Transformation Of Maria Teresa's In The Time Of The Butterflies
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Frail woman rebuilt to become indestructible: The prominent transformation of Maria Teresa
The novel, In the Time of the Butterflies, retells the story of 4 sisters who fought in a revolution against the dreaded regime of Trujillo in the Dominican Republic. The Mirabal sisters, Maria Teresa, Dedé, Minerva and Patria all have different insights and perspectives on what they think freedom actually is. The novel is written in first and third person and Maria Teresa’s contributions to the novel are written in the first person; entries taken from her diary. Maria Teresa’s first chapter in the novel depicts her as naive and materialistic. Maria Teresa finds comfort in expressing herself, however, she doesn’t have the confidence to do it out in the open so she contains her thoughts and emotions in…show more content… When Maria Teresa was being tortured, she described her experience and informed the reader that she felt her “whole body [jump] with exquisite pain.[She] felt [her] spirit snapping loose, soaring above [her] body”(Page 255). Even though Maria wasn’t the most physically strong person there is to be, she didn’t give in and let the torturers get what they wanted. She withstood it all because she had become much stronger mentally and was able to override the physical pain by focusing on the actual issue and not her pain. This a very mature thing for Maria Teresa to do, considering the fact that when she was younger she was very emotional and would tell herself to “stop till [she] got over [her] emotions”(Page 42). Yet, as Maria Teresa grew up, she began to allow herself to feel and express how she felt. Whenever she felt down, she would take breaks and then return to her diary when she felt better. When she was being tortured, she didn’t let the physical pain get in the way of her emotions thus allowing her to base her decision on a clear