Themes

Several themes I came across in the novel were true love, mother figures, cruelty, and magic. The theme of true love occurred many times , within the relationship between Pedro and Tita. The connection between Tita and Pedro is very extreme. Even from across a room, they can feel the heat from the other’s body. They’re physically drawn to one another, and this bond is something miraculous. It’s what little girls dream about obtaining when they meet their true love.  This idea of true love is one of the many illustrations that Laura Esquivel draws for the reader. Another idea that Esquivel explores is mother figures. In Tita’s case, she never felt a motherly bond with her mother, because of Mama Elena’s chilly disposition. Instead she formed a bond with Nacha, the cook. Nacha teaches Tita the life lessons one can learn from the kitchen. Tita uses this exact method when she raises Esperanza, who is not her daughter. Later in the novel when Rosaura dies, Tita again takes the role of being Esperanza’s mother. This idea that children can be raised even more successfully by someone else than their mother, is the message that Esquivel is trying to put forth. She’s saying that it’s okay for a child to find comfort in someone else if the relationship that they have with their own mother is not a good one. Tita’s mother is one of the origins of cruelty within the novel, another main theme expressed by Esquivel. Mama Elena beats and forces her daughter to perform numerous, labouring tasks. As if that isn’t enough, she demands her to complete them to sheer perfection. Mama Elena also holds down upon Tita a ridiculous tradition in which Tita cannot marry nor have children, and that she must tend to her mother until her death. Mama Elena punishes Tita even though she’s completely innocent and obedient. What’s so cruel about her is that she treats Tita this way only to avenge her own guilty feelings for not following her heart and marrying her true love. The only thing that can compensate for Tita’s unfortunate luck, is the magic that she can create through her food. This magic within Tita is the most important theme shown by Esquivel. Tita unintentionally channels the emotions she feels into the food she makes. For example, when she feels intense lust for Pedro after he gives her a bouquet of roses, this feeling gets channelled into the rose petal sauce. When Gertrudis eats the quail immersed in the rose petal sauce, she experiences an intense serge of heat and desire. Another example of magic is at the end of the novel, when Pedro dies and Tita finds a way to join him onto heaven. She consumes matches in order to ignite the spirit inside her so heaven’s pathway will open up to her and allow her to finally be with Pedro for eternity. It’s such a shame when lovers are separated by death, and the fact that Tita never has to part from Pedro again is magical.