The House on Mango Street

It's really fascinating to carry a book around in public. People you barely know (or don't know at all!) suddenly have something to talk to you about. I've heard lengthy book reviews from folks I could never imagine holding a book and from people I could have sworn were bordering on the edge of illiteracy. I was reading part of To Kill a Mockingbird during spring break at my younger brother's band competition when I was approached by someone's mother who told me all about her experience reading the novel in middle school. She said she loved it. When I was reading Candide, I passed someone in my dorm who told me all how her 10th grade teacher read it aloud to her class. She said she thought the book was hilarious. Apparently people like to talk about books and carrying one around is treated as an open invitation for conversation.

So when I carried my slim paperback copy of The House on Mango Street into the band hall yesterday, I wondered what sort of reception it would get. I didn't think it would go unnoticed and it sure didn't. There were four or five people who noticed it right away and they all echoed the same sentiment:

They didn't like it.

For one, it was because he thought his AP English teacher analyzed it too deeply; there's not that much significance to the red balloon, he said. Another thought that the format was dumb; there wasn't much cohesion between chapters and no real plot, he said. Yet another was irritated because he thought the book's popularity stemmed from the author's nationality; people only read it because the author's Mexican, he said.

At this point, I hardly knew what to think. So I didn't, and just opened the book up to the first page. The first page of the novel, not the introduction. I skipped the introduction. I would come back to it later, but not now.

I think the book is cute. It's nice. I mean that with every connotation you probably have for those words. You may think it sounds condescending, but not really. It's almost condescending, but still respectful.

It's a well written book, and the sentences flow. The words craft images in the mind, they paint with colors and with feelings more vibrantly than half of the novels out there. I enjoyed reading this book.

But I'm not really sure what it's about. I mean, yes, it's about a little girl named Esperanza who moves with her family to a little house on Mango Street. It's about living in a poor family in a poor neighborhood but still trying to be normal. That's what it's about. So why do I feel like I missed something?

I reached the end and found myself grasping for more. There had to be more, I knew it. A deeper meaning somewhere, some significance beyond these simple stories. But I didn't know what.

I still don't know.