The House On Mango St.

Sandra Cisneros ' novel The House on Mango Street tells of Esperanza 's life in an inner city Chicago barrio filled with Latin Americans who are attempting to live the American dream . During her time on Mango Street Esperanza meets many people and experiences growth in ways that both anchor her to her life in the barrio and prompt her to go beyond Mango Street . The language used by the narrator is expressive of the poetic voice of a young child , yet it also reveals a mature and insightful method of analysis that occurs

with the benefit of hindsight . Cisneros is , therefore , adept at expressing the immediate impressions of the youthful Esperanza as well as translating those situations and impressions into universal and transcendent interpretations . These interpretations follow the nuances of meaning given to Esperanza 's name which express longing , distress , hope and despair

The story finds Esperanza moving into a new house on Mango Street that is at once exciting and disappointing . The house is exciting because it is much nicer than the apartment that Esperanza once lived in . However it disappoints her because she had been imagining a home that was much more beautiful . While she had envisioned lots of bedrooms and bathrooms the house has only one of each . Esperanza is twelve years old when she moves to Mango Street and the story continues for another year of her life

Esperanza makes friends on her street - Lucy and Rachel - and she spends much of her time with them and with her sister Nenny who becomes her responsibility . The three girls spend time in the neighborhood and have adventures that define them as children , yet that also acknowledge their entrance into womanhood . One of their first acts as friends is to pool their money to buy a bicycle , on which they have childlike fun while riding about the street . However , they are also given a pair of high heels that fit them well and accentuate the new-forming curves on their bodies . In these heels they are transformed from children to budding women

In that year , Esperanza also makes friends with a girl named Sally , who is beautiful and provocative . Sally dances and flirts with boys , so much so that it causes her father to believe that she might get into trouble Once , her father beats her and in an effort to prevent her flirtatious attitude . Though he eventually apologizes for this and tells Sally to come home , he does it again later and hurts her so badly that she has to remain out of school for two days

The narrator relates this story almost in conjunction with many other stories of women who , like Esperanza , want to leave Mango Street . Many of them who leave are able to do so only by means of a man . Some get pregnant and leave , while others get married and leave . Even Esperanza 's sister expresses a desire to have a man rescue her from the neighborhood . Esperanza feels a bit ashamed of...