Buried Onions

An important theme in Buried Onions is determinism and survival of the fittest. The novel shows a world where there really aren’t many significant choices and one can, as a minority member living in a poor neighborhood, lose one’s life at any moment. Resisting crime by making positive, personal choices is difficult, as shown, for example, by Eddie having to stand up to significant pressure from his own aunt to become a vengeance killer.

Such determinism-themed novels often portray bleak landscapes, with individual hopes crushed and otherwise good characters’ declines being precipitated by the strength of negative environmental forces. Classic novels from Theodore Dreiser’s Sister Carrie to Thomas Hardy’s Jude the Obscure show characters declining over time, primarily at the hand of forces they cannot overcome. Eddie, too, might have been crushed by the series of events happening to him and by the gangs in his neighborhood. Under pressure, he might have murdered Angel and gone to jail for life. Most in south Fresno are shown here being pushed and pushed until they end up in a cycle of poverty and addiction, fear and violence.

What makes this novel similar yet different from earlier naturalistic and deterministically-based novels, however, is found in the heart of the main character, and involves the assertion of human choice.

Another key theme in the novel is choices, and having the ability to make them. This idea separates it from early naturalistic novels which often suggested environmental forces completely determined the world, rather than merely having strong influence. Here, negative environmental influence is strong but Soto shows that it also can be fought.

Nearly all of the characters in Buried Onions can be seen as making some type of choice. Coach, for instance, stands for someone whose entire life has been a choice to work with poor young people in an unglamorous setting in order to attempt to help them. Eddie’s mother, both in moving to Merced at the time she did and in throwing down her hearing aid and not listening have chosen to not to be present for helping Eddie with his needs. This is at a crucial time in his life, right when he is coming of age. Mr. Stiles, whom most would consider a good person, chooses to not fully trust Eddie, and that, too, makes for a negative difference in Eddie’s life.