Final Blog Assignment

                What experiences define a woman’s life? The answer is all of them. Why should a woman’s defining life moments be any different than everyone else’s? A woman will have her life defined by experiences that are not exclusive to any one group. The spectrum of human emotion is not foreign to any member of the race and likewise each case of defining experiences should inevitably be unique to the individual and their life. Anger, love, oppression, happiness, sadness, these are all things that are felt by women and are a byproduct of their humanity.

                I feel like there is this stereotype out there in society about which experiences women feel. As if they should only be content to be defined by tradition rather than exploring their own being. For instance, in the story of the Mirabal sisters “In the Time of the Butterflies” Minerva aspires to be a lawyer so that she may fight for justice and right what she perceives to be the wrongs perpetrated against the people by the Trujillo regime, contrary to her sister whom is rather content to be a simple housewife. Now there is nothing wrong with the choice of stay at home mother however, it is certainly not the only choice and Minerva’s choice would equally define her as a woman.

                It is just like that old saying ‘life is what you make it’, there is no cookie cutter example of what is and what is not, a defining moment in the lives of women. To make the claim that only one set of experiences can lead to successful womanhood is to take away the freedom of the individual and continue the viscous cycle of oppression in which women have been victimized for too long.

                Many wonderful things are celebrated in women’s lives however; I do believe it all comes down to the pursuit of happiness. Whether the woman actually succeeds in her pursuit is irrelevant so long as she is actually able to engage in it. To be able to pursue the basic human want of happiness is critical in every person life. The reason why this is a cause for celebration in women’s literature is that so often they are robbed of this opportunity through oppressive traditions often orchestrated by their male counterparts. To pursue happiness is to rebel against the machine and to take a journey towards greater personal freedom. A classic example would be the case of Precious in the story, “Push”. Precious is able to overcome the oppression of her social environment and is able to pursue a little bit of her own personal happiness out of a desperately bleak situation. That is certainly a cause that should be celebrated. Another case in which a woman is able to pursue happiness but is unsuccessful would be the Haitian housekeeper in “Between the Pool and the Gardenias”. The woman pursues her dream of motherhood and this is her pursuit of happiness. To her the defining moment in her life was to be mothering a child, while this story had a rather tragic ending for just a moment she was able to pursue happiness and that should not be overlooked.

                We all need to vent sometimes, for women the ability to vent anger is another key element of the experiences which define women’s lives. A source of anger which I have noticed throughout many of the readings is the perception of women vassals for male sexual enjoyment yet at the same time female sexuality is something to just be ignored. There are just too many cases of sexual abuse against women and I think that for the better part of human history that female sexual rights have been ignored is a focal point of a lot of that anger. The co-partner in crime to sexual abuse has to be the pent up frustration over not being able to express themselves. “The Vagina Monologues” probably best exemplifies this as it is a book which broke barriers for tackling this very issue. The fact that Eve Ensler only recently undertook this project and that for some of the women interviewed it was the very first time that they had been asked about their own sexuality is even more astounding. For how many centuries did women have to go without being able to express their most personal feelings? Personally I am shocked there was not a more radical revolt on the behalf of women everywhere over this pent up frustration.

Two or three things i know for sure

Dorothy Allison, throughout her book, writes down in italics the little bits of wisdom she has learned over the years to be true and one of these truths that have particular resonance is about one of the most basic things we are all taught in life. She writes, “Two or three things I know, two or three things I know for sure and one of them is that if we are not beautiful to each other, we cannot know beauty in any form.”

                This phrase has appeared in one form or another all throughout the most basic teachings of life. Even as far back as the bible the phrase love others as you would love yourself appears. To be beautiful to each other as we must love each other and until we are able to be beautiful to each other we will never know beauty. For too long in our world there has been suffering perpetrated by ugly hatred and the beauty of it all cannot possibly be seen unless we begin to love one another.

                To be beautiful to each other is a much simpler task than to be ugly. Being beautiful could be as easy as tracing your niece’s face with your fingers as Allison does.  Being ugly to one another requires scheming and anger, things that detract from life and hide the beauty of it all from us. Without being beautiful to one another we will never be able to see life for what it should truly be. Life spent making the lives of others more difficult and thereby your own existence less fruitful is a tragedy. Conversely a life spent experiencing joy and bringing joy to others is a life that has been enjoyed and one in which happiness has been pursued to its fullest extent.

Two or three things i know for sure

                In Dorothy Allison’s “Two or Three Things I know for Sure” she has an interesting way of telling her story. Not only does she write about her life and that of her family but she also manages to include some photos pertaining to the people involved in the story. The photos are especially interesting to me because without Dorothy Allison’s writing you would never guess what was really going on and could not hope to appreciate the significance in some instances.

                For example, there is one instance in which there is a photo of a young girl curiously examining a rifle and in the next aiming at nothing in particular. In the photo there is no malice in this young woman’s eyes and all of her actions, as depicted in the photo, point to a person with a passing curiosity towards the weapon. However, there is much more to this photo than meets the eye and this becomes a common theme in “Two or Three Things I Know for Sure”. Allison writes, “I know. I’m not supposed to talk about how long it took me to wash him out of my body – how many targets I shot…”. You would never know that the woman in the photo is imagining taking a shot at her abusive stepfather when she aims that weapon at the target. Allison is allowing us to be privy to the back story of every photograph and thereby enabling readers to gain access the valuable details which make the photo relevant.

                It would seem that one of the things that Dorothy Allison knows for sure is that there is always more to something if you look under the surface. In her photos it is impossible to understand the context  without Allison’s assistance and she wants us to come away knowing this, that most things are not what they appear to be.

the shawl

Is Rosa crazy? Absolutely.  It is not possible to destroy a successful business and thereby your livelihood, move to Miami so that you may live in a life of squalor all the while praying for the arrival of a shawl, which by the way you believe to be magic in that it sustains life for days and is somehow an embodiment of your niece, whom you view as your daughter, who has been deceased for decades. If someone can read this story and not gain the impression that Rosa is a bit off mentally, then they recognize a different definition of the word crazy then most.

                Rosa moves to Miami after smashing up her antique store in New York as a way of both lashing out against those who do not understand the suffering she had to endure back in Poland but also because she wanted to escape from her evil and almost devil-like niece Stella. Almost completely normal if you take out the, my niece is evil in the flesh bit. It is also incredibly hypocritical of Rosa to claim that Stella was responsible for Magda’s death. Had Stella ran after her daughter not only would Stella still be dead but she too would have shared in Magda’s tragic fate, this false choice that Rosa believes Stella had is nearly identical to the same false choice that Rosa had during the march to the camp. Rosa could have stepped out of line and attempted to give Magda away to a stranger but she was able to reason in her mind that it would only result in the deaths of both of them and that therefore she would not attempt to save her life because it would be in vain.

                So why should Rosa not blame herself equally for Magda’s death as she blames Stella? It can only be because she is being a hypocrite and treating her niece who also had to endure the hell that was the Holocaust along with her for not jumping into that electric fence alongside her daughter.

The Shawl

In The Shawl Ozick devotes only a small portion of her novel to telling the story of Rosa while she was enduring the horrors of the Holocaust in Poland, or as what Rosa and Stella refer to as the during period. Now there are several reasons Ozick has chosen to tell her story in this way and it is important to remember that this story is not actually about the Holocaust itself but rather the story of Rosa.

                The first chapter is only there to introduce the cast of characters and to showcase the chain of events that will lead to Rosa’s current situation in Miami during the next chapter. While the second chapter goes into great and vivid detail of her life since Magda was killed.

                Another reason the second chapter is so much larger than the first is that according to Rosa her current situation is worse than when she was going through the Holocaust. This may be due to the fact that while in her mind Magda is very much alive, she can have no physical interaction with her outside of the shawl. It could also be that this time has been so rough for her because in Miami for a large chunk of time she does not have access to the shawl and thus her last physical connection to Magda.

                Stella’s way of dividing up their lives between the before, during, and after does not gain traction with Rosa and because of this difference the second chapter is much longer. Stella is content with moving on from the events of the past and is working towards her after. Rosa views this differently in that she does not believe in the after. Saying, “After, after that’s all Stella cares. For me there’s one time only; there’s no after.”  Rosa cannot get past the events of the first chapter  and still lives in a world in which Magda is very much alive, to move on would be to admit that Magda is dead but this is something that Rosa is not willing to do she is still in those moments in which she thrust the shawl into her mouth following the time when Magda was killed.

When the Emperor was Divine

I think the author seeks to break the silence surrounding the internment of Japanese citizens during the Second World War because the act of ignoring our history and this shameful decision by the United States government is in some ways worse than the actual internment of those Japanese citizens. To ignore an injustice is a slap in the face to the people against whom it was perpetrated against. It conveys the feeling that what was done to them did not matter. Well, the author here is writing to show us that the forceful internment of the Japanese does matter and that we must confront our past in order to move forward.

                If our country continues to be willingly ignorant of this great injustice then we have forsaken all of our principles upon which we stand for. How can we have an ounce of credibility when confronting our enemies for injustices committed against element of their society which they view negatively when we do the same thing. It is hypocrisy at a national level and it cannot be allowed to continue.

                As far as this novel relating to the events of September 11^th, I think the similarities between these two events are few. Really the only one I can see is that we were attacked by a foreign entity and many people died and even then Pearl Harbor was an act of war by a sovereign nation while the world trade center attacks were an act of terrorism by a group, which while harbored by some nations did not actually have control of a nation. To go even further I think the United States has actually learned a bit from their actions towards the Japanese. After the attacks of 9/11 all of the countries Muslims were not rounded up and thrown into camps, sure some had their civil liberties violated via phone taps by a scared government and had to endure prejudice perpetrated against it by an equally scared citizenry but this does not even come close to what the Japanese had to endure.

When the Emperor was Divine

                In the story “When the Emperor was Divine” Otsuka decides against giving the main characters of the book names. I think by doing this she intends to convey a parallel between her story and the way in which history has viewed the internment of Japanese citizens during World War Two.

                Even in my own educational experience the internment of the Japanese was something that was casually glanced over when we were studying World War Two. Looking back this was probably a clever attempt by whomever it is that creates the curriculum to cast this countries sad mistreatment of its own citizens during the war aside in the hopes that no one would remember that it ever happened. Ironically this is what the Nazis were doing towards the end of the war when their defeat was imminent. They desperately tried to cover up all evidence of the Holocaust because they knew deep down that they had committed an awful act and they did not want to be held responsible.

                Likewise, the United States does not want people to be bringing up similarities between their treatment of the Japanese and the Nazi treatment of the Jews. Unfortunately, much like the Nazis found out the United States will not be able to outrun its past no matter how hard it tries in the history books to pretend that it was a minor event or that it never happened at all.

                 Otsuka does not name her characters because they were ignored by the rest of society. It is why in the very beginning of the story she gives the name of the presumably white American hardware man and not the Japanese woman who comes in to make a purchase. Society at that time would not ignore the mass internment of people who were deemed to matter like the hardware man like they did the internment of the Japanese.

When the Emperor was Divine question 1

I do believe that Otsuka’s employs a minimalist approach in “When the Emperor was Divine”. However, I also believe that she does this on purpose in order to accomplish something concerning Japanese culture rather than for the sake of producing a minimalist novel.

                As stated in the question Otsuka’s style does lend a sort of muted tone to the story. Repressed emotional interaction coupled with the muted or monotone tone of the novel lead the reader into uncomfortable territory, as is intended for the reader is exploring a world in which they experience a foreign culture of which they most likely have had few run ins with.

                While the family in this novel is American it is also important to consider that the American culture is not the primary one for this family especially the mother for whom America is not the homeland. Otsuka purposefully employs this method to reflect Japanese culture which tends to be more reserved emotionally and less opinionated than our American culture.

                By using a minimalist or monotone approach Otsuka is able to better contrast the differences between these two cultures and the clash of both has an effect on the children. For example, the young boy who packs his baseball glove, reads comic books, and has cowboy and Indian curtains also has a statue of Buddha and longs for the times when his father would pluck caterpillars off plants with chopsticks. In many ways this young boy signifies the tug and pull of both cultures as he struggles to identify completely with either.

                While this novel may seem minimalist or monotone it is because that is the way it has to be. Without these characteristics the reader would not be able to fully see and experience Japanese culture. Most readers, unless they happen to be Japanese, would better identify with a more lively and emotional bunch of characters however; they would not be reading a novel about Japanese culture. It should feel like something different when reading this book because in all likelihood you have never seen the world through the lens of Japanese culture.

When the Emperor was Divine

“It said DO NOT DISTURB. The woman did not open the door.”

In “When the Emperor was Diving” by Julie Otsuka there is one character which stands out from the rest in my opinion. The mother, who is raising her kids without a father after his arrest, is preparing for their move to a Japanese internment camp.  However, early on in the story a particular aspect of this woman’s personality stands out above the rest.

                She follows orders almost as if there were a microchip imbedded in her brain compelling her to obey, of course this is not normal behavior for most people who tend to be more independent. She is machinelike from the very beginning when she reads the poster proclaiming their impending relocation her response to which was to simply write down the orders and carry on.

                Another instance in which this woman’s steadfast obedience rears its head is when she is packing up the families possessions. When she comes to her daughter’s room there is a DO NOT DISTURB sign hanging on the door. Rather than casually dismiss this youthful attempt at independence she obeys the sign and carries on.  In what other family is it typical for a mother to obey written orders from their children?

                In addition to simply obeying all orders without much resistance, if any, is the extent to which she carries them out. The government would not allow those being relocated to bring their pets along with them. So she proceeds to free the bird and give away their cat, all perfectly normal so far. However, she then proceeds to execute their pet dog in a manner that can only be described as grisly. She claims she was granting the dog mercy, since when does mercy involve being bludgeoned to death with a shovel?

                The woman exhibits obedience that is both extraordinary and troubling. It really makes you wonder what could have instilled in her such a trait. It is just not normal for someone of any culture to take being shipped off to a internment camp and being stripped of most of your property with such casualty.

Push - American Dream or Despair?

                Is the story of Precious in the novel Push by Sapphire an example of the American Dream or is it on of utter and complete despair? While I find myself wanting to say that there is hope for Precious and that perhaps her story does in fact body that dream I just cannot bring myself to overlook the undue hardship Precious had to overcome.  

                The dictionary describes the American Dream as “a life of personal happiness and material comfort as traditionally sought by individuals in the U.S.”

It would be silly to claim that Precious ever achieved this and indeed twisted to think that her story could be an interpretation of the American Dream of which all aspire to. Growing up in a violent home, being raped by your parents, being ignored and cast aside by the majority of societal institutions, giving birth to not one but two children of incest, and to top it all off you find out you have HIV after all that. That is not what I would call a happy ending.

                While it is possible to make that argument that her overcoming of illiteracy in spite of all these things is quite inspiring and while they may enable her son to have shot at achieving the American Dream for himself. It is important to remember that this is no sure thing especially when you consider that if he were to placed into the custody of Precious’ mother or grandmother thereby becoming stuck in the same vicious cycle Precious was subject to. However, this does not make her the embodiment of the American Dream. While part of the dream is to overcome personal strife there is also a financial element of which she has never achieved. To give an example, Carnegie who came to this country a pauper with only the shirt on his back and through hard work, perhaps a fair amount of luck as well, was able to become a billionaire and an icon of his day. Precious and Carnegie both overcame their personal troubles to varying degrees however although no fault of Precious’, she will never achieve her potential. During this time in the AIDs epidemic patients were not living long like they do today, she will most likely struggle to keep herself and her son afloat before she will succumb to her disease and leaving her son to either foster care or thrusting back into the viscous cycle of abuse perpetrated by her family.

Push - Does the way Precious speaks affect the way we see her?

                “My name Precious Jones. I was born in Harlem. My baby gonna be borned in Harlem. I like what color – yellow, thas fresh. ‘N I had a problem at my ol’ school so I come here.”

The voice of Precious does change the way we see her and the way others in the community see her. As soon as precious opens her mouth most people write their own biography of whom Precious must be, often employing stereotypes and failing to take into consideration the various factors that are affecting Precious such as her upbringing.

                Part of the reason that girls like Precious slip through the cracks of the system so often is because of these mental assumptions we make of people, in this case based upon speech. Because Precious spoke so improperly many wrote her off as a lost cause that was neither worth the time nor the effort of school faculty. This is where the school and the community let Precious down. They never stop and think about why Precious does not speak properly and considering the fact, in the case of the school, that they possess her file which details the causation of her lack of an education due to abuse at home this can only be a case of gross ignorance or apathy by the school towards Precious. What is worse is that the school continued to pass the buck by allowing her to move on all the way to the ninth grade without being able to read, write, or properly interact in a social setting.

                As to how the reader will inevitably see Precious, it becomes apparent rather swiftly that she is lacking a proper education. Additionally, she often is seen using a violent tone which is often associated with a string of profanity. This gives us the impression that Precious lashes out at those who would ideally support her and furthers her isolation from them leading to her continuing to slip through the crack of the system.

Fun Home

                I would like to discuss here the purpose and rationale behind Alison Bechdel’s decision to illustrate her novel rather than simply leave the job of creating an image to the reader. There are a number of reasons for this interesting choice and I believe each furthers the main purpose which is telling the story of her father and herself over the years from childhood up and to her father’s death.

                In most stories, at least it has been my experience, the author’s attempt to paint an image by using descriptive language and carving out a basic idea for a setting along with all the other intricacies of the tale and it is up to the reader to bring the story to life within them using their own experiences. This tactic enables each reader to have a potentially different experience from another when reading a story. However, in Bechdel’s case, by illustrating the story herself she takes away this task, or as I consider it an element of the story that makes the story, from the reader and institutes her own depictions of events.

                As to why Bechdel would do such a thing, In my opinion it is because she does not want the reader to get the wrong impression of the way things were and fall into the illusions that her father created. She wanted to force the reader into viewing her father from her perspective in order to get a sense of who he really was. In this light, Bechdel’s decision to illustrate her story rather than simply write it makes more sense and is understandable however, with this method comes a degree of bias that will be hard to be able to look past. I wish that Bechdel would have made it easier for her readers to reach their own conclusions about her father rather than through her inevitable bias undoubtedly brought about due to her feelings of her father as distant during her childhood and even sometimes uncaring.

Fun Home

                A common theme throughout Fun Home is sexuality. Both Alison and her father Bruce are dealing with sexual tension and angst throughout the novel and deal with their own sexuality and radically different ways. Through their sexuality father and daughter share something in common, an attraction to members of the same sex, where they differ however is the way in which they embrace or repress their sexuality.

                Alison discovers early on that is different from other girls. When she and brothers go on a trip she insists that they refer to her with a boy’s name. Throughout her childhood she continuously yearned to become more masculine, much to the chagrin of her father. When Alison leaves for college she finally comes to terms with the fact that she is a lesbian and begins researching her sexuality, immersing herself within the lesbian subculture and even becoming involved by attending meetings at her school. She even manages to work up the courage to ‘out’ herself to her parents via a phone call.

                Alison is radically different from her father. While she embraces her homosexuality he rejects his, referring to himself as a badperson and guiltily scurrying off to faraway places where he may solicit gay sex. Bruce never came out of his closet voluntarily; it was only when his affairs became known that he began to face facts, even then though he was still ashamed of what he was.

                Bechdel shows the immense burden sexuality can become to us if bottled up on the inside and never allowed to be out in the open. While her father was trying to conform to the accepted lifestyle of his time he forgot one thing, himself. It was a mistake Alison fortunately did not make for herself. More importantly though, Bechdel’s novel brings within it the message of accepting yourself as being pivotal to your success as person. To go through life rejecting oneself is merely an existence and certainly not a life.

Fun Home

Sometime during the aftermath of her father’s death Alison ponders the possibility that her father may have purposefully stepped in front of the truck that killed him. The theory that her father’s life ended in suicide rather than on accident is an interesting one to say the least.

                First, let us explore some of the clues pointing to the conclusion that her father did indeed kill herself. In the time leading up to his untimely demise Alison noticed something peculiar. Her father was highlighting passages in his books that seemed to explore death and even suicide. Furthermore, he would leave these little clues out in the open, perhaps hoping that someone would discover them and save him from himself. However, when Alison does happen upon her father’s curious highlights she chooses to discount them. In one instance she even rationalizes his behavior by claiming that, knowing the man her father was, he must have gone on to read the next section of the reading which disagrees with suicide.

                This was most likely a way of trying to alert others as to his possible plans to get a sense of their response. This is common with many cases in which people have attempted suicide and is a definite warning sign. Additionally, when you include the fact that her father was not emotionally connected with his family as with his books the reason to suspect suicide grows even further. Had Alison taken these warning signs seriously she may have been able to intervene.

                Her father’s way of trying to elicit a response rather than just come out and proclaim what they were looking for can also be seen in Alison. After her father’s death she finds herself unable to feel grief so she turns to others in order to see their grief in the hopes that seeing the emotion would make her feel better. While the two circumstances may be different in that Alison was not feeling something and wanted to see others emotions, her father wanted to see the care for life that he no longer felt and through subtle signals he attempted to do the same thing. In both cases they were unsuccessful.

Fun Home

                In Fun Home, Alison looks back on her childhood and growing up with her at times emotionally distant father who ran the family business, a funeral home. Her father was obsessed with decorating and architecture, a passion that was almost bordering on obsession. She even goes so far as to say that he treated his furniture like children and his children like furniture. Alison always had the impression that family would always play second fiddle to her father’s other interests.

                Alison mentions her theory that all of her father’s decorating was an elaborate effort to hide something. As if all the lovely furniture and décor was part of a cover-up in that they would distract all of those who visited their home from what was really going on. Here I think Alison was accurate in her description. While the Bechdel’s appeared to have the perfect home they did not have a family to go with it. After her father dies Alison finds out that her dad has been having sex with teenage boys, something she never saw coming. By creating the perfect family home, while sacrificing the family bond and thereby eliminating the purpose of his obsession, he kept hidden many secrets.

                I believe that because her father was so skilled at disguising his life that it was impossible for anyone to really know him. Alison thought her and her father had nothing in common what so ever, yet they did share one thing. Both Alison and her father were gay. Such a secret must have been a heavy burden for Alison’s father to carry and that may be the reason he spent so much time creating a materially perfect family environment, yet because of his secret he could never connect emotionally with his family.

In the time of the butterflies

“Dede will bury us all in silk and pearls”

                I wonder if when the girls heard their father make this prediction they had any idea how spot on he was about her future.  Dede survived the assassination due to her ever present reluctance to participate in her sister’s revolutionary activities. As a result, her husband was not imprisoned and she did not have to make that deadly trip. However, as tragic as losing one’s family is having to live in their shadow for the remainder of your life while having to raise their children, seeing her sister’s faces in them every day, must be a living hell.

                The ending the Mirabal sisters faced was just blatantly unfair. No one should have to endure the struggle they did, having been physically and emotionally ravaged by the regime of Trujillo, only to end up being tricked into death.  However, the story never ended for Dede. It still continues to this day although still tragic, I cannot fathom the difficulty she faces in having to run that museum, or when she would attend a party celebrating the memory of her iconic sisters.

                Dede must fight everyday to remember how her sisters used to be. Before they were national heroes and when they were just her sisters living altogether under one roof, dreaming of what they would one day become. I doubt that any of them envisioned, their father especially, the intricate role they would play their countries struggle for freedom. Let alone that they would be the source of inspiration for many Dominicans who longed to be free.

                Dede goes on to wonder in the epilogue whether or not her sisters died in vain. It makes you think what would have happened if they had only been able to hold out until Trujillo was eventually assassinated himself, maybe they could have had a political future in the new Dominican Republic, or maybe they would have been able to use their statues as icons to steer the post-Trujillo world towards a more stable and bloodless path.

Mate Timeline

First Communion
Recieves First Diary
Lied for Minerva
Opinion of Trujillo Changes
December 1953 - Death of her father and learns about his affair
Recieves her second diary
Graduates from high school
Refuses to marry her cousins
Sept. 19 - goes to University with Minerva
Becomes bored with law and switches her major to philosophy and letters. Here she begins to diverge from Minerva's path
April 28 1956 - Queen of Capitol
Moves in with Minerva
Saves Minerva and Manolo's marriage
Introduced to Palomino when he drops off a package for the revolution
Discovers revolution
Moves into her own apartment
Is given codename Mariposa (2) - joins rebel movement
Her and Leandro aka Palomino confess their love for each other
Feb. 14 1958 - Gets married to Leandro
Has a child (jacquelyn)
Is imprisoned for involvement in revolution
Stands up to Minerva by not complaining about the guards who were nice to them in letter to OAS
Gives letter to OAS informing them of Trujillo's cruelty towards political prisoners
Released from prison and placed under house arrest along with Minerva
Her imprisoned husband is moved to a new prison closer to where they live
On her way back from visiting her incarcerated husband she was murdered by agents of Trujillo along with her sisters Minerva and Patria as well as their driver

In the time of the butterflies

                Alvarez does want to take us beyond the legend of the in creating our characters and she does this in various ways. With legends, the heroes never really acquaint themselves with the people. They are distant icons that people never really got to know, to understand. Alvarez gives the legends a more human demeanor in her story. They have raw emotion, flaws, and little quirks that make us connect with them on a radically different level in which we feel like we were a part of them and what they were doing.

                By including all of the little personal details of her characters, Alvarez puts you in the same room as these women. As I mentioned before, you really get a sense that you knew these people. For example, when Minerva stands up to her father or is making a smart comment at the car dealership you truly get a vivid image in your mind of who Minerva is, what she looks like, how she talks, etc. It’s the same when Mate writes in her diary about her clothes for her first communion, Alvarez grants us a new degree of context that allows us to appreciate just how innocent little Mate really was.

                All of this new context that Alvarez strives to grant the reader creates an invaluable sense of familiarity. This familiarity allows the reader to form a connection with the characters and take on the role of a silent character who is actually a part of the action. I think the reader should take on this silent character role as it adds to the sense of immersion that is so imperative for a good story to be told. When people finish reading Alvarez’ story they are going to remember the tale of these women because they will feel like they were a part of it.

In the time of the butterflies

Alvarez feels compelled to bring this story to American readers because in many aspects it draws parallels to our own countries struggle for freedom. Both countries were at one time ruled over by a tyrannical despot who sought to crush individuals who sought a free nation for themselves and for future generations. A common narrative throughout this story is the struggle for freedom in an oppressive nation. Alvarez chronicles the events of the oppressed Dominican Republic through the points of view of a tight-knit Dominican family, the opinions and personalities of which vary greatly.

                As to what we should gain from Alvarez’ tale of these young women’s harrowing tale is an appreciation for the liberty enjoyed by citizens of the United States. I think it is an aim of Alvarez to make Americans appreciate that the cost of that liberty is great and is the result of enormous sacrifice. Too many people live every day of their lives in America without so much as a thought as to how lucky they are and how great life is compared to other nations where liberty is a repressed dream rather than an everyday reality.

                In America, we can bash the president all day long in any manner that we jolly well feel like. In Trujillo’s Dominican Republic if people criticized the president they would have to go into hiding for a while. An example is when Minerva states that another reason not to buy the used Buick is because the dealer claims Trujillo drives one. This results in the family having to lay low in order to avoid becoming political prisoners of the oppressive regime.

Alvarez’ voice can be heard in all of the characters because there is no way of possibly knowing what certain characters actually said, especially when not in the presence of Dede. Alvarez uses the character’s personality and gives them dialogue, thoughts, and emotions typical of that personality.

Is this an American story? In the sense that in America we are free and we only got that way because of the brave who died to that we may be free from tyrants like Trujillo or King George. It can also be said that this is Alvarez’ story because she is able to interview Dede without fear of censorship or retribution from a sensitive dictator.

I am an Emotional Creature - Would you rather

 “Would You Rather” shows that young girls, especially the one who insists on playing the game, struggle with the more difficult decisions that have to be made and look to others for possible answers.  It is possible that the girl asking these questions is in some deep corner of her sub-consciousness running a simulation of these various scenarios in an effort to prepare herself should they come to fruition.

However, it is very apparent that the girl being asked these questions does not want to concern herself with these difficult circumstances, especially because these circumstances are imaginary. She would prefer to not choose between “living with my mother or my father”. Saying, “I want different questions. I hate these choices. I hate my life.”

“Are you crying?” “Yes”.

Both of these girls struggle with decision making when there are no clear good choices to be made. They both also have their own way of dealing with this stress. The first girl asks her friends for input in the form of this game, hoping to feel more comfortable should the day come when she may be facing these situations in reality rather than part of a game. The second girl prefers not to think about such terrible things. She is innocent and does not want to deal with hypotheticals that she quite possibly may never have to face in her life.

The first girl will have the benefit of going into life with some context of the problems she undoubtedly will encounter and perhaps a clue as to which she will decide when presented with them. Unfortunately, all of this comes at the cost of losing the joy of innocence at a younger age. The second will go on with her youth bumbling around on the roads of bliss. However, she may be overwhelmed one day when she will have to make choices where the good option is not so obvious, or absent completely.