Grade 10, Unit 3
In The Time of the
Butterflies
by Julia Alvarez
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Lesson 1 | Reading to Learn Text
BBC Latin America and the Caribbean: “I Shot the Cruelest Dictator in
the Americas”
Before his assassination on a dark highway on 30 May 1961, the Dominican dictator, Rafael
Trujillo, ruled with an iron fist for almost 30 years. Tim Mansel meets one of the men who
shot him.
Rafael Trujillo's rule is considered one of the most brutal periods in the
history of the Dominican Republic. Taking power in 1930, his hold over the
country was absolute. He tolerated no opposition.
Those who dared to oppose him were imprisoned, tortured and murdered.
Their bodies often disappeared, rumored to have been fed to the sharks.
In 1937, Trujillo ordered the racially motivated massacre of several
thousand Haitians living in the country.
Gun battle
His rule ended when he was gunned down on 30 May 1961.
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Gen Imbert went into hiding after the assassination
Antonio Imbert is 90. Fifty years ago he was one of the seven men who
ambushed and killed Rafael Trujillo.
He is a large man with closely cropped hair and he has put on a military
uniform for my visit.
General Imbert - he was given the military rank later to enable him to
receive a state pension - is officially a national hero.
He is brought into the room by his wife, Giralda, moving slowly towards a
small rocking chair. His wife lights a cigarette for him. "What do you want
to know?" he asks.
It was late evening when Trujillo was shot dead in a gun battle on the road
that leads from the capital to San Cristobal, where the dictator kept a
young mistress.
In their vehicle, Gen Imbert and three other conspirators were waiting for
Trujillo's chauffeur-driven Chevrolet to come past. Gen Imbert was driving.
Other gunmen were stationed further up the road.
The old man's memory is not what it was. But he does remember taking up
the chase as Trujillo's car sped past and he recounts the first shots being
fired. He remembers Trujillo's driver slowing down and he has not
forgotten the decision to pull across in front of Trujillo's car, blocking its
path.
"Then we started shooting," he says.
Trujillo and his chauffeur were armed, and fought back.
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Gen Imbert recounts how he and one of the others got out of the car to get
closer to their target.
"Trujillo was wounded but he was still walking, so I shot him again," he
says. At the end of the gun battle, the dictator, commonly known simply as
El Jefe, was left sprawled dead across the highway. “Then we put him in the
car and took him away," says Gen Imbert. They took his body to the house
of a plotter, where it was eventually discovered by police.
'Salvation'
Fifty years later I wonder if he is happy to have shot the Dominican
dictator?
"Sure," he replies. "Nobody told me to go and kill Trujillo. The only way to
get rid of him was to kill him."
Gen Imbert is not alone in having drawn this conclusion.
In a letter to his State Department superior in October 1960, Henry
Dearborn, de facto CIA station chief in the Dominican Republic, wrote: "If I
were a Dominican, which thank
heaven I am not, I would favour destroying Trujillo as being the first
necessary step in the salvation of my country and I would regard this, in
fact, as my Christian duty."
'Cordial relations'
During his rule, Trujillo collected medals and titles, and expropriated
property and businesses for himself and his family. He renamed the capital
city Ciudad Trujillo, and the country's highest mountain Pico Trujillo.
Throughout this, he maintained cordial relations with the US - a picture
taken in 1955 shows him in smiling embrace with then US vice-president
Richard Nixon. But the relationship gradually soured over Trujillo's human
rights record. The final straw was an assassination attempt sponsored by
Trujillo, against the president of Venezuela, Romulo Betancourt. The US
closed its embassy and withdrew its ambassador.
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President Eisenhower had already approved a contingency plan to remove
Trujillo if a suitable successor could be persuaded to take over. But the
new Kennedy administration withdrew formal support for the attempt on
Trujillo's life at the last minute.
The failed invasion of Cuba at the Bay of Pigs had taken place the previous
month, and President Kennedy was worried that a power vacuum in
nearby Dominican Republic could allow another Castro to take power
there. "The Cold War had moved to the Caribbean," says Bernardo Vega,
Dominican historian and former ambassador to Washington.
The only material support provided by the US for the assassination was
three M1 carbines left in the US Consulate after the withdrawal of embassy
staff, and handed over with CIA approval.
Within days of the assassination, Trujillo's son Ramfis took charge and
almost everyone involved in the conspiracy and members of their
extended families were rounded up. Two of Gen Imbert's fellow
conspirators were killed in gun battles while resisting arrest. The other
four were imprisoned and later shot.
A plaque near the spot where Trujillo died commemorates their sacrifice. It
refers to the killing not as assassination but as "ajusticiamiento", a Spanish
word that implies justice being done. "We Dominicans react very
negatively when the people who killed Trujillo are called assassins," says
Bernardo Vega. "Ajusticiamiento is a way to give it a positive twist, to say
that it was a good thing to do."
'Personal revenge'
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Gen Imbert owes his survival to the courage of the Italian consul in Santo
Domingo who allowed him to hide in his house for six months. He still has
one of the American M1 carbines, but he won't allow me to see it. "You
don't show things like that," he says.
But he does let me see the hat he wore to disguise himself in the hectic
days after the shooting.
He tells a story of how he took a public bus and the driver recognised him,
but wouldn't take any payment out of respect for what he'd done.
And his wife brings out the pair of scuffed brown brogues that he was
wearing the night he shot Trujillo.
They're surprisingly small - size seven-and-a-half - with worn patches on
the soles.
"They've never been repaired," his wife tells me. "He puts them on every 30th of May and
sometimes he wears them for several days."
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Pre-Lesson 2 | Homework
Anticipation Guide for In the Time of Butterflies
Directions: Read each statement, decide whether you agree (A) or disagree (D). Be prepared to
defend and support your opinions with specific examples. After you’ve completed your guide
compare your opinions on those statements with the author’s implied and/or stated messages.
Agree or Disagree
_____ If you are forced to choose between the side of your significant other or your siblings, you
should always choose your significant other.
_____ If you don’t agree with the laws, you should still obey them for the sake of peace.
_____ A leader should always consider the things they stand for before the safety of his/her
followers.
_____ When one is unfaithful to their significant other, they should immediately break up with them.
_____ People listen more with their head than their heart (i.e., people are motivated by logic over
love).
_____ When people are fighting for what is right, it’s ok to disregard the law.
_____ Daughters need more protection and sheltering than boys do.
_____ We are most responsible to our nation as opposed to ourselves, our families, or communities
Choose two of the comments above and explain why you agree or disagree. Make sure to use
complete sentences.
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Lesson 2 | Reading to Learn Text 1
Venezuela: Trujillo’s Murder Plot
Dominican Dictator Rafael Leonidas Trujillo has done many harsh
acts and some stupid ones in his 30 years in power. But perhaps
none has ever matched the deed he was accused of last week. The
Organization of American States listened to detailed evidence that
Trujillo personally plotted last month's nearly successful
assassination attempt against Venezuela's President Rómulo
Betancourt. The OAS found the case persuasive enough to vote 19 to
0 (with the Dominicans and the Venezuelans abstaining) to judge the
evidence and act on it.
Most of the evidence marshaled by Venezuela came from testimony
of captured plotters. As they told it, a C46 cargo plane took off June
17 from Caracas' Maiquetia airport carrying four passengers,
including a self-styled Venezuelan general named Juan Manuel
Sanoja. As the plane neared Ciudad Trujillo in the Dominican
Republic, Sanoja instructed the pilot to radio the message: "Advise
the Generalissimo that General Sanoja is aboard plane. Also advise
Colonel Abbes Garcia."
"You may land at San Isidro Military Base," came the answer. The
plane passengers were met by Dominican officials in Mercedes Benz
limousines and driven to a house in Ciudad Trujillo. There they were
shortly joined by Colonel John Abbes Garcia, 36, Trujillo's chief
intelligence agent and hatchetman.
Abbes Garcia told them: "I have an apparatus that might interest
you." He produced an innocent-looking, brown overnight case
covered with imitation alligator skin. Inside was a small radio
transmitter designed to operate a receiver that could detonate
dynamite. At this point, the testimony continued, a car drove up to
the house, and in strutted Trujillo himself. He asked about
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Venezuela's political atmosphere and declared that "the enemy must
be hit hard." For Trujillo, Betancourt is "the enemy," and Betancourt,
in turn, obsessively hates Trujillo. "If we don't do it to him," Trujillo
told Sanoja & Co., "he will do it to us."
Next day Abbes Garcia demonstrated how the detonator worked by
blowing up two cars. Then Sanoja and his fellow recruits flew back to
Venezuela.
On the morning of June 24, two of the plotters parked a green 1954
Oldsmobile on the road Betancourt would take to at tend the
Venezuelan Armed Forces Day ceremony. They placed two green
suitcases, loaded with 60 lbs. of ammonium-nitrate dynamite and a
radio receiver, in the trunk, hooked up the detonating receiver.
When Betancourt's car passed, one of the plotters, standing 200
yards away, pressed a button inside the brown overnight case and
the Olds exploded.
But Abbes Garcia had misled the Venezuelans on how much
explosive was needed. Though three others were killed, Betancourt
survived with minor burns. And enough of the Olds was left to make
it easily traceable. The owner was quickly found, and he spilled the
story. Venezuelan cops had no trouble finding the abandoned
detonating device. The lesson seemed to be that any political figure
who displeases Trujillo can realistically fear that the dictator will try
to murder him.
excerpted from TIME MAGAZINE, July 18, 1960
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Lesson 2 | Reading to Learn Text 2
Dominican Republic: Warning Beneath the Cliff
Tragic coincidences are not uncommon in Dictator Rafael Leonidas
Trujillo's Dominican Republic. Last week Trujillo's mouthpiece, El
Cáribe, reported another: the curious case of three wellborn sisters
noted for their opposition to the Dictator. They were found dead
near the wreckage of a Jeep at the bottom of a 150-ft. cliff on the
north coast of the tight little island. Said El Cáribe: "The accident in
which Driver Rufino Cruz and the sisters Patria Mirabal de Gonzáles,
Minerva Mirabal de Tavárez and Maria Teresa Mirabal de Guzman
died is presumed to have happened when Cruz lost control of the
vehicle."
There was much to the story of the three Mirabal sisters that El
Cáribe did not tell. The story began with Minerva, 32, who reportedly
caught the Dictator's eye some years ago when she was a pretty
university student. When Trujillo tried to exercise his Dominican
version of droit du seigneur, Minerva's response was a stinging slap
on the face. Shortly thereafter, both Minerva and her middle-aged
father were jailed, Minerva briefly, her father for two years before he
was released —to die 15 days later of a combination of malnutrition,
beatings and general misuse. The sisters all married anti-Trujillo
husbands—a lawyer, an engineer, a farmer. In 1957 the three
couples began organizing an underground opposition to the Dictator
among the Dominican Republic's middle and professional classes;
after the failure of a Cuba-based airborne invasion in 1959, the
underground movement took as its name the date of the failure—the
14th of June. Last January, as the 14th of June gathered strength to
strike at Trujillo, the Dictator got word of the plot and cracked down.
In the trials that followed, two of the husbands got 20 years, the
other 30. To forestall plotting, the men were sent to widely
separated prisons. Two of the sisters themselves were imprisoned
briefly, then allowed to return to their family home near Salcedo, 70
miles northwest of Ciudad Trujillo. Two months ago, without
explanation, all three husbands were moved to a prison near
Salcedo. There, after a tantalizing delay, the wives were granted
permission to make a joint visit a fortnight ago. The sisters' cars had
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been confiscated; gratefully they accepted a stranger's offer to ride
to the prison in his Jeep. On the way back, for reasons unexplained,
the Jeep driver left the main highway for an unnecessary—and
fatal—jounce along a desolate, cliff-edged road.
There was, of course, no hint of foul play in the reports from
Trujilloland. But the terrible deaths of the three sisters and their
driver—who presumably was considered expendable—would be
something for the 14th of June underground to think about.
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Lesson 2 | Reading to Learn Text 3
The River Massacre: The Real and Imagined Borders of Hispaniola
Sending letters directly between the Dominican Republic and Haiti
has only recently become possible. For most of the last sixty years,
their postal services routed the mail ninety miles north to Miami as if
the two countries had decided that they no longer shared the island
of Hispaniola. This is absurd at best; a flight between their capital
cities, Santo Domingo and Port-au-Prince, takes only half an hour.
Deep in the Cordillera Central mountain range, the border is virtually
irrelevant to peasants who cross it easily on market days and switch
rapidly between Dominican Spanish and Haitian Kreyol. In the north,
the river that separates the two countries is so shallow that in it
women wash clothes and children play.
Tragedy, not geography, forms the real border. Its name, as any
Dominican or Haitian can tell you, is the same as that of the
deceptively calm northern river: The Massacre. During just a few
weeks in October 1937, Dominican soldiers killed 30,000 Haitians
along the border because the victims' skin was dark, even though
Dominicans were just a few shades lighter. The events still divide the
Dominican Republic and Haiti so deeply that there may as well be an
ocean not only around them but between them.
Dominicans typically do not describe the massacre as the result of
popular hatred against Haitians, but instead imply that Dominicans
dislike Haitians because of the massacre. This sounds odd but is not
far from the truth, which is that for six decades nationalist
Dominican governments distorted history and promoted dissent to
defend the madman dictator Rafael Trujillo. Trujillo was openly
inspired by Hitler's racial theories and ordered the massacre as a
way of "whitening" his country. To quiet critics, Trujillo deployed an
intense "Dominicanization" propaganda campaign portraying his
racist mania as a paternal act to save his people from Haiti.
A former sugar cane plantation guard, Rafael Trujillo began his
ascent to power in the National Guard, where he was trained by
American Marines occupying the Dominican Republic. He quickly
rose through the ranks, becoming head of the armed forces when the
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American troops left in 1924, a time of relative prosperity. It was not
long before he toppled an aging caretaker president, and in 1930 he
began a thiry-one-year dictatorship during which he renamed
mountains and cities after himself and embellished his own name
with the honorific Great Benefactor of the Nation and Father of the
New Dominion. He wore pancake make-up to lighten the traces of
color his Haitian grandmother's blood had left in his skin. Yet
Dominican society still snubbed him for his working-class family
origins, and for his youthful exploits as a petty thief.
Turmoil in Europe resonated both with the Dominican Republic's
growing economic difficulties and with Trujillo's own obsessions
with race and status. By 1937 the Dominican Republic was
practically broke, its sugar exports fetching only a penny a pound,
one twentieth of the price during the boom a decade earlier. In late
September of that year, weeks before the massacre, the Dominican
president publicly accepted a gift of Hitler's Mein Kampf, whose
racial theories he clearly embraced. A visiting Nazi delegation was
welcomed by glowing newspaper editorials: "Long live our
illustrious leaders, the Honorable President, Doctor Trujillo, and the
Führer of the German Reich, Adolf Hitler."
Hitler's ideas gave Trujillo a racist and nationalist plan to distract
Dominicans from their empty stomachs. Reminding Dominicans that
they could not afford to feed foreigners too, Trujillo cracked down on
migration from Haiti. But powerful American sugar cane plantation
owners, who brought in Haitians to cut cane because, unlike
Dominicans, they worked for practically nothing, forced him to make
huge exceptions. He resorted to deporting Haitians and tightening
border patrols, but the Haitians kept coming. On October 2, 1937,
while Trujillo was drunk at a party in his honor not far from the
Massacre River, he gave orders for the "solution" to the Haitian
problem.
In the Book of Judges, forty thousand Ephraimites were killed at the
River Jordan because their inability to pronounce "Shibboleth"
identified them as foreigners. On the Dominican border, Trujillo's
men asked anyone with dark skin to identify the sprigs of parsley
they held up. Haitians, whose Kreyol uses a wide, flat "R", could not
pronounce the trilled "R" in the Spanish word for parsley, "perejil."
Dominicans still refer to the massacre as El Corte, the cutting,
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alluding to the machetes the Dominican soldiers used so they could
say the carnage was the work of peasants defending themselves;
only the government could afford to kill with bullets. El Corte also
suggested to the Haitians' work of harvesting sugar cane (ironically,
soldiers did not touch the Haitians who stayed on the Americans'
sugar plantations).
- Michele Wucker
excerpted from TIME MAGAZINE, December, 12, 1960
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Lesson 2 | Reading to Learn Text 4
Dominican activists challenge Rafael Trujillo’s dictatorship
(Fourteenth of June Movement), 1959-1960
Rafael Leónidas Trujillo ruled the Dominican Republic from the
moment he won the fraudulent elections of 1930, up until his
assassination in 1961. Through his more than thirty-year rule,
Trujillo demanded strict obedience from all Dominicans, and had no
qualms in using repressive actions to force compliance or eliminate
dissent. In fact, Trujillo and his regime were accountable for more
than 50,000 deaths.
Many different attempts were made against Trujillo’s life, although
for many years most of the population acquiesced or supported the
regime and its policies. The dictatorship had a very extensive
coercive network, and the government used spies to keep the
population in check. Nonetheless, in January of 1959 a few elite
activists decided to forge a resistance campaign to end the
dictatorship. Manuel Tavárez, Leandro Guzman, and the three
Mirabal sisters: Minerva, Maria Teresa, and Patria, were some of the
initial organizers of the campaign. Most were inspired by the recent
deposition of Latin American dictators, such as Fulgencio Batista in
Cuba and Marcos Perez Jimenez in Venezuela. Therefore, the rise of
democratic ideals in Latin America, along with the limited freedoms
possessed by the Dominican population, galvanized activists to work
for social change by ousting the military regime.
The activist’s first step was to organize the Dominicans that opposed
the regime, yet had failed to forge a common association due to fear
of government repression. The campaign was initially unnamed and
covert, yet external events unexpectedly impacted its development.
On June 14, 1959, a group of exiled Dominicans aided by the Cuban
government lead an unsuccessful invasion of the island. Trujillo’s
forces were able to quell the invasion, and they brutally tortured and
murdered all survivors. Consequently, out of solidarity for their
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fallen compatriots, the domestic campaign adopted the name
“Fourteenth of June Movement”. Moreover, the brutality of the
government produced a dramatic increase in the members of the
resistance. Information of the rising campaign was silently spread
throughout the country, and activists recruited members from
different socioeconomic status and professions. Middle-class
students formed the bulk of the resistance campaign, and many
defied the cautious warnings of their family members. Actually,
many young resisters’ parents were members of the military regime.
Among the actions taken by these participants were the handing out
of leaflets and pamphlets against the regime, camouflaged meetings
of protest, symbolic reclamations throughout the countryside, some
public declarations, and attempts to recruit government officials or
their family members.
The movement formally stated its objectives at a general meeting on
January 10, 1960. Leaders openly declared their campaign for
democracy and a new regime, as well as for some economic
adjustments. As expected, shortly after the regime discovered the
movement, the military began to imprison, torture and sometimes
even murder its members. Those affiliated with the movement were
sent to a special prison called “la 40”, where they were tortured until
they provided officials with adequate information. Members of the
movement spread the stories of the tortures against women and
students, and they recounted the infamous conditions inside the
prisons. As a result, the repression and tortures augmented public
support for the campaign, since many members of the population
were outraged by the treatment bestowed upon their fellow citizens.
In addition, though the scope and tactics used by activists were
limited, the repression they endured spurred opposition from third
party actors against the regime. The Catholic Church, which had
previously supported the dictatorship, became an active opponent of
the government. It voiced its opposition through all of its churches,
where priests read official pronouncements denouncing the regime’s
violation of human rights. Similarly, government repression
provoked international condemnation. Particularly, Romulo
Betancourt, the president of Venezuela and a known enemy of
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Trujillo, led the OAS member states to sever diplomatic relations
with the dictatorship. An economic trade embargo was put in place
to debilitate Trujillo’s government, and many embassies provided
asylum to political dissidents. Moreover, the United States ceased its
support of the dictatorship and withdrew its ambassador. Therefore,
third party allies helped delegitimize the regime and weaken some of
its traditional bases of support.
Nevertheless, the government was not significantly deterred by
external pressure, and it continued to persecute its opponents. Most
notably, on November 25, 1960, the three Mirabal sisters were
assassinated, and the military staged the murder to make it look like
a car accident. This action was easily uncovered, and it infuriated the
public. Though the government had effectively eliminated most of
the movement’s leadership, it also sparked the reprisals that
contributed to its own undoing. Despite the fact that the Fourteenth
of June Movement was essentially dismantled, brutal government
actions gave rise to more belligerent factions within Dominican
society. As it happens, Trujillo was assassinated by a group of armed
men on May 30, 1961.
However, the assassination of Trujillo does not imply the success of the nonviolent
campaign. The campaign’s goal was to replace the dictatorship with a democratic
government, yet Trujillo’s death did not change the militaristic nature of the regime.
Nonetheless, the campaign was not entirely ineffective. It managed to develop a
unified network of resistance against the dictatorship, promote democratic ideals
and aspirations, and delegitimize the regime.
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Pre-Lesson 3 | Homework
The Parsley Massacre
In October 1937 Rafael Trujillo (called "El General" in this poem), military dictator of the
Dominican Republic, ordered nearly 20,000 migrant workers from the neighboring country
of Haiti to be killed because they could not pronounce the Spanish word for "parsley"
correctly. Specifically, they could not pronounce the letter "r" – "parsley" in Spanish is
"perejil" – so if it came out "pelejil," the speaker was condemned to death for having a
Haitian accent.
Rita Dove, an African-American poet and Poet Laureate of the United States from 1993-1995, took
up this issue when she composed "Parsley," probably one of the preeminent political poems to
come out of the United States in the twentieth century. The poem, written in two parts, gives the
reader a glimpse into both the world of the Haitian migrant workers living in the Dominican
Republic, and then the world of Trujillo himself, where she investigates his chilling inner world for
seven long stanzas. "Parsley," published in 1983, remains one of Dove's most talked-about pieces.
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Lesson 3 & 4 | Close Reading Text
Parsley
BY RITA DOVE
1. The Cane Fields
There is a parrot imitating spring
in the palace, its feathers parsley green.
Out of the swamp the cane appears
to haunt us, and we cut it down. El General
searches for a word; he is all the world
there is. Like a parrot imitating spring,
we lie down screaming as rain punches through
and we come up green. We cannot speak an R—
out of the swamp, the cane appears
and then the mountain we call in whispers Katalina.
The children gnaw their teeth to arrowheads.
There is a parrot imitating spring.
El General has found his word: perejil.
Who says it, lives. He laughs, teeth shining
out of the swamp. The cane appears
in our dreams, lashed by wind and streaming.
And we lie down. For every drop of blood
there is a parrot imitating spring.
Out of the swamp the cane appears.
2. The Palace
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The word the general’s chosen is parsley.
It is fall, when thoughts turn
to love and death; the general thinks
of his mother, how she died in the fall
and he planted her walking cane at the grave
and it flowered, each spring stolidly forming
four-star blossoms. The general
pulls on his boots, he stomps to
her room in the palace, the one without
curtains, the one with a parrot
in a brass ring. As he paces he wonders
Who can I kill today. And for a moment
the little knot of screams
is still. The parrot, who has traveled
all the way from Australia in an ivory
cage, is, coy as a widow, practising
spring. Ever since the morning
his mother collapsed in the kitchen
while baking skull-shaped candies
for the Day of the Dead, the general
has hated sweets. He orders pastries
brought up for the bird; they arrive
dusted with sugar on a bed of lace.
The knot in his throat starts to twitch;
he sees his boots the first day in battle
splashed with mud and urine
as a soldier falls at his feet amazed—
how stupid he looked!— at the sound
of artillery. I never thought it would sing
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the soldier said, and died. Now
the general sees the fields of sugar
cane, lashed by rain and streaming.
He sees his mother’s smile, the teeth
gnawed to arrowheads. He hears
the Haitians sing without R’s
as they swing the great machetes:
Katalina, they sing, Katalina,
mi madle, mi amol en muelte. God knows
his mother was no stupid woman; she
could roll an R like a queen. Even
a parrot can roll an R! In the bare room
the bright feathers arch in a parody
of greenery, as the last pale crumbs
disappear under the blackened tongue. Someone
calls out his name in a voice
so like his mother’s, a startled tear
splashes the tip of his right boot.
My mother, my love in death.
The general remembers the tiny green sprigs
men of his village wore in their capes
to honor the birth of a son. He will
order many, this time, to be killed
for a single, beautiful word.
NOTES: On October 2, 1937, Rafael Trujillo (1891-1961), dictator of the Dominican Republic, ordered
20,000 blacks killed because they could not pronounce the letter “r” in perejil, the Spanish word for
parsley.
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Lesson 6 | Do Now Text
From Trujillo: Little Caesar of the Caribbean by German E. Ornes
Dr. Ornes was a member of the Dominican Congress vice president of the
Development Commission, publisher and editor of Trujillo's newspaper, El
Caribe before he broke with Trujillo in 1955. The exceprt below is from his
record of the dictator's regime, indicting Trujillo and his works. Ornes’ account
is a valuable, subjective and interesting contribution to the growing Caribbean
literature of protest. [Adapted from Kirkus Review]
Dr. Ornes was a member of the Dominican Congress vice president of the Development
Commission, publisher and editor of Cludad Trujillo's Caribe before he broke with Trujillo in 1955.
This highly antipathetic record of the dictator's regime is a large indictment of Trujillo and his
works, whipped up in an angry partisan froth. Trujillo's poverty-ridden background; his
unscrupulous rise within the military at the time of the U.S. Marines occupation; his seizure of the
presidency of the Dominican Republic in 1930 after a series of political and military skirmishes; his
27 years of entrenched heavy-handed rule; the current political environment -- the wide gulf
between the democratic constitution and the actual workings of the regime; the state of education,
the armed forces, the servile press, the dictator's huge power-wielding family, are reviewed in a
manner adathing, outraged and depressed. The last chapter covers the still- unsolved mysterious
disappearance in 1956 of the Basque scholar, a lecturer at Columbia University, Dr. Jesus de
Galindez, and the supposedly closely-linked subsequent death of the pilot, Gerry Murphy. A
valuable, subjective and interesting contribution to the growing Caribbean literature of protest.
It is not enough to pay homage to Trujillo personally. Every function must include something in
honor of Trujillo's parents. Either a floral tribute for the late father's tomb or a visit to his living
mother. Practically every day Dominican newspapers print touching photographs of one delegation
of citizens or another surrounding the old lady. In addition to the kind face of the Excelsa Matrona
(the Most High lady), a feature common to all the photographs is a big flower basket in the center.
Slogans such as "God and Trujillo," "Trujillo Forever," "Trujillo Is My Protector," "All I Have I Owe to
Trujillo," "Long Live Trujillo," "We Will Always Follow Trujillo," adorn public and private buildings,
fortresses, pushcarts, and even shoeshine boxes. Every public building, every store, practically
every home, must hang pictures of the Generalissimo and his little brother Hector, the present
President of the Dominican Republic. (Some far-seeing people display as well the photograph of
Trujillo's elder son, Lieutenant General Rafael Leonidas "Ramfis" Trujillo Martinez.)
The pictures are carefully exhibited in the most public places. A familiar sight is the bronze plaque,
with Trujillo's picture in colors, which can be found in every hotel lobby, restaurant and in most
private homes. The plaque reads on one side: "In this place Trujillo is the chief"; and on the other:
"National Symbols: Rectitude, Liberty, Work and Morality." The existence of such a plaque is odd
enough in itself, but what few visitors to the country know is that this "national symbol" is another
of Trujillo's businesses they sell for $30 and bring in a nice bit of revenue to Ferreteria Read C. por
A., the hardware concern owned by Mrs. Rafael L. Trujillo, which issues them on an or else basis.
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However, recent rumor is that when it became common knowledge that the wholesale cost of the
plaque, manufactured in Mexico, was less than $2, the Ferreteria gave way to public opinion and
lowered the price. Merchants must pay in cash, but other people may acquire the plaque on credit:
"hang it now, pay later."
During 1955 and 1956 the automobile license plates reminded people of the act of Congress
christening the period "The Year of the Benefactor." Some willing drivers added a smaller plate with
Viva Trujillo.
The missing Basque scholar Dr. Jesus de Galindez a personal witness to this process of moral
disintegration pointed out in his perceptive analysis of the regime entitled The Era of Trujillo that
"at times this adulation becomes, unwittingly, a form of cruel irony, as in the case of the sign which
I saw hanging over the door of the lunatic asylum in Nigua: “We owe everything to Trujillo!"
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Pre-Lesson 5 | Homework
Background on Alvarez: About Me
I guess the first thing I should say is that I was not born in the Dominican Republic. The flap bio on
García Girls mentioned I was raised in the D.R., and a lot of bios after that changed raised to born,
and soon I was getting calls from my mother.
I was born in New York City during my parents' first and failed stay in the United States. When I
was three months old, my parents, both native Dominicans, decided to return to their homeland,
preferring the dictatorship of Trujillo to the U.S.A. of the early 50s. Once again, my father got
involved in the underground and soon my family was in deep trouble. We left hurriedly in 1960,
four months before the founders of that underground, the Mirabal sisters, were brutally murdered
by the dictatorship (see In the Time of the Butterflies).
It's not like I didn't know some English at ten when we landed in New York City. But classroom
English, heavily laced with Spanish, did not prepare me for the "barbaric yawp" of American English
-- as Whitman calls it. I couldn't tell where one word ended and another began. I did pick up enough
English to understand that some classmates were not very welcoming. Spic! a group of bullies
yelled at me in the playground. Mami insisted that the kids were saying, Speak! And then she
wonders where my storytelling genes come from.
When I'm asked what made me into a writer, I point to the watershed experience of coming to this
country. Not understanding the language, I had to pay close attention to each word -- great training
for a writer. I also discovered the welcoming world of the imagination and books. There, I sunk my
new roots. Of course, autobiographies are written afterwards. Talk to my tías in the D.R. and they'll
tell you I was making up stuff way before I ever set foot in the United States of America. (And
getting punished for it, too. Lying, they called it back then.) But they're right. As a kid, I loved
stories, hearing them, telling them. Since ours was an oral culture, stories were not written down. It
took coming to this country for reading and writing to become allied in my mind with storytelling.
All through high school and college and then a graduate program in creative writing, was a
driven soul. I knew that I wanted to be a writer. But it was the late sixties, early seventies. AfroAmerican writers were just beginning to gain admission into the canon. Latino literature or writers
were unheard of. Writing which focused on the lives of non-white, non mainstream characters was
considered of ethnic interest only, the province of sociology. But I kept writing, knowing that this
was what was in me to do.
Of course, I had to earn a living. That's how I fell into teaching, mostly creative writing, which I
loved doing. For years, I traveled across the country with poetry-in-the-schools programs, working
until the funds dried up in one district, and then I'd move on to the next gig. After five years of being
a migrant writer, I decided to put down roots and began teaching at the high school level, moving
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on to college teaching, and finally, on the strength of some publications in small magazines and a
couple of writing prizes, I landed a tenure-track job.
1991 was a big year. I earned tenure at Middlebury College and published my first novel, How The
García Girls Lost Their Accents. My gutsy agent, Susan Bergholz, found a small press, Algonquin
Books, and a wonderful editor, Shannon Ravenel, willing to give "a new voice" a chance. I was fortyone with twenty-plus years of writing behind me. I often mention this to student writers who are
discouraged at nineteen when they don't have a book contract!
With the success of García Girls, I suddenly had the chance to be what I always wanted to be: a
writer who earned her living at writing. But I'd also fallen in love with the classroom. I toiled and
troubled about what to do. After several years of asking for semester leaves, I gave up my tenured
post. Middlebury College kindly invited me to stay on as a writer-in-residence, advising students,
teaching a course from time to time, giving readings.
So here I am living in the tropical Champlain Valley. (That's the way folks in the Northeast Kingdom
refer to this part of Vermont!) I'm happily settled down with my compañero, Bill Eichner, on eleven
acres which Bill farms, growing most of our vegetables and greens and apples and potatoes and
even Asian pears organically, haying the back pasture, and planting so many berry-bearing trees
and bushes we now have enough birdsong around here to keep me humble. Recently, he has added
animals: cows, calves, rabbits, chickens. As a vegetarian, it is an odd adventure helping raise
somebody else's meat. But if you are going to be a carnivore (or wear shoes or carry a handbag) this
is the way to do it: conscionably with affection and care and abiding gratitude to the creatures who
provide for us.
The other reason I am in Vermont is Middlebury College. Now too many years ago to count, I came
here as a transfer student after spending two weeks at the Bread Loaf Writer's Conference, which is
run by the college. Here on this campus, I found my calling as a young writer. Excellent teachers
taught me my craft, and friends and classmates encouraged me by listening to me read my poems
late at night in our dorm rooms or more formally at campus readings. Years later, after teaching all
around the country, I was offered a job here. I came back and have never left. After I gave up tenure
to devote myself to full-time writing, the college offered me a post as a writer in residence. I teach
occasionally, give readings often, visit classes, advise young writers by reading their creative
writing assignments and theses, and -- one of my greatest honors -- serve as the
godmother/madrina to our Latino students' organization ALIANZA. I've now spent more years at
this place than I have anywhere else on this planet. It truly is my Alma Mater, the mother of my soul.
I guess the only other thing I should mention about my life is our project in the Dominican Republic.
About eleven years ago, Bill and I started a sustainable farm-literacy center called Alta Gracia.
Rather than telling you the whole long story here about why we are growing organic, shade-grown
coffee; why we started a school on the farm; why sustainability is so important a concept for us all
to be thinking about, I'll send you to A Cafecito Story, a modern, "green" fable I wrote inspired by
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our project. The afterword by Bill tells all about our own farm. Visit our websitecafealtagracia.com
and find out how to order our coffee, Café Alta Gracia, and maybe even visit the farm!
I'll let the three-part resume (below) fill you in on the blow by blow details: publications,
presentations, teaching experience, awards. Actually, the best place to find out about me and my
writing life is to read my book of essays, Something to Declare. I wrote that book for readers who
were always asking me about writing and about my life. I haven't changed my mind all that much
since 1998 when it was published, which is kind of gratifying, to think that certain things remain
true, like that Frost quote from "Into My Own," in which he says that, even after death, those who
meet him won't find him much changed from him they knew, "only more sure of all I thought was
true." Nice when poems tell the truth, even when we writers are known for making things up.
A more recent nonfiction book, Once Upon A Quinceañera: Coming of Age in the USA, also gives
autobiographical information on my own coming of age in the United States and on finding my
voice as a woman and as an American writer.
Interview with Alvarez
INTERVIEWER: Two of your four fiction books – In the Time of the Butterflies and your most recent
book, In the Name of Salome – are works of historical fiction. What is it about the Mirabel sisters in
In the Time of the Butterflies… that made you want to tell their stories? What responsibilities do you
feel when writing about historical figures?
ALVAREZ: Who knows what that pull is that brings a storyteller and a story together? It seems…
almost magical, like a spell that is cast on us by our "material," and at the same time a spell we cast
to make the material come forward and sing its song in our ear. We do the latter by craft, which is
why I urge my students not just to rely on "a really great idea" coming and plopping itself down on
their screen or on their paper. Work, work, work -- and invisible work at that -- has to be done to
make it sing… So, part of me doesn't know why the Mirabal sisters or why Salomé became such
powerful figures in my imagination. I know with the Mirabal sisters I felt a measure of
responsibility to tell their story. They were the four sisters who were sacrificed to the regime,
whereas my sisters and I made it safely to this country. It was also a desire to understand my
parents' generation, who fell victim to the dictatorship -- la generación perdida (the lost
generation), as they are known in the Dominican Republic -- so much talent, so much energy and
faith, so many lives gone to waste. I needed to understand and to redeem the time for myself.
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Lesson 9 | Reading to Learn Text
Feminism Definitions
1. What is the feminist lens?
(from Critical Encounters in High School English by Deborah Appleman)
Feminist literary criticism helps us look at literature in a different light. It applies the
philosophies and perspectives of feminism to the literature we read. There are many
different kinds of feminist literary theory. Some theorists examine the language and
symbols that are used and how that language and use of symbols are “gendered.” Others
remind us that men and women write differently, and analyze how the gender of the author
affects how literature was written. Many feminist critics look at how the characters,
especially the female characters, are portrayed and ask us to consider how the portrayal of
female characters “reinforces or undermines” sexual stereotypes (Lynn, 1998). Feminist
literary theory also suggests that the gender of the reader often affects our response to a
text. For example, feminist critics may claim that certain male writers address their readers
as if they were all men and exclude the female reader. Like feminism itself, feminist literary
theory asks us to consider the relationships between men and women and their relative
roles in society. Much feminist literary theory reminds us that the relationship between
men and women in society is often unequal and reflects a particular patriarchal ideology.
Those unequal relationships may appear in a variety of ways in the production of literature
and within literary texts. Feminist theorists invite us to pay particular attention to the
patterns of thought, behavior, values, and power in those relationships.
Feminist literary critics remind us that literary values, conventions, and even the
production of literature have themselves been historically shaped. They invite us to
consider viewing familiar literature through a feminist perspective.
Feminism Definition
What Is Feminism?
By Jone Johnson Lewis
Women's History Expert
Feminism refers to a diverse variety of beliefs, ideas, movements, and agendas for action.
Here is what I find to be the core similarities among those using the term for their own
beliefs, ideas, movements and agendas for action:
 Feminism consists of ideas and beliefs about what culture is like for women just
because they are women, compared to what the world is like for men just because
they are men. In ethical terms, this form or aspect of feminism is descriptive. The
assumption in feminism is that women are not treated equally to men, and that
women are disadvantaged in comparison to men.
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
Feminism also includes ideas and beliefs about how culture can be and should be
different -- goals, ideals, visions. In ethical terms, this form or aspect of feminism is
prescriptive.
 Feminism includes ideas and beliefs about the importance and value of moving from
A to B -- a statement of commitment to behavior and action to produce that change.
 Feminism also refers to a movement -- a collection of loosely connected groups and
individuals committed to organized action, including changes in behavior of
members of the movement and persuasion of others outside the movement to make
change.
In other words, feminism describes a culture in which women, because they are women,
are treated differently than men, and that, in that difference of treatment, women are at a
disadvantage; feminism assumes that such treatment is cultural and thus possible to
change and not simply "the way the world is and must be"; feminism looks to a different
culture as possible, and values moving towards that culture; and feminism consists of
activism, individually and in groups, to make personal and social change towards that more
desirable culture.
There are many differences within the constellation of ideas and groups and movements
called "feminism" on:

what counts as unfairness, discrimination or oppression

what in culture produces the disadvantages women experience

whether the goal is equal treatment of women and men, or whether it
is equal respect in different roles

which women's experiences are taken as normative -- do women of
different races, classes, age groups, etc. experience inequality in
significantly different ways or is the common experience as women
more important?
In 1983, Alison Jaggar published Feminist Politics and Human Nature where she defined
four theories related to feminism: liberal feminism, Marxism (or Marxist feminism), radical
feminism, and socialist feminism. Her analysis was not completely new; the varieties of
feminism had begun to differentiate as early as the 1960s. Jaggar's contribution was
clarifying, extending and solidifying the various definitions, which are still often used
today.
Radical Feminism
What Is Distinctive?
By Jone Johnson Lewis
Women's History Expert
Definition:
Radical feminism is a philosophy emphasizing the patriarchal roots of inequality between
men and women, or, more specifically, social dominance of women by men. Radical
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feminism views patriarchy as dividing rights, privileges and power primarily by gender,
and as a result oppressing women and privileging men.
Radical feminists tend to be more militant in their approach (radical as "getting to the
root") than other feminists are.
Radical feminism opposes existing political and social organization in general because it is
inherently tied to patriarchy. Thus, radical feminists tend to be skeptical of political action
within the current system, and instead tend to focus on culture change that undermines
patriarchy and associated hierarchical structures.
Radical feminism opposes patriarchy, not men. To equate radical feminism to man-hating is
to assume that patriarchy and men are inseparable, philosophically and politically.
Socialist Feminism
Women's History Definition
By Linda Napikoski
Women's History Expert
Definition: The phrase "socialist feminism" was increasingly used during the 1970s to
describe a mixed theoretical and practical approach to achieving women's equality.
Socialist feminist theory analyzed the connection between the oppression of women and
other oppression in society, such as racism and economic injustice.
Socialists had fought for decades to create a more equal society that did not exploit the
poor and powerless in the ways capitalism did.
Like Marxism, socialist feminism recognized the oppressive structure of capitalist society.
Like radical feminism, socialist feminism recognized the fundamental oppression of women
in patriarchal society. However, socialist feminists did not recognize gender and only
gender as the exclusive basis of all oppression.
Socialist feminists wanted to integrate the recognition of sex discrimination with their
work to achieve justice and equality for women, working classes, the poor and all
humanity.
Liberal Feminism
What is Liberal Feminism?
By Jone Johnson Lewis
Women's History Expert
Liberal feminism's primary goal is gender equality in the public sphere -- equal access to
education, equal pay, ending job sex segregation, better working conditions -- won
primarily through legal changes. Private sphere issues are of concern mainly as they
influence or impede equality in the public sphere. Gaining access to and being paid and
promoted equally in traditionally male-dominated occupations is an important goal. What
do women want? Liberal feminism answers: mostly, what men want: to get an education, to
make a decent living, to provide for one's family.
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What is described as liberal feminism is theory and work that focuses more on issues like
equality in the workplace, in education, in political rights. Where liberal feminism looks at
issues in the private sphere, it tends to be in terms of equality: how does that private life
impede or enhance public equality. Thus, liberal feminists also tend to support marriage as
an equal partnership, and more male involvement in child care.
Abortion and other reproductive rights have to do with control of one's life choices and
autonomy. Ending domestic violence and sexual harassment have to do with removing
obstacles to women achieving on an equal level with men.
Liberal feminism tends to rely on the state and political rights to gain equality -- to see the
state as the protector of individual rights. Liberal feminism, for example, supports
affirmative action legislation requiring employers and educational institutions to make
special attempts to include women in the pool of applicants, on the assumption that past
and current discrimination may simply overlook many qualified women applicants.
The Equal Rights Amendment was a key goal for many years of liberal feminists, from the
original women's suffrage proponents who moved to advocating a federal equality
amendment, to many of the feminists of the 1960s and 1970s in organizations including
the National Organization for Women. The text of the Equal Rights Amendment, as passed
by Congress and sent to the states in the 1970s, is classical liberal feminism:
"Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by
any state on account of sex."
While not denying that there may be biologically-based differences between men and
women, liberal feminism cannot see that these are adequate justification for inequality,
such as the wage gap between men and women.
Critics of liberal feminism point to a lack of critique of basic gender relationships, a focus
on state action which links women's interests to those of the powerful, a lack of class or
race analysis, and a lack of analysis of ways in which women are different from men. Critics
often accuse liberal feminism of judging women and their success by male standards.
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Pre-Lesson 10 | Homework
Shaping a Latina Feminist Identity
By Patricia Valoy
My mother would never call herself a feminist, even though she is the embodiment
of a feminist.
She will say that feminism is incompatible with Catholicism, but warns me of the
perils of religious fanaticism; that life is tough for all women, while reminding me she
wants me and my sisters to have more opportunities than she did; that she does not have
time to protests things she cannot change, although she singlehandedly raised three
daughters, working 12 hour shifts as a home attendant for the elderly, six days a week; and
that she really wants me to one day get married and give her grandchildren, but there’s no
rush!
For many years I thought my mother’s refusal to believe in feminism came from her
misconceptions of what it meant. Maybe she was caught up in the whole “lesbian” and
“hairy legs” myths that are so often associated with women who are just trying to be
treated as equals.
But the reality is that as a Hispanic woman she did not believe that the traditional,
Western, view of feminism related to her. Feminism for her felt like a movement she was
not entitled to be part of.
Surely women played a major role in the revolutionary movements of the 20th
century in Latin America, but those efforts were rarely spoken of in feminist circles.
According to history books women’s rights movement of the 19th and 20th century never
truly took root in Latin America.
The only way I could understand my mother’s brave streak, while her other female
relatives were so deeply entrenched in gender roles and a patriarchal household, was to
look at her past, starting with the woman who gave birth to her.
My maternal grandmother became pregnant with my mother out of a love affair in
Dominican Republic. My grandfather was already engaged to be married, and he was not
going to lose his macho status by being associated with a woman of “lose morals,” so he
abandoned her.
Being a single mother is not easy in any part of the world, but Latin America is
steeped in conservatism that shames women for being overtly sexual, while exalting men’s
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promiscuity. My grandmother was shunned from her village, kicked out of her home, and
left to fend for herself and her baby daughter.
Ironically, it was my grandfather’s oldest sister, unmarried and in the process of
becoming a nun, who took a pregnant woman in. After my mother was born her aunt made
sure that her niece was fed, clothed, and educated, and she looked after the woman her
brother had abandoned.
Unfortunately my grandmother was never able to get rid of the stigma of being a
single mother and the embarrassment of her lover’s abandonment for a more honorable, ie.
virginal, woman.
She suffered several mental breakdowns, was hospitalized for neurosis, and in 1970
she committed suicide by swallowing a poisonous cocktail of pills. My mother was raised
by her paternal aunt, a woman who was planning on becoming a nun and never expected
she would have to be a mother to her brother’s child.
Years later the one thing my mother was certain of was that she was alive, educated,
and healthy, none of it had to do with a man. There were no men in her life, except for the
few times her biological father would invite her to his immaculate home, where she felt
unwanted and out of place.
At the age of 20, my mother married my father. For the first time in her life she had a
man in her life, but he was not the prince charming people always told her about. Soon
after the honeymoon my father made her quit her university studies claiming her first
priority should be her children, he kept her from learning how to drive, and eventually
regulated the time she could spend outside the home.
This was exacerbated after we migrated to the United States, by then my sister was
born and my mother was pregnant with her third daughter. Now my mother was expected
to live by marianismo, the concept that the ideal woman should be spiritually immaculate
and eternally self-giving; she is to self-sacrifice and reject her own pleasure in order to
please others, particularly the men in her life.
Meanwhile my father lost the status he once had as a married man with children and
the owner of his own business in the Dominican Republic. After several failed attempts at
opening businesses he drowned in debts, started to drink heavily, and became violent at
the slightest provocation. Six years after we first stepped foot on American soil, my parents
separated.
The night my mother left we had no where to go. She wandered aimlessly through
the streets of Brooklyn, New York with three young daughters and one suitcase. Her
nearest relative was on vacation, but it was the only home she could trust. So we sat in her
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front stoop for hours, although we knew that there was no chance anyone would open the
door.
Eventually my mother started looking for a spare key and found it. So we slept in
her cousin’s house for that night. It was a house I had visited often, but that night it felt
eerie, as if we had broken into a stranger’s home. After unsuccessfully trying to search for a
shelter that would take in a mother with three daughters, we went to the house of one of
my school mates, whose mother had recently left her husband.
She took us into her tiny apartment and gave us the bedroom of her youngest son. It
only had a twin size bed and one window, so my mother would cover the floor with our
clothing and lay a sheet over it as a makeshift bed for me and my sister, while she slept in
the bed with my baby sister. We did that for six months until my mother was able to finish
a training to become an elderly caretaker, get a job, and eventually a new home.
After all of this, my mother was thankful. She says she is one of the luckiest women
in the world because she has three great daughters who make her proud. She does not pity
herself, she does not even complain.
When talking of the past she says that many have suffered more, and that she would
not change anything. Admittedly, when I first began learning of feminism, I became upset
with my mother. Surely she had to be angry after so many men in her life had failed her.
How could she not see that she had to become the sacrificial lamb for us, while our
father went out at night and did not once have to worry whether his daughters had enough
to eat or a place to sleep? How could she work 12 hours a day and still come home to
prepare us a meal and clean the house?
I wanted her to be angry, because I was. Why did she have to suffer because of the
mistakes others made?
It did not take long for my mother to notice my rebellious streak. One day she had
enough of me talking down to her about her inability to see feminism from my point of
view. She asked me if I was ashamed of my culture, or if I thought that taking care of
children was not a satisfying job; if I truly believed that domestic duties would diminish my
worth; and if I thought following traditions were demeaning.
She reminded me that I was the one who insisted on having a quinceañera, the Latin
American version of the Sweet Sixteen; a coming of age tradition that included a religious
ceremony and my father changing my shoes from flat to heels and presenting me to the
world as a woman.
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I wanted that, and today I know that it was a patriarchal society that led me to
believe my father needed to confirm my womanhood, but I loved it. I will not deny it. It was
symbolic and it allowed me to feel closer to my culture.
My mother, the woman that was the definition of marianismo, the unfeminist, was
also the woman who taught me to find my own kind of feminism. A feminism that is
threefold and includes an attachment to traditional culture, a satisfaction for being a
mother and wife, and a devotion to religious symbolism.
My mothers’ feminism was about learning to do better than just survive. She was a
full-time worker, a full-time mother, and was fully invested in her community and her
church. She did not have the option of choosing between a fruitful career or being a stay-athome mother.
In fact, I had no working definition of a stay-at-home mom until I was in college,
because it was a far-fetched dream in my life. All my female relatives had no choice but to
work because not doing so meant their children would go hungry. So they all babysat each
other’s children as a way of supporting each other.
I tried hard to make my family fit into the ideal feminist household: a home with two
loving and equally working parents who somehow could still make time to be with their
children and take summer vacations. But that was idealistic.
My reality was my mothers’ feminism; a feminism that was not just about
envisioning a different world, but creating a life that will change it for her children.
Hispanic women are fully aware that our culture is entrenched in misogyny, but not
necessarily any less than American culture. Women in the United States are often expected
to take their husbands’ last name. Many men still go to their bride’s father to ask for her
hand in marriage; just because we see it as a sweet gesture it does not mean that it isn’t
patriarchal in nature.
Valuing your heritage will not take away from being a strong, independent, selfsufficient woman. I feel resentment at the way that Western feminism made me see my
mother as a woman trapped in tradition, when in reality she was a living example of a
feminist.
Loving tradition and having pride in your culture does not mean these women
cannot vocalize the gender issues of their communities. My mother’s feminism was the
truest form of feminism for me; a belief in the potential upward mobility of all women.
Feminism cannot continue to exist as a monolithic block, or we will never be able to
include women from all walks of life.
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Lesson 10 | Do Now Text
From “Motherhood and Feminism” by Amber E. Kinser
Voluntary motherhood, the feminine mystique, racial uplift, revalorist feminism, the mother heart,
the second sift, othermothering, the new momism , the mommy wars—all of these phrases serve as
cultural flashpoints that highlight the complex, dynamic, and sometimes contentious relationship
between feminism and motherhood. Feminist writers and activists in the United States have moved
at various points in history between celebrating motherhood, critiquing it, using it as leverage to
gain other rights, and reconceptualizing it so that mothering can be a more empowering experience
for women. Feminists have worked to honor mothering as a center of most women's lives, whether
they have cared for their own or other children, and whether they have a come to care for such
children by birth, adoption, marriage or long-term commitment, community relationships, or other
connections. Writers as diverse as a literary novelists, feminist theorists, and bloggers in the online
"mamasphere" have examined the ways in which the practices of mothering have shaped women's
lives. They have articulated the complex tasks of caring for others and teaching children how to
function effectively in their social worlds, a task typically performed by mothers and mother
figures. Feminists have also channeled a great deal of energy into critiquing motherhood as a source
of women's oppression, isolation in the home, and exclusion from paid work and career
opportunities. These writers and thinkers have examined the way that expectations for how
women should mother are entwined with a host of other social expectations and often have little to
do with what is best for women or children. Rather, feminists have argued, expectations for "good"
mothering are grounded in the interests of male dominance, capitalism, religious power,
homophobia and racism. In addition to honoring and critiquing motherhood, feminists have
employed women's roles as mothers as a way to strengthen their arguments on other matters.
From this perspective, feminists have asserted that a woman's obligations as a mother uniquely
positioned her to comment on social problems and issues. Her "mother knowledge” about human
needs and relationships and her ability to manage the details of multiple lives at once can be
applied outside the immediate context of home and family and can inform and benefit other social
arenas and concerns, such as politics, community relationships, peace, and environmental justice.
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Lessons 15 & 16 | Frame Text
Tapestries of Life excerpt by Bettina Aptheker
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37
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Appendix A | List of characters
In the Time of the Butterflies: Characters
Patria Mirabal
Patria is the oldest of the Mirabel sisters. She is very religious and spends most of her youth waiting
to become a nun. This changes when she meets her Pedrito and they marry. Her faith wavers when
she looses her third child as she takes it as a punishment from God. While her sisters begin getting
involved in the revolution, she focuses on raising her family. She later regains her faith and starts a
Christian revolutionary group alone and merges it later with her sisters'. She does not get arrested
along with her sisters but in the end she is killed along side them.
Dede Mirabal
Dede is the second oldest Mirable sister. She is the only Mirable sister who survives at the end of
the novel. She decides not to participate in the revolutionary movement of overthrowing Trujillo.
She's married to Jamito and they have three sons, Enrique, Rafael, and David. Unfortunately, Dede
and her husband's marriage results in divorce. After her sisters' death, she is the only one who's left
to tell the story in the novel at the end.
Minerva Mirabal
Minerva is the third Mirabal sister. She is the most fervently revolutionary and has heard Trujillo's
dark secrets from her best friend, Sinitia Perozo, who first told of the evil of Trujillo. She once was
requested to be Trujillo's girlfriend but rejected to be so. She and her revolutionary husband,
Monolo Tavarez, have two children: Minou and Manolito.
Maria Theresa Mirabal
Also known as Mate throughout the book, she is the youngest of the four sisters. When she begins to
live with her sister, Minerva, and learns of the revolution, she decides to join in the struggle. That is
where she meets and falls in love with Leandro who is also working for the revolution. She is later
taken away to prison for her actions and released after many months. As the youngest of the sisters,
she is still the baby of the family. Because of this, there are many times when she is seen crying
throughout the story, even though she later grows older and is an adult with children.
39
Character Relationship Tree
40
Appendix B | Vocabulary
Novel-Specific Vocabulary
Important Literary Terms for this Unit
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ALLUSION reference to someone or something that is known from history, literature, religion,
politics, sports, science, or another branch of culture. An indirect reference to something (usually
from literature, etc.).
CHARACTERIZATION the process by which the writer reveal the personality of a character.
CONFLICT the struggle between opposing forces or characters in a story.
FORESHADOWING the use of hints and clues to suggest what will happen later in a plot.
IMAGERY the use of language to evoke a picture or a concrete sensation of a person, a thing, a
place, or an experience.
IRONY a discrepancy between appearances and reality
METAPHOR a figure of speech that makes a comparison between two unlike things without the use
of such specific words of comparison as like, as, than, or resembles.
MOTIF a recurring image, word, phrase, action, idea, object, or situation used throughout a work (or
in several works by one author), unifying the work by tying the current situation to previous ones, or
new ideas to the theme.
PERSONIFICATION a figure of speech in which an object or animal is given human feelings, thoughts,
or attitudes.
POINT OF VIEW the vantage point from which the author tells a story
PROTAGONIST the central character in a story, the one who initiates or drives the action. Usually the
hero or anti-hero; in a tragic hero, like John Proctor of The Crucible, there is always a hamartia, or
tragic flaw in his character which will lead to his downfall.
SYMBOLISM a person, place, thing, or event that has meaning in itself and that also stands for
something more than itself.
THEME the insight about human life that is revealed in a literary work.
Frequently Used Words from In the Time of the Butterflies
Words for Part 1
1. posthumous
a group of representatives
occurring or coming into existence after a
person's death
Then, the big celebration over at the museum,
the delegations from as far away as Peru and
Paraguay, an ordeal really, making that many
little party sandwiches and the nephews and
nieces not always showing up in time to help.
Now after thirty-four years, the
commemorations and interviews and
presentations of posthumous honors have
almost stopped, so that for months at a time
Dede is able to take up her own life again.
3. anonymity
the state of being unknown
2. delegation
Doesn’t she have seven more months
41
of anonymity?
decorate with colors
In Greek, "an" means "without" and "onoma"
means "name"--"anonymous" means "having
no known name or identity or known source."
There are the three pictures of the girls, old
favorites that are nowemblazoned on the
posters every November, making these once
intimate snapshots seem too famous to be the
sisters she knew.
4. impertinent
improperly forward or bold
9. tribute
Otherwise, they go on and on, asking the
most impertinent questions.
something given or done as an expression of
esteem
5. veritable
She still feels guilty about not continuing
Mama’s tribute of a fresh blossom for the girls
every day.
not counterfeit or copied
There is a veritable racket of gratitude on the
other end, and Dede has to smile at some of the
imported nonsense of this woman’s Spanish.
10. distressing
causing distress or worry or anxiety
The Latin "verus" means "true" and the
adjective "veritable" emphasizes the noisiness
of the gratitude--some of which sounds like
nonsense to Dede.
Over the woman’s shoulder, she sees she has
left the door to her room ajar, her nightgown
flung with distressing abandon on her bed.
11. transcend
6. laden
be superior or better than some standard
filled with a great quantity
My niece Minou tells me I am doing
some transcending meditation, something like
that.
On the back of an envelope left beside the
museum phone, she has sketched an enormous
tree, laden with flowers, the branches
squirreling over the flap.
12. clairvoyance
apparent power to perceive things not present
to the senses
7. inevitably
in such a manner as could not be otherwise
Especially—though he doesn’t say this—if she’s
going to censor theclairvoyance of his several
glasses of rum.
Why, they inevitably ask in one form or
another, why are you the one who survived?
8. emblazon
13. pious
42
having or showing or expressing reverence for a
deity
Ramfis looked intently at Sinita, who glared
right back at him.
She stresses the verb confessing as if their
father were actually beingpious in looking
ahead for his daughters.
19. Communion
the act of participating in the celebration of the
Eucharist
14. Immaculate Conception
I started noting the deadness in Padre Ignacio’s
voice, the tedium between the gospel
and communion, the dry papery feel of the host
in my mouth.
(Christianity) the Roman Catholic dogma that
God preserved the Virgin Mary from any stain
of original sin from the moment she was
conceived
The Eucharist is a Christian ceremony in which
bread and wine are consecrated and consumed
to remember the Last Supper and Christ's
death.
It was as if I had just heard Jesus had slapped a
baby or Our Blessed Mother had not conceived
Him the immaculate conception way.
15. exodus
20. catechism
a journey by a group to escape from a hostile
environment
an elementary book summarizing the principles
of a religion
Sinita grabbed her towel and soap dish from her
night table and joined the exodus.
All I can think of is the picture in
our Catechism of a valentine with measles.
16. sanctity
21. venial
the quality of being holy
warranting only temporal punishment
A strange other-worldly light suffuses the house
smelling of labor andsanctity.
I told her that if I was going to commit a Mortal
sin, as lying to a religious can’t be Venial, the
least Minerva could do was tell me what I was
risking my immortal soul for.
17. blithely
in a joyous manner
22. diligent
We looked blithely at the road ahead,
quadruplet angels.
characterized by care and perseverance in
carrying out tasks
18. intently
I resolve to be diligent with my tasks and not
fall asleep when I say my prayers.
with strained or eager attention
43
Papa had said we must wait until I was
seventeen, but he consented to giving me those
three days of dispensation.
23. inaugurate
open ceremoniously or dedicate formally
This time I’m inaugurating my patent leather
shoes and a baby blue poplin dress with a little
jacket to match.
29. desolation
sadness resulting from being forsaken or
abandoned
24. pilgrimage
Snug in my heart, fondling my pearl, I had
ignored their cries ofdesolation.
a journey to a sacred place
She is not coming back until after the
Virgencita’s feast day on the 21st as her whole
family is making the pilgrimage to Higuey.
30. limbo
in Catholicism, the place of unbaptized but
innocent souls
25. console
The poor innocent would be stuck in limbo all
eternity!
give moral or emotional strength to
Pedrito just cracks his knuckles and consoles her
by saying that they can have another one real
soon.
31. commemorative
intended to honor the memory of someone or
something
26. mortification
We joked about all
the commemorative marches and boring
speeches we had been spared by leaving this
particular weekend.
restrain the lusts of the flesh by self-denial and
privation
The nuns closed themselves up in their convent
for their yearlymortifications in honor of the
crucifixion of their bridegroom and Lord, Jesus
Christ.
32. reminisce
recall the past
We sang, told stories, reminisced about this or
that.
27. tarry
leave slowly and hesitantly
33. intervene
Sor Asuncion said, as if she had asked a question
and I was tarryingin my answer.
get involved, so as to alter or hinder an action
Mama intervened before those two could get
into one of their fights.
28. dispensation
an exemption from some rule or obligation
44
34. estranged
about her sister.
caused to be unloved
4. filigree
I felt a tremor of excitement, as if I were about
to meet an estrangedfriend with whom I longed
to be reconciled.
delicate and intricate ornamentation
A small diamond set at the center of a
gold filigree flower.
35. forsake
5. disembodied
leave someone who needs or counts on you;
leave in the lurch
not having a material body
She would not tell me, but when I guessed,
“Another woman?” she sighed, and then said,
“Ay, Virgencita, why have you forsaken me?”
Lio’s whispers were eerie, a disembodied voice
from the dark interior of the car.
The question echoes a line from the Bible when
Jesus was on the cross and cried out, "My God,
my God, why have you forsaken me?
an early warning about a future event
6. premonition
I was sure I was having premonitions that Lio
had not escaped after all.
7. ambivalence
Words for Part 2
mixed feelings or emotions
1. reluctant
I forgot my earlier ambivalence, and I blamed
Papa for everything: his young woman, his
hurting Mama, his cooping me up while he went
gallivanting around.
not eager
Minerva had reluctantly chaperoned Dede and
Jaimito and brought her cedula to be stamped.
8. debonair
2. illicit
having a sophisticated charm
contrary to or forbidden by law
But the truth was, Mama looked old, even older
than Papa with his dapper new hat and his linen
guayaberas and his high black boots, and
a debonair cane that seemed more a selfimportant prop than a walking aid.
But they did want to know if he had ever offered
me any kind of illicitmaterials.
3. chastise
censure severely
9. relent
Dede chastised him for suggesting such a thing
45
give in, as to influence or pressure
14. benefactor
Finally, Mama relented, but she insisted Pedrito
and Patria go along to take care of me, and
Jaimito and Dede go to make sure Patria and
Pedrito did their job.
a person who helps people or institutions
Manuel de Moya is supposed to be so smooth
with the ladies, they probably think they’re
following the example of the Virgencita if they
bed down with the Benefactor of the
Fatherland.
10. consolation
the comfort you feel when soothed in times of
disappointment
15. dais
As a consolation prize, I offered to bring her
back another souvenir.
a platform raised above the surrounding level
Only one reserved table is left in front of
the dais.
A "consolation prize" is usually given to
someone who lost at something in order to
make her feel better.
16. hesitation
the act of pausing uncertainly
11. merely
“It is really quite an honor,” he adds when he
notes my hesitation.
and nothing more
Papa hadn’t broken with this woman
but merely moved her off the grounds and into
town.
17. illustrious
having or conferring glory
12. respectable
After the toast, the Spanish ambassador
presents this illustriousdescendant of the great
Conquistador with yet another medal.
characterized by conventionally acceptable
morals
18. pervasive
We drove down narrow streets, past row on row
of respectable little houses.
spreading or spread throughout
13. devotee
I start to tell her about the hanky-panky I saw
under the table, but thepervasive Manuel de
Moya is beside us again.
an ardent follower and admirer
My theory is that the god of thunder Huracan
always acts up around the holiday of the
Conquistador, who killed off all his
Taino devotees.
19. ailment
an often persistent bodily disorder or disease
Later, at the table, I listen to him make idle
46
conversation with the old senator about the
various ailments they have both suffered.
Although "peruse" can also antonymously mean
"to look over or through in a casual or cursory
manner" the given definition is the one most
often used.
20. indulgent
tolerant or lenient
25. Epiphany
He gives me the indulgent smile of an adult
hearing an outrageous claim from a child.
twelve days after Christmas
She was saving it up for my Epiphany present,
but she saw me so upset at Papa’s funeral, she
thought it would help me most now.
21. incriminate
suggest that someone is guilty
Held on January 6th, the festival celebrates the
manifestation of the divine nature of Christ to
the Gentiles (as represented by the Magi). In a
general non-religious sense, an epiphany is "a
sudden intuitive realization or perception of
reality."
All the way home, I keep going over and over
them as if I were an intelligence officer marking
all the incriminating passages.
22. petition
request formally and in writing
26. irreparable
We are driving around in the rain in San
Francisco, getting our last-minute errands done
before we leave for the capital this afternoon
topetition for Papa’s release.
impossible to rectify or amend
Knowing as I do, the high esteem in which my
husband Enrique Mirabal held your illustrious
person, and now somewhat less confounded by
the irreparable loss of my unforgettable
companero, I write to inform Your Excellency of
his death on Monday, the fourteenth day of this
month.
23. cleave
separate or cut with a tool, such as a sharp
instrument
That cleaving look in her eye is not just memory.
27. beneficent
Note that this word has two definitions that are
almost opposite: one means to cut in two and
the other means to stick to.
doing or producing good
Especially now, in this dark moment, we look to
your beacon from our troubled waters and
count on your beneficent protection and wise
counsel until we should breathe the very last
breath of our own existence.
24. peruse
examine or consider with attention and in detail
The general picks up a page from the folder
and peruses it.
47
Ever since I’d had my vision of the Virgencita, I
knew spirit wasimminent, and that the churches
were just glass houses, or way stations on our
road through this rocky life.
28. suffuse
cause to spread or flush or flood through, over,
or across
This morning, Minerva came into the kitchen to
get Manolo his cafecito, and her face
was suffused with a certain sweetness.
33. yearning
prolonged unfulfilled desire or need
My old yearning to be in the religious life
stirred.
29. contraband
goods whose trade or possession is prohibited
by law
34. radiance
I’m still worried she might have spotted our
work, but Sonia says that woman has a different
kind of contraband in mind.
the quality of being bright and sending out rays
of light
That room was silent with the fury of avenging
angels sharpening theirradiance before they
strike.
30. contraption
a device or control that is very useful for a
particular job
35. bountiful
Maybe she’ll think it’s some sort of
abortion contraption!
producing in abundance
It was in those old and bountiful fields that
Pedrito and his son and a few of the other men
buried the boxes once we got them loaded and
sealed.
31. temporal
characteristic of this world rather than the
spiritual world
Words for Part 3
The church, refusing as it did to get involved
in temporal matters, remained the only
sanctuary.
1. oversight
a mistake resulting from inattention
Dede apologizes for her oversight and
introduces the woman to her niece.
The Latin "tempus" means "time"--the physical
world and all the matters relating to it would be
considered temporal in comparison to the
eternal nature of the spiritual world.
2. delirious
marked by uncontrolled excitement or emotion
32. imminent
The interview woman is delirious at the good
fortune of meeting both sister and daughter of
close in time; about to occur
48
the heroine of the Fourteenth of June
underground.
6. vestibule
a large entrance or reception room or area
3. docile
He left her sitting in the small vestibule while he
finished up with the delivery Dede could hear
going on in the adjoining choir room.
willing to be taught or led or supervised or
directed
She had always been the docile middle child,
used to following the lead.
7. rendezvous
a meeting planned at a certain time and place
The Latin "docere" means "to teach"--Dede is
actually the second of four children, but her
middle child docility is heightened by being
surrounded by sisters, with the one
immediately above her being very religious and
the one after her being headstrong.
Compare with the antonymous "domineering"
from this list.
She told herself that she was going to be late for
her rendezvous.
8. curt
marked by rude or peremptory shortness
He was curt in his greetings, even to Manolo,
whom he had always liked.
4. domineer
9. assess
rule or exercise power over in a cruel and
autocratic manner
estimate the nature, quality, ability or
significance of
Her life had gotten bound up with
a domineering man, and so she shrank from the
challenge her sisters were giving her.
Dona Leila hurried out to assess the porch.
10. reconciliation
Compare with "docile" from this list--the two
example sentences seem to prove that
opposites attract.
the reestablishing of cordial relations
“We went to Jarabacoa,” Minerva reminded
Manolo in a tight voice that suggested she
disapproved of the reconciliation he was
engineering.
5. demise
the time when something ends
11. deadlock
She herself was preoccupied—by the births of
their sons, by the family setbacks after Papa
was jailed, by Papa’s sad demise and death, by
their own numerous business failures.
a situation in which no progress can be made
Her statement broke the deadlock, though it
was probably the last thing Minerva had
49
fine arts, connecting it to fear here gives the
word an ironic tone.
intended.
12. dismantle
16. anguish
tear down so as to make flat with the ground
extreme mental distress
He had not wanted Dede to accompany me
either, but she said she could not allow me
to dismantle my house alone.
But for now, she wanted to spare the child even
a moment of furtheranguish.
13. desecrate
17. unbearable
violate the sacred character of a place or
language
incapable of being put up with
The screams from the wagon
were unbearable to hear.
All of it violated, broken, desecrated, destroyed.
14. conflagration
18. confiscate
take temporary possession of a security by legal
authority
a very intense and uncontrolled fire
And Nelson and Pedrito, seeing
the conflagration and fearing for Patria and the
children, came running down from the hills,
their hands over their heads, giving themselves
up.
They were confiscating the two vehicles
registered under a prisoner’s name.
19. insomnia
an inability to sleep
15. connoisseur
It was not the naughty insomnia that resulted
from a trip out to the shed to listen to the
contraband station.
an expert able to appreciate a field
He had an emergency, he told Dede, but being
a connoisseur of fear, she guessed he was
afraid.
20. proposition
a suggestion offered for acceptance or rejection
The Old French "connoistre" means "to know"
(which comes from the Latin "cognoscere"
which means "to learn")--from these roots
alone, the noun "connoisseur" would fit the
example sentence, because Dede has
experienced fear, so she knows how to
recognize it in others. But because
"connoisseur" is often used for an expert of the
I guess I saw it as a clear-cut proposition I was
making El Jefe.
21. empathic
showing empathy or ready comprehension of
others' states
50
Raulito was having one of his crying fits and
Jacqueline, who isempathic when it comes to
tears, had joined in.
praying.
27. inflection
the patterns of stress and intonation in a
language
22. grievous
causing or marked by grief or anguish
I don’t know if I was praying as much as
listening intently—trying to judge the success of
my petition from every pause and inflection in
Pena’s voice.
“We cannot remain indifferent to
the grievous blows that have afflicted so many
good Dominican homes...”
23. depicted
28. allegation
represented graphically by sketch or design or
lines
a formal accusation against somebody
Their allegations against the government were
lies.
The sun was shining through the stained glass
window of John the Evangelist, depicted in a
loincloth some church ladies had complained
was inappropriate, even in our tropical heat.
29. indiscreet
lacking discretion; injudicious
24. hilarity
That night as we walked in the garden, I
admitted to Mama that I had made
an indiscreet promise.
great merriment
Inside, Dede and I could barely contain
our hilarity.
30. functionary
a worker who holds or is invested with an office
25. pittance
Finally, we were escorted down the hall by a
nervous little functionary, who kept checking his
watch and motioning for us to hurry along.
an inadequate payment
Capitan Victor Alicinio Pena was listed in the
real estate transactions as having bought the
old Gonzalez farm from the government for
apittance.
31. interminable
tiresomely long; seemingly without end
26. distracted
All the way down that interminable hall, Noris
held tight to my hand.
having the attention diverted especially
because of anxiety
32. consequence
I tried not to be distracted, but to keep right on
51
the outcome of an event
being passive and gentle could be revolutionary.
As a consequence, there have been extra guards
patrolling the hall outside our cell, so I didn’t
dare write until tonight.
38. rhetoric
using language effectively to please or persuade
What I needed was a shot of Fidel’s
fiery rhetoric.
33. solidarity
a union of interests or purposes among
members of a group
39. escapade
a wild and exciting undertaking
Minerva and El Rayo cooked up this idea that
everyone without exception was to wear a
crucifix as a symbol of our solidarity.
One night long ago, he had kept Manolo and
me, as well as Elsa, in stitches with tales of his
journalistic escapades.
34. unfounded
40. diminished
without a basis in reason or fact
made to seem smaller or less, especially in
worth
Now she’d see that her fears were unfounded.
35. privilege
That story was remembered my way, but I
felt diminished hearing it.
a special advantage or benefit not enjoyed by
all
41. reinstate
Magdalena has taught me more about
how privileged I really am than all of Minerva’s
lectures about class.
bring back into original existence, function, or
position
It was the end of September before visiting days
were reinstated at La Victoria, and we got to
see the men.
36. memento
a reminder of past events
Some of them I’d taught how to write their
names, so this is a realmemento of my time
here.
42. fabricate
make up something artificial or untrue
We grew suspicious, for a stranger in our midst
probably meant a SIM plant with
a fabricated name.
37. passive
peacefully resistant in response to injustice
Elsa had given me this book when I first got out
of prison to show me, she said, that
43. imperious
52
having or showing arrogant superiority to
4. convalesce
Mama murmured her good days, but Dede gave
the chauffeur theimperious look of a mistress
whose servant has disobeyed her wishes.
get over an illness or shock
I rearranged the house where I was going to put
each one while they were convalescing.
44. reprieve
5. morgue
a relief from harm or discomfort
a building or room where dead bodies are kept
before burial
I felt giddy, as if I’d been granted
a reprieve from my worse fears.
At first the guards posted outside
the morgue did not want to let me in.
45. ubiquitous
being present everywhere at once
6. sedative
I had a brief, ludicrous picture of the old, rather
heavy woman banging a SIM over the head with
her ubiquitous black purse.
a drug that reduces excitability and calms a
person
I remember Jaimito trying to hush me, one of
the doctors coming in with a sedative and a
glass of water.
Words for Epilogue
1. precede
move ahead in time or space
7. memorial
It seems they left town after four-thirty, since
the truck that precededthem up the mountain
clocked out of the local Public Works building at
four thirty-five.
a recognition of meritorious service
Manolo’s voice sounds blurry on
the memorial tape the radio station sent me, in
memory of our great hero.
2. excessive
8. amnesty
unrestrained, especially with regard to feelings
a warrant granting release from punishment for
an offense
Their sentimentality was excessive, but I
listened, and thanked them for coming.
After forty days of bombing, they accepted the
broadcast amnesty.
3. telegram
a message transmitted by telegraph
9. coroner
There was a telegram that had been delivered
first thing that morning.
an official who investigates death not due to
natural causes
53
I can count them up like the list
the coroner gave us, taped to the box of things
that had been found on their persons or
retrieved from the wreck.
her apartment.
15. brink
the limit beyond which something happens or
changes
10. engross
Sometimes, I lie at the very brink of
forgetfulness, waiting, as if their arrival is my
signal that I can fall asleep.
consume all of one's attention or time
She is less ready to talk about the second wife,
the new, engrossing family, stepbrothers and
sisters the age of her own little one.
11. insignia
a badge worn to show official position
Seven rings, three plain gold bands, one gold
with a small diamond stone, one gold with an
opal and four pearls, one man’s ring with garnet
and eagle insignia, one silver initial ring.
12. convent
a religious residence especially for nuns
She wanted them locked up like nuns in
a convent, she was always so afraid.
13. exasperated
greatly annoyed; out of patience
Her voice has that exasperated edge our
children get when we dare wander from their
lives.
14. atrium
the central area in a building, open to the sky
Then we’ll go to the museum where Minou can
get some cuttings from Tono for the atrium in
54
Appendix C | Further Reading
Additional Reading
Did you enjoy reading Macbeth or learning about other related topics like
psychological disorders? Look below to find other reading options!
If you think…
I really liked Alvarez’s
writing – what other
fiction can I read by her?
I really liked learning
about the history of this
time and the people
involved – what other
nonfiction can I read?





Then try reading…
How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents
Finding Miracles
Before We Were Free
The Feast of the Goat by Mario Vargas Llosa
The Terrible Ones by Valerie Moolman
55