Summer Reading Blog Posting 1

[yanglu]

"The soul longs to return to the place it came from, leaving the body lifeless..'

Throughout our life, since we were born, our soul is always looking for the thing that it truly connects with. Whether it be a person, a hobby, or even the unknown, our soul will seek and pursue to find its match for all of eternity if needed. In this novel, our protagonist, Tita, feels like she has met her soulmate, the person she thinks that her soul will spend all eternity with, after having a romantic chat with Pedro. But even when Tita is denied of that scenario by her mom, her soul never moves on from what it wants,and instead it trys harder to achieve that goal. Even overcoming many obstacles, such as the marriage of Pedro, and Rosaura, and then the transfer of the couple to San Antonio, forced on by Mama Elena, it always repeats the same concept of the term soulmates. Two souls that are split up will follow theirs paths over and over again in order to reach their other halves, despite all the obstacles along the way. They simply can not achieve true happiness until they are joined together for all of eternity. This concept and idea of soulmates is not very newly developed, but in fact dates back to ancient greecian times. In The Symposium by Plato. It states that humans originally consisted of four arms, four legs, and a single head made of two faces, but Zeus feared their power and split them all in half, condemning them to spend their lives searching for the other half to complete them. And according to theosophy, God made androgynous souls, equally male/female, but later were split due to karma, and until both re-payed their karmic debt, they couldn't be joined together until so. In the case for Tita, her matching soul mate is Pedro, and every time they are broken apart, they will always come back to another. I think in the end of the novel, When their souls are bonded so tightly that nothing could break the bond i think, that is when their souls truly conjoined, and inner peace is settle. And since the souls are matched, that is why i think that Tita went to the extreme to die with Pedro through fire, since their souls are now matched for eternity.

[emilyrogers]

“Rosaura was moved by the tears in her sister’s eyes, taking them for tears of joy, and she felt a slight lifting of the guilt she sometimes suffered for having married Tita’s sweetheart.”

Throughout a majority of the novel I didn’t quite understand the relationship between Tita and Rosaura. Maybe it’s because I have a closer relationship with my sister, but family seemed of little importance in this book. This quote surprised me when I read it. I believed Rosaura had little sympathy for Tita let alone guilt. A random woman marrying the love of Tita’s life is one thing, but for her sister to take him away from her? This entire situation set me off and I hated Rosaura from that moment on.

Tita and Rosaura never discussed the marriage or the predicament that was set upon them. There was no acknowledgement of an issue, as if Tita and Pedro didn’t even know each other. However, on page 213 Tita finally had enough. My view of Rosaura changed a lot after the quarrel. Seeing Rosaura as un-human subsided and I actually saw feeling inside of her. Tradition is important to many families, it’s tradition. Being married and having babies wasn’t a choice in her life, it was mandatory. The sisters can thank Mama Elena for this, for ruining any chance of a relationship between each other.

Rosaura died of digestive problems leaving the relationship between her sister and herself on a bad note. After everything that had happened between her and Tita, Tita would never learn that Rosaura had felt guilt from what she’d done. All Tita saw Rosaura as was her mother’s daughter, a cruel and unfeeling human being. Reading “Like Water For Chocolate” really had me appreciate me and my sister’s relationship as well as my mother’s. I chose this quote because it surprised me that after all the uncanny things Rosaura did to her sister throughout the novel, she knew what she had done and atleast knew that it was wrong.

[kyramcguirk]

"As they danced, John followed them with his eyes, with a look full of affection and just a hint of resignation. Tenderly Pedro touched his cheek to Tita's, and his hand on her waist felt hotter than ever." (Page 236)

This is kind of that monumental moment where Esquirel finally outright declares that Tita chose Pedro, and everyone is full of joy, leading into a big fat, happy ending… Just kidding. Why in the world would Tita choose a terrible jerk like Pedro who supposedly ‘loved her passionately’ when he decided to marry her sister (not to mention he practically rapes her later on), when there was a wonderful man who helped her through all of her hardship and loved her with all of her faults just praying for her to accept him? Either she is mentally deranged, or the author does not really understand how love works.

Maybe I am being too harsh on the storyline; I’m sure the ‘passion’ in Tita’s heart for Pedro was terribly great and she couldn’t stand to be away from him, blah blah blah, etc. I just don’t see why in the world she would make that decision. Who’s to say he won’t turn on her again the moment she starts having digestion problems like her unfortunate sister? He abandoned her when she most needed and loved him, ripping apart her heart and mental stability, and she just came crawling back as soon as he was available. Honestly, I find it utterly despicable.

In the meantime, Prince John Perfection is in the background, waiting on her hand and foot, nursing her back to SANITY (this problem not only caused by her psychotic, overbearing mother, but also partly by the douchebag that broke her heart) and loving her unconditionally, and she throws him to the curb like a piece of trash! WHO THROWS AWAY THEIR PRINCE CHARMING?!?!? I assure you, if mine ever comes along, I will not be making that torrential mistake. However, there goes Tita, wishing away a happy life with one flick of a spoon. Disgusting. Completely disgusting.

[teresaboone]

'She made her cuts through the rind with such mathematical precision that when she was done, she could pick up the watermelon and give it a single blow against a stone, in a particular spot, and like magic the watermelon rind would open like the petals of a flower, leaving the heart intact on the table. Unquestionably, when it came to dividing, dismantling, dismembering, desolating, detaching, dispossessing, destroying, or dominating, Mama Elena was a pro.'

If Mama Elena lived her life for anything, it seemed as though she lived to keep Tita and Pedro apart. All the awful things that Mama Elena did, she did for the sake of keeping the tradition alive: the youngest daughter is forbidden to marry. Her youngest daughter was Tita.

By sending Pedro and Rosaura away from the ranch, Mama Elena was – or tried diving, detaching, dominating, and destroying Tita and Pedro’s true love for one another. Soon after the couple left, Tita experiences a breakdown that causes Mama Elena to send Tita away to an asylum, another desolating and dismantling act. Sending Tita away was a source of abandonment and all that was left of Tita was her “heart intact on the table.” She was broken, vulnerable, and craving the love of a man, so much that she meets and falls in love with Dr. John Brown.

Although in the end, Tita ran back to Pedro, Mama Elena had such a huge part of the distance and diving of the two’s true love for one another. Her main goal was to do everything in her power, dead or alive, to keep the two lovers apart. For much of life, she succeeded. In the end, nothing could keep the two from being together.

I think this theme of trying to control someone who is so deeply in love, and the one in love winning in the end, is so common in life. Whether it is someone else trying to control a relationship, or simply just life getting in the way, so much can play into factor what can divide, dismantle, dismember, desolate, detach, dispossess, destroy, and dominate a relationship. But if the love is true and if you fight for it, love wins everytime. After all, all is fair in love and war, right?

[kevinkryah]

"Gertrudis stopped running when she saw him riding toward her. Naked as she was, with her loosened hair falling to her waist, luminous, glowing with energy, she might have been an angel and devil in one woman. The delicacy of her face, the perfection of her pure virginal body contrasted with the passion, the lust, that leapt from her eyes, from her every pore. These things, and the sexual desire Juan had contained for so long while he was fighting in the mountains, made for a spectacular encounter." Pg. 55

While reading this passage, I was reminded of the kind of dime-a-dozen romance novels that attract the ridicule of so many a critic. Several literary techniques contribute to this. For one, the use of adjectives such as “luminous” and “pure” gives the writing a provocative and sensual tone, as if it was trying to make the reader a voyeur. There is also an element of cliché that lends to this atmosphere of cheap romance; the back story of the soldier Juan (he was a soldier nursing desires of love) is trite, and the passion erupting between the two at first glance was hackneyed even at the time of Shakespeare. The silliness of the encounter as a whole, the sheer camp of it, made me laugh out loud, something that generally doesn't happen for me when I read.
However, for as much I put down Gertrudis' sexual awakening, the passage didn't disrupt the tone, but it added to it. Laura Esquivel paints the atmosphere of the book as a fairy tale or a fable, bringing in fantastical or occasionally grotesque elements and shaping them around a simple story of love. This passage is deliberately styled to seem over-the-top or over-romanticized because of the tone set by Esquivel. In this context, the romance between the awakened, fiery Gertrudis and the repressed, noble warrior Juan seems natural and fitting. Similarly, while in a standard novel, the extravagant description choices in the passage would seem excessive, Esquivel's tone gives the words a sweeping, romantic effect, and on closer examination of the passage, one can't help but be sucked in to the passion of the two lovers on the field.
Overall, out of context, the passage seems ridiculous and corny, but in terms of Esquivel's writing, the passage functions as a microcosm of the entire atmosphere of the book: romantic, fantastical, and witty.

[franklinnorris40]

"Tomorrow I will be leaving this place, which is not where I belong. I still don't know where that is, but I know I have to find the right place for myself somewhere." Pg126

There are people in the world who have no idea of where there belong and could care less. Then there are the ones who have found their place in society. These are the people who see an opportunity and go for it no matter the amount of work or how much it seems that you'll fail. They see it as even if they fail at least they gave it a shot, but they are going to give it everything they have to succeed.

This passage made me begin to think "Why would she run off and change her entire life because of a couple men leaving her?", but after reading further into the novel I realized she did not run off because of just a guy. She ran off to find herself and why she was brought here on this earth. Following her sudden choice to leave the ranch got me to believe that Gertrudis is an opportunist. She saw a chance and she took advantage of what was presented in front of her. Not knowing what would come out of her decision didn't faze her choice she was going to leave no matter the consequences, good or bad. It must have been frightening to go off alone, but you have to risk it to get the biscuit. Her arrival back to the ranch in September gave me a surprise as she rode up on horseback with her love and a regiment of fifty troops behind her. It also helped clear the fear of failing in my head. Knowing that a woman that lived in Mexico darning the Mexican Revolution went out on her own and came back a general in the revolutionary army make me believe as long as you take a chance and work for it you can do anything.

Gertrudis makes someone like me want to go out and find who I really am. I mean isn't why we are really here?

[brittanycain]

“If I couldn’t marry, was I at least allowed to experience love? Or not even that?”

Being restricted, in my opinion, is the easiest way to bring one down. I think nothing is more cruel than not allowing freedom. Their customs in this book are so far off from what I see today as "normal". Although, the difference is what makes this book so interesting. Knowing that the "usual" is not so usual.
This quote is so disturbing because I could never even begin to fathom not allowing to even express your own honest feelings. The fact that it is her own family and blood keeping her from happiness intentionally is disgusting. Love is an extremely powerful emotion. It can become strong and beautiful, or it can take a quick 180 degree turn and become hateful and ugly. What Mama Elena is doing to Tita only leads to disaster. If Tita and Pedro's love is true (which we find out later in the novel) they will overcome Mama Elena. Honestly, actual love has the power to do that.
Karma eventually shows its true colors later. First, the birth of Roberto brings Pedro and Tita even closer. Mama Elena only becomes bitter and tries to control this emotion. She sends away her oldest daughter and Pedro. Yet she still does not understand she can not contain this. The baby Roberto dies, due to lack of care and nurture. This loss effects Tita majorly and Mama Elena sends her to an asylum. Karma strikes again and Mama Elena continues to refuse Tita. She does so much that it literally kills her; or you could say Mama Elena ends her own life.
This now shows an opportunity for Tita and Pedro, but Mama Elena still tries to interrupt spiritually. Tita over comes the fear of her mother and no longer backs down. The quote I chose to talk about represents so many actual realities. As much as Mama Elena tried, she could not come between actual feelings. Karma played its natural role in their lives. You can not have control over every little thing in life, or major event, that is. The only thing we can change is how we get there, but not the ending result.

[Summer Reading]

"For twenty years she had respected the pact the two of them had made with Rosaura; now she had enough of it. Their pact consisted of taking into consideration the fact that it was vital to Rosaura to maintain the appearance that her marriage was going splendidly, and the most important thing to her was that her daughter grew up in that sacred institution, the family--the only way, she felt, to provide a firm moral foundation. Pedro and Tita had sworn to be absolutely discreet about their meetings and keep their love a secret. In the eyes of others, theirs must be a perfectly normal family."

This passage near the end of the story surprised me more than any other. For one, it was because of an interesting technique used, since twenty years of time was skipped and you were left wondering whose wedding was being described. Secondly, the events described in this paragraph seemed absurd. Let's look at the story. The love of your life, instead of running away with you or waiting for you, decides to marry your sister to "stay close to you". Then you secretly have an affair for twenty years? To me, this is an awkward way of going about things.

Secondly, this was the major instance where I saw a diversion of the parallels in plot that this book shares with Jane Eyre. Before this, I could see Tita as Jane, Pedro as Rochester, and John as the priest, but this scene altered things a bit. Tita and Pedro's love seem less realistic than Jane and Rochester's in this passage. To be serious, I can see why Jane chose Rochester but I can't see why Tita chose Pedro.

Despite not understanding their love, I certainly appreciated Esquivel's way of describing it. The way the months and years affected Pedro and Tita, and the way food was used to describe it, was incredibly creative and helped me to understand a lot of their relationship, even if I don't see why they went through it.

It's just passages like this that bother me. The author wants us so much to believe in the love Pedro and Tita share and I never see them getting to know eachother, but simply going through great lengths to have an affair.

[rachelbrammer]

“She couldn’t drag a single word of appreciation out of Pedro’s mouth. What she didn’t know was that Mama Elena had “asked” Pedro to stop praising the meals, on the grounds that it made Rosaura feel insecure, when she was fat and misshapen because of her pregnancy, to have to listen to him compliment Tita in the guise of praising the delicious food she cooked.”


It seems to Tita and even sometimes of the author that Mama Elena is just there to “blow out” Tita’s “flame” but maybe there’s two sides to Mama Elena’s bitterness. There’s the side that just wants to crush anything Tita wants or the side that is helping Rosaura.

Mama Elena could just be crushing Tita’s happiness because Tita is supposed to take care of her until she dies. Making sure that Tita won’t run away with Pedro and not take care of her. When Tita realizes she won’t be able to leave with Pedro, when Pedro and Rosaura are living away from the farm, Tita becomes a good worker making her bath and doing whatever Mama Elena wants yet at the same time she’s too out of it to do a great job she keeps messing things up. In the end Mama Elena has built up so much bitterness in Tita that all the food tastes bitter and she can’t trust Tita, the one who is supposed to take care of her. Maybe if Mama Elena was nicer that wouldn’t happen, if someone is going to be with you forever shouldn’t you be nice to them not evil.

Mama Elena could also just be protecting her other daughter, Rosaura . The wedding might not have been the best thing for Rosaura, marrying a man she knew loved her sister, but everything after could have been protecting Rosaura from the truth, or from feeling insecure. When Rosaura felt insecure about herself because Pedro was complimenting Tita Mama Elena made it stop. When Mama Elena saw how close Tita and Pedro were getting Mama Elena sent them away. It wasn’t until Mama Elena died that Rosaura got really bad with her mental and physical state. No one was protecting Rosaura from anything and for the most part just lets her sister and her husband do anything as long as nobody knows. Maybe things would have better for Rosaura if Mama Elena kept protecting her.

Whether Mama Elena’s action were to hurt Tita or help Rosaura she still seemed like an evil, cold, heartless woman, hurting Tita both mentally and physically for things to work out her way. The damage on Tita can’t be turned undone.

[zgriffin]

"But the weeping was just the first symptom of intoxication--an acute attack of pain and frustration--that seized the guests and scattered them across the patio and the grounds and the bathrooms, all of them wailing over lost love."
This quote pertains to Pedro and Rosara's wedding cake that Tita had shed countless amounts of tears into. This made the guests who ate the cake feel the sorrow that Tita felt when making the cake for the wedding of her beloved man. Esquivel instills a lot of power in food in her novel Like Water for Chocolate. It is a great way to show just how powerful and prominent food and cooking is in Tita's life. Tita cannot express her griefs and frustrations through acting out due to her traditional and strict parenting. This is showing that the frustration that Tita is feeling is expressed through her food, her livelihood. Esquivel does a great job of portraying these situations of emotion and exaggeration. The level of description that Esquivel goes to paints a picture that, in this particular case, is rather gross. this really gives you a raw picture of feeling and allows the message that Esquivel is trying to get across. The picture of people vomiting all around during a wedding party shows just how badly Tita is feeling; it also shows us how much emotion Tita is able to handle while showing no symptoms of disturbance. The people at the party are vomiting and sobbing when being exposed to the sorrow that Tita endures regularly. This is a great way to portray a person's emotions.

[nickpetr]

“…if only she could remember how to cook so much as a couple of eggs, enjoy any kind of food, if only she could…return to life.” pg. 124

A good author never simply tells the reader how a character is feeling. Rather, it’s the author’s job to illustrate to said reader exactly what a character is feeling. Throughout, Like Water for Chocolate, Laura Esquirel is able to do just that through the symbolism of the food and recipes that surround each phase of the book. This passage is a perfect example of this because it illustrates that without any recollection of how to cook or enjoy food, the protagonist, Tita, is left with nothing but a void. An empty and sinking feeling that consumes her. The reason for this is that throughout the entire novel, food is used as a direct symbol for the emotions flowing through the characters, but most importantly Tita. By saying that Tita has no recollection of food, Esquirel is showing that Tita has had all emotion leave her, and thus has been drawn away from life itself. But not only does Esquirel use food as a keeper of emotion, she also expertly uses it as a keeper of memory. This is seen later in the passage when Tita is reunited with ox-tail soup, but also reunited with her dearly departed friend, Nacha. The ox-tail soup embraces Tita with a warmth she has not felt since her childhood days of cooking with Nacha, which in turn brings back the memory of Nacha herself. And through the warmth and sheer happiness of these memories Tita is able once again able to feel the similar warmth that emotion can bring to the body. From food rises memory and from memory rises emotion. Esquirel weaves this cause and effect relationship into all of the food within the novel to illustrate to the reader exactly how Tita is felling until food is shown as a symbol of the emotions running through the character creating it. So when someone says that the secret ingredient is love, they may not be far from the truth.

[jacksonmorrow]

"Something strange was going on. Tita remembered that Nacha had always said that when people argue while preparing tamales, the tamales won't get cooked. They can be heated day after day and they still stay raw, because the tamales are angry."- Pg. 218-219

As you read through this novel you are constantly reminded of the relationship between emotions and food. Whether you are trying to figure out how the monthly recipes relate to the story or why certain ingredients act in a sort of fantastical way, it is always there. In this passage, I believe Esquivel compared the tamales to that of Tita's unconscious mind, and I also believe it can be seen expressed in other parts of the story as well. In this certain part however, the tamales are reacting to Tita's uncertain thoughts about the relationship between her, Pedro, and Rosaura.

In the previous scene, right before Tita noticed the tamales were not cooking, she witnessed all the chickens fighting and when they were done there were only three left and all three were badly injured and had made a mess. This is what I think caused the tamales to act strange as Tita could have quite possibly had an epiphany at that moment, realizing that those three chickens were her, Pedro, and Rosaura and to keep fighting like this will only end in a bad way. While Tita may have not fully realized it, her unconscious and the tamales did.

The other thing that I liked about this passage is that it once again brought in the Mexican culture that makes this novel so different. The thing you have to remember is that this book is being told by a the daughter of Esperanza, Pedro's girl, and this story had already been passed down two generations and that is why some of these descriptions in the book seem so unreal. Mexican culture is all about passing down stories about things like La Chupacabra or a lone rebel who took on an army.

Esquivel manages to stay true to her Mexican heritage and ties it in through a girl named Tita and her love of cooking.

[davionajohnson]

"when you're told there's no way you can marry the woman you love and your only hope of being near her is to marry her sister, wouldn't you do the same?"


As I read this quote I couldn't stop thinking about how crazy Pedro was. He really wanted to risk his chance with the one he truly loved just to be closer to her. I know he thought that he was doing the right thing but I really think that it was a stupid decision. And made me question if Pedro really loved Tita. Because if he did he wouldn't break her heart and marry her sister Rosaura. Pedro had to know the damage he was causing by marrying Tita's sister. He knew that they were going to have kids together. And I dont think that sneaking around was agood decision. It causes so much stress. They had to make sure no one around them saw or found out about their relationship. Even when Rosaura died they couldn't really be together because he still in a way was Rosaura's husband. If Pedro really loved Tita he would of made a way for them to be together. And I realize that Pedro probably thought that this was a good way for them to be together but morally he was wrong.

[anastasiawilliams]

"While Tita was forming the squares, she mourned for the Three Kings' days of her childhood, when she didn't have such serious problems."

We’ve all had that feeling before. Sitting in our rooms, cramming for that big Pre-Cal final, we all wished that we were back in the first grade, studying for the spelling test where the hardest word was “chocolate.”
Oh, we’d all love to go back.
But in first grade, that test seemed just as hard to us as the Pre-Cal final did last year. And in a couple years, when we’re taking college level Calculus, we’ll wish that we were back in Pre-Cal. The challenges that we face will always seem difficult to us, because that’s what challenges are. We learn from getting through those challenges. When we wish for those “days of our childhood,” we wish that we could go back with the knowledge that we have now, and complete tasks that we’ve already finished. So of course you want to go back to that spelling test now, you already know the answers.
Tita wishes that she could go back to the Three Kings’ days of her childhood because she has the answers to her old problems now. She knows what she received, and she knows that there are things in life that are more important than gifts. And when she learns that she isn’t pregnant, the stress she felt this Three King’s day will seem unnecessary. She’ll wish she could go back and enjoy her holiday.
No matter how hard any of us wish, we will never be able to revisit the past. As much as we would like to be back in the first grade, we’re still going to be seniors, and as much as Tita would like to revisit the Three Kings’ days of her past, she’s still living the one she wants to escape. Until that time machine has been perfected, we will mourn those parts of our lives that have already lived.

[janieleereed]

"...I would be delighted to be your companion for the rest of your life- but you must think over very carefully whether I am the man for you or not. If your answer is yes, we will celebrate your wedding in a few days. It it's no, I will be the first to congratulate Pedro and ask him to give you the respect you deserve." (page 223)


If Tita does not want to marry John, can I? Yes, I know he said he will never love anyone ever again, and he is technically a “fictional character”, but he is such an amazing guy. When I found out that Tita was marrying Pedro, I was furious. Pedro is a selfish coward with a big ego. He was so insecure that he tried to guilt Tita into marrying him when he said “You aren't tied to me anymore, a poor sick man.”
Before I had finished the book, I assumed that Tita was going to end up with John. This scenario has been repeated through almost every romantic-comedy throughout time. A girl is in love a man who she thinks she loves, but this guy ends up being a huge jerk. Then, said girl finds another guy, who she starts out being friends with, and she and the new man fall in love and are happy forever. So, in this case, Tita's original man is Pedro. She meets John and they become good friends. And then they fall in love. I was under the impression that Like Water for Chocolate was going to be a Mexican Sleepless in Seattle.
But, I was sadly disappointed. Tita doesn't meet John on top of the Empire State Building. Instead, she marries a man who was too much of a coward to stand-up to Mama Elena and the rest of Tita's family. John proved his love for Tita, that even after all those years, he had never fallen in love with another woman.
John was being a true gentleman when he said this to Tita. He said that he would love her no matter what she had done, because he loved her for who she was. He always wanted to see her happy, even if that meant being with another man. Just like Tita's love for Pedro, John's love could never be extinguished.