The House of the Spirits 147help him and Blanca flee into exile, away from the
fight for human rights.
Alba is the only character who manages to
surmount her tragic nature. Raped and tortured
for her part in the socialist rebellion, she survives
because her grandfather intercedes on her behalf.
She appears to reject her beliefs, succumbing to the
temptation of wealth. But she is saved from tragic
destruction by her decision to become an agent for
change. Carrying a child whose father is either an
extremist rebel or the man who tormented her in
jail, Alba decides to break the chain of vengeance
and to forgive her captor, ensuring a safe haven for
her child no matter who the father is.
As Alba observes, she is part of a grand design
that determines her family’s fate. Because of fate, the
heroes in The House of the Spirits are destined both to
great and charitable acts and to their own destruc-
tion. Only Alba, whose name signifies dawn, is able
to surmount her tragic flaw and offer hope.
Anne Massey
OppressiOn in The House of the Spirits
It is no surprise that oppression is a major theme in
Isabel Allende’s The House of the Spirits. Although
no specific reference is made to the country or time
frame in which the story is set, the reader can guess
that the tale unfolds against the backdrop of Chile’s
1973 military coup, an event that established a
regime known for torturing and eliminating those
who opposed it. However, oppression in Allende’s
work does not take place solely in the political realm;
rather, it takes the form of religious, economic,
sexual, and racial dominance.
Political control is the novel’s most obvious form
of oppression. In an effort to eradicate the social-
ist regime, the military tortures Alba. The Poet—a
clear reference to Pablo Neruda, famous for both
his political advocacy and his verses, many of which
exemplified Marxist ideology—dies after political
events, including the exile and assassination of his
friends, exhaust his will to live. Jaime is interrogated
before being killed by a firing squad.
The novel opens with references to religious
oppression. In church on Holy Thursday, the priest
names the parishioners he believes to be sinners,
and Clara and her family are ostracized after Clara,
during Mass, critiques the church’s take on hell.
Even Father Restrepo feels the oppression of the
church, observing that his wages appear to have
been established by the Inquisition. Férula perceives
her humble suffering in caring for her mother as
a pathway to heaven, yet she blames her torturous
existence and failure to marry on her mother. Férula,
in turn, uses guilt and religion to control her brother,
Esteban Trueba. When Trueba arrives home soaking
wet after spilling a cup of Viennese coffee proudly
purchased with his first paycheck, Férula warns him
that God is punishing him for wasting their moth-
er’s medicine money. And as a child, Trueba wore a
rope of Saint Francis around his waist to symbolize
the promises tying him to his mother and sister.
Having grown up poor, Trueba feels the burden
of economic oppression, but he overcomes this
through his mining enterprise. He then proceeds
to use his newfound power to dominate, through
violence, the servants at Tres Marías. When two
peasants are found dead, the community is certain
that Trueba, the patrón, is culpable. In Trueba’s eyes,
his workers are children, and he ignores pleas to
offer them wages instead of shelter and vouchers for
purchases at the company store.
Trueba’s life at Tres Marías exemplifies sexual
oppression. He rapes Pancha García and other
women at both Tres Marías and neighboring haci-
endas. When Clara arrives at Tres Marías, she tries
to spread her mother’s slogans of gender equality
among the peasant women, but her ideas are met
with laughter. The women tell Clara that men will
always be in charge and that the men would beat
them, and rightly so, for subscribing to Clara’s
whims. The proof of the women’s words is seen
in Trueba’s violence toward his wife. Angered, he
attacks Clara.
Ethnic dominance permeates life at Tres Marías.
The servants and workers are perceived as children
who would not survive without the landowner’s gen-
erosity. Pedro Segundo García, the hacienda’s fore-
man, knows that he will never confront the patrón,
and Pancha García is merely seen as an instrument
for Trueba’s physical relief at the end of the day.
Blanca is forced to hide her relationship with Pedro
Tercero García, a peasant, and is forced into an love-
less marriage in order to hide her having become