For Water Like Chocolate
Magical realism (n.) A chiefly literary style or genre originating in Latin America that combines fantastic or dreamlike elements with reality (Dictionary.com). In the novel, Like Water for Chocolate, written by Laura Esquirel, magical realism is used throughout the story to explain the impossible, within the daily life of the fictional characters. This magical realism is a continuous element of story, starting from when the main character, Tita, is born. Magical realism continues to work its magic when Tita’s love, Pedro, marries her sister and lives under the same roof as her, and when she dies at the very end of the story. However, Tita is not the only one within the book that is affected by the magical realism. There are also many other characters whose personalities are heightened by the magical realism. Esquirel creatively uses the magical realism to show the characters’ innermost desires, emotions, and personalities in order to make the novel a sweet and delighting romantic experience. Desire is an emotion that describes a deep longing and wanting is chiefly crafted using magical realism within the novel. One of the many examples of this activity would be the pull of desires were brought by the magical dish of qua . . .
In the spur of the moment, she “ran away with one of Villa’s men, on horse back … naked” (pg 58). At the end of the novel, Tita finds herself alone in the world after her lover, Pedro, dies. Mama Elena’s personality is also illustrated by magical realism. You are worthless, a good-for-nothing who doesn’t respect even yourself! (pg 173) The use of magical realism illuminates the characters personality to stress and heighten them. In grief and longing, she gathers up candles and she begins to chew them in order to “reproduce the most moving memories of her and Pedro … In this she was successful; when the candle she chewed made contact with the torrid images she evoked, the candle began to burn” (pg 245) causing her to become warm again. The desires within the book were well animated by Gertrudis rose-smelling passion, which causes Tita to embark into her emotions on how she could never marry her love, Pedro. As she “wash into the world on a great tide of tears that spilled over the edge of the table and flooded across the kitchen floor” (pg 6), the reader can see how Esquirel uses magical realism to show the emotions deep within Tita, something as simple as onions. Gertrudis was not the only character within the story affected by the dazzling inclination of the dish, because Pedro and Tita felt this spark of exigency also. Her early birth brought by the distinguish smell of onions as she laid in her mother’s womb was one example. Her dominating behavior shows that even death could not stop her over-bearing behavior that haunts Tita even after she knows for certain that she is gone and begotten. Being so, the novel causes us to believe in the possibilities of magical realism within the world even though it’s highly impossible. The ranging emotions contain within her makes it impossible to warm herself because of the undoubtedly truth that Esquirel’s magical realism heightens these emotions, which bring more spice into the story. Gertrudis, one of the main characters within the novel, hadn’t been mention much until the entrancement of the dish where she became heated and hot, desperate for passion. The beauty of the magical realism uses in the novel drawn by Esquirel describes the characters raging desires, beautiful emotions, and stresses each characters personality.
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