The House On Mango Street Maturity Essay

Maturity One person’s knowledge and understanding grows deeper when they get older and mature. This idea is shown through the novella The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros. The House on Mango Street takes place in a mexican neighborhood which isn’t the best. It’s a poor, rough, and not very friendly neighborhood. The book starts when she is 12 or 13 and talks about her life and challenges till age 17 or 18. Esperanza negative view of herself slowly changes as she begins to focus on her larger community and her place within it. Through this, Cisneros shows that knowing and accepting where one comes from is an important part of growing up and determining one’s identity. In the chapter “My Name” Esperanza tries to find her true identity. In this part of the story Esperanza describes her name and the meaning of it. Cisneros illustrates, “ In English my name means hope. In Spanish it means to many letters”(10). Esperanza and the meaning of her name shows how she isn’t grown up because she worries to much on what people will think. In the story most people say …show more content…
In this part of the story Esperanza describes hips and what they mean and why she wants them. Cisneros illustrates, “One day you wake up and they are there. Ready and waiting like a new Buick with the keys in the ignition” (49). Esperanza is talking about how hips show how she is not mature because she wants what the older girls want. She is always saying negative things about herself, like before it was her name but now its her hips. She is jealous because she doesn’t have hips. She thinks that once you get hips it will be like escaping or having a path to being mature. Just like how a Buick is a escape place for someone who bought a new car, because they are mature and can make adult decisions like buying a new car. In the end Esperanza is slowly starting to become mature as she is aging but she still gets jealous of other