English 2000 Perspectives in Literature

“Women lose their lives not knowing they can do something different. Men eat themselves up believing they have to be the thing they have been made.”

I believe this quote deals with gender roles and the idea that were are confined to certain things. Gender roles are often seen as what a person has to be in order to be considered a part of their gender. What the author seems to be saying in the first part of the quote is that women were too focused on being a women that it prevented them from being able to see that they can be something else. The same applies for the second sentence in the quote. The men were probably raised to be a certain way as the women. Their fear or lack of knowledge could be what stopped the people at that time from going out into the world and trying to be something other than what they had been raised to be.

~Carlos L

In the book, this quote means that the children grow up thinking that they can’t change the ways they were raised. That all they grew up knowing; everthing they saw as “normal” or as”the way things were”, was never going to change. As these children become women and men, they aren’t able to see past the small box they grew up in. Which in case continues the cycle where nothing is different because they keep “Believing the shape of the life they must live is as small and mean and broken as they are told” (pg.51).

“Age, Class and Sex: Women Redefining Difference” by Audre Lorde remind me of this quote “Women lose their lives not knowing they can do something different. Men eat themselves up believing they have to be the thing they have been made.” Says Allison (51).  Some women keep repeating the same mistakes over and over again throughout the generation without knowing that there is another way. Due to that, they repeat the same obstacle because women accept the past without thinking to change their life. They think that they are always the weakest one, not like men. On the other hand, Allison did not repeat the same mistakes. She tried her best to stay different from others by protecting and changing herself.

“Women lose their lives not knowing they can do something
different. Men eat themselves up believing they have to be the thing they have been made.” I think this quote means that women can do so much more then they are told. In the book most of her aunts were just “baby machines” and apparently looked not very intelligent, “wide-mouthed.” Back in those days women were told to follow the standard way of living, which was you cook and clean for the family, basic house wife. So im guessing that what she meant when she says women can do more, if they didnt accept the way things were and tried to be a little more knowledgeable about there surroundings. Men thought they were predestined to do something because they were full of pride. But to much pride isn’t good because it can cause you to lose yourself and fail at what you are trying to accomplish. You lose sight of whats important, like family. The uncle that was good looking on page 30, no one thought he would end up living with his sister because he was so good looking and charming, but he ends up losing everything with no one but his sister to stay with.

Humans are very sexual beings. When we socialize, get to know one another and provoke the dopamine in each other’s bodies, we are being sexual. When we kiss it’s sexual. Even when we rate others, it’s sexual- despite who you’re rating. Violence is hitting someone. Violence is also raping someone. But it can also be in words. You can be violent to others by calling them ugly, by calling them useless, by making them feel insignificant. From what I’ve read, Dorothy Allison saw sexuality as violence. Violence between females and females, but more  between males and females.  See, in “Two or Three Things I Know For Sure”, Allison makes many connections between sexuality and violence. She states: “My beautiful sister had been dogged by contempt just like her less beautiful sisters— more, for she dared to be different yet again, to hope when she was supposed to have given up hope, to dream when she was not the one they saved dreams for. Her days were full of boys sneaking over to pinch her breasts and whisper threats into her ears, of girls who warned her away from their brothers, of thin-lipped adults who lost no opportunity to tell her she really didn’t know how to dress.”[Allison, Dorothy (1996-08-01). Two or Three Things I Know for Sure (pp. 78-79). Plume. Kindle Edition.]  She saw that the sexuality between male and female created more violence than anything else. When she looked at her sister, she saw a beautiful girl that many attacked because they saw her beauty and felt perverse thoughts about her. Like what non-perverted person looks at a teenager and feels contempt for them over their sexuality which is something that’s supposed to be beautiful? That’s not even cool.  She also stated “I told her about my lovers. She cursed the men who had hurt her. I told her terrible stories about all the mean women who had lured me into their beds when it wasn’t me they really wanted. She told me she had always hated the sight of her husband’s cock. I told her that sometimes, all these years later, I still wake up crying, not sure what I have dreamed about, but remembering something bad and crying like a child in great pain.” [Allison, Dorothy (1996-08-01). Two or Three Things I Know for Sure (p. 80). Plume. Kindle Edition.] To me it seems that more than anything, she saw sexuality as something that has the potential to be fun and beautiful, but could become perverted quickly and become very violent. I wasn’t really disturbed reading of the violence. She’s kind of right. In this life, many violent things happen, and it happens to many people- those who “asked for it”, those who can keep their mouth shut, those who know to look the other way. Even those who would rather pretend nothing was even happening. Yeah, it sucks, but it’s the world we live in. The one where if we don’t take our sexuality, and our bodies, it’s painful and violent. 

kay im done. gn

                There are many roles and reasons Allison tells stories in this novel. She tells stories as a way to remember her mother and her memories, to help her heal from being raped and abused as a child, to tell the story of other women and to help give a voice to other individuals who were sexually abused .  She tells stories about her memories of her mother and her family to remind her of those times, especially since her mother died. Her stories  were  also a form of therapy for her. A way for her to express her anger and pain about the sexual abuse, and make sense of it. “That’s the lie I told myself for years, and not until I began to fashion stories on the page did I sort it all out, see where the line ended and a broken life remained (38-9)”. Story telling helped Allison makse sense of her life by writing it all out so she could figure it out.

                     Allison tells stories to speak for women, specifically the women she grew up with. “Of all the stories I know, the meanest are the stories the women I loved told themselves in secret-the stories thar sutained and broke them (69)”. She told stories about the lives the women lived. Their struggles and pain with dealing with life in their society and  with men. She wrote stories to  be a voice for those who can’t or won’t speak out loud. To try to make a difference in other people’s lives so that they can survive and deal with their pain by knowing they are not alone. “My theory is that talking about it makes a difference-being a woman who can stand up anywhere and say, I was five and the man was big. So let me say it (44)”. Even though she is making a difference by telling her story, being so candid and open, it does mater if her stories are true, because it affects her credibility from a reader’s perspective;since she is tryng to help others. However, from a  writer and therapeutic perspective, her storeis doesn’t need to be true because it is her method of coping and surving. help others.

Two or Three Things I Know For Sure by Dorothy Allison and The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cigneros are similar in certain ways. Like in both stories Esperanza and Dorothy love story telling and  begin by talking about their childhood. They are both “working-class” and both have fantasies and/or dreams that they want to happen. Such as Esperanza dreaming to move in to a house she can call her own and be proud of it while Dorothy fantasized about going to places she barely heard of, doing things that no one she knew had ever done. These two stories also have differences such as setting, race, and values. Two or Three Things I Know For sure takes places in the country area and The House on Mango Street takes place in the city. If I had to take a guess I’d say Dorothy is white and Esperanza is spanish. As far as value goes Esperanza is pridful and values her house and does not want to be considered “Poor” while Dorothy does not seem to care about wealth or looking good.

In the House on Mango street, cisneros wrote about the dream of a “real house” meaning not an actual house but having a home, some place that feels comfortable and safe. The way a home is described in this novel is almost a safe environment and no issues. Just because youblive in a house it does not mean that its a home it can mean living in something but it may not be a place you consider safe or not even having a family that you may not feel any relation to.  I understood cisneros to want a life when going home means happiness.