Laura Esquivel’s: Malinche

In 2006 Laura Esquivel (born September 30, 1950), published her latest novel: La Malinche. Laura Esquivel is a Mexican author who has made a remarkable contribution to Latin-American Literature. Personally other of her most beautiful literature works: Como Agua Para Chocolate (published in 1989), is just astonishing. Here, I am presenting s criticism for Chapter 1 of Laura Esquivel’s La Malinche

Chapter 1

La Malinche: Creator or Traidor 

We might not know a lot about Malinche, but we surely know that she was a wise and very intelligent woman. On chapter 1, I was able to see that the author makes a lot of reference to water. Not just as water, the way we see it nowadays, but the indigenas, were very devoted to it. They even had a God of the Water and the rain. Of course, we can assume that their natural elements – such as water, fire and the air- were actually, a big symbol for them. It represented their context, their vision of the world. They might have been thankful to these elements for something they accomplished. They also talked about the elements as if they were alive, as if they had some sort kind of power in them. I made a connection with this hypothesis, when Malinalli is in her mother’s breast, her grandma ‘spoke to the wind’ and the wind ‘responded’ to her, with a soft breeze.

In this first chapter, Malinalli’s (Malinche’s) birth is described. While the description is shown, the author is telling us that, for old indigenas, the act of ‘birth purification’ and the family, were very important for their culture. Malinalli’s grandmother is just essential, without her, she wouldn’t have been born. Despite this, the grandmother is really shown as a symbol of maternity for Malinalli and she’s described in such a sweet way. 

All of this, and some more actions, leaves us without doubt that the concept of ‘birth’ was an important and symbolic event in their life. The indigenas also gave them their name, in accomplishment of their birth ceremony. I mean, if the whole event was great, wonderful and precious, then the baby would have an amazing name. Their name was also a reflection of what they were supposed to be later on.