HOUSE ON MANGO STREET and Tomas Rivera's AND THE EARTH DID NOT DEVOUR HIM. How both novels use the environment to establish the tone. Compares and contrasts differences of the novels in terms of such characterstics as geography, people and time.

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As local Latin novels, Sandra Cisneros’ The House on Mango Street and Tomas Rivera’s And the Earth Did Not Devour Him both present the effects of environment on the characters and illustrates how environment can be used to establish the tone of a novel. Although these two novels share many similarities with respect to ethnicity and its effects, they differ in terms of such characteristics as geography, people, and time. This report will compare and contrast these elements and will argue that a critical difference between the two is that Rivera focuses on the environment in which Mexican-American migrant workers of the 1940s and 1950s lived while Cisneros positions her story in an urban barrio.
Rivera’s story takes place within the context of the experiences of the Chicano migra

And then they make fun of you" (Rivera, p. Rivera's story takes place within the context of the experiences ofthe Chicano migrant farm workers between 1945 and 1955. Thesimilarities that do exist are at best superficial. To achieve a house ofher own and to acquire the autonomy and dignity that such a propertyrepresents, Esperanza must run away from her family and from the barrio inwhich she lives. Esperanza's name means hope andhas been her primary legacy from her grandmother, but this namedistinguishes her from her schoolmates in much the same manner thatRivera's protagonist is distinguished from his Anglo classmates. 94), and they are barred bybarbers from having their hair cut in the shops (Rivera, p. For the characters ofRivera's story, the externality of their culture is part of theirexperience of the United States. In contrast, the protagonist of Rivera'snovel can only make memories into dreams. This is a critically important differencebetween the two young characters, both of whom are searching for somethingreal about themselves that can become the basis of their adult identity. As this brief report suggests, the experience of being Chicano andbeing "other" as described by Rivera and Cisneros is not the same. This is a different environment than that addressed byRivera in his story, in which a remarkable degree of solidarity among thecharacters in the migrant stream can be observed.Cisneros uses a series of vignettes in which various characters, includingEsperanza, describe their world in a manner similar to the somewhat moredisjointed stories told by Rivera. The environment or geographic setting of the two stories is differentin that Cisneros positions her novel in an urban rather than a ruralsetting. Mexicansare disliked "because they steal" (Rivera, p. 133)." The experience ofbeing "other" in a disparate society has unhinged this woman's mind,causing her to retreat into a place of spirits and some form of ephemeralsecurity. Forthese women, the house functions as a place of confinement but forEsperanza, the ideal house will be a place of freedom in which anautonomous woman can live without the oversight or the control of a male.The homes dreamed of by Rivera's characters are homes that do not belong toothers, but they are unrealistic and unrealizable dreams. "The Dual-ing Images of la Malinche and la Virgen de Guadalupe in Cisneros's The House on Mango Street." MELUS, Summer 2 , 25 (2), pp. Rivera's story is setin the 194 s and 195 s while Cisneros novel appears to have been set in thelate 197 s or early 198 s when the book was published. 1 3). "A Home in the Heart." AZTLAN - A Journal of Chicano Studies, Fall 1997, 22 (2), pp. It focuses on aboy's quest of his identity, with the young man functioning as the novel'scentral consciousness (Olivares, p. The specific historical and social context of Rivera's novel is thelife of the Mexican-American migrant farm worker in Texas. 119 - 125+.Rivera, Tomas. 89). She isable to take advantage of the opportunity for education that frustratesRivera's adolescent male. Houston: Arte Publico Press, 1992.Salvidar, Ramon. It is inthe dark, in solitude, that this young man connects the self to his familyand to their mutual experiences in the isolated world of the migrant streamof the 194 s and 195 s. Olivares (p. It is a geographythat is not "a house quiet as snow, a space for myself to go, clean aspaper before the poem" (Cisneros, p. New York: Vintage, 1984.Olivares, Julian. Through his quest for self, he embodies the collectiveconscious of his society, but he does so in an environment that positionssuch a conscious as "other." Consequently, it is his lack of self-conceptthat must be overcome in order for him to find some degree of identity thatis tolerable. Ramon Salvidar(pp. Chicano Narrative. The duality represented in the story by images of la Malinche (theviolated woman) and the Virgen de Guadalupe (the Holy Mother) representsthe dichotomy of Esperanza herself. A real house.One I could point to" (Cisneros, p. 1 8). Works CitedCisneros, Sandra. 97).Though she makes this statement only with respect to a childish situation,it is actually the leitmotif of the entire story. 74 - 76) has suggested that the novel offers psychological portraitureand employs juxtaposed, noncontiguous retelling of events to engage theattention of the reader. This is not thecase for Esperanza, whose narrative demonstrates that she can overcome thelimitations of the confining house on Mango Street. She can "make a storyfor my life" (Cisneros, p. In this story, therefore, Mango Street represents aphysical as well as a psychological place or geography. The House on Mango Street. What is valued in one is suspect in another. In Cisneros' story, the attribution of"otherness" is as likely to come from a member of this support network asit is from any external or Anglo actor. 1 3). 124), the house of which Esperanza dreams is adifferent house than the one in which the women of her barrio live. According to Petty (p. The opportunities available to Esperanza are substantiallydifferent and better than those available to Rivera's characters. The setting andtime frame of the story suggest that the discrimination, suspicion andovert racism that the young man encounters will be among the dominantinfluences over his life and the formation of his identity. Though Esperanza and her family move frequently in the barrio, theirmovement is far more circumscribed than that of Rivera's migrant workers.This provides them with a more permanent sense of community and place.While these Chicanos are still very much "other" they have formed asupportive community or network in which solidarity against the externalworld is self-affirming. 92). His alienationis mirrored by that of his mother, for whom a simple shopping trip forChristmas gifts turned into an episode of madness and humiliation, with"voices coming from the merchandise (Rivera, p. 141). The protagonist of the story isan adolescent for whom the experience of being a Chicano in the migrantstream is self-defining. 13). The characters in both novels arerelatively similar in terms of their poverty, but Cisneros is depicting aworld in which Chicanos have moved from the migrant stream into a degree ofpermanency in specific urban environments. The young boy's experience of this discrimination shapes hisunderstanding of what it means to be a despised "other" in American societyand demonstrates to him that acculturation will not be easy, even if hedoes manage to obtain sufficient education to move out of the migrantstream in which his parents are trapped (Rivera, p. Madison: University Of Wisconsin Press, 199 .Sloboda, Nicholas. Although these two novels share manysimilarities with respect to ethnicity and its effects, they differ interms of such characteristics as geography, people, and time. 151). Withthis brief story, our attention is engaged and we are made aware that theworld in which the young man lives is a world in which he and his familyare very much the despised "other," vulnerable to the racial prejudices ofthe Anglo authorities. For Cisneros' characters, thisexternality is not as pressing a problem. 89 - 1 6. 13) suggests that it is through his isolation - self-imposed with respect to his family, and externally imposed with respect tothe Anglo society in which he is tangentially a member - that the young manachieves identity. Over this 3 -oddyear period of time, the Chicano experience in the United States hadchanged in some substantial ways. ...And the Earth Did Not Devour Him. 1 9). This reportwill compare and contrast these elements and will argue that a criticaldifference between the two is that Rivera focuses on the environment inwhich Mexican-American migrant workers of the 194 s and 195 s lived whileCisneros positions her story in an urban barrio. Houston: Arte Publico Press, 1991.Petty, Leslie. Thus,the suspicions of the Anglos encountered by the boys in stores, school, andother settings become part of his identity - imposing from an externalsource a negative description of self and a determination to uncover thereality of that self. The environments in which he functions - that of the familyand the migrant community, and that of the Anglo society - are oppositionalto one another. 5). Significantly different in terms of setting and narrative format,Cisneros's The House on Mango Street focuses in large measure on a femalequest for identity within an urban environment. Editor. The story is a journey, in essence, from a lack ofself-identity to a formation of a viable identity. For Esperanza, the primary goal is "to have a house. For example, we are given a brief story ofFigueroa, who has been released from prison where he was incarceratedbecause "probably some gringo couldn't stand seeing him in town with thatwhite girl he brought back with him from Wisconsin" (Rivera, p. Esperanza wishes to become the someonethat her mother did not become. However, Esperanza understands that in order to achieve a personalidentity, "I don't know why but I had to run away" (Cisneros, p. This sense of being the "other" is further confirmed when theprotagonist of the story describes how he achieves solidarity with thosewho matter in his life. The time frame is also significantly different. Everybody just stares atyou up and down. He does this "by being alone" because only in thisway "can you bring everybody together...From now on, all I have to do iscome here, in the dark, and think about them (Rivera, p. The protagonist of Rivera's story wishesmerely to know who he is. This is yet another criticaldifference between the two novels. He experiences a sense of "otherness" as evidentin his assessment of what it feels like to be in an American school: "It'salways the same in these schools in the north. As local Latin novels, Sandra Cisneros' The House on Mango Street andTomas Rivera's And the Earth Did Not Devour Him both present the effects ofenvironment on the characters and illustrates how environment can be usedto establish the tone of a novel. Thomas Rivera: The Complete Works. The tensions between thegoals of the individual and the goals of an ethnic social group areexplicated in the struggle between Esperanza Cordero and her family(Sloboda, p.

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