The House on the Mango Street

人生不过三万天

Content: 1. Esperanza describes the unique laughter connection between her and her sister, Nenny. Despite their different personalities, they have surprisingly similar laughter and can even be amused by the same things at the same time. In the text the two coincidentally think of a house in Mexico when they see one while others feel puzzled.
2.Esperanza and her sister walk into a junk store owned by Jill, an elderly African-American man who barely speaks. The store is filled with old things, the most striking of which is a broken piano with a music box on top. The girls are attracted to the music box, but Gil just looks at them in silence. When her sister Nenny tries to buy the music box, she is told by Jill that the music box is not for sale.
3.Esperanza introduces neighbor Meme Ortiz, an active boy with a ferocious dog at home. Meme once fell from a tall tree and broke both his arms, but remains unchanged in his mischievous ways. His home is a dilapidated house with a crooked tree left behind by the former tenants, but the children love to climb it.
4.Esperanza describes how after Cathy's family moves away, the neighbors, Louie's family, who are Puerto Rican immigrants, are always bustling in their home. One of Louie's cousins owns a stolen Cadillac, and the children excitedly ride around in it until the police come to arrest him.

Evaluation: In these four chapters, Cisneros continues her fragmented but poetic narrative style, always maintaining the tone of a child's narration, but able to touch on deeper social issues through the surface, capturing the daily details of Mango Street through Esperanza's point of view. Chapter 7 shows the complex emotional bond between the sisters through the small but profound imagery of “laughter,” and the language is simple yet powerful. The second-hand furniture store in Chapter 8 is particularly well depicted, with the silence of Gil's old man and the imagery of the broken piano together building a corner that has been forgotten by time, hinting at the neglected loneliness of the immigrant community. Chapter 9 vividly presents the existence of children in poor neighborhoods through Meme's adventures and injuries, danger and freedom co-exist. Chapter 10, on the other hand, is darkly heavy in its lighthearted tone, as the arrest of Cousin Louie is downplayed by the children's point of view, but more poignantly reveals the immigrant community's struggle on the edge of the law.

Reflection: What touched me most while reading these chapters was Esperanza's keen eye for detail. In Chapter 7, her laughter connection with her sister reminded me that the deepest bonds in family relationships often exist in the smallest, everyday moments. The second-hand furniture store in Chapter 8 reminded me of the phenomenon of “abandonment” in modern society. Old man Gill and his store are like the forgotten corners of a fast-moving society. Do we often turn a blind eye to the “shabby” things around us? Do the neglected people and objects also hold stories worth listening to?

The children's adventurous and transgressive behavior in Chapters 9 and 10 illustrates the complexity of growing up in poverty. Meme climbs a tree even though she is injured, and Louie's cousin steals a car even though he knows it is dangerous-behind these behaviors is a desire for freedom. It made me realize that before judging the choices of others, perhaps it is important to understand the world they live in. These chapters also made me realize that growing up is never simply a matter of right or wrong, but rather a matter of survival and struggle in a given environment.