The House of the Spirits Critique - Essay Example

The House of the Spirits Summary “The House of the Spirits” by Isabel Allende, published in 1985, is the story about an array of twisted love scandals during a time of war, all of which began with Clara del Valle, a woman who is able to predict the future but unable to change the course of the events that are to take place. The story begins with a priest’s accusation that Clara is possessed by the devil, which is the same day that Clara starts keeping a journal. Fifty years later, with the help of these journals, Clara’s husband and granddaughter, Esteban and Alba, try to understand the confusing, gap-filled story of their family from the eyes of someone who saw the events unfold before they even took precedents. After her sister Rosa dies from being poisoned, Clara becomes a hermit. Esteban, Rosa’s fiance, is busy making a fortune and sexually exploiting peasant girls because he feels that he is entitled to due to his financial status. Upon deciding to visit the old del Valle house, Esteban meets Clara and they quickly become engaged and marry. After they are married, Ferula, Esteban’s sister, moves in with them. A year later, Esteban and Clara give birth to their first child, a daughter named Blanca, who, as she gets older, falls in love with Pedro Tercero. By the end of that summer, Clara finds herself to be pregnant with twins, boys to be named Jaime and Nicolas. Before the birth of her boys, Clara’s parents die in a car accident, resulting in the beheading of her mother, Nivea. Clara isn’t immediately told of what has happened to Nivea, in fear of complications with her pregnancy, but she still finds out. She sets out to find the head, aided by Ferula. During this devastating time, Ferula and Clara become really close; eventually, Ferula and Esteban are fighting for Clara’s attention and love. One day, Esteban comes home to find Ferula and Clara in bed together, and he hastily kicks Ferula out of the house, but not before she can curse him with a lonely life. As time goes on, Blanca and Pedro’s love deepens, though they know that Blanca’s father would never approve, as Pedro is from a different class. Years later, Esteban finds out about his daughter’s love affair by Jean de Satigny, who only wants to secure himself in Esteban’s financial life either as his business partner or his son-in-law. In an attempt to separate his daughter from her lover, Esteban tries to kill Pedro, harming his own wife in the process, who then establishes a silent relationship between her and her husband. However, years down the road, Blanca becomes pregnant. Esteban claims to have killed Pedro and forces her to marry Jean; after a short amount of time with his oddities, Blanca leaves Jean and soon gives birth to a daughter, Alba. Alba is born and raised believing that her father, Jean, is dead, and eventually meets Pedro, Blanca’s first true love. Eighteen years later, after Alba’s grandmother dies, she enters into university, where she meets Miguel and begins a relationship with him. Unfortunately, her love for him is no different than the love that her mother had had for Pedro. It is during this time that a revolution breaks out that throws everyone into a frenzy as one group tries to discredit another. The man in charge of the dictatorship abducts Alba, who eventually learns that the man is Esteban Garcia, the grandson of Esteban Trueba and Pancha, a peasant girl that Esteban had taken advantage of many years ago. Pancha had told Esteban Garcia of his family, and he had spent his time building up his military rank in hopes to learn even more of his family, eventually becoming close with his father and Alba. Wanting revenge for the mistreatment of his mother, Esteban Garcia goes after Alba. With the help of another prostitute that Esteban Trueba had been with, Esteban Garcia is able to get his revenge on Alba, who spends much time in a detention facility. The story ends where it begins, with Alba and Esteban Trueba reading the journals that Clara had left behind. After Esteban dies, Alba, expecting a child of her own, finishes the work that she and her grandfather had started. Analysis The title of the novel is incredibly fitting as, by the time that the story ends and Alba is still continuing to piece the information together, everyone else from the journals, save for Alba, has died. The house really has become nothing but a haven for the spirits seen throughout the novel. And although the story is told using the journals that had been kept by Clara, the story itself is told from the points of view of Esteban and Alba as they read the journals. One of the purposes of the novel is to tell this second-hand story from one person who saw the events coming before they actually took place by two people who had only been present for some of them. The second purpose of the novel was to piece together a very confusing family history. Even in the cases where Clara was not present, she still knew what was going to happen because of her clairvoyant abilities. Through the use of the many themes of the novel, the story itself begins to fall into place. One of the most played themes is the struggle between classes. It seemed that with each child that was given birth, they would later fall in love with someone that the father of the family would not approve of. It was quite common in Latin culture for potential spouses to be of the same social and educational class as each other, which is displayed throughout Latin literature. Unfortunately, as made evident throughout the novel, actually finding one’s soulmate in the same class was a task that many did not bother to adhere to, even though they knew that their family would not approve. However, towards the end of the novel, in the middle of a clash of classes, Pedro Tercero tries to save Esteban, the man who had tried to kill him, which acted as a turning point for the opinions that those people held towards the other’s class. Another theme seen in the novel was the power and strength of women. Each protagonist of the novel was female, while the males were the forces of which they were constantly going against. The females are of the utmost importance of the story and the men only exist there because they marry these women. They would have had no role otherwise. Between the births, an abortion, and the sexual and physical violence against women seen throughout the novel, the female protagonists remain strong through it all, quickly becoming the support group for one another. Indeed, the issues that the females face are touched upon more than any of the conflicts that the males see. The twisted plots of the novel have a deep focus on the importance of genealogy and blood relations, especially in regard to women. Each woman faced similar hardships as the woman before her, especially where true love was involved, for many women found themselves with someone that others did not agree with. All of these aspects can be seen in how the plot would always turn when one woman would give birth. New hardships and conflicts would be presented, and life would continue on for that woman and her child until that child was old enough to have children of her own, thus starting the cycle all over again. “The House of the Spirits” viewed women as the turning points for life within their family, as well as the bonds that kept them together and striving. Read More