A Review of Red Clowns

A review by SlimJimBrown for Pat's period 3 English class

"Sally, you lied. It wasn't what you said at all. What he did.
Where he touched me. I didn't want it, Sally. The way they said it.
The way it's supposed to be. All the story books and movies...
Why did you lie to me?"

In the passage from youth to adulthood we learn a great deal about ourselves and others that break the myths pertaining to how things are supposed to be. In the vignette "Red Clowns," by Sandra Cisneros, we encounter the protagonist Esperanza dealing with disillusionment. She must put into her own terms an negative experience which has superceded her previously positive outlook while meeting the next stage on her path to maturity. The narration circles around Esperanza's thoughts from a chilling first person perspective as she deals with grown-up problems through a child-like mentality:

"Sally, make him stop. I couldn't make them go away.
I couldn't do anything but cry. I don't remember. It was dark.
I don't remember.I don't remember. I don't remember.
Please don't make me tell it all."

Sally is Esperanza's trusted friend, the one who invited her to the carnival perhaps to persue a romantic interlude. What Esperanza encountered can be described as anything but romantic. "That big boy, where did he take you? I waited such a long time. I waited by the red clowns, just like you said, but you never came for me." While Esperanza (whose name means "anticipation") waited for Sally, she was approached by one of the red clowns who said, "I love you Spanish girl, and pressed his sour mouth to mine." The depiction of the events is decorated with child-like alliterations, such as the "storybooks and the movies" as a reference to the media portrayal of love, and the "red clowns laughing their thick tongued laugh." It would be interesting to determine once and for all whether the "red clowns" are really just clowns at the carnival, or the description of a more complex situation made simplified through Esperaza's vision.