Like Water for Chocolate: Passion Personified by Food

In the novel, Like Water for Chocolate, author Laura Esquivel tackles on a subject that is considered taboo in many cultures: Sexual passion, and the embrace of it. For many of us, as children especially, we are taught to turn off our “passion button.”  We are trained to react to and treat such feelings as a base and instinctive nature that, by all means, must be kept in check; for it not only gets in the way of our good sense, but it creates the perception that we are lower people because it is only animals that give way to their instincts. Esquivel knows all too well this argument. She laughs it off and sets out to gives a better and reasonable assessment in her book. Through the variant metaphors of food Esquivel captures the quintessence of love and sexual desire.

From the way the book begins, we see that protagonist, Tita, will struggle to find her way: She is forced out of her mother’s stomach by the smell of onions, “making a premature entrance into this world,” she is denied love and marriage and is instead doomed to care for her abusive and repressive mother until she dies. And so her only way to express her passion is through the making of scrumptious food. “The joy of living is wrapped up in the delights of food for Tita.” It is how she “comprehends the outside world.” The amazing aromas and sounds bring her satisfaction but this is not enough, for the contact she makes with a man awakens her to a totally whole new set of feelings. Nevertheless, when she attempts to exploit them, she’s stopped in her tracts. She suffers emotionally and physically for the longest time as a consequence.

This leads her to question herself, whether this whole time she had based her life on the wrong premise — that she had assumed wrongly from the outset. What’s more, Tita struggles on her alone. It seems her sister Rosaura, and certainly her mother didn’t understand or know what she was feeling. So, she looks around for guidance, but Nacha is already dead and Gertrudis is nowhere to be found. She resists her mother to the best of her ability but she is questioning her efforts as she does it for she is unsure of herself; maybe the sexual cravings she bears for Pedro are abnormal. But disregarding them gives her a gnawing pain. The answer comes to Tita when she is in the care for doctor. He not only heals her physically but emotionally as well when he says that:

            Each of us is born with a box of matches inside us but we can’t strike them all by ourselves, just as in an experiment, we need oxygen and a candle to help…the oxygen would come from the breath of a person [we] love; the candle could be any kind of food, music, caress, word, or sound that engenders the explosion that lights one of the matches…If one  doesn’t find out in time what will set off these explosion, the box of matches dampens, and not a single match will ever be lighted. (115-116)

This is Esquivel’s rebuttal to all who preach against, attempt to doubt, and deny their passions.

Don’t get me wrong. I agree that too much passion can make for a shallow and empty person, but I also hold the view that too little of it makes for a dull and rigid existence. Esquivel demonstrates this to us through each of the three sisters. We see Gertrudis become so charged with sexual passion at such a young and tender age that she catches the showering shed on fire. She runs away breaking all the rules and the expected norms. Yet, after she runs away for a few years to chase her sexual passion, upon her return, we discover that she lacks basic skills and can’t even make syrup for the fritters. This demonstrates that she wasn’t a measured and balanced person; she missed out on critical side of life. Then we see Rosaura—who for the sake of propriety constrains and ignores her passion, but suffers in the end for it, as she swells up in girth, swelling up in gas and eventually dying from chronic dyspepsia. Finally there is Tita—she is the sister who represents a balance between the two that I have aforementioned, for she shows discipline, and respect. She gives some credence to the ideas of society, as she obeys her mother carefully, staying in the kitchen cooking and working her butt off to please those around her. I mean, she even constricts her love for Pedro. Indeed, all these are good qualities to possess; they make for a cultured person, however they do not make for the complete person. This is what Esquivel points to in the end, when, finally, Tita makes love to Pedro, experiences the most intense climax in her life, and realizes “she doesn’t want to die.” She wants more, she “wants to experience these emotions more times.” This, to Esquivel, is what it means to live and be alive. 

The Zorro of Allende, Wagner, and Francavilla

Zorro the Graphic novel is the consummation of the masterful storytelling of Isabel Allende, the genius of Matt Wagner in preserving and adapting the beautiful story into a form suitable for a graphic novel, and the artistic brilliance of Francesco Francavilla in putting together images conjured by the words.

After reading this graphic novel I’m astounded by how it isn’t anything like the Zorro that I, feel, I’ve known for as long since I heard of a super hero known as Zorro. The Zorro that I know is the one that was played by Antonio Banderas in the 1998 film alongside Anthony Hopkins and Catherine Zeta Jones. Of course being a film, and not a novel, there wasn’t an overwhelming expectation of a film to go into elaborate detail regarding my hero’s past and his motives (Then again, a graphic novel went into serious depth). Nevertheless, what I gathered from the amazing film was pleasing: First, Zorro is a Spaniard who has been wronged by the authorities. Namely, they’ve killed his brother. Thus, his chief motivation is to pay back his wrongdoers. Under the tutelage of a brilliant maestro he learns and excels in combat. In addition to this, he comes across a sum of money (or something like that) which enables him finance his quest. Keep in mind, Zorro doesn’t go on a detour to protect the people in his town. When he does so, it is because it is in keeping with his already pre-existing goal to exact revenge upon the corrupt authorities.

So, upon reading the graphic novel I’ve discovered that Diego De La Vega’s (Zorro) father is a Spaniard and his mother is a native Indian, he is well-to-do, he has a close relationship with his milk brother—Bernardo, and a serious of unfortunate events is what leads him to take up the role of his spirit guide, El Zorro (the fox), and “ride a path blazed of fairness, paved with the stones of equality...The trail of justice!” His legend isn’t in that he is Zorro but it lies in what isn’t known to society, his misfortunes and triumphs that compel and guide him to what the world come to see in the final presentation as El Zorro.

Allende shows that he is a rich, up-to-date man of honor who has ties to the native people (they symbolize the oppressed), so, at the same time, we see why he cares for the lowly and disregarded of society. All the same, the narrator of the story is Bernardo, a native Indian and brother to Zorro. Given his background and that he is “mute,” again, this reemphasizes that Zorro isn’t in it for his personal glory but, truly, for the protection of the oppressed. He yearns to “speak” for them.

Wagner brings back all hearkens back to the concepts and the themes exuded by Allende’s Zorro in his adaptation. He does this by giving us two time frames in the story telling. The young Diego De la Vega’s life unfolds while, our hero, Zorro carries on his acts of sabotage against the corrupt and the powerful. It is interesting, because throughout the whole story, the narrator doesn’t mention Zorro as much as he does Diego De La Vega. He describes De La Vega in a great deal of detail. His virtues and extraordinary temperaments are made plain. And it is towards the end that it is revealed that all this greatness is goes into making the masked figure that is Zorro.

The graphic novel is made complete with the artwork Francesco Francavilla. Francavilla displays Zorro as a darkened figure. He doesn’t merely mask his identity in presenting him this way, but he masks his emotions and his thoughts as well. The best optimization of this is when Diego De la Vega puts on the outfit of Zorro for the first time upon returning from Spain. The panel is arranged, three-by-three, stacked on top of one another, suggesting sequential action as he puts on what will be a symbolic and notorious attire. Most, important of all, is the facial expression that he wears. It is one that is marked with stoicism and a soft anger. Francavilla wants to display that Diego De La Vega is not the kind boy when he puts on such on those clothing: For he is preparing to fight what is evil and ugly, so he needs to confront it with such a countenance.

Jorge Luis Borges: "Emma Zunz," "The Gospel According to Mark," "The Garden of Forking Paths"

Throughout the three narratives Borges delves into the concept of time; the subjectivity of it, which therefore renders it with a cyclic nature. He, also, speaks about the nature of sacrifice. In fact, throughout the three novels we get to see the protagonist kill or killed in some sacrificial manner. Finally, Borges, in keeping it “magically real,” hearkens back to the power of the mind. Primarily, the role that it plays in our ability to perceive and interpret reality.

            Beginning with the idea of time, I’ll start talking about the “Garden of Forking Paths.” In the whole story, which is told in first person, we are—as readers—bestowed into the inner reaches of the protagonist’s mind. His insecurities and doubts we are privy to. It is quickly revealed that he is a “cowardly man” who engaged in the business of espionage not for the love of Germany, but for the need to vindicate “the people of [his] race, that there was no need to fear “the enumerable ancestors who merged within [him]. Furthermore, it becomes apparent that he has to get intelligence to the Nazis, and meanwhile he’s being pursued by another spy who wants to kill him. Because he is an anxious and fearful man who is “pressed for time,” he shifts through time by sifting through various decisions and actions right away. Instantaneously, he dictates in his mind the path that he will take to reach his goal, but just as soon as he resolves to execute a plan by following that path, he swiftly changes his mind and branches from that path, altering his course and therefore altering his fate.

 In the end, Borges says “the author of an atrocious undertaking out to imagine that he has already accomplished it, out to impose upon himself a future as irrevocable as the past” For to him time is “intimate and infinite” It is a sinuous spreading labyrinth that would encompass the past and the future and in some way involve the stars.” The big idea here is that life is not linear nor is one’s destiny. As we see with our protagonist, what he did or failed to do in the past resulted in the present for him and what he does or fails to do renders his future accordingly. What’s more, with every mood, or whim, or calculation that bears on our thoughts as make decision, we create for a different ending for ourselves.

Sacrifice plays a great role in the “Gospel According to Mark.” Here, Borges makes a pretty bold statement. He mirrors his narrator, Baltasar Espinosa, after Jesus Christ in every sense. He is thirty three, he is well spoken, intelligent, but without “direction.” This is a blow to the heart mainstream Christian belief because the actions of Christ are thought to be all pre-destined. He came to act in a story that was already written about him, long ago from the prophets. Borges recreates Christ with a few caveats. That is, he is more practical than religious, he is more complacent than willful, and that he did good acts not out of a fondness for humanity but because he was compelled by his “acquiescent nature.” As the story proceeds, Espinosa goes and lives among the rural Gutres (they represent the poor and, also, his apostles), he has dinner with them and later they crucify him. Again, this just corroborates that Espinosa is Christ. What Borges wants to communicate, however, is that the man who many think of as purely pious and devoted singularly one cause, is, in fact, more reasonable and practical. He is “normal” like the rest of us. Indeed, he was full of opinions, but he was not perfect in every way that’s why some of his actions were “questionable.” Ultimately, he is sacrificed because people misunderstand and misconstrue his ways.

Finally, with regards to perception, we can look at “Emma Zunz.” Zunz is fascinating because she preps herself up in order to relive a painful experience so that she can free herself to “become the person she would be.” She had suffered humiliation for her father being wrongfully indicted for the crime of embezzlement; then, again for his subsequent suicide. She vows revenge by going out to kill her father’s old friend who was responsible for her suffering. However, to go about it, she has to make herself feel the pain. She was already suffering from it, but she has to bring out the pain to its quintessence so that she can compel herself inflict it upon someone else. Now she is a virgin, but for the sake of duty, she goes out and sleeps with a hideous man. Herein lies Borges brilliance: a virgin’s greatest pride and fear is the protection and loss of her maidenhead. So, as an audience, to witness such a momentous and self-effacing and self-sacrificing act causes us to cringe and say “Oh, I feel your pain now. You really got screwed when he did this to your father.” Even more amazing, Zunz wills herself to imagine and live in the moment again. Her mind recreates an old reality and merges it with her new one, so that she does “become the person she would be.”

Gabriel Garcia Marquez-- The Paradox of "An Old, Ugly Angel and a Young, Handsome Dead Man"

            Gabriel Garcia Marquez infiltrates the psyche of readers as well as, practically, most humankind in the two short stories, “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” and “The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World.” In the former he draws focus to the confused, and often, preconceived imagination which stumps the mind’s ability to really perceive reality. In the latter he mocks the “overactive” imagination which can create a palpable and most genuine feel of fantasy, leaving one trapped in it.

            Who would imagine that an angel of god could be “old and bald with very few teeth, possessing a pair of dirty half-plucked wings." What’s more, could you imagine that he couldn’t speak latin (“the language of the god”) or that he’d be so decrepit that he looked “much too human?” Likewise, would you imagine that in death, a man could elicit so much heart-felt emotions from a village of strangers that they'd  think him to be a real, everyday-villager who once lived amongst them?” That he would be considered one of the villages’ own and given a name (Esteban) because he was so handsome? That is to say, would you imagine that, through his graceful and good looks, people would have more faith, more belief, in a dead man having lived with them than in an old angel who was living with them and performing miracles before their very eyes? The answer is that people put their faith and hopes in the wrong places. In the story of the dead man people weep and mourn for a man who never did and cannot do a thing for them; they attribute a name to his face and create a tale of his life. Conversely, in the story of the old man we see an abandoned and disdained man, who although is an angel of god, is not thought of so and in fact is received with doubt and skepticism.

            All Marquez wants to say is that faith, which if is something that one holds important, must be practiced in a most sincere way or else one can never truly see the "real" miracles that permeate through it. He demonstrate this by how Pelayo and Elisenda (the host family of the old man) are incapable of realizing that before them is an angel by who’s presence they’ve been made more wealthier and more whole. “The world had been sad since…Sea and sky were a single ash-gray thing,” but his presence marked the beginning of the “first sunny days.” Yet sadly, mankind, when confronted with a manifestation of his religious devotion, fails to comprehend the complexities and paradoxes and so choose to see “it depart.”  Marquez is saying that what we do when we see that what we’ve been taught doesn’t fit the mold of the reality of what confronts us is we retreat into the gates of our minds and lock it. But that’s not what we must do. Instead, we have to wrench ourselves from the grip of what has been, for so long, ingrained in the fabric of our minds as the simple, and pure truth. In this way, we analyze everyone and everything as good or bad, harmful or beneficial on purely its intrinsic qualities alone and not by appearances or the derivatives of any other quality that we already harbor.

Cortazar's Intentions: "The Continuity of the Parks", "The Demeanor at Wakes", & "Axolotls"

Julio Cortazar in his short stories, Axolotls,” “Our Demeanor at Wakes”, and “The Continuity of the Parks,” presents the human being in a light that shows his shortcomings and strengths. He highlights the positive attributes such as our sense of pity and compassion, but also makes plain our temperament to be deceitful to the point where we not only fool and manipulate others but lose ourselves, and our humanity.

I’ll begin with this praising of humanity by looking at “Axolotls”. The narrator in this story is very much like all of us in that he seeks to live for his sole delight, amusement and joy. He goes to the zoo for this very reason. This man wants to be entertained at sheer sight and thrill evoked by the panther and the lion. Indeed, it wasn’t his intention to see the silent, diminutive axolotls; fortuitous circumstances bring him into contact with them and it is at that moment that he “is linked by something lost and distant” between them. So, it isn’t as if the axolotls weren’t already “…slaves of their bodies” who were “condemned infinitely to the silence of the abyss” and doomed to a “hopeless meditation.” We can presume that they had dwelled in that state inside the “dark, humid building that was the aquarium,” ever since they had been put there. Cortazar wants to remind us all who live every day to bear this in mind — that we shouldn’t live emotionally insulated from what is happening around us. He recognizes that we prefer not to think about the suffering in the world, because it is easier for us that way (and I’m at fault of this). But it is this exactly, which Cortazar urges us to eschew. There are those around the world, who although are, perhaps, distant and separated in time, but suffering. “Once we go on to know,” we discover amazingly that they are not different from us but, we are the same. I couldn’t agree more.     

Now, in looking at “Our Demeanor at Wakes” we get to see Cortazar satirizing on human follies in a more mean-spirited way. Although, I disagree on the subject matter (death) that he chooses to demonstrate our propensity to be hypocritical, he gets the point across. At the very beginning he tells you right away “We don’t go for the anisette, we don’t even go because we’re expected to. You’ll have guessed our reason already: we go because we cannot stand the craftier forms of hypocrisy.” And he’s talking about— in this case — people’s exaggerated show of sorrow— but, in general, people’s pretend show of care and concern towards others. Cortazar alludes to what author Kyoko Mori in her memoir, Polite Lies, calls “polite lies”. The term is Mori’s expression of what we do to keep and maintain polite society. It is how we are unable to express ourselves completely to people, how we cannot be frank. And this is not in the sense of being brutally honest, but rather, it is not being able to say what we mean to say. Thus, we fake it, and therefore we lie. Simply put, don’t do it. Because if and when you do, it compels others to act in the like manner, as a result, it renders us all hypocrits.

Lastly and above all, however, Cortazar is shouting and pointing out to readers and saying, “Look, I’m not just putting on display here the virtues and vices of mankind but I want you to notice the way I’m doing it. I’m using art.” Yes, he wants us to understand the power of art. He tells us that art is real.  “The continuity of the Parks”epitomizes this concept. As the audience we get to witness our protagonist become the main character in the novel he’s reading because his situation and his environment are so much intertwined. Again, this is us. We are moved to be moved by art.

The Popol Vuh

        After reading the Mayan sacred text about the creation of the world and the origin and purpose of humanity, I'm  struck by the parallels that I am able draw between their perspective, and the Christian beliefs in which I share: From the void, dark and formless matter which had gods hovering in or above the waters to the creation of men or man who was perfect in every sense-- An image of the gods themselves-- whom became reduced to imperfection by their god or gods in order to forestall any competition between creator and creation. Furthermore, the purpose of both humanity in the two accounts of creation is to give worship,  and adoration to their gods and ask them for guidance and wisdom, and above all, remember them in whatever they do. The Mayans did this through prayer and sacrifice. They "were reverent, they were givers of praise, givers of respect, lifting faces to the sky" when they made requests. Almost, in the same fashion as a  Christian, it is important for me to read the bible, meet up every Sunday at church and, with reverence, make supplications. Through these acts I pay homage to my god remembering him as the creator of all things.
       A final point, when I think about these similarities it makes me wonder how both the Christian beliefs and the Mayans beliefs and some other ones are so much alike. Especially, with their overall guiding themes. My guess is that the human condition is the same everywhere and as a result human beings are rendered by their environment to think alike.