'Multicultural Literature: “Poisoned Story” Essay\r'

'Latino civilisation, specifically Puerto-Ri th chthonic mug finale has changed through with(predicate) the figure of advanceds report. Puerto Rico has witnessed a spinal fusion of races and cultures spanning over numerous years, starting in 1898, after the Spanish-American war. Ultimately, Puerto Rico was annexed to the unite States, the Puerto Rican people made United States citizens with limited restrictions and minded(p) commonwealth status. The changes made during those eras did non come with give away consequences to the Puerto Rican culture. In â€Å"Pois wizd Story”, author genus genus genus genus genus genus genus genus genus genus genus Rosario Ferre depicts the semipolitical and economic ever-changing norms and tensions amongst the social classes of the Puerto Rican’s culture. In Ferre’s baloney â€Å"Poisoned Story” several major themes argon prevalent through the drool: opposition amid the juicy and clobbers class, literacy, description of historimetropolis and magic naive realism.\r\nThe prevailing complex body part of the tarradiddle is ground upon a chronicle conflict between the characters which dramatizes the issue of the actual â€Å" generator” inside the business relationship. The reason this is historic is because the c erstwhilepts of the Puerto Rican hi reputation is based upon experience of the individual Puerto Rican. The class structure between rich and curt at one era was clear. During this tale, the class structure and culture of two generations against the scope of the United States relationship is developed. The characters inside the boloney even off several classes of people in the Puerto Rican parliamentary procedure. Also, Ferre uses a tale appearance in the taradiddle that introduces different â€Å" economisers” within the allegory or shall we say different learnings of occurrences of history based upon personal experience within the Puerto Rican fusion of culture.\r\nRead more: A depiction of a hallucination city.\r\nThe Puerto Rican economy was disturbed with the United States preventive which led to classes of people macrocosm displaced within society, as was the case with the character of adopt Lorenzo. study into Lorenzo was Rosaura’s grow. After the death of his front wife, gain Lorenzo conjoin his second wife named Rosa. An important issue of this story is the masculine character of Don Lorenzo re turn overs and the fact that he hook up with out of his class when he married Rosa, leaving behind his traditions and some of his culture. The character of Don Lorenzo transitions through the story. In the beginning, Don Lorenzo is viewed in in high spirits regard, with pride for his land and culture. As the story progresses Don Lorenzo looses his land, his home, and his heart as he and his aristocratic culture deteriorates before his very eyes with the help of his new wife Rosa and changing social structu re.\r\nRosa is an antagonistic source and character in the story. Rosa is the representation of the lower class of society, or the â€Å"works class”. Good with her hands, the character of Rosa is stand for as creation cunning and resourceful by one of the writers, and bitter and cruel by another. Dep ending on who is writing the story, there is a like and abhor of this character on several levels in regards to the interactions with some(prenominal)(prenominal) characters Don Lorenzo and Rosaura.\r\nRosa is draw as cosmos from the working class, much different from Lorenzo’s outgrowth wife. The physical description covers Rosa as having â€Å" blanket(a) hips with generous breasts” who â€Å"reestablished” Don Lorenzo’s domestic comfort after the death of his number 1 wife (p.9). Rosa is overly depict as coming from a different class background when creation described by her customers:\r\nâ€Å"Whoever would have thought it; from cha rwo humanity to gentlecleaning lady, setoff w countenanceing in mud, thence wallowing in wealth. But finery does not a lady make.”(p.8).\r\nThis class jumping is important to recognize in the fact that Rosa was once Don Lorenzo’s wife’s c argiver, and at a while she has replaced the aristocratic mother and wife, defying the social dodge of forgetful vs. rich. Rosa’s character transitions from poor to rich, mistakable to a creative Puerto Rican rendition of a Cinderella story: rags to riches. Rosa is in addition instrumental in leading, or forcing the characters of Don Lorenzo and Rosaura to evolve or assimilate into the then current Puerto Rican culture.\r\nThe character of an aristocratic daughter named Rosaura is introduced in the first paragraph. Rosaura was the daughter of a once rich sugar cane grove owner named Don Lorenzo. It can be assumed that Rosaura was fairly raw at the onset of this story, but old bounteous to read and attend direc t. Her mother had recently died (reason is not specified) and her father quickly remarried to Rosa. This young girl love to read passwords in a â€Å"dense overgrowth of purge bougainvillea vines” (p.1). It should be noted that the color of crimson and red are repetitively utilise to describe associations with Rosaura. The red association is first in the bang on vine, then in the bloodlike guava compote which gets spilled on Rosa’s dress.\r\nThe story represents Rosaura as an educated daughter, a part of the â€Å" grandeur” who was described to possess the ability to read in a country where the illiteracy rate was very high. It can be assumed through Puerto Rican history and through the narrative description in the story, that unless you were of the wealthy class, groomingal activity was not an option: â€Å"…she was forced to leave school because of his poor business deals” (p.9). The literacy rate was very poor in Puerto Rico which was a furthestming country. The characters that were literate in the Poisoned Story also represent the mood of who usually writes history, which is the literate, or the rich.\r\nThe structure of the story is come to on the narrative theme of the concept â€Å" poisoned story”. The introduction starts with an excerpt from a book or story by A Thousand and unity Nights, author unknow:\r\nAnd the world power said to Ruyan the sharp Man:\r\n-Wise Man, there is nothing compose.\r\n-Leaf through a few more pages.\r\nThe King turned a few more pages, and\r\nBefore long the poison began to cover rapidly through his body. Then\r\nThe King trembled and cried out:\r\n-This story is poisoned.\r\nThis poem sets up the overpower major theme of the writer being in control of the story, and those words or interpretation being poison. The rising action of the story is centered well-nigh the different perspectives of the interpretations of the â€Å"history” of the story that is bein g commented on through the writers.\r\nWithin the story there is the perception of several writers. Several parts to the story are written in a fairylandtale manner, with articulately chosen words and beautiful descriptions of days by when the aristocracy led the social class structure and all(prenominal)one seemed magically fantastical. Exquisite dolls, fancy dinners and luxuries were of the excess for the aristocracy while the working class struggled to stage pabulum on the table. The opposite perception of that similar time is written in a language that seems to be sympathetic to Rosa and her hardships as being from the working class, trying â€Å"honestly” to work her way up the entrepreneur ladder in the fashion industry. The leash voice in this story is that of Rosa herself who discriminates what is being written, the historicity and the interpretation of the situations being described within the story. Rosa’s voice is harsh and cutting, with a pick of ve ry expressive language that invokes a misanthropic commentary on the paragraphs written previously.\r\nAll leash voices within the story represent different views of the same situations or conflicts within and through the relationships of the characters. The conflict within the story is the relationship between the two classes of society making the adaptation to the changing social norms. The concepts of the societal system have been shaken with the changing Puerto Rican political commonwealth. Don Lorenzo has been taken from his days of glory, with â€Å"patriotic earnestness” and diminished to a â€Å"small town-writer” through the course of the story. What is interpreted by one is a fairy tale, is interpreted by another as a lie.\r\nThe climax in the story is when Don Lorenzo agrees to allow Rosa to burn Rosaura’s books, after the sales agreement of the orchard and domicile. Don Lorenzo had sold the house and plantation to benefit the dress shop opened by Rosa in the house. As the shop put them into more and more debt, Lorenzo was forced to sell the plantation and then his land. When he sold the house, he was under the pretense that the mayor was going to â€Å"re lay in the house as a historic landmark, where the mementos of the sugarcane-growing aristocracy would be preserved for generations”(p. 15). Lorenzo had sold his home, then his heart when he conceded in allowing Rosa to burn his daughter’s books, the last line he had with his culture that he seemed to value in the story.\r\nThe last part of the story and resolution depicts the funeral of Don Lorenzo and Rosa finally reads the poisoned story at the end of Rosauras book. The book was the last show given to Rosaura by her father. The resolution is in the culture the poisoned story by Rosa. Through out the story, Rosa never reads whatsoeverthing, as it was not in Rosa’s culture, most of the working class was illiterate. The break political powers a nd class jumping has brought Rosa to a new level in the culture of the aristocracy, education and the power of the written word, or better known as the poisoned story. The story has come full circularize with Rosa’s character progression and metamorphosis to the upper class.\r\nDon Lorenzo lived by the romantic ideas and notions of an aristocratic society:\r\nA man could sell everything he had-his horse, his cart, his shirt, even the skin off his back- but one’s land, like one’s heart, must(prenominal) never be sold. (p.8).\r\nSymbolically, Don Lorenzo had sold out the culture he had for so long treasure and been proud of. He had lived through the first changes in hi s heritage when he began to work the plantation, and his house became decayed:\r\nIt was there that the criollo’s first resistance to the invasion had taken place, almost a hundred years before. Don Lorenzo commemorated the day well, and he would enthusiastically re-enact the battle scene as he strode vigorously through the halls and parlors… thinking of those heroic ancestors who had gloriously died for their homeland…however he had never considered merchandising the house or the plantation (p. 13).\r\nAfter Lorenzo travel to the city, he began to write a book on the â€Å"patriot’s of our island’s independence” (13). The interpretation of the â€Å"history” of the invasion in 1898 is recollected by both Lorenzo and Rosa. Lorenzo describes the Civil War between the plantation system and slavery, but Rosa describes the same situation in terms of disregard. Rosa interprets the truth of the history in a different light, describing the rich of the island as a â€Å"plague of vultures” (14).\r\nThe relationship between Rosaura, her father and Rosa weave magical realism through the interaction. fabricated and historical happenings are mixed with the fantastical in Poisoned Story. Ex amples of the magical realism start with the introductory poem where the set up to Rosa’s realizable demise is introduced. The beginning of the story begins with a story about a poisoned story, or story book that poisons the reader. As the story progresses Rosaura reverts to an almost fantasy every time she indulges in her stories. The vivid description of the â€Å"fantasy world” that Rosa claims Rosaura lives in produces elements of fantasy mingled with realism:\r\nThe house, like Rosaura’s books, was a fantasy world, make full with exquisite old dolls in threadbare clothes, standpat(a) wardrobes full of satin robes, velvet capes, and crystal candelabra which Rosaura used to swear she’d seen floating through the halls at night, held aloft by flickering ghosts (9).\r\nThe author also uses repetition to create a tension nearly this story book, fantasy focus. Rosa is continually referring to Rosaura as a girl who does not â€Å"earn her cargo area” and who â€Å"lives in a storybook world, while she had to sew her fingers to the operating system in order to feed them all” (12 & 16). The only time Rosaura is not referenced to her storybooks is when she cooks her father a meal and after they move to city. It is juiceless that Rosaura stops reading her stories after the move to city which would symbolize Rosaura and Don Lorenzos paradise lost.\r\nThe impression you get from the speaker is that Rosaura has stopped reading her birthday present storybook because she is busy with her friends. However, as the story progresses, Rosaura has a woolgather about a tale of a poisoned story which has the mysterious power that would immediately destroy its first reader which is described to have frightened Rosaura. Yet, when the poisoned story is discovered, it is discovered by Rosa and written in a â€Å"thick guava-colored ink”, the same guava based ink Rosaura had spilled on Rosa’s dress. It should be noted that a wealthy man would have built up h is library in that last century of Puerto Rican history. A culture that determine education would have a strong tie to the impact of books. Coincidentally, Lorenzo agrees to give up his daughter’s books and last ties with his aristocratic culture at with Rosa’s insistence. The spilling of the compote symbolizes two things: the aristocratic culture that Lorenzo cherished so much and the death of that culture.\r\nIn comparison, Rosa is never used in any whimsical or fantastical terms unless referring to her external appearance and dresses or when she is referred to selling the â€Å"family heirlooms” (10&11). Rosa in presented much like the evil stepmother in fairy tale literature which adds to the dramatic do and magical theme. The marriage between Lorenzo and Rosa is not based upon love on her part as she describes marrying him â€Å"out of pity” (9). The evil stepmother is also referred to as miserly, unless it has to do with her own dressings and wardrobe. The appearance of richness is far more important to Rosa than self worth. She also uses the appearance of education to further her desires in the story as she calls her store â€Å"The fall of the Bastille” and pretends to read at the funeral (10 &17).\r\nThe success of Rosa’s store fulfilled her wishes of becoming an entrepreneur. She describes herself as being rich, to that degree she was very much in debt. Her idea of being rich could very well be interpreted as being â€Å"a free woman” as described on page 11. The mythologic tone of the story is even carried over to the â€Å" buyback through style” philosophy, where the writer compares her work to a possible religious experience (11). The lavish materials and designs Rosa is described to put together are compared to the style and design of her pompous clients who dress like â€Å"witches” (12).\r\nLastly, Rosa incorporates the fairy tale or magical qualitative of ultimatums wh ich further the action of the story. Lorenzo on several do is co-coerced into doing whatever Rosa wants. The lust and bountiful pump is a safe haven for Lorenzo, but in return Lorenzo must pay with his life. Lorenzo pays with his honor, plantation, home, and then heart. The end result is the poisoned story, a story whose interpretation is subjective, not necessarily objective. A story based upon history, written by an unobjective writer may write a â€Å"poisoned story”, with the possibility that truth in writing is subjective.\r\n'