Essay Example on Analysis of "The Madonnas of Echo Park"

Identity is one of the major themes that dominate the novel. The theme manifests in the contexts of culture and belonging. When the novel begins, Skyhorse says that, like thieves, they slipped back into a country that once theirs. Primarily, this points to the fact that when they initially left the country, and during their stay away, they never enjoyed any bit of the ordeal. First, they were forcefully evicted from their home country to create room for what later became Dodger. Identity made them remain cohesive in the foreign land. But when they later decided to move back to their original land, they had to sneak for fear of the reaction of the people who had then become inhabitants of the land.

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Identity also leads to discrimination in various instances in the novel. For example, laborers, gangbangers, cleaning ladies, and bus drivers who are mainly Mexicans only live in the outskirts of Los Angeles, but not amongst their bosses. Also, during the shooting that focused on non-locals, Felicia (Hector's wife) is shot by ethnicity and culture (61). The shooting, other than costing lives, helps to bind more the people who lived in Echo Park. Ideally, being the primary target of discrimination, they felt some commonness among them hence became more bound to their identity. Out of discrimination, and differences in culture, Juan refuses to dance with Tran simply because she is Chinese (105). Tran would have probably been his wife, but cultural differences kept them apart. The various instances in the novel portray the hardships immigrants face when they are amongst other communities. They find it hard to blend cultures, identities, and belonging of their origin, and that of their host communities. Therefore, they live in fear and suspicions of all occurrences around them.

In every new chapter in the novel, the author vibrantly brings out the suffering that his characters undergo, either in their hands of their fellow Mexicans or in the hands of host American communities. Ideally, his focus is to highlight the fact that foreigners in a society have to endure a lot of suffering while away. Skyhorse worked for almost 18 years in a restaurant before the business closed down. He then opted to be day laborer to sustain himself. During his service as a laborer, he witnessed the murder of a person whom he suspected was a fellow Mexican. But he feared to report to the police for fear of deportation. The author of the novel also says that it cost Mexicans a lot of property to become Americans. In the first two pages of the novel, Skyhorse says that the more land one lost, the more they would become American. Further, one would even lose their places in the country. Repetition is also used to describe the truck that was used to carry out operations.

Even among the Mexicans, there seem to be a lot of challenges with which one has to contend. Families as well face challenges within their setups. For example, Hector had to take his wife (Felicia) to the restaurant in which he worked, just to show her how respectable he was amongst his colleagues. Felicia did not care for Hector's job, nor did she think of anything of Hector clearing drinks from Tom Bradley's (the mayor of Los Angeles) table. Their situation developed, and Hector ultimately lost hope on her. Later, he opted for another relationship.

Imagery is one of the styles that Skyhorse has used in his novel. Usually, imagery is a figurative language that literary works use to bring a visual description to a character, a place or a situation. Imagery helps to bring vivid explanations, hence a more natural understanding of the work. Skyhorse describes the truck that was used as, "...late model GMC pickup truck, mushroom brown, the white guy driving and a Mexican seated next to him in the cab..." From his description, the author's audience gets a clear picture of the look of the vehicle that was used in the context. The imagery also stresses the theme of discrimination - only whites drove the cars, but other ethnicities did minor or inferior tasks.

Other items have also been used to signify certain aspects in American society. For instance, jacaranda trees mean a strong establishment. The perceived strength of the tree makes the author wish that he had grown some in his room so that authorities would not be able to bring down his structure because even bulldozers cannot easily fell them. He says, "...They felled the mightiest of bulldozers... I thought that if I grew a jacaranda in my room, it would anchor our home to the land that we wouldn't have to leave" . Skyhorse has succeeded in wisely choosing characters that act in the harmony with the major themes and styles he has used in the work. His diction is also right, and does not discriminate an age group - anybody can comfortably read and understand the work.

Work Cited

Skyhorse, Brando. The Madonnas of Echo Park: A Novel. Simon and Schuster, 2011.