The House on Mango Street – Sandra Cisneros (1984) 110 pages

The House on Mango Street is narrated by Esperanza Cordera, a young girl who tells us about her life in a San Francisco neighbourhood through a series of vignettes.

“They always told us that one day we would move into a house, a real house that would be ours for always so we wouldn’t have to move each year. And our house would have running water and pipes that worked. And inside it would have real stairs, not hallway stairs, but stairs inside like the houses on T.V. And we’d have a basement and at least three washrooms so when we took a bath we wouldn’t have to tell everybody. Our house would be white with trees around it, a great big yard and grass growing without a fence. This was the house Papa talked about when he held a lottery ticket and this was the house Mama dreamed up in the stories she told us before we went to bed. But the house on Mango Street is not the way they told it at all.”

The language is simple but the writing so skilled. Cisneros evokes so much about Esperanza’s situation as a girl growing towards adulthood, in a society that expects very little of her as she is a woman, Mexican-American, and poor.

From Bums in the Attic: “People who live on hills sleep so close to the stars they forget those of us who live too much on earth. They don’t look down at all except to be content to live on hills.”

Throughout the novella, Esperanza matures considerably. At the start she sounds quite child-like:

Boys and Girls: “Someday I will have a best friend all my own. One I can tell my secrets to. One who will understand my jokes without my having to explain them. Until then I am a red balloon, a balloon tied to an anchor.”

Meme Ortiz: “The dog is big, like a man dressed in a dog suit, and runs the same way its owner does, clumsy and wild and with the limbs flopping all over the place like untied shoes.”

I thought those vignettes were wonderful in capturing an older child’s voice, alongside some really arresting imagery.

As she grows up, Esperanza starts to desire a more adult life:

Sire: “Everything is holding its breath inside me. Everything is waiting to explode like Christmas. I want to be all new and shiny. I want to sit out bad at night, a boy around my neck and the wind under my skirt. Not this way, every evening talking to the trees, leaning out my window, imagining what I can’t see.”

She is sexually assaulted later in the novella, and this is dealt with sensitively but without minimising her experience in any way. Gradually, Esperanza recognises the futile hopes people live with, the promise of lottery tickets, of lovers who have left:

Marin: “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.”

As the quote from Marin shows, this delusion is never judged harshly. Life is tough and people need something to cling to. By the end of the novel Esperanza begins to realise that she will not follow a predetermined path, she will find her own way and strive for something more – unlike her friend Sally who pays a high price for the financial security of marriage.

Linoleum Roses: “She sits at home because she is afraid to go outside without his permission. She looks at all the things they own: the towels and the toaster, the alarm clock and the drapes. She likes looking at the walls, at how neatly their corners meet, the linoleum roses on the floor, the ceiling smooth as wedding cake.”

The House on Mango Street is such an accomplished piece of writing. It is really accessible – it is taught in schools in the States – and yet it never speaks down to the reader. The images are startling and evocative and the themes are huge and complex. I haven’t remotely done justice in this post to a book entirely deserving of its classic status.

Beautiful and Cruel: “My mother says when I get older my dusty hair will settle and my blouse will learn to stay clean, but I have decided not to grow up tame like the others who lay their necks on the threshold waiting for the ball and chain.“

Esperanza’s voice rings so clear and true, I was really rooting for her to successfully walk her own path.

A House of My Own: “My books and my stories. My two shoes waiting beside the bed. Nobody to shake a stick at. Nobody’s garbage to pick up after. Only a house quiet as snow, a space for myself to go, clean as paper before the poem.“