Part 1 of Essay
They are both domineering. They are both oppressive. They are both despotic. Esteban Trueba, in Isabel Allende's The House of the Spirits, and Mama Elena, in Laura Esquivel's Like Water for Chocolate, are two very similar authoritarian characters in their nature and function in much the same manner. Allende's patriarch ....

Part 2 of Essay
.... to worry her. Gertrudis, in Like Water for Chocolate, runs away from home rather than rebel in Mama Elena's house and face her wrath and to obtain sexual freedom. She runs from the adversity and does not ever get to face her mother for she dies before Gertrudis returns home. Esteban Trueba and Mama Elena are also developed in in the reader’s view to have similar character traits in much different manners. Each of the family leaders disowns their daughter for their rebellion and neither gives her a sec ....