Comparison of Latin Males

International Baccalaureate World Literature

Both Esteban Garcia from the novel The House of the Spirits written by Isabel Allende and Pedro from the novel Like Water For Chocolate, written by Laura Esquivel are seen as weak males in the Latin American culture. Esteban Trueba is described as machismo by the author. A machismo male has an exaggerated display of masculinity where the male characteristics such as strength, aggressiveness and emotional response are emphasized, (“Machismo” par 1). Pedro is considered a weaker man because he does not have the required characteristics of masculinity, such as bravery, money, leadership and lack of emotion. Both Latin authors, Laura Esquivel and Isabelle Allende, have created weak male characters. And in the Latin culture, for a man to be considered ‘macho’, he must be willing to be jealous, malicious, vindictive and willing to fight without hesitation to protect one’s manly image. In Allende’s novel, Esteban is considered to be a machismo male; whereas, in Esquivel’s novel, ironically Pedro does not play the machismo role. Even though both Latin American writers create two different types of male characters; a machismo male and weaker male, they both end up failing.

In the beginning of The House of the Spirits, Esteban Trueba is seen as a man in love; he gave up two years of his life to live in a “wooden shack” (21) to work in a mine for Rosa the beautiful. And after Esteban loses his beautiful fiancé, he moves to Tres Marias, hoping to rebuild the settlement. It appeared to be a successful way to make money and gain power. Because of this power, Esteban gains a bad temper and a violent attitude: “Trueba’s bad temper became legend, and grew so exaggerated that it even made him uncomfortable. He forbade anyone to talk back to him and could tolerate no opposition; he viewed the slightest disagreement as a provocation” (63). And because of his violent behavior, he is seen as a machismo male because ‘macho’ men are aggressive. However, Esteban takes it too far by becoming violent because he wants to stay in power. This shows that he is not physically weak, but mentally weak

by wanting too much power and becoming lonely and trying to find happiness by sleeping with “all the available women in Tres Marias”(63).

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by wanting too much power and becoming lonely and trying to find happiness by sleeping with “all the available women in Tres Marias”(63).

Pedro in Like Water for Chocolate is not seen as a machismo male because he does not appear to want to be in control. Mama Elena makes the decision that Rosaura moves “to live with her cousin in San Antonia, with her husband [Pedro] and little boy” (80). In the house where Pedro lives, Mama Elena is the one with all the power and control. If Pedro wanted to be a man in power, first he would not have agreed to marry Tita’s sister, Rosaura, because it was his “only hope of being near” (15) her. If Pedro were a man of power, he would have “taken her away with him, where there were no rules to keep them apart” (57). This shows that Pedro does not want to be a man of power or control because if he wanted to be a man with control, he would have left the village with Tita and married her.

Some men like to buy expensive things or have a successful career to gain respect of other men. Because Esteban in The House of The Spirits is a machismo male, which shows he can get competitive, he felt that he was “rich enough to buy himself luxuries” (92) such as statues, Turkish carpets and teardrop chandeliers to put in his big house on the corner. Esteban buys a big luxurious house also to show his authority, his wealth, and his success. Esteban thought that buying such an expensive house with extravagant decorations would prove his manhood, but it just makes him weaker as he thinks the house is a “reflection of himself, and family” (93). Even though Esteban is the owner of the ‘big house on the corner,’ he is still not the man in charge of the house. Clara has more control of what goes on in the house than Esteban, as she is the one who decides to “have another room built in the house, when a new guest arrives” (93) or “have a wall knocked down, until the mansion was impossible to clean” (93). So even though Esteban Trueba is a ‘strong’ man who likes to boast about his belongings, he is still seen as a weak character because his wife has control over him.

In Like Water for Chocolate, Pedro does not have any expensive belongings or a successful career to boast about. But Pedro feels that even though he is married to Rosaura, he still has an extravagant prize, Tita. But because Pedro does not have the strength to stand up to Mama Elena, to say that it is Tita he wants to marry, and it is Tita that he will marry, he remains with her sister, Rosaura. Pedro is not like other men, who like to boast about possessions because Pedro does not own much. So Pedro is seen to be weaker than other males in both novels because even though he has his eye set on something for a long time, he does not have the courage or strength to stand up to the people standing in his way of what he wants. Instead, he obeys Mama Elena. For example, after giving Tita roses, “with such a look [from Mama Elena] it was that he excused himself to look for Rosaura” (48). Rosaura and Tita also have control over Pedro like Mama Elena. Rosaura can control Pedro because she is his wife and mother of his child. Tita controls Pedro through her cooking as Pedro thought her quail was “a gift from the gods” (51) and had him crying while “watching the stars act out the love” (43) that he was denied with Tita. This shows that even though both men are controlled by women, the man with the more material wealth is able to have more power and control than the man with less.

Even though both men have no control or power over their women in these two novels, the males try hard to gain the control of the women. When Clara stands up to Esteban and says that he “hasn’t done a thing you [Esteban Trueba] done yourself, sleeping with unmarried woman not of your own class” (Allende 200), Esteban is furious and “lost control and struck her in the face, knocking her against the wall” (200). Even though Esteban felt guilty for hitting his wife, he felt more powerful and more in control of his household. But after, “Clara never spoke to her husband again. She stopped using her married name and removed the fine gold wedding ring that he had placed on her finger twenty years before” (201), Esteban wanted his wife’s forgiveness. This shows that even though he does a manly thing by slapping his wife, she has more control over their relationship by moving out and not talking to him and making him want her more and beg for her forgiveness admitting to “feel lonely”(225).

In Pedro’s relationship with Tita, he thinks he is being masculine by moving into Mama Elena’s house and marrying Rosaura just to be closer to Tita. But all he is doing is hurting Tita even more, and that shows that he is not a macho man, even though he is trying to be closer to Tita. He has no control over his relationship with Rosaura or Tita, as “just a look from Mama Elena can inform him to look for Rosaura to repair the damage” (Esquivel 48). This shows Pedro’s weakness and Mama Elena is in control.

In conclusion, the authors use these two different types of men to show that men in the Latin American culture can be considered weak. Normally, when people think of a ‘macho’ man, they think of strong men who know how to take control, but in Allende’s novel, Esteban as a macho man is a weak character, who gets caught up in materialism and power. In Esquivel’s novel, he a weak man that is easily controlled by the other female characters, even the weakest female characters such as Rosaura. But by using two different male characters, the authors are able to show that the man who strives for active fulfillment as a young man, such as Esteban Trueba in The House of The Spirits, can become frustrated and end up withdrawing because he is not able to deal with his pain. And in Like Water for Chocolate, Esquivel creates a character who is easily dominated by the females, yet, after twenty years of suffering, is finally able to achieve his happiness. Therefore, Latin American authors use different male characteristics in their novels to highlight the strength of the females and the suffering of the males.

Works Cited

Allende, Isabel. The House of the Spirits. Trans. Magda Bogin. New York: Bantam, 1993.

Esquirel Laura. Like Water for Chocolate. Trans. Carol Christensen and Thomas Christensen.

New York: Anchor, 1995.

“Machismo.” Encarta. 20 May 2008. http://encarta.msn.com/encnet/features/dictionary/