Time of the Butterflies Essay Example
Time of the Butterflies Essay Example

Time of the Butterflies Essay Example

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  • Pages: 20 (5434 words)
  • Published: August 29, 2017
  • Type: Essay
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Back in the present ( 1994 ) . Dede considers how Fela. their longtime retainer. thinks that she is possessed by the liquors of the dead Mirabal sisters. She had by chance come across Fela’s shrine to the misss one Friday in the shed behind the house. She had ordered Fela to travel the shrine. but Minou scolded her for being intolerant. Minou frequently stops at the shrine. which is now down the street. She asks Dede where Lio Morales now lives. since Minerva has asked her to present a message to him—just to state hullo. and to province how much she thinks of him. When the interview adult female presses on. inquiring Dede. “When did all the jobs start? ” Dede begins to talk about Lio Morales. She met him one “hot and humid afternoon” while she was forming

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her father’s store with Minerva. They are completing up before they head to Tio Pepe’s to play volleyball with their friends. Dede knows that her cousin Jaimito. on whom she has started to hold a crush ( even though he one time annoyed her ) . will be at that place. Mario. one of their distributers. arrives with Lio. and introduces him as his cousin.

He knows Elsa Sanchez and Sinita Perozo from the university. When Dede references that they are committed to playing volleyball. Minerva invites Mario and Lio. Minerva gets their father’s permission. and the misss go to Tio Pepe’s with Mario and Lio. A few hebdomads subsequently. Lio is still fall ining them for volleyball. Jaimito suggests that the misss come to play. As they take off their places and get down to

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delegate places. Dede notices that Minerva and Lio are losing. She is diffident if it is really an accident. but she hits the ball into the hedges. galvanizing the concealment twosome. Once Lio emerges from the hedges. Jaimito starts a battle with him. and the game ends in clumsiness. Lio and Jaimito both begin to come to the Mirabals house more and more. When Maria Teresa by chance reads aloud to Mama a newspaper article that reveals that Lio is “a Communist. a insurgent. ” Mama becomes disquieted that she has been allowing him spend clip at their place. But Minerva continues to see him on two-base hit day of the months with Jaimito and Dede. Still. Minerva refuses to acknowledge that she is in love with Lio.

When Dede asks him how he wants to carry through his radical ends. Lio can non give her the direct reply she wants. Dede becomes more and more nervous as Lio’s name continues to look in the newspapers. and she and Minerva lie about disbursement clip with him. Then Lio announces that he’ll be traveling into expatriate with some of his companions. One dark. after a assemblage of the Dominican party in San Francisco. Jaimito asks Minerva if Lio has invited her to travel into expatriate with him. and she says that he has non. Jaimito tells them that the constabulary were looking for Lio at his house and that he was taken down to the station for oppugning.

He told them that Lio had given him girlie magazines to acquire them off his dorsum. Minerva leaves. and Dede and Jaimito begin to snog. Jaimito tells her there is

something he wants her to see out back. They get into Papa’s auto. and he slips a ring on her finger. proposing. But they are surprised by Lio’s cough from the backseat—he has been concealing at that place. Jaimito is ferocious that he would jeopardize the Mirabals. but Lio gives Dede a missive to present to Minerva. As Dede walks Jaimito to his auto. she agrees to get married him. Entirely. Dede decides non to state Minerva that Lio is concealing in the backseat of Papa’s auto. She goes into her sleeping room and opens the missive Lio asked her to present to Minerva. In it. he invites her to travel into expatriate with him. Dede decides that she will non expose her sister to that danger. so she burns the missive in the lamp.

Analysis

This chapter reveals the tense relationship between Dede and Minerva. Their personalities are at odds: Minerva is full of inquiries and mischievousness. while Dede is much more organized and chooses to smile and disregard things without stirring up problem. But it is Lio who brings out Dede’s bitterness toward her sister. Though she loves Jaimito. Dede is covetous of Lio’s involvement in Minerva. She sees them as a glamourous twosome making exciting things. while she and Jaimito are simply expected to stop up together. She exposes them concealing in the shrubs together and even burns the missive from Lio that was intended for her sister. Dede tells herself it is to protect Minerva. but her action is clearly besides out of green-eyed monster that her sister might acquire involved in such a audacious escapade with Lio. As the storyteller. Dede uses

exclaimings frequently. qualifying herself as person whose placid. smiling demeanour is interrupted by explosions of emotion. When she considers her undertaking of being “the grande doll of the beautiful. awful past” by associating her family’s history to the adult female interviewer. she exclaims. “But it is an impossible undertaking. impossible! ”

In speaking about her hubby. she wonders. “But who could command Jaimito. merely boy of his doting female parent. undisputed foreman of his five sisters! ”The metaphors of knotted twine and fascination carry through this chapter. as Dede describes herself acquiring caught up in the turns and bends of life. When Lio teases her for traveling to play volleyball in a frock. “Suddenly. Dede feels foolish. caught in her frivolousness as if she were a kitty knotted in narration. ” As Dede reads articles in the paper about how people are acquiring arrested. “Dede’s bravery unraveled like a row of stitches non finished with a good. hardy knot. ” Bing sown up can be for protection or for fascination. She does non believe Lio has a program. and she becomes afraid to be involved with him. The enunciation that Dede uses as storyteller telling the events of the past ties Minerva to decease.

After Maria Teresa reads to Chea Mirabel the article naming Lio a Communist. Chea calls for Minerva. and “From her sleeping room. the book she was reading still in manus. appeared the decease of them all. ” Though the phrase “to be the decease of” can be used lightly to intend person is a smattering. in this instance. Minerva really is the decease of them all. When Lio announces that he is traveling

to go forth to travel into expatriate with his companions. “Minerva was deathlike quiet. ” It is clear that Dede in some manner blames Minerva for acquiring the household involved in political relations and therefore conveying about her ain decease and that of her sisters. There is a intimation of prefiguration. excessively. at the terminal of the chapter. when Dede considers Jaimito’s matrimony proposal.

She is non surprised by it because she has ever seen it as inevitable that she would get married Jaimito. “There was no inquiry – was at that place? – but that they would pass the remainder of their lives together. ” Notably. the inquiry that interrupts her idea is both in the immature Dede’s head and in the memory of the older Dede in 1994. retrieving how she felt and how she might hold suspected that she and Jaimito would stop up acquiring a divorce. Even when she thinks of Jaimito lovingly. as he begins to suggest. Dede from the present can non assist but look into the enthusiasm she felt at the clip: “Her spoiled. amusing. fun-loving adult male. Oh. what a batch of problem she was in for. ”

What do you desire. Minerva Mirabal? Summer

Minerva has been populating at place for a few old ages. and rumours are get downing about her being a tribade. She besides realizes that something is awry between Mama and Papa. She is bored and covetous of Elsa and Sinita. who are analyzing in the capital. Out on thrusts. she begins to detect her father’s Ford ever parked in forepart of the same campesino household place. Four misss run out to the route. and

she sees that they have Mirabal eyes. She realizes that Enrique Mirabal is their male parent and that they are her half sisters. Since Lio went off. Minerva has been holding concerns and bad asthma. One afternoon she goes into her father’s armoire and goes through the pockets of his apparels. She finds four letters addressed to her from Lio. and she reads them. He refers to his proposal that she leave the state with him. which of class Minerva knows nil about. Ferocious. she drives the Jeep over to the campesino house where she knows she will happen her father’s Ford.

He comes out and asks her what she wants. but she merely rush away. When Papa gets place that dark. he leads Minerva outside into the garden. where he slaps her. But when he says she owes him regard. she tells him he has lost it. Minerva has besides found an invitation to one of Trujillo’s private parties in her father’s coat pocket ; it specifically mentions that Minerva should go to. Mama is scared for Minerva’s safety. so she insists that Pedrito. Patria. Dede. and Jaimito go along. excessively. Before the party. Papa sends the Ford to the store. so Minerva thrusts him to his medical assignments in San Francisco. One twenty-four hours. he means to halt by the house he has bought for his ex-mistress and his other kids after the assignment. and Minerva insists she be allowed to travel along to run into them. She even meets Carmen. their female parent. with whom Papa says he is no longer involved.

Discovery Day Dance. October 12

The household arrives at the party an hr

tardily. holding gotten lost. But Trujillo is late. excessively. as they learn from Manuel de Moya. his secretary of province. A tabular array is reserved for the Mirabals. but Don Manuel tells Minerva she is traveling to sit with Trujillo. Finally El Jefe arrives. but he does non sit with Minerva ; alternatively. she is entertained by Manuel de Moya. It is about to rain. but the tabular arraies are pushed back for dance. When Don Manuel asks Minerva to dance. she says she has a concern and can non. Patria brings her calmantes before Don Manuel returns with some for her every bit good. Finally. Minerva agrees to dance with him. Soon. Trujillo becomes her spouse. He flirts with her. and she tells him she wants to analyze in the capital to be a attorney. But when he implies that he would wish to “conquer” her. she says she is “not for conquering. ”

He tells her the university is no topographic point for adult females. adverting the “communists and fomenters. ” connoting they have been caught. By error. Minerva blurts out. “Virgilio Morales? ” She must turn back and feign she does non cognize Lio. and Trujillo believes her. When he pulls her inappropriately close. jab at her in a coarse manner. she slaps his face. The rain begins instantly. and the party moves rapidly indoors. The Mirabals rush off. but Minerva forgets her bag. She and Patria can non happen it anyplace. and they assume that person already brought it indoors and that it will be mailed to them. But on the drive place. Minerva realizes that she has put the letters from

Lio in the pocket of the liner.

Rainy Spell

The Mirabal household left the party before Trujillo did. which is against the jurisprudence. Two guardias arrive at their house and say that Governor de la Maza wants to see Enrique Mirabal and Minerva instantly. but Mama says. “If she goes. I go. ” At the governor’s castle. Papa is sent to the capital for oppugning. He whispers to Minerva that she is to take money to the illicit household in San Francisco every two hebdomads until he is back. Minerva does so. but she can non happen the house in the rain. She sees Margarita. the oldest girl. and asks her to take her to her mother’s house. Once at that place. Minerva gives Carmen the money and asks if she can inscribe the girls in school. Minerva and Chea return to the capital to request for Papa’s release. They get a room at a hotel. At the Office of Missing Persons. Minerva meets a adult male who has named all his boies Pablo Antonio so that if one of them is captured. he can curse he is non the boy they are looking for.

But the man’s instance takes so long that there is non clip to hear the Mirabals’ . The following forenoon they are woken at the hotel and taken to the National Police Headquarters for oppugning. where Minerva is interrogated about Lio by General Federico Fiallo and Don Anselmo Paulino. She admits that she lied to El Jefe about non cognizing Lio. but she says it was because she was afraid of displeasing him. She says she is no longer in communicating with Lio.

Manuel de Moya enters and suggests that “a private conference with El Jefe would be the quickest. most effectual manner to stop all this bunk. ” He means. of class. that Minerva should kip with Trujillo. but she insists that her male parent and female parent come along to the meeting.

Three hebdomads subsequently. they see Trujillo. Papa has merely been released. but he has gone huffy due to his imprisonment. In Trujillo’s office. it is revealed that Tio Chiche. one of Trujillo’s friends. is related to Chea Mirabal. He is a gambler and Mama doesn’t like him really much. but she jumps on this connexion in order to appeal to Trujillo. Minerva notices a set of die on Trujillo’s desk. and she realizes that they are loaded. She makes a stake with him: they will turn over the die. and if she wins. she can travel to jurisprudence school. but if he wins. he gets to kip with her. Minerva knows to utilize the heavier set of die. and of class she wins. to Trujillo’s irritation. Minerva. Chea. and Enrique Mirabal thrust place in the rain.

Analysis

As Minerva asks herself what she wants. she uses the amour propre of “that princess put to kip in the fairy narrative. ” It is Lio who woke her up when she met him: “The presumptions. all I’d been taught. fell off like so many screens when you sit up in bed. ” This amour propre is dry. since Minerva is anything but the stereotyped adult female of a fairy narrative. waiting for a adult male to come and wake her up so her life can get down. In actuality.

Minerva speaks out for women’s rights and takes affairs into her ain custodies. Imagery of woven thread appears once more in this chapter. as Minerva struggles with determinations about where her life should travel: “Back and Forth my head went. weaving a yes by dark and unknoting it by twenty-four hours to a no. ” The quandary is whether she loves Lio ; she can non make up one's mind. The determination is made for her when he decides to seek refuge. The imagination appears once more when Mama clings to her connexion of Tio Chiche ( a friend of Trujillo’s ) and Papa in his lunacy points out that “Chiche darnels excessively much. I won’t play with him. ” As a consequence. “Mama’s eyes are tiring a hole in Papa. Our one line of life in this stormy sea and Papa is cutting the rope she’s been playing out. ”Violent enunciation appears one time once more in this chapter. as it has throughout the novel.

As Enrique Mirabal leads Minerva down the private road into the garden. “The Moon was a thin. bright machete cutting its manner through spots of clouds. ” This metaphor is continued when Minerva describes its visible radiation as “sharp. ” and it foreshadows the smack she is about to have from her male parent. The subject of Trujillo being conflated with God comes out in the paper fans that the misss received at the party they went to. thrown by Trujillo. The fans had the Virgencita on one side and Trujillo on the other. The combination fusss Minerva: “Sometimes it was El Jefe’s examining eyes. sometimes it was the Virgin’s

pretty face I couldn’t stand to look at. ”The events of the party are mirrored by the weather’s patterned advance to a rain storm. When they arrive at the party. “there is a strong zephyr. denoting rain. ”

When Minerva references Lio’s name. “suspicion clouds the gaze” of Trujillo’s face. and when she refuses to dance with Manuel de Moya ab initio. “a cloud of irritation crosses his face. ” When Minerva slaps Trujillo. it is like the bang of boom that begins the storm: “and so the rain comes down hard. slapping sheets of it. ” In the thick of the storm. her household is the ship that steers her to safety: “Dede and Patria are turning in all waies like sentinels on the mast of a ship. ” Completing the amour propre. Minerva steals a small cosmetic ship as a keepsake for Maria Teresa. who was excessively immature to go to the party. As they escape in the rain. it looks as though the ship is being steered safely through the storm.

But there are two jobs. Once Minerva realizes she has left the letters from Lio in the disregarded bag. all hope is lost. She feels something difficult against her leg and reaches down to detect “the small caravel sunk in the creases of my moist frock. ” And the household has committed a offense by go forthing the party before Trujillo. If Trujillo is the captain of a doomed bossy ship. protocol provinces that the captain is to go forth last ; but at this point the government is still strong and can randomly declare that the nation’s captain must be allowed to

go forth foremost. The opposition still has a long manner to travel.

Chapter 7

Maria Teresa writes this chapter in her new diary. another gift from Minerva. Enrique Mirabal has passed off. and Maria Teresa is outraged that Carmen and her four girls attended the funeral. Maria Teresa is fighting with her father’s decease. She had a distressing dream in which she found her marrying frock inside her father’s casket. She has the same dream once more in February. but this clip Manolo. Minerva’s husband-to-be. is in the casket. In October. while she is a pupil at the university. she once more has the dream. but now it is Armando Grullon. one of Minerva’s friends. in the casket. She has besides developed crushes on both her cousins. Raul and Berto. and she asksFela to assist her determine which of the brothers she will get married. She kisses Berto on the lips on January 1 but is confronted about it by Raul on January 8. These events cause her to go fed up with both of them. Meanwhile. Tio Chiche has suggested that Mama compose a missive toTrujillo confirming their trueness to his government. Maria Teresa is assisting her write it. merely as she helped Minerva with her address at the Salcedo Civic Hall in which she praised Trujillo ( gaining permission to travel to jurisprudence school ) . But Fela has helped her set a expletive on the missive.

Minerva has fallen in love with a adult male at jurisprudence school named Manolo. but he is engaged to person else. She comes to see in January. provably in a radical mentality. declaiming Fidel Castro’s words that she has

heard on illegal wireless Stationss. On Valentine’s Day. she visits once more. this clip conveying Manolo along. Maria Teresa has cooked dinner and is wholly taken with Manolo. By March. nevertheless. she becomes leery since he met Minerva while he was engaged to person else. Maria Teresa has arranged to populate with Dede and Jaimito and their boies. Jaime Enriqueand Jaime Rafael. in San Francisco during the hebdomad. and come place to Mama’s house on the weekends. Unfortunately. their ice pick concern is neglecting. and shortly they decide to travel back to Mama’s house and assist run Papa’s shop.

On July 3. Maria Teresa graduates. Tia Flor bakes a bar for the party. Tia Flor besides confronts her and says that she needs to take between her two boies. Raul and Berto. Maria Teresa responds that she wants neither one. Meanwhile. the family’s yardboy. Prieto. has betrayed them by describing to Security everything they have done. They can non fire him. nevertheless. since it would look leery. In September. Maria Teresa goes to fall in Minerva at the university in the capital. and they are roomies. While Minerva encourages Maria Teresa to lodge with jurisprudence. the younger sister finally decides to exchange to Philosophy and Letters. She meets one of Minerva’s and Manolo’s friends. Armando Grullon. who tries to snog her. Now it is 1955. and Minerva is acquiring married in the rain. She moves in with Manolo. and by December 11 she is pregnant.

By April 1956. Maria Teresa has started utilizing her journal as an “all-purpose supply book. ” She is trying to compose a address to give as Miss University. and Minerva is reding

her how much and when to advert Trujillo. Minerva has given birth to Minou and is assisting her younger sister write the address. Now it is July 1957. and Maria Teresa writes that Minerva is traveling to Monte Cristi with Manolo after graduation. Trujillo. nevertheless. plays a awful fast one on Minerva by non really allowing her a licence to pattern jurisprudence ; her sheepskin is useless. Maria Teresa helps Minerva set up her new place in Monte Cristi. and it comes out that Manolo is rip offing on Minerva with another adult female.

By August. though. the twosome is “on the patch. ” and Minerva credits Maria Teresa with conveying them back together. In her entry of September 28. 1957. Maria Teresa studies that she by chance intercepted a bringing of guns from Leandro ( codename Palomino ) to the house. Manolo and Minerva explain about the national resistance that’s forming. and Maria Teresa joins them. Maria Teresa begins to fall in love with Leandro. Maria Teresa becomes a hub of a radical cell. populating with Sonia and hive awaying bringings in the “munitions room. ” While Sonia is off in La Romana. Leandro comes over and says that he is traveling to remain with Maria Teresa to protect her. Maria Teresa ends up get marrieding Leandro on Valentine’s Day. 1958.

Analysis

Because of the diary manner of Maria Teresa’s narrative. frequently the reader must calculate out what is being referred to because of the deficiency of particulars. For illustration. in the December 15 entry. Maria Teresa writes. “I can’t believe she came to the funeral mass with her girls” without stating who “she” is. It is

as if she is in such an disquieted province of head that she doesn’t bother to explicate herself ( after all. it is a diary and Maria Teresa knows who she is speaking about ) . The reader infers that she must be mentioning to Carmen. In one sense. Maria Teresa’s narrative is told via Minerva. since both journals were gifts from her older sister. Yet. in this chapter the reader learns about many of import events in Minerva’s life through Maria Teresa’s diary entries. For case. we learn in Maria Teresa’s study about the address at Salcedo Civic Hall that Minerva has gained permission to go to jurisprudence school. We besides learn about Minerva’s matrimony to Manolo. the birth of Minou. and Trujillo’s denial of her licence to pattern jurisprudence upon graduation from jurisprudence school. It is of import to retrieve that we are larning about the events chiefly from one point of position.

The personal. household affairs are related in the diary. while the political affairs are frequently belowground plenty non to do it into the journal. by and large because Maria Teresa does non cognize much of what is traveling on. By late 1957. nevertheless. the personal and political domains are unifying more rapidly for her once more. As a storyteller. Maria Teresa uses the technique of rhetorical inquiries. but they are influenced by the broody nature of her diary entries. On December 31. 1953. as she looks out at the stars. she asks. “What does it all mean. anyhow? ” When Leandro spends the dark on December 1. 1957. she writes. “Guess whose name was in my right shoe all twenty-four hours?

” mentioning to the love enchantment Fela taught her old ages ago. Another feature of Maria Teresa’s narrative voice is the usage of exclaimings. After she kisses Berto. she exclaims. “Oh horror! Oh brazenness! Oh disgust! ”

In July. when she eats two pieces of the bar Tia Flor cooked for her graduation party. she writes. “My hips. my hips! ” This technique characterizes her as an emotional. dramatic adult female. Even in a serious state of affairs. such as when Minerva sobs before stating Maria Teresa that Manolo is rip offing on her. Maria Teresa writes. “My brave Minerva! ”Death seems to skulk throughout the chapter. Of class. Enrique Mirabal has really died. and Maria Teresa’s repeating dream revolves around a casket. But she besides uses linguistic communication that calls decease to mind. The chapter opens with her statement. “I feel like deceasing myself! ” When she comes back to her journal on July 3. she writes. “Diary. I know you have likely thought me dead all these months. ”

Chapter 8

Patria’s kids. Nelson and Noris. have grown up. and they all live in Pedrito’s great-grandfather’s house. Eighteen old ages after acquiring married. she has spent New Year’s Eve at Mama’s new house in Conuco. and she has fallen asleep at her ain house. But she is woken up by Minerva. Manolo. Leandro. and Nelson. who report that Fidel Castro and Ernesto “Che” Guevara have ousted Batista in Cuba. That dark. Raul Ernesto. Patria’s following boy. is conceived. Patria is afraid for her sisters and for her boy Nelson. who is “always labeling along behind his Tio Manolo and his new Tio Leandro. work forces of

the universe who had gone to the university and who impressed him more than his state male parent. ” She sends him to Santo Tomas de Aquino. a seminary in the capital. with the aid ofPadre de Jesus Lopez. When Nelson begins to speak about fall ining the liberators. Patria goes to Padre de Jesus Lopez for aid. but he tells her he. excessively. is lost. and can non demo her the manner. Minerva and Maria Teresa both have had babes. Manolito and Jacqueline. severally. Minerva asks Patria to take attention of Manolito. explicating that she is traveling to “be on the route a batch. ”

But she and Manolo visit from Monte Cristi every hebdomad ; they meet on Patria’s and Pedrito’s land with many other revolutionists. But this gives Nelson the opportunity to acquire involved when he is place from school. He reports back to her that the revolutionists are anticipating an invasion by the liberators from Cuba. Though she is pregnant with Raul Ernesto. Patria decides to travel on a retreat with Padre de Jesus and the Salcedo group to Constanza. They are the Christian Cultural Group. led by four priests including Padre de Jesus and Brother Daniel. Trujillo has heard rumours of the pending invasion and has declared a province of exigency. but the retreat goes to Constanza anyhow.

They stay in a retreat house that resembles a nunnery. and Patria feels peaceful. On June 14. while they listen to Brother Daniel speak about the Assumption. the versant is bombed. The first moving ridge of the liberating invasion is the mark. and as Patria tickers. one of them ( who is about Noris’s

age ) is gunned down. The Christian Cultural Group comes back down the mountain. and Patria’s household meets her on the route coming into town. In the newspaper. they read that 49 work forces and male childs died in the onslaught. They read six yearss subsequently that the 2nd moving ridge of the invasion force was intercepted and besides defeated. At the following meeting of the Christian Cultural Group. the temper has changed well: Padre de Jesus speaks like a radical. and they change their name to Accion Clero-Cultural. or ACC.

Their mission is to form a powerful national resistance. Patria voluntaries Pedrito. Nelson. Minerva. Manolo. Maria Teresa. and Leandro for the organisation. However. Pedrito becomes disquieted that the revolutionists are run intoing in their backyard. since a new jurisprudence has been passed that will let the authorities to impound the land of anyone found to be harbouring any enemies of the government. Patria is able to rock him when she reveals that their boy Nelson is involved. excessively. The Fourteenth of June Movement is founded so. in Patria and Pedrito’s place. There are about 40 people. with Manolo as president. They make bombs. called “nipples. ” and fell arms. Patria sends Noris to Chea Mirabal’s house. and they use her sleeping room as an ammos room.

Analysis

As storyteller. Patria uses similes and personification that connect her to both heaven and Earth. When Padre de Jesus tells her he can non assist her because he. excessively. is lost. she says. “I was agitating like when a zephyr blows through the vestry and the votive tapers spark. ” She is in the topographic point of the prayerful tapers.

being shaken by nature. When she is overwhelmed by the beauty of Constanza. she personifies the land and nature more by and large as if it is tied to God: “Purple Mountains making towards angelfeather clouds ; a falcon surging in a unagitated bluish sky ; God combing His sunlight fingers through green grazing lands straight out of the Psalms. ”Pedrito besides ties Patria to the Earth. This is apparent in the linguistic communication she uses to show non being worried about him like she worries about her sisters: “Pedrito didn’t worry me.

I knew he would ever hold one manus in the dirt and the other someplace on me. ”Patria uses a manner of narrative that involves direct reference and exclaimings. qualifying herself as deliberate but besides at times every bit emotional as her younger sister Maria Teresa. For illustration. when Nelson sees an aroused expression on her face after he tells her about the invasion. she says. “But you know why that expression was at that place? I’ll Tell you. ” Similarly. when she explains why Noris does non desire to travel along with her to the retreat. she says. “I surely couldn’t talk her into a retreat with ‘old ladies’ and a clump of bad-breath priests. ( Lord forgive her! ) . ”When Noris meets her after the versant is bombed. Patria notices “a alteration in her. as if her psyche had at last full-blown and began its rhythms. ” This metaphor comparing the psyche maturating to a catamenial rhythm hearkens back to Chapter 2. in which Minerva begins her “complications” both physically and emotionally as she realizes the state is in danger.

and the power and immorality of Trujillo.

It besides is evocative of Maria Teresa. who in her diary entries as a immature miss yearned to detect her psyche. Patria besides struggles to accommodate her committedness to God with her desire to protect her household and support her state. Symbolically. she and Maria Teresa make a list of the arms they’ve assembled “in the pretty book we’d been taught by the nuns for composing out Bible transitions. ” Even when the retreat house is bombed. she describes it spiritually: “His Kingdom was coming down upon the really roof of that retreat house. ” As they ride back down the mountain after the retreat. she says. “I tried looking up at our Father. but I couldn’t see His Face for the dark fume concealing the tops of those mountains. ”This chapter besides keeps the reader informed about the larger history. We learn about the function of Cuba and its revolutionists. We besides learn about the events of June 14 and the beginnings. filtered through the storyteller. of the Movimiento 14 de Junio.

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