The House On Mango Street By Sandra Cisneros

In The House on Mango Street, a coming-of-age novel narrated by a young Mexican-American girl, Sandra Cisneros shows that the places people live shape their identities and lay the foundation upon which they create the rest of their lives. As much as Esperanza dislikes Mango Street, the impoverished neighborhood in which she grows up, her experiences there define her formative years and become a fundamental part of who she is. It is the lens through which she sees the world and discovers herself across gender, ethnic, and social spectrums. Following the death of her friends' baby sister, Esperanza encounters three elderly women. They take her aside and tell her, "You will always be Mango Street. You can't erase what you know. You can't forget who you are" (105). Esperanza, though she would like to, cannot cleanse herself of her upbringing, of the place she loathes to call home, simply because it is her. The people she met and the memories she made with them have left a permanent mark on her beliefs and her values that time cannot erode away. …show more content…
She writes, "One day I will pack my bag of books and paper. One day I will say goodbye to Mango...They will not know I have gone away to come back. For the ones I left behind. For the ones who cannot out" (110). Though Esperanza has the means to leave Mango Street through her education and her writing, those she leaves behind cannot. In the end, she cannot abandon the people who helped mold her into what she is. For better or for worse, Esperanza would not be the same Esperanza without them. Her connection to them is permanent and transcends beyond her geographical location. It is an integral part of her