Tomas Rivera Essay
Bucher Sara
Professor Barillas
English 200 Section 3
03 March 2015
The Loss of Innocence in Tomas Rivera’s … And the Earth Did Not Devour Him
Tomas Rivera’s novel, … And the Earth Did Not Devour Him is about a boy who is a Mexican American migrant worker that tells a series of stories and events that happen throughout a significant year in his life, “The Lost Year”. These short stories show that the boy is innocent because he is young and naïve. His innocence is slowly being lost over the transition between childhood and adolescence by all of the experiences he encounters and by coming to the realization that sometimes people do not always deserve the respect they actually receive. He is maturing and starting to develop his own opinions and views and especially in the story, “Hand in Pocket”, he realizes that people are not always what they seem. The experiences that the boy goes through that withdraw his innocence the most is in the story, “Hand in Pocket”, in which he is living at Don Laito and Dona Bone’s house. By observing two respected adults do horrible things like, stealing, taking advantage of vulnerable people and even murdering a man, it is slowly corrupting this young boy’s image of the world and society. In the following quote from “Hand in Pocket” is an example of a situation that the boy goes through and finds out that people are not always what they seem and do not deserve the respect they actually receive, “When it got real dark they made me help them drag him out and throw him into the hole that I myself had dug. As for me, I didn’t really want to but then they told me that they would tell the police that I had killed him. I thought of how my dad had paid them for my room and board and how even the Anglos liked them so much. I was real scared but I went ahead and threw him in the hole” (100). Those were two respected adults by the community and they took advantage of the young boy who was naïve and scared and did not know any better and that
Professor Barillas
English 200 Section 3
03 March 2015
The Loss of Innocence in Tomas Rivera’s … And the Earth Did Not Devour Him
Tomas Rivera’s novel, … And the Earth Did Not Devour Him is about a boy who is a Mexican American migrant worker that tells a series of stories and events that happen throughout a significant year in his life, “The Lost Year”. These short stories show that the boy is innocent because he is young and naïve. His innocence is slowly being lost over the transition between childhood and adolescence by all of the experiences he encounters and by coming to the realization that sometimes people do not always deserve the respect they actually receive. He is maturing and starting to develop his own opinions and views and especially in the story, “Hand in Pocket”, he realizes that people are not always what they seem. The experiences that the boy goes through that withdraw his innocence the most is in the story, “Hand in Pocket”, in which he is living at Don Laito and Dona Bone’s house. By observing two respected adults do horrible things like, stealing, taking advantage of vulnerable people and even murdering a man, it is slowly corrupting this young boy’s image of the world and society. In the following quote from “Hand in Pocket” is an example of a situation that the boy goes through and finds out that people are not always what they seem and do not deserve the respect they actually receive, “When it got real dark they made me help them drag him out and throw him into the hole that I myself had dug. As for me, I didn’t really want to but then they told me that they would tell the police that I had killed him. I thought of how my dad had paid them for my room and board and how even the Anglos liked them so much. I was real scared but I went ahead and threw him in the hole” (100). Those were two respected adults by the community and they took advantage of the young boy who was naïve and scared and did not know any better and that