In The House on Mango Street, Cisneros wants readers to recognize that society’s expectations can lead people to feel inferior or unworthy about who they are, what they look like, and where they live, and that this humiliation can lead to a loss of control and anguish.

Which two excerpts from the novella work together to develop this overall message?


"I wonder if she made the best with what she got or was she sorry because she couldn’t be all the things she wanted to be. Esperanza. I have inherited her name, but I don’t want to inherit her place by the window."

"But the house on Mango Street is not the way they told it at all. It's small and red with tight steps in front and windows so small you'd think they were holding their breath."

"Shame is a bad thing, you know. It keeps you down. You want to know why I quit school? Because I didn’t have nice clothes. No clothes, but I had brains."

"There. I had to look to where she pointed—the third floor, the paint peeling, wooden bars Papa had nailed on the windows so we wouldn't fall out. You live there? The way she said it made me feel like nothing."