Character Analysis of Esperanza in 'The House on Mango Street'

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The House on Mango Street Acceptance is the key to happiness; it can unlock countless doors of joy and bliss but also lock one into a dismal site. In Saundra Cisneros’s novel The House on Mango Street, the author tells a tale of a young Mexican girl named Esperanza, who struggles in transitioning into her adolescence and discovering her identity. She struggles in accepting herself and her future as she feels trapped in her role as a girl and her current residency. After longing for years for her family of six to move into a real home of their own, as opposed to renting or an apartment, her family turns her dream into a reality. They move into a small home located in a Chicago ghetto in a primarily Hispanic community. This house, however, fails to meet Esperanza’s vision of what their home would be like. It’s small, run down, and hardly enough room to accommodate the family of six. She is embarrassed by the home and yearns to leave and to never return. She turns to her community and neighbors to escape the feelings of isolation and disappointment as she is able to befriend kids her own age and also some adults that she observes and learns from. She experiences many new things and observes her friends and from that she grows and finds herself in troublesome situations. It is through these struggles that Esperanza develops as a young woman and discovers to accept her identity and come to terms with her own happiness. After hearing word that she and her family will be moving into their own home, Esperanza’s imagination, fueled by the stories told by her parents, runs wild and paints pictures in her head of the new home; however she is disappointed to say the least. Esperanza pictures her and her family living in a beautiful spacious home in a nice neighborhood, and the house on Mango Street fails to reach her expectations. She envisioned many everyday luxuries and

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