T. C. Boyle - A digital scrap-book about "The Tortilla Curtain"
América
América is the second wife of Cándido and the sister of his first wife at the same time. She‘s seventeen years old and dreams the American Dream. She lived in Tepoztlán, her parents loved her and she did everything that was expected of her. But she decided to go to the North with Cándido and live in a house with a TV, a yard and a car. And here, in the North everything goes wrong because of the accidental meeting.
América sees her husband lying in the dirt and having spells of amnesia. She is scared and realizes that Cándido isn‘t able to earn money at all. So she tells him that she‘ll try to get a job (page 28) but Cándido is too proud to let her work: "Nobody can tell me I can‘t feed my own wife-" (page 28).
América goes to the labor exchange although she doesn‘t fit in there and although Cándido didn´t permit her to go. She doesn‘t find work immediately but because of her love to Cándido ( page 80 :"..., and she loved him, she did, to the bottom of her heart.") and her wish to fulfil her American Dream she keeps on searching. Another reason for this is her pregnancy. She doesn‘t want to raise up her child in a camp in the canyon so she has to earn enough money for an apartment. Finally she has success (page 84) and gets work. She works hard and never stops because she fears to be fired. She earns her first money and is proud of it (page 123: "The face she turned to him was joyful, proud, radiant – she‘d earned money, her first money ever,...."). Everything seems to develop positively and her only fear is being caught by 'Immigration‘.
And then it happens: América is raped by a Mexican (page 141). She changes her attitude and is no more optimistic. She lies to Cándido and only tells him that the men took her money (page 175). Now she hopes to leave the place for which she has no love and feels relief and joy when Cándido tells her that the labor exchange has closed (page 198). But they stay there and América loses all her joy of life and says that she wants to die (page 235). Now the relationship between Cándido and América changes, too. Because of the rape it‘s no longer close and América begins to blame Cándido for everything (page 272:" It was his fault.", page 273:" And who had deprived her of all this? Cándido. And she hated him for it. She couldn‘t help herself.").
Then she gets the baby and the birth of their little daughter seems to change their relationship in a way that they talk to each other and show their love again. But it doesn‘t destroy América´s thoughts of wanting to go home and as the fire burns down everything and they have no more money left, América loses temper and says that she wants to leave Cándido (page 323:" I‘ve had it. I‘m finished.").
Although they‘re fed up with problems, the baby seems to be sick and América wants to go to a doctor. We get to know that the baby is blind and América worries about it (page 329). In the end she tells Cándido the truth about her rape and says that that‘s the reason for the child‘s blindness.
And then everything collapses: Delaney finds their shack with the wish of killing them and thousands litres of water run down the mountain. Fortunately, Cándido and América get hold of each other but the destiny of the child isn‘t clear.
All in one, you can say that the accident is the reason for all this. If Delaney hadn‘t hit Cándido, he wouldn‘t have been injured and América wouldn‘t have had to work. She wouldn‘t have been raped and their money wouldn‘t have been stolen. Maybe they would have been able to fulfil their American Dream after a few months!?
by Dörthe
