House on Mango Street Interpretive Essay

The work of fiction House on Mango Street is written by Sandra Cisneros. It shows the dreams of Esperanza, a little girl who lives on Mango Street, an impoverished area of Chicago. She likes writing and wants to be an author. Both Alicia and Esperanza view education and writing as a pathway to better life. Through these characters, the author suggests that education would offer a kind of freedom. Alicia is Esperanza’s friend. She likes writing. She always studies all the night otherwise she would have a life like her mother. She wants happiness, her own life and to do the things whatever she wants. “Alicia, who inherited her mama’s rolling pin and sleepiness, is young and smart and studies for the first time at the university. Two trains and a bus, because she doesn’t want to spend her whole life in a factory or behind a rolling pin,”(31-32). Alicia is very young; she still has a chance to achieve her dreams. She knows if she wants stay away the life like her mother’s which is doing boring works in the factory, she needs to keep studying and writing. She believes that keeping writing can make a big change on her life. she can get a better life and a life with more freedom. As well as Esperanza, she also likes writing, she enjoys writing. “You just remember to keep writing, Esperanza. You must keep writing. It will keep you free, and I said yes, but at that time I didn’t know what she meant,” (61). As an adult, Esperanza’s aunt, has more experience than Esperanza has. She knows how important it is for a woman to have freedom. Esperanza didn’t understand what she meant when she was young, but she realized that now. She understood keeping writing can make her happier; can make her feels free just because she can write all the things down that she thinks about. Also, Cisneros, the author suggests that education offers a kind of freedom. A woman should not be fettered by a husband. “I could’ve been somebody, you know? Esperanza, you go to school. Study hard.