Cook Book

Has anyone noticed that when most of De La Garza family died (Pedro, Tita, Elena, Rosaura, Nacha, Roberto), and the ranch burnt down, the cook book still survived?

I think that this cook book symbolizes that even when people die, the cooking of a family will survive. And somehow, when the recipes of a family passes on, so does the essence and history of the family. The author further backs this up by having Esperanza’s daughter tell the story of a huge family of people that she’s never met. And she through Tita’s stories, she connects herself to the De La Garza family. This is shown when Esperanza’s daughter says “…Or why my tears flow so freely when I prepare them – perhaps I am as sensitive to onions as Tita, my great-aunt, who will go on living as long as someone cooks her recipes” p246.

This connection to Tita is repeated on p1 when the narrator says “Mama used to say it was because I was especially sensitive to onions, like my great-aunt, Tita”. 

The last page emphasizes the fact that Esperanza’s daughter is very much like Tita and even points out that Tita lives in her recipes, which could be expanded to that Tita lives in Esperanza’s daughter who cooks her recipes. It specifically shows that food not only connects a family together physically; it also connects generations and ties in the history of a family.

 

Family

We all know by now that a major theme of Like Water For Chocolate is food. We also agree that food is a symbol of family. Sitting down at the table to eat is a time when all family members are present, when the family spends time together, and when the sense of family is felt most strongly. Recipes for dishes are passed from generation to generation –from mother to daughter, mother to daughter. Food is the bond that joins the family together and strengthens the love between its members. Agreed?

Then why on earth is the entire novel about the conflict, the breaking, the destruction of a family?!

Tita hates Mama Elena for keeping the horrible tradition of not allowing the youngest daughter to marry. Tita hates Mama Elena for suggesting the marriage between Pedro and her sister Rosaura. Mama Elena hates Tita for being a disobedient daughter. Tita hates Mama Elena for killing Roberto and then goes insane. When she returns home, Mama Elena insists that Tita is poisoning her with bitter food.

Tita hates Rosaura for marrying her love, Pedro. Rosaura hates Tita for having an affair with her husband. Tita hates Rosaura for continuing the horrible tradition regarding the youngest daughter.

Gertrudis hates Mama Elena for being such a control monster in the house. When she runs away, Mama Elena is so disappointed in her daughter, she disowns Gertrudis and refuses to acknowledge that she ever existed.

Now, let’s take into account all the unfortunate events that befall this family. There are the awful love triangles (Tita-Pedro-Rosaura and Pedro-Tita-John) that cause so much trouble. Chencha is raped. Nacha dies in grief. Roberto dies due to unknown reasons. Rosaura dies from stomach problems. Mama Elena dies from taking the syrup of ipecac. Tita and Pedro die from an overdose of passion.

In conclusion, by the end of the book, the family has been completely destroyed.

Don’t you find it ironic that the main theme is family?!

 

Writers hate parents

Ever noticed that in so many books, the protagonist is an orphan? It’s either that or the character had parents, but the writer got rid of them either by killing them or by whisking the characters to a far away place, away from their parents. These two ways are more obvious. Sometimes, another way is used to replace these two. This is less obvious and I call it the “Orphan substitute.” Basically, this refers to a bad relationship between the child and the parents.
It’s funny because I’ve been coming up with the names of famous books and most of them use this theme

-Harry Potter
-Series of Unfortunate Events
-Lord of the Rings (No mentions of Frodo’s parents, in fact not a lot is mentioned about any of the characters in the fellowship)
-The Outsiders
-Eragon

Many classics use this theme as well

-Oliver Twist
-Great Expectations
-Anne of Green Gables
-Jane Eyre
-Wüthering Heights
-Secret Garden
-David Copperfield

Finally, let’s look at the texts we’ve studied. In Tristan and Iseult, Tristan was an orphan. Iseult was not an orphan, but she was given to King Mark as a bride and moved far away from her parents. In Romeo and Juliet, there was a case of Orphan Substitute. The parents were absent even though none of them were dead. It just didn’t seem like the parents had a very close or loving relationship with their children. An obvious example of this would be Juliet’s parents. In the case of Like Water For Chocolate, it was a combination of the Orphan and the Orphan Substitute. Tita lost her father before she could remember and did not maintain a good relationship with her overbearing mother. Finally, for Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, it is another case of Orphan Substitute. Gawain was not close (distance-wise) to his parents. Whether he was an orphan or not, I couldn’t remember. Anyone else know

Well, look through some of the books you’ve read. This theme is very popular among writers and it’s just kind of interesting. I feel that this is another part of a writer’s scheme plan to sell more books. A distant relationship or no relationship with parents gives the characters more opportunities to experience and do different things. It gives them more freedom to be themselves and allow more development throughout the novel.

Again dear classmates, I ask you for your input. What do you think?

 

Is it unconditional love?

Have you ever noticed how the women in some of the romances we have read always reconsider (at some point or other) if they really love the other person?Of course we all know that there is nothing to reconsider; they love this person eternally. I was concentrating again on connections between all the romances, and found this to be recurring.

In ‘Tristan and Iseult’ , there is a little misunderstanding between the two lovers.On p.172, Iseult believes that Tristan has betrayed her and that his feelings have passed on to another Iseult because of false information communicated unintentionally. She decides to never again see Tristan and shuns him any time he tries to get near, like when he comes disguised as a leper to the church door, or when he comes as a Madman to court. Afterwards, of course, Iseult finds that she cannot live without Tristan and then is forced to admit that she’ll love him eternally.

This happens also in ‘Romeo and Juliet’, though over a span of a few minutes. Starting on line 79, Juliet will insult Romeo, driven by her grief for the death of Tybalt. She talks about how he has deceived her, using many powerful metaphors. However, just a few lines after on line 99, when she has heard these insults coming from the nurse, her opinion changes drastically, and again she admits to herself that she cannot live without Romeo.

This connection also holds true for the most recent romance. In ‘ Like Water for Chocolate ‘, Tita is in love with Pedro since the day she set eyes on him, but when he agrees to marry Rosaura, she reconsiders her love for him. She tries to put him off her mind and move on , but when she learns of his true intentions, that spark that had dimmed, fired back up. A similar thing occurs when Pedro leaves for San Antonio. She establishes a relationship with John and then is not sure who she loves. When he comes back though, we know too well that Tita can only truly love Pedro.

So as you can see this happens in many of the romances. This might be a way the author has to reinforce the strength of the love between the couples. If their love can be broken easily, then there was no real love in the first place. On the other hand, if both lovers cannot forget each other no matter how much time passes or what circumstances change, then that love was always there. Could there be other reasons? Also, did you find this in any of the other stories?

 

Love portrayed as “Pure”

Overall, in this course we have studied several fundamental and very interesting books and works of literature, from Medieval times and Shakespearian plays to modern works by Margrett Atwood. What we have touched upon in this course has certainly changed my perspective/view of the way love/ family duty is in either in reality or fantasy or in Magic realism. 

At first, the way that love is looked upon in these texts seemed to be irrational. In reality, there are always situations where love occurs among first sight. However, the irrantionality takes a role when love at first sight immediately leads to the decisions of marriage, as some would consider being superficial. This overall idea can be seen in many, or rather most of the texts that we have covered. For example, in Romeo and Juliet, we see that Romeo enters the Capulet’s party and at first sight, he falls in love with Juliet, a shining light in the complete darkness. In comparison, in Like Water for Chocolate, there is still a love at first sight kind of themes when Pedro meets Tita at a party, and immediately falls in love with her to the extent that would bring marriage. Similarly, all the other love stories have covered this pattern.

As covered before, true love is a type of love that is pure and long endured, not something that happens at first sight. By the way the book is setting it,  it seems like they’ll marry the first person of the opposite sex they see. This point is what that exactly kept me thinking about the meaning of the authors intend to consider true love.      

   Eventually, I came to understand the topic more clearly when I thought of the situation of the times that the books were written and the present times. It was obvious that although these books were of a fanticised world that brought up unreal situations to the modern times, they had a somewhat sense in them. In esscence, it is a time period and irrelative factor that lead to this conclusion, more than anything else.     

Also, in my opinion, there are still similar family expectations/ duties in some parts of the world to the ones of Like water for chocolate. Things such morality, propriety, and social appearence are still intact to many families even today.

What do you guys think about this?   

 

Why why why… again

Throughout the story Like Water For Chocolate, Laura Esquival uses imagery such as cold to represent sadness and heat to represent love and passion. Then, once again, I had to ask why.

Let me pull you back to my previous post, How does this Relate to us? (http://10tops.wordpress.com/2007/01/21/how-does-this-relate-to-us/), by noting that this imagery is not exclusive to this book. If you look at any of the works we studied, and many more that we didn’t, you’ll find this type of imagery. So the question arises, why is this imagery so common? Obviously, there must be a universal understanding of these images.

Let me pull you out of my previous post so that we may explore these images in more depth. What is it that makes the relation between cold and sadness so logical? I suppose that being cold is bad and so is being sad: a distant relation at best. However, there are people who have never expeirienced cold, yet they still understand this metaphor. It seems that this is another thing that people are born understanding… but why?

It is my own personal belief that everything has a purpose; when you look at nature, you see developments that all have purposes: long necks to reach high branches, patterned skin to blend in with surrounding plants, the list goes on. But what I don’t understand is, what possible purpose could such an understaning of heat and passion have? Could nature have made a mistake? It’s not likely. So what is the root of this understanding?

I believe the answer to this question lies in the lymbic brain: the part that deals with instinct. Scientists believe that the lymbic brain used to be much more developed than it is today, however, as humans developed speech and higher concious thought, the lymbic brain was lost and much of our instinct with it. All that remains is that funny feeling that someone is watching you, or that gut feeling you get when you first meet someone. But that leaves us with yet another question; how did people communicate before speech: back when the lymbic brain was more developed?

If we look at our friends the animals, we can tell that they are communicating, yet we can detect no form of communication through speech. This is where my theory lies. I believe that, back before humans had speech, communication was much more rudimentary. In this system, thoughts and ideas were conveyed through emotions and feelings. How these emotions wer transported remains a mystery, however it probably has something to do with the inuition that still remains with us today. This system of communication became obsolete with the development of speech and slowly disappeared, however our innate sense of whichc ideas are related to certain emotions stuck with us.

This may seem a little far fetched, but it certainly explains a lot. I thought about this for a while, and this is the answer that makes the most sense to me, but if you disagree, then please, tell us all what you have to say on the matter: I am intrigued as to what people have to say on this matter. So, as usual, have at it!

 

How does this relate to us?

Many times, you may look at a book and think: what does this have to do with my life? From a glance, the answer would be nothing. On a superficial level, the people in these books lived a long time ago, and have no relevance to our lives today. Then you take a closer look, and you have one of those ‘oh…’ moments.

When you really think about it, what are these books about? The answer is love. As I have stated in previous posts (http://10tops.wordpress.com/2007/01/16/how-this-all-fits-in/#comments), these books all revolve around the same central theme, and it’s a theme that relates directly to us in some way or another. While each story has a different way of representing this theme, they all put accross the same ideas.

The idea of love, and not being able to be with the one you love, is a universal idea that is understood accross all cultures. Even if you want to be difficult and say that you’ve never been in love, it’s still something that relates to you: wanting something and not being able to have it. Nobody can say that they have never wanted something that they couldn’t have.

So we’ve established that all the books we’ve read revolve around the theme of wanting thing’s you can’t have… now what? Well, I started thinking, is this the doing of Ms. White, or is there something more here? Pick a story at random, any story. I bet you can find the same theme in that story. One last time, let me reference those old Warner Bros. cartoons: the one where Bugs Bunny, and another rabbit are fighting over a girl. Sound familiar? Now, this is a cartoon that is aimed at children who are 6,7, maybe 8 years old; it’s very unlikely that they’ve been in love, or understand it, however they understand the story because of that central theme.

So, how far back do you think we can go with this? Well, all the way back to when we were infants. Have you ever seen a baby, beside them is one of their toys that they are not playing with. Try taking it; see what happens. The baby wants the toy because now he can’t have it. Apparently, we’re born understanding this theme.

Basically, this is a roundabout way of answering what Ms. White asked; I think that looking at these texts in depth has definately changed the way that I think about literature in general. But what I want to know is, why do writers use this theme so much? Is it because they know that if they use it, people will be able to relate to the story? I’m not entirely sure, but I’d like to hear what you have to say on the topic.

Have at it.

 

T&I and Like Water for Chocolate

What do we notice when we compare these two?

I believe the very first thing I noticed was the male feuding. Pedro is jealous of Dr. Brown for Tita and is constantly throwing tantrums and wanting to talk to Dr. Brown (which would obviously lead to violence) while the barons in T&I are jealous of Tristan for King Mark and are trying to kill Tristan. We find that in both of these stories, men seem to turn only to violence to solve their issues. Is it a stereotype that men have to fight to solve their problems? Or is it that a book becomes boring if they negotiate? Based on the development in T&I, fighting seems like the proper choice, but Pedro, in Like Water for Chocolate, becomes very unpredictable as the story progresses. Although he could have been perfectly fine with reasoning with Dr. Brown, somehow we are convinced that he lacks the mental stability to. Why do you believe men have to fight? In today’s media, women are no longer talking, I see more and more female vs female fighting. Is fighting simply entertaining or is it content? What is the significance of fighting now, and back then? Why do male vs male almost always have to compete through tests of strength?

Secondly, we find that the man is always coming for the woman. Though women have been given a less dominant role (especially in T&I, but fading in Like Water for Chocolate because of the revolution), the men are always on a goose hunt for the woman’s attention. Pedro is always trying to find ways to be with Tita, while Tristan never seems to be able to leave the castle where Iseult is. Even through exile, he returns to the castle over and over. The idea of Petrarchan love still has its traces, it seems, in Like Water for Chocolate. The woman may not be as high as before, but she is no longer simply a sex doll – at least, in Tita’s case. I know this is arguable, so hit me with your input. =D

 

Women and Gender Roles

As we all know, if we take a walk down history lane, women have almost always been thought as inferior to men. In this post, I will discuss two points:

1) The role of women relative to other texts studied in this course
2) The role of women in Mexico during the Mexican Revolution

—

1) In “Like Water for Chocolate” it is evident that female characters dominate the story. If asked to write down the names of all the significant characters in the novel, the number of females would outnumber the number of males by far.

Females: Tita, Rosaura, Mama Elena, Gertrudis, Chencha, Nacha, John’s grandmother, Esperanza, Narrator
Males: Pedro, John, Alex, Roberto

However, if we look at any other text/movie we studied this semester, we would find that the scale would usually tip to the men’s side.

T & I
Females: Iseult, Brangien, Iseult of the White Hands, Queen of Ireland
Males: Tristan, Mark, Gorvenal, Morholt, Felons x4, Frocin, Ogrin, and more

R & J
Females: Juliet, Nurse, Rosaline, Lady Capulet, Lady Montague
Males: Romeo, Benvolio, Mercutio, Lord Montague, Lord Capulet, Paris, Tybalt, the Prince, Friar Lawrence, Balthazar, and more

G & GK
Females: Lady Hautedesert, Guinevere
Males: Gawain, Arthur, Lord Hautedesert

Big Fish
Females: Sandra Bloom, Josephine (the fiancee), Mildred (the little girl who fell in love with Ed bloom)
Males: Ed Bloom, Will Bloom, Don Price , Karl the Giant

Days of Heaven
Females: Abby, Linda
Males: Bill, Farmer, Foremen

If most of these stories are focused on men, the dominance of female characters is a change in literature… which brings us to my next topic.

2) In “Like Water for Chocolate”, there was significant emphasis on propriety as Mama Elena always forced Tita to be a certain way. Tita was to act like the impeccable and filial daughter that will care for the mother until the day she died. Gertrudis, as I assume, was probably expected to behave similarly, minus the caring-for-mother-until-the-day-she-dies part. This was the traditional way to live. However, the society at the time was in revolutionary turmoil. The Mexican Revolution was a time of change.

As political views (and leaders) changed, so did the roles of people in society, especially women. Back then, the public opinion of women’s abilities was much less than those of men, but it was changing. Through the story, this was demonstrated when Gertrudis was given the rank of an army general. The Mexican Revolution was one of the first cases where women were given a chance to fight in a battle. Perhaps it was because Emiliano Zapata tried to encourage change during the Revolution that women were recruited into the Zapatista guerillas (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexican_revolution#Zapatista_women), but it was enough to stimulate a whirlwind of change.

Edit: What do you think are the reasons that this particular text had a reversed ratio of female characters to male characters relative to the ratio of other texts/films we studied in the course?

What was unique and significant about the role each female played the book?

Do you think I should take over for Bev Oda? Hehe, just kidding…

 

Food and Magic

            Throughout this book there have been many instances of magic realism, most of which are associated with the food Tita creates. As Tita’s rebelliousness began to grow her strong emotions were reflected in the food she cooked. Before she had the courage to directly stand up to Mama Elena the food she cooked was the medium to express her feelings. This brings up the question: why food was subject to so much magic realism?

I think the reason why magic realism was applied to food is because of how universal it is. Whereas music and art only apply to some of us, food is in all of our lives. Since magic realism is all about mixing the magic with what’s real, food is the ideal choice. We’ve all heard of metaphors exaggerating the taste of food, but Laura Esquivel’s descriptions of the effects of food are much more elaborate. It’s so descriptive that sometimes we doubt our ideals of what’s real by reading the effects of the recipes. By using food as the medium the author was able to smoothly meld together the magical and real aspects of each chapter.

Apart from magic realism food is also used because it is very appealing to the senses. While music can only affect the ears food makes use of many senses. Mentions of sizzling oil and crumbling crusts (bad examples I know) are always able to light a few senses.

 

Apart from the reasons I said why else do you think the author chose food?