SOURCE: Helsper, Norma. “Binding the Wounds of the Body Politic: Nation as Family in La casa de los espíritus.” In Critical Approaches to Isabel Allende's Novels, edited by Sonia Riquelme Rojas and Edna Aguirre Rehbein, pp. 49-58. New York: P. Lang, 1991.

In the following essay, Helsper demonstrates the ways in which The House of the Spirits appropriates conventional Western symbols of the family in Allende's vision of Chilean society.

This essay will deal with a specific instance of what Kenneth Burke called the “stealing back and forth of symbols”:

The divine right of kings was first invoked by secular interests combating the theocrats. It held that God appointed the king, rather than the church authorities, to represent the secular interest of “the people”. Later, when the church made peace with established monarchs, identifying its interest with the interests of the secular authorities, the church adopted the doctrine...