Book N°4 - Englishtravelbookclub's meeting of the 10TH september 2017
A suggestion of Susan Palmer
The
Author
Laura Esquivel is a novelist and
screenwriter. She was born on 30th
September 1950. She was the 3rd of 4
children to Julio Cesar Esquivel, a telegraph operator, and Josfa Valdes, a
homemaker. Her father’s death in 1999
was the inspiration for her book Tan velo\ como el deseo. Laura Esquivel trained as a teacher, she
founded a children’s theatre workshop and wrote and produced dramas for
children. She first married actor,
producer and director Alfonso Arau, with whom she collaborated on several films. She now lives with her present husband in
Mexico City.
In March 2009 Laura Esquivel ran as a
preliminary candidate of the Local Council in District XXVII of Mexico City for
the PRD. She has also served as head of
the Mexico City Cultural Committee and member of the Science and Technology and
Environmental Committees for the Morena Party.
Like Water for Chocolate (Como agua para
chocolate) was her first novel, released in 1989, and became a bestseller in
Mexico and the United States and in 1994 it was developed into an award-winning
film. The film became one of the largest
grossing foreign films ever released in the US.
Esquivel earned 11 Ariel Awards from the Mexican Academy of Motion
Pictures.
Meaning
of the title
Like Water For Chocolate’s full title is:
Like Water for Chocolate: A novel in monthly instalments with recipes, romances
and home remedies.
The phrase ‘Like Water For Chocolate’ comes
from the Spanish phrase ‘como agua para chocolate’. This is a common expression in some
Spanish-speaking countries, and it means that one is very angry. In some Latin American countries, such as
Mexico, hot chocolate is made with near-boiling water instead of milk. It is also a simile for describing a state of
passion or sexual arousal.
Background
to the story
In the book, Laura Esquivel uses magical
realism to combine the ordinary and the supernatural. The novel takes place during the revolution
in early twentieth century Mexico and it shows the importance of the kitchen
and food in the life of the main character, Tita. The novel is structured as a year of monthly
issues of an old-style women’s magazine containing recipes, home remedies and
love stories. Each chapter opens with a
traditional Mexican recipe followed by instructions for preparation. Each recipe recalls to the narrator a significant
event in the main character’s life.
The author has stated that she believes
that the kitchen is the most important part of the house and characterizes it
as a source of knowledge and understanding that brings pleasure. The idea for the novel came to Esquivel
“while she was cooking the recipes of her mother and grandmother. Apparently ‘Esquivel used an episode from her
own family to write her book. She had a
great-aunt named Tita who was forbidden to wed and spent her life caring for
her mother. Soon after her mother died,
so did Tita.”
Plot
The book is
divided into 12 sections named after the months of the year, starting in
January and ending in December. Each section begins with a Mexican recipe. The chapters connects each dish to an event in the protagonist's life.
Tita de la
Garza, the novel's main protagonist, is 15 at the start of the story. She lives
on a ranch near the Mexico—US border with
her mother, Mamá Elena, and her older sisters Gertrudis and Rosaura.
Pedro is
their neighbor, with whom Tita falls in love at first sight. The feeling turns out to be mutual, so Pedro
asks Mamá Elena for Tita’s hand in marriage. Unfortunately, she forbids it,
citing the de la Garza family tradition that the youngest daughter (in this
case, Tita) must remain unmarried and take care of her mother until her
mother's death. She suggests that Pedro marries Tita's sister, Rosaura, instead.
In order to stay close to Tita, Pedro decides to follow this advice.
Tita has a
deep connection with food and a love for cooking, enhanced by the fact that
Tita's primary caretaker as a child was Nacha, the family cook. Her love for
cooking also comes from the fact that she was born in the kitchen.
In
preparation of the wedding, Tita is forced to prepare the cake with Nacha.
While preparing the cake, Tita is over come with sadness, and cries into the
cake batter. At the wedding, everyone gets violently sick, vomiting everywhere.
Suspecting Tita was behind the incident, Mama Elena punishes Tita. After the
wedding, Nacha is found dead, with a picture of her fiancé.
Later,
Pedro and Rosaura have a son, Roberto. Rosaura is unable to nurse Roberto, so
Tita brings Roberto to her breast to stop the baby from crying. Tita begins to
produce breast milk and is able to nurse the baby. This draws her and Pedro
closer than ever. They begin meeting secretly, snatching their few times
together by sneaking around the ranch and behind the backs of Mamá Elena and
Rosaura.
Tita’s
strong emotions become infused into her cooking, unintentionally affecting the
people around her through her food. After one particularly rich meal of quail in rose petal sauce flavoured
with Tita’s erotic thoughts of Pedro, Gertrudis becomes inflamed with lust and
leaves the ranch in order to make ravenous love to a revolutionary soldier on
the back of a horse, later ending up in a brothel and subsequently disowned by
her mother.
Rosaura and
Pedro are forced to leave for San Antonio, Texas, at the urging of Mamá
Elena, who suspects a relationship between Tita and Pedro. Rosaura loses her
son Roberto and later becomes infertile from complications during the birth of
her daughter, Esperanza.
Upon
learning the news of her nephew's death, whom she cared for herself, Tita
blames her mother, who responds by smacking Tita across the face with a wooden
spoon. Tita, destroyed by the death of her beloved nephew and unwilling to cope
with her mother's controlling ways, secludes herself in the dovecote until the
sympathetic Dr. John Brown soothes and comforts her. Mamá Elena states there is
no place for "lunatics" like Tita on the farm, and wants her to be
institutionalized. However, the doctor decides to take care of Tita at his home
instead. Tita develops a close relationship with Dr. Brown, even planning to
marry him at one point, but her underlying feelings for Pedro do not waver.
While John
is away, Tita loses her virginity to Pedro. A month later, Tita
is worried she may be pregnant with Pedro’s child. Her mother's ghost taunts
her, telling her that she and her child are cursed. Gertrudis visits the ranch
for a special holiday and makes Pedro overhear about Tita’s pregnancy, causing
Tita and Pedro to argue about running away together. This causes Pedro to get
drunk and sing below Tita’s window while she is arguing with Mama Elena’s
ghost. Just as she confirms she isn't pregnant and frees herself of her
mother's grasp once and for all, Mamá Elena's ghost gets revenge on Tita by
setting Pedro on fire, leaving him bedridden for a while and behaving like “a
child throwing a tantrum”. Meanwhile, Tita is preparing for John's
return, and is hesitant to tell him that she cannot marry him because she is no
longer a virgin. Rosaura comes to the kitchen while Tita is cooking and argues
with her over Tita's involvement with Rosaura’s daughter Esperenza’s life and
the tradition of the youngest daughter remaining at home to care for the mother
until she dies, a tradition which Tita despises. She vows not to let it ruin
her niece's life as it did hers. John and his deaf great-aunt come over and
Tita tells him that she cannot marry him. John seems to accept it, “reaching
for Tita’s hand...with a smile on his face”.
Many years
later, Tita is preparing for Esperanza’s and John's son Alex’s wedding to one
another, now that Rosaura has died from digestive problems. During the wedding,
Pedro proposes to Tita saying that he does not want to “die without making
[Tita] [his] wife”. Tita accepts and Pedro dies making love to her
in the kitchen storage room right after the wedding. Tita is overcome with
sorrow and cold, and begins to eat matches. The matches are
sparked by the heat of Pedro's memory, creating a spectacular fire that engulfs
them both, eventually consuming the entire ranch.
The
narrator of the story is the daughter of Esperanza, nicknamed "Tita",
after her great-aunt. She describes how after the fire, the only thing that
survived under the smouldering rubble of the ranch was Tita's cookbook, which
contained all the recipes described in the preceding chapters.
Group’s View
Although
this was not typical for our ‘travel’ theme, we did explore Mexico through the
recipes and briefly touched on the revolution in 20th century Mexico.
The group
thought it was an interesting book to read and one they perhaps may not
ordinarily have chosen.
We could
not see Tita’s draw to Pedro as we felt that he was not a particularly a pleasant
character, a bit of a wimp!
It was
discussed that Tita may have had ‘shaman’ qualities due to the effect her
cooking and emotions had an effect on those consuming her food.
Mama Elena
was not a very nice woman but her behaviour was a result of the events she had experienced
during her life.
John seemed
like such a nice man and Tita was a fool not to marry him!
At the end
when Tita & Pedro died in the fire, we thought this was a good analogy to
their ‘burning love & passion’ for each other.
Overall, an
interesting read.
