The House on Mango Street

Rating:
Summary: Teenage Diary
Review: I am a parent, and read this book recently because it is on the assigned reading list for freshmen at the local public high school. The best thing I can say about the book is that it is very short and can be read in a few hours. Essentially, it takes the form of a diary/journal of a young teenage Hispanic girl in a poverty-sticken section of Chicago. The author obviously has a feminist viewpoint. I will concede that the author is capable of a poetic turn of phrase, but overall the book is not well-written and could not possibly have been assigned in a Literature course as an example of high-quality writing. Instead, it apparently was selected by people who agree with the sociological opinions of the author, and who feel that those should be foisted onto the ninth-graders.

Rating:
Summary: A Masterpiece -- Buy this book!
Review: THE HOUSE ON MANGO STREET Sandra Cisneros paints a picture for us of life of a Mexican-American girl growing up in the Hispanic section of Chicago. We learn that, for this little girl, Mango Street is not a place of dreams which would " have running water and pipes that worked. And inside it would have real stairs, not hallway stairs, but stairs inside the house like on T.V." Instead, the house on Mango Street is "small and with tight steps in front and windows so small you'd think they were holding their breath." The house on Mango street is the place she and her family moved to when the pipes broke in their last apartment and the landlord refused to fix things.

The book is written as a series of vignettes by Esperanza Cordero. The short essays/articles that make up the book have a flavor of a journal or diary entries. Rather than a single story, these journal entries are a series of vignettes which alternate stories of things that happened with description of people and things. As we read, we not only learn about the house, but the neighborhood of Mango Street and the people who inhabit it.

Though not preachy in the least, the book brings us into a reality of life for a poor Latina child facing the challenges of living in a tenement, the differences in life based on class and gender. She comes face-to-face with the reality of racial enmity and some self-hate for her own differences. As she learns about life, we are hearing her voice and we are learning, too.

I can't say enough about this book, except to highly recommend you buy it! Also recommended: THE LOSERS' CLUB: Complete Restored Edition by Richard Perez



Rating:
Summary: Twee
Review: Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards, when asked what he thought of Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, is rumored to have responded "Subtle." The description might be more reasonably applied to Cisneros' The House on Mango Street, which is a damn sight too subtle in my opinion. It is, as the previous review pedantically states, a series of vignettes. However, unless one is easily seduced by breathless prose and the kind of poetic resonance that is believed to swirl around descriptions which rely almost wholly on the reader attaching her own range of implications about character and setting to a few pedestrian facts, look elsewhere. For self-indulgence and wilful naivete, take Cisneros; for virtuoso writing combined with the excitement of plot and the interest of psychology look to Martin Amis or Michael Chabon.

Rating:
Summary: The House on Mango Street
Review: Reading this book for the first time at an older age was a good idea, alteast for me. The House of Mango Street is a very poetic book, each chapter being a work of art, not just a transition from one point to another. This book gives you perspectives into the lives and sentiments of many different people. What I find amazing is how I was able to connect back to my childhood and take a respite into nostalgia. Even though many of the childhood experiences in this book were painful, I still very much enjoyed the opporunity to revisit a life of joyfulness, sorrow, urgency, and vivid color, before the age when life is dulled with experience. The house on Mango Street is a place where nothing is ordinary; a place where an adventure is always around the corner whether it be heartbreak, disillusionment, or a soaring excitement. I don't recommend this book to people who are too far engaged in their own lifes to look for significance and beauty. This is a book for the lifelong learner. If the person of whom I am thinking is you, then I'm can guarantee you will not be disappointed with The House on Mango Street.

Rating:
Summary: A Wonderful Reading Experience
Review: This book was one of the best books I have read in a while.

I read the entire book in one day. Sandra Cisneros crafted this collection of mostly unrelated events beautifully. Every chapter (usually 2-4 pages long) contains either the thoughts or happenings of the main character, Esperanza. Esperanza, probably around 12 years old, is a future poet trying to make sense of who she is and deals with issues such as racism, sexuality, and poverty vs. wealth.

Through eloquent, and sometimes profoundly simple thoughts, Esperanza tries to figure out the world around her.

Her family often moves, hoping that one day they will find the dream house they have always wanted. The house on Mango Street is not their dream house, but it is a step up from the other houses they have lived at.

Esperanza can't wait to leave the house, but after spending a year their, she realizes that Mango street is a part of her she can not escape, and should not be ashamed of.

These 110 pages go by very quick. Just after reading it, I decided the book was good, but now that I keep thinking about it, and remembering passages from it, I grow more fond of it all the time. This book will make you laugh, and it may make some cry.

Cisneros is an excellent writer. She does not waste a word in this book setting very powerful moods for the reader.

Without a doubt, I will pick up more of this author's work off Amazon. Along with House on Mango Street, I'd like to recommend another short, very involving -- and curious book -- The Losers' Club by Richard Perez, about a Spanish-American would-be "loser" addicted to personal ads. Another memorable book.


Rating:
Summary: i hate this book
Review: It infuriates me that this book is so underrated. It is absolutely exquisate. I believe everyone would benefit from reading this book, but I do think you must be on a certain wavelength to fully appreciate it. Cisneros writes in a sparse, blindingly truthful style that I have not seen in anything else. I do have a bit of a bias, as I find my writing sytle to be similar to her, I come from a similar background as Esperanza, I also live in Chicago, and she is my favorite author, but the contents of this book are so amazing I can't bring myself to understand how people don't connect with it. I believe knowing firsthand everything Cisneros is writing about makes it better for me, too, but that's not to say it can't be enjoyed by everyone. The concepts are often universal.
I even wrote a major research paper on the rigors of cultural oppression on Latina women as shown in the novel, and outlined Esperanza's transendence from these barriers. There is SO much depth to this book. But again, you must be open and on a certain wavelength to find the depth and recongize its power.

One of my absolute favorite excerpts is from the vignette titled "Sally"

"Sally, do you sometimes wish you didn't have to go home? Do you wish your feet would one day keep walking and take you far away from Mango Street, far away and maybe your feet would stop in front of a house, a nice one with flowers and big windows and steps for you to climb up two by two upstairs to where a room is waiting for you. And if you opened the little window latch and gave it a shove, the windows would swing open, all the sky would come in. There'd be no nosy neighbors watching, no motorcycles and cars, no sheets and towels and laundry. Only trees and more trees and plenty of blue sky. And you could laugh, Sally. You could go to sleep and wake up and never have to think who likes and doesn't like you. You could close your eyes and and you wouldn't have to worry what people said because you never belonged here anyway and nobody could make you sad and nobody would think you're strange because you like to dream and dream. And no one could yell at you if they saw you out in the dark leaning against a car, leaning against somebody without someone thinking you are bad, without somebody saying it is wrong, without the whole world waiting for you to make a mistake when all you wanted, all you wanted, Sally, was to love and to love and to love and to love, and no one could call that crazy."

How can a person not connect with that?? This book is a jewel. I highly recommend it. Enrich yourself.


Rating:
Summary: I Was Forced to Read This!
Review: The House on Mango Street is truly a one of a kind book. I first read it when I was in 6th Grade, and found it to be interesting but didn't entirely get it. It wasn't until recently when I re-read it that I discovered Sandra Cisneros's great insight into the world of poverty.

The book is a collection of very short stories (some as short as one page), each talking about one aspect of Esperanza's, a young Hispanic girl, life while she lives in a large house with her family on Mango Street. It is the first house they have ever owned, and at first is a place she finds to be glorious. However, over time, she discovers that the world surrounding the house and her is not as great as it seems.

The characters in the novel is the one thing I find to be the most fascinating. Cisneros creates believable people, but then places them in shocking and sometimes even heart-wrenching situations. These characters not only help create Esperanza's world, but also grow throughout the book, until by the end they help reveal the story's theme.

I personally think this novel can be enjoyed by anyone, but despite its shortness it is not an easy read. The writing style can be confusing at times, and characters may be hard to trace, forcing you to go back and read over parts of the book. In addition, it takes a while for all of the many stories within the book to combine into one large picture of Esperanza's life, but when they do, it can only be mind-stimulating.

I would reccommend this book to anyone who has a little bit of patience, and especially to those who have lived what may be called an "easier" life, as I believe it could add greatly to their perspective.