Ready Reference Treatise: How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents

By Raja Sharma

The story is narrated from the reverse chronological order. It has been narrated from shifting perspectives.

The text of the story makes it a “Formation Novel” or “The Bildungsroman”, which happens to be a genre of the novel that concentrates on the psychological and moral development of the protagonist from the protagonist’s youth to adulthood. Change happens to be very important in this genre of novels. There are a number of formal, topical, and thematic features which establish the book as “Formation Novel.”

Nowadays, the term coming-of-age novel is used, but it happens to be less technical, though with wider use.

The story covers more than thirty years in the lives of four sisters. In the opening of the novel there is the description of their adult lives in the United States. The novel ends with the description of their childhood in the Dominican Republic. Their father had opposed Rafael Leonida Trujillo’s dictatorship in the Dominican Republic, and consequently they were forced to leave their own country.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Raja Sharma
• Release date: May 4, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301948567

Raja Sharma

Raja Sharma is a retired college lecturer.He has taught English Literature to University students for more than two decades.His students are scattered all over the world, and it is noticeable that he is in contact with more than ninety thousand of his students.

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Ready Reference Treatise: How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents

By Raja Sharma

Copyright

Ready Reference Treatise: How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents

By Raja Sharma

Copyright@2011 Raja Sharma

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Chapter One: Introduction

How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents by Julia Alvarez, was first published in 1991.

The story is narrated from the reverse chronological order. It has been narrated from shifting perspectives.

The text of the story makes it a Formation Novel or The Bildungsroman, which happens to be a genre of the novel that concentrates on the psychological and moral development of the protagonist from the protagonist’s youth to adulthood. Change happens to be very important in this genre of novels. There are a number of formal, topical, and thematic features which establish the book as Formation Novel.

Nowadays, the term coming-of-age novel is used, but it happens to be less technical, though with wider use.

The story covers more than thirty years in the lives of four sisters. In the opening of the novel there is the description of their adult lives in the United States. The novel ends with the description of their childhood in the Dominican Republic. Their father had opposed Rafael Leonida Trujillo’s dictatorship in the Dominican Republic, and consequently they were forced to leave their own country.

The most significant themes of the novel are coming of age and acculturation. There are several other themes as well.

The story describes the hardships faced during immigration, the struggles to assimilate, and the sense of displacement. It also describes how the Garcia family suffered because of the confusion of identity. They had been uprooted from their native country and familiarity and forced to start a new life in New York City.

There are fifteen interconnected short stories in the novel. Each of the stories focuses on one of the four daughters, and sometimes the whole family.

The perspectives continue to shift all through the novel. There is a particular focus on the character of Yolanda.

Yolanda is the protagonist, and it is also believed that she is the alter ego of the author.

Chapter Two: Plot Overview

The story has been presented in the reverse chronological order. It is in the form of episodes.

Altogether there are fifteen chapters divided into three parts. Part I covers the period between 1989 and 1972, Part II covers the period between 1970 and 1960, and the third part covers the period between 1960 and 1956.

The first part of the novel describes the adult lives of the Garcia sisters. The second part of the novel describes their immigration from the Dominican Republic to the United States and the period of their adolescence, and the third part of the novel is the recollection of the early childhood of the Garcia sisters on the island, in the Dominican Republic.

The Garcias happen to be one of the rich families in the Dominican Republic. They trace their roots back to the Conquistadores.

The head of the family, Carlos Garcia, is a physician. He is the youngest of the thirty five children his father had sired during his lifetime, both in and out of his marriage.

Laura is the wife of Carlos. She also comes from an important family. Her father is the owner of a factory, and he is also is a diplomat with the United Nations.

Since it is an extended family, the members of the family live as neighbours in large houses on an expansive compound with many servants at their service.

Carla, Sandra, Yolanda, and Sofia, the Garcia girls are born in the early 1950s.