What is the center of Woman Hollering Creek?
Therefore, the borderland’s center is Woman Hollering Creek and it is in this place that the story unfolds. Cleofilas refers to Mexico as “a town of dust, despair and gossip” on the other side that is very similar to a Texan town called Seguin.
What is Woman Hollering Creek by Sandra Cisneros about?
Woman hollering Creek written by Sandra Cisneros is a short story that is very interesting because it narrates the destruction of a woman’s dreams called Cleofilas. It begins when she is given into marriage to Juan Pedro while her father telling her that, “there is no time I will abandon you because I am your father” (Cisneros, 50).
What is the conflict in Woman Hollering Creek?
In this story of Woman Hollering Creek, conflict is used to display the harsh realities of the patriarch world that Cleofilas finds herself in. she was silenced by the ways of this patriarch world but finally found her voice in the end.
When was Woman Hollering Creek first published?
“Woman Hollering Creek” was first published in Sandra Cisneros ’s 1991 collection of short stories, Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories.
What time period is Woman Hollering Creek set in?
A collection of 22 short stories and vignettes set in Mexico and the southwestern United States between the early 1900s and the late 1980s; published in English in 1991.
What is the main idea of the story Woman Hollering Creek?
The theme of love as power is most apparent in some of the "Woman Hollering Creek" stories, but it appears even in Mango Street, in the lives of Esperanza's acquaintances and in her own youthful experience.
What is the conflict in Woman Hollering Creek?
The antagonists would be her Father and her Husband. 2. THE NATURE OF THE CONFLICT. The story is about a father wanting his daughter to get married and the conflict of the story is the abuse that she went through and trying to find a way out.
Who is the main character in Woman Hollering Creek?
CleófilasChaq Uxmal PaloquínLucy AnguianoRosario De LeonIxchelClemenciaWoman Hollering Creek and Other Stories/Characters
What are some themes in Woman Hollering Creek?
Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories ThemesLove, The Joy of Life, & Interconnection. In Woman Hollering Creek, Cisneros is interested in exploring how romance can inspire characters to appreciate the joy of being alive. ... Female Objectification & Power. ... Cultural & National Identity. ... Loss, Longing, & Grief. ... Coming of Age.
What kind of character is Cleofilas?
The protagonist of “Woman Hollering Creek,” a woman who marries Juan Pedro and moves with him from Mexico to the United States despite her father's misgivings. Cleófilas yearns for passion, but when she starts her new life in America, she realizes she's married an abusive, slovenly man prone to drinking and abuse.
How does Cleofilas react the first time her husband hits her?
The first time Juan Pedro hits her, Cleófilas doesn't even try to defend herself. Although she's always vowed to herself that she'd hit back if a man ever laid his hands on her, she just stands there as her lip bleeds. Later, she strokes Juan Pedro's “dark curls” as he weeps “tears of repentance and shame.”
What is the role of Cleofilas in Woman Hollering Creek?
In Woman Hollering Creek Cleofilas is a mother that is abused and goes through hardships and wants to be in love. Cleofilas is obsessed with Spanish soap operas. She fantasizes about them and wants her life to be like that when she marries and moves to Texas with Juan Pedro.
What is the subject of Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories?
Saved in:Main Author:Cisneros, Sandra,Physical Description:xii, 165 pages ; 21 cm.Edition:First Vintage contemporaries edition.Series:Vintage contemporaries.Subjects:Mexican Americans -- Social life and customs -- Fiction. Mexican-American Border Region -- Social life and customs -- Fiction.4 more rows
What is the setting of The House on Mango Street?
The house is in the center of a crowded Latino neighborhood in Chicago, a city where many of the poor areas are racially segregated. Esperanza does not have any privacy, and she resolves that she will someday leave Mango Street and have a house all her own.
Why doesn't Cleofilas return to her father's home in Mexico?
Cleofilas Enriqueta DeLeon Hernandez After her husband, Juan Pedro, begins to abuse her, she stays quiet even though she shudders at the thought of all the dead women she reads about in the newspapers. She realizes how dangerous her situation is, but pride prevents her from returning to her father in Mexico.
What is the subject of Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories?
Saved in:Main Author:Cisneros, Sandra,Physical Description:xii, 165 pages ; 21 cm.Edition:First Vintage contemporaries edition.Series:Vintage contemporaries.Subjects:Mexican Americans -- Social life and customs -- Fiction. Mexican-American Border Region -- Social life and customs -- Fiction.4 more rows
What is Cleofilas curious about for most of the short story?
Cleofilas, however, wants to find out the story behind the meaning of the creek's name and she wants to know why the women were hollering.
What explanation does Mrs Wright give for her husband's death?
What explanation does Mrs. Wright give for her husband's death? She says that somebody strangled him.
Why did Sandra Cisneros write Woman Hollering Creek?
Like the other stories in the collection, Woman Hollering Creek was written to tell of the experiences of female Mexican immigrants in America. Cisneros also wrote this story to appeal to the soft and emotional side of the readers.
What is the woman's role in the story Woman Hollering Creek?
In “Woman Hollering Creek” Cisneros writes of a woman, Cleofilas, who is trapped in a constricting, culturally assigned gender role due to her linguistic isolation, violent marriage, and poverty.
When was Woman Hollering Creek published?
Critical Overview. Cisneros’s Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories received much attention when it was published in 1991. It was explicated in several literary journals, including Tulsa Studies in Women’s Literature, Frontiers, and Heresies, and won acclaim in the mainstream press.
What is the woman who shouts creek?
“Woman Hollering Creek” was first published in Sandra Cisneros ’s 1991 collection of short stories, Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories. Like her novel, The House on Mango Street, published in 1983, which describes the lives of Mexican immigrants in a Chicago neighborhood, “Woman Hollering Creek” describes the lives of Mexicans who have crossed the border to live on “ el otro lado” —the other side—in the American Southwest. Critically acclaimed as a major voice in Chicana and feminist literature, Cisneros has won numerous awards and has established herself as an important voice in the American literary mainstream as well. Cisneros’s work is widely anthologized, and her novel, short stories, and poetry are part of many high school and college literature classes.
What are the roles of women in Cleofilas?
Women, in Cleofilas’ culture, are assigned to carefully circumscribed roles, as they are in most cultures. For example, she is given to Juan Pedro by her father, moves from her father’s house into her husband’s house, does not drive or have access to a car, and is isolated with her child to the small house where she must cook, clean, and care for her family without even the companionship of a television. She is shocked to meet Felice, a woman who drives a pickup truck that is her own, not her husband’s, since she does not even have a husband. It is a truck she chose and that she pays for herself. Felice’s life is full of freedom that Cleofilas never even imagines. When Felice lets out a loud yell as they cross Woman Hollering Creek, Cleofilas and her baby are both startled by the outburst. Felice explains that the only woman who is revered, or for whom any place is named around their town, is the Virgin, and in fact “you’re only famous if you are a virgin.”
Where does Cleofilas live?
Across a stream called Woman Hollering Creek, Cleofilas soon finds that she has left the boring yet peaceful life she shared with her father and six brothers for the tumultuous, lonely, desperate life of a woman with an abusive husband. Her new life, which was supposed to have been full of the passion she had seen on television soap operas, grows “sadder and sadder with each episode,” even though she believes that “when one finds, finally, the great love of one’s life, [one] does whatever one can, must do, at whatever the cost.” She is trapped with her infant son and widowed neighbors, Dolores and Soledad, along the banks of the creek with the name no one can explain. Cleofilas wonders if it is pain or anger that caused the woman of Woman Hollering Creek to holler. No one can answer; no one remembers.
Where is Soledad in the book?
Soledad, whose name means “alone,” is Cleofilas’s neighbor on the left in Seguin, Texas. Soledad says she is a widow, but rarely talks about her husband. Local gossip claims he either died, ran off with another woman, or went out one day and never came back. Soledad is one of the few people Cleofilas can visit, but she does not offer any hope for relief from the abuse Cleofilas suffers. She frustrates Cleofilas because she cannot explain the name of Woman Hollering Creek, and she is full of warnings about the dangers of walking alone at night.
Who is Felice in Cleofilas?
Felice is a woman who rejects traditional sex roles and fiercely and fearlessly defends women who are trapped in restricted, traditional lives.
What is the creek in the house called?
Once they settle in Seguin, Cleófilas finds herself drawn to the lovely creek running behind the house. No one knows why the creek is called La Gritona (Woman Hollering). The first time she crosses the creek with Juan, she laughs when he tells her its name.
Where does the story of the sailor begin?
The story begins in Mexico, the day Don Serafin gives Juan permission to marry his daughter, Cleófilas, and take her to the “other side,” across the border. In the emotion of parting, he reassures her that as her father he will never abandon her, a remark that she later remembers for its comfort and hope.
When was Woman Hollering Creek published?
Overview. Woman Hollering Creek, a short story collection published in 1991, presents compelling narratives featuring female characters of all ages, eras and walks of life. The youngest of the characters are girls still occupied with elementary school and making friends. Teenagers are also presented, exploring the new challenge ...
What are some of the women stuck in?
Some of the women are stuck in relationships that are abusive. Other women struggle with partners who are unfaithful or duplicitous. Beyond the scope of their romantic relationships, the women look to art, pop culture and religion for meaning in their lives. Occasionally, other women are the enemy.
What is the first section of the book?
The first section of the book features stories told from the vantage point of female children, in most instances. The stories explore familial relationships with parents, siblings and elders. Economic conditions play a role in the children’s lives.
Where is Eyes of Zapata set?
Between larges bites of bread, they give each other kisses. The story “Eyes of Zapata” is set in Mexico during the Mexican Revolution. Inés, the narrator, is in love with Emiliano Zapata, an agrarian revolutionary leader and the father of her children.
Who is Carmen in La Fabulosa?
In “La Fabulosa: A Texas Operetta,” an unnamed narrator describes Carmen, an attractive woman who often catches men’s eyes because she has big breasts. While casually dating a man named José, Carmen becomes involved with a famous senator from Texas.
What is the second section of One Holy Night?
The second section is called “One Holy Night, ” which is also the title of the first story. In this piece, an eighth-grader named Ixchel lives with her Mexican grandmother in the United States and falls in love with Chaq Uxmal Paloquín, a man who calls himself Boy Baby and claims to be the descendant of Mayan kings. While selling cucumbers from a pushcart, Ixchel follows Boy Baby into his dirty bedroom behind the auto repair shop where he works. There, he tells her he’s destined to have a son who will bring back the “grandeur” of his people. When she leaves, she is no longer a virgin, and she forgets to bring the family pushcart home. She says the pushcart was stolen, but her grandmother doesn’t believe her and goes to the auto repair shop only to discover that Boy Baby has fled. Later, Ixchel learns she’s pregnant, and her grandmother arranges to have her sent to Mexico. The family later discovers that Boy Baby isn’t Mayan and that he has killed eleven girls in the last seven years, hiding all their bodies in what’s known as the Caves of the Hidden Girl.
Who is the woman in the story "Woman Hollering Creek"?
In the story “Woman Hollering Creek” Sandra Cisneros discusses the issues of living life as a married woman through her character Cleofilas; this character married a man who was very physically and mentally abusive.
What is the thesis of Sandra Cisneros's Woman Hollering Creek?
Thesis: Sandra Cisneros’s Woman Hollering Creek is an excellent example of a conflict with a family that has to endure a family member is abuse. This short story begins with vision of Cleofilas Father want his only daughter to marry and be happy for the rest of her life.
What happened to Cleofilas and her husband after she attempted to leave her husband?
The final resolution in this story is left to the reader’s imagination. It does not state what happened to Cleofilas and her husband after she attempted to leave her husband. The life that Cleofilas had was faced with many experienced and all types of hardships, Cleofilas thought her life would be like that, of the telenovela, only now the episode got sadder and sadder to believe that she could stay no matter what happens she started to realize what the most important thing in life.
Why did Cleofilas leave her home town?
It seen as if it is clearly an issue of gender and abuse in this story, Cleofilas decides to leave her home town and get marriage to fulfill her dreams of a more wonder life style in the United States . Cleofilas had this images of what her life would be like from watching the soap operas on TV, and it gave her this impression of life.
What does Cisneros say about her father's house?
Cisneros offers her reader this idea “Sometimes she thinks of her father’s house. But how could she go back there?” (Cisneros 50)
Where did Cleofilas leave her father?
The time has come for her to leave her father and her six brothers in Mexico to go to El otro lado with Juan Pedro and, begin a new life as his wife in a small shackle. Cleofilas would soon find out that the life she knew with her and her brothers would be over as she knew it.
Who are the widowed women in the telenovelas?
Cisneros employs much symbolism in the characters she chooses. Especially, Cleofilas’ the neighbors on both side of her are widowed women named Dolores and Soledad. Cleofilas’ s name is clarified by a friend of hers, who tries to explain it to Felice over the phone: The Mexican culture reveres women who suffer, as Cleofilas admires the tortured souls on the telenovelas.
Author Biography
Plot Summary
- Cleofilas Enriqueta DeLeon Hernandez believes she will live happily ever after when her father consents to her marriage to Juan Pedro. She leaves her father and six brothers in Mexico and drives to “el otro lado”—the other side—with Juan Pedro to start a new life as his wife in a ramshackle house in a dusty little Texas town. Across a stream called Woman Hollering Creek, …
Characters
- Dolores
Dolores, whose name means “sorrow,” is Cleofilas’ neighbor on the right. She is a widow who lives in a house full of incense and candles, mourning her husband and two dead sons. She grows immense sunflowers and sad-smelling roses to decorate their small graves in the nearby cemet… - Felice
Felice is an independent, spirited woman who owns her own truck and who is willing to help other women in distress. Along with the clinic physician, Graciela, she conspires to help Cleofilas escape from her abusive husband. Felice is a woman who rejects traditional sex roles and fierce…
Themes
- Love and Passion
Cleofilas longs for “passion in its purest crystalline essence. The kind the books and songs and telenovelasdescribe when one finds, finally, the great love of one’s life, and does whatever one can, must do, at whatever cost.” Because, she believes, “to suffer for love is good. The pain all s… - Sex Roles
Women, in Cleofilas’ culture, are assigned to carefully circumscribed roles, as they are in most cultures. For example, she is given to Juan Pedro by her father, moves from her father’s house into her husband’s house, does not drive or have access to a car, and is isolated with her child t…
Style
- Point of View and Narration
The majority of “Woman Hollering Creek” is narrated in the third-person omniscient voice. The narrative voice that describes Cleofilas’s life in Mexico, her father and brothers, the women friends with whom she gossiped in her town, speaks in longer more lyrical sentences than the narrative … - Topics for Further Study
1. Research the folklore surrounding the mythical woman, La Llorona. How have Chicana writers redefined her as a role model for modem women? 2. Compare Gloria Anzaldua’s account of the conquest of Mexico by the Spaniards to the account in an encyclopedia or a world history textbo…
Historical Context
- Mexico: The Early Years
From the beginning of the fourteenth through the end of the fifteenth century, the Aztec people built an empire in what is now Mexico by conquering other tribes. Under Montezuma II, from 1502 until 1520, the empire reached its peak in the days before the arrival of the Spanish conquistado… - Post-Colonial Times
After three hundred years of colonial rule, Mexico, which at that time comprised much of what is now the southwest of the United States, won her independence from Spain, in 1821. In the 1848 treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo that ended the Mexican-American war, Mexico ceded all territory no…
Critical Overview
- Cisneros’s Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories received much attention when it was published in 1991. It was explicated in several literary journals, including Tulsa Studies in Women’s Literature, Frontiers, and Heresies, and won acclaim in the mainstream press. Writing in the New York Times Book Review, Bebe Moore Campbell gave the collection a favorable review, …
Criticism
- Jennifer Hicks and Barbara Smith
Hicks has a Master’s Degree in English literature, and has written extensively for academic journals, and is CEO of WordsWork, a freelance writing firm that provides Web site content. Smith has Master’s Degrees in both bilingual studies and humanistic and behavioral studies. She has d… - What Do I Read Next?
1. Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza(1987) by Gloria Anzaldua, a Chicana writer. This largely nonfiction volume also includes poetry. In it Anzaldua analyzes the experiences of Mexicans/Chicanos in the United States. 2. Latina: Women’s Voices from the Borderlands(1995) …
Sources
- Anzaldua, Gloria. Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza,Spinsters/Aunt Lute, 1987. Campbell, Bebe Moore. “Crossing Borders,” in The New York Times Book Review,May 26, 1991, pp. 6-7. Candelaria, Cordelia. “La Malinche, Feminist Prototype,” in Frontiers,Vol. 5, No. 2, 1980, pp. 1-6. Candelaria, Cordelia. “Letting La Llorona Go, or Re/reading History’s Tender Mercies,” in Heresies…
Further Reading
- Chavez, Lorenzo. “Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories,” in Hispanic,April, 1991, p. 52. Ponce, Merrihelen. “A Semblance of Order to Lives and Loves,” in Belles Lettres: A Review of Books by Women,Vol. 7, No. 2, Winter, 1991-92, pp. 40, 44. “Sandra Cisneros,” in Contemporary Literary Criticism,Volume 69, edited by Roger Matuz, Gale, 1992, pp. 143-56.