Oscar Wao Individualism
Man is always born free, yet as one grows up he or she may mold themselves to meet society's expectations. Freedom is truly being able to make a decision by oneself. If one lets society and other people control what he or she does, individuality will never be achieved. It is important for an individual to build up an identity for themselves even if it is not the norm in society. Ralph Waldo Emerson one of the most famous writers and Transcendentalists to ever live, advocated individualism. Individualism is the ideology that accentuates the moral worthiness of an individual, believing one can make his or her decisions by themselves without influences from other people or society. This basically means the truest freedom for one to achieve is
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individualism. Based on Emerson’s thinking we can divide people in this world into two groups, the individualists or the Emersonian geniuses and the antithetical Emersonian geniuses. The Emersonian genius described by Emerson is: "To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men, — that is genius”, (Self Reliance pg. 1). The antithetical Emersonian genius is someone who is enslaved to the dictates of society and does not want to think for themselves, they merely listen and adhere to what other people say without a second thought, this is real slavery. The Emersonian genius is the epitome of freedom. Oscar Wao, many may know him as a nerd that will forever be a loner at home, but there is much more to the story than that.
Oscar Wao believes he is such a lowly person: no friends, no life, and no freedom. Another thing that really bothers Oscar is that everyone around him is in a relationship and he is not, when he was small he used to be a very alpha male character someone that all the girls would like. He was known for his dating habits in the Dominican community and was very popular for it. But as he grew up he gained weight and wasn’t particularly attractive to anyone. Oscar had a challenging life throughout the story whether it was his alcohol addicted ruthless mother or his rebel sister. Oscar let the way people looked at him shape his future, which is a characteristic of an antithetical Emersonian …show more content…
genius. Oscar is enslaved by many things, including the wealthy people in society. Due to this he could never get what he wanted which was a stable romantic relationship. He fell in love with Ybón later on in the book while on a visit to Santo Domingo. She was not his first love, but his last. The mutual feeling they shared was really important to Oscar. But since Ybón had a husband, Oscar never got the chance to be with her forever. However Oscar did get the one thing that he thought he would never get, sex. He thought he would remain a virgin for life but he didn’t, after all good things come to those who wait. But that incident wasn’t a good thing for Oscar because Ybón’s husband ordered a hit on Oscar as soon as he found out. If Oscar hadn’t gone after Ybón, and listened to her husband the first time he would have never gotten into the mess he got into and would have lived a decent life. Oscar is so enslaved to love that he ends up being killed for it. And in the end he had to pay for those few moments of pleasure, with his life. If he wasn’t so enslaved he would have escaped from that terrible fate that he went through. His whole life he has been chasing after the most impossible chances of love. He could have prospered so much more in his life if he hadn’t gone after love. Love is like an addiction to Oscar that he can’t escape no matter where he goes, not matter how he tries to isolate himself from society. This almost took him to point where he wanted to put an end to his life himself. Oscar doesn’t realize that there is more to life than love, there is more to life than just depending on someone. He always had the choice to be a strong independent person who can do far more things in life than someone who is dependent on other people. But he chose not to. People shamed him for not being the stereotypical Dominican. “The narrator’s reasoning in alleging the unsightliness of Oscar’s hair appears to be that even Oscar’s blackness is derived from the wrong source, from Puerto Rico rather than the Dominican Republic. His overweight body is unable to perform what is considered masculine movement. In addition to “thr[owing] a ball like a girl” (20), Oscar finds that “kids of color, upon hearing him speak and seeing him move his body, shook their heads” and told him, “You’re not Dominican” (49).” (Dictating Desire, Dictating Diaspora: Junot Díaz’s The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao) This shows that Oscar being overweight and the way he walks and talks in a non manly manner doesn’t fit into what society believes is a Dominican. He is not an alpha male or a muscular hottie, but he is Oscar, someone just as special. However Oscar never realizes this, and it always nags at him. He did try and make a change to his physical appearance, since Yunior forced him to, but other than that Oscar never made an attempt to change himself. Although he was enslaved by so many things, it can also be argued that Oscar was freer than anyone else since it was never in his will to change himself and the way he looked. Which means he didn’t let the names society called him get to him. In that way he could be seen and the archetypal Emersonian genius. But the factors that enslaved him outweigh the factors that made him free by far. Oscar was the antithetical Emersonian genius, but Equality 7-2521 is the opposite of that. He is the epitome of the Archetypal Emersonian genius. “At the heart of Emerson’s idea of self-reliance is the profoundly American idea that self-knowledge is the key to self-improvement and self-realization. Emerson argued that the object of education is to help a person find that in himself that is strong enough to be relied upon. This was not hokey ego-boostering; Emerson proposed quite specific methods of introspective learning, all of them aimed at discovering what is strong and valuable in one’s own mind.”(Self-Reliance vs. Self-Esteem) Emerson believed that learning what one is capable of doing, and self actualization is a big freedom that one can achieve in their life. Equality 7-2521 did exactly that, he learned a lot of things that no one else knew. And he knew that he was capable of much more than what society said he was capable of. Oscar was never self actualized and he was very unsure of what he was capable of doing which is what got him into the mess that got him killed in the first place. But those characteristics are not the only ones that make Equality 7-2521 free. Equality 7-2521 later known as Prometheus, started out as a street sweeper.
The leaders of the collective society he lives in named him a street sweeper since they believed he was not capable of doing anything else. A collective society operates in a completely different way than the way we live today. People that live in a collective society do everything for the good of the society rather than their self-interest. Self-interest does not exist in a society, where one is assigned a time to wake up, eat, shower, and sleep. The people living in this society have absolutely no freedom whatsoever. Citizens are forbidden to learn about or even speak of the unmentionable times, which was the past. This society is so group centered that every subject is required to speak of oneself using the word “we”. This whole novel revolves around self-actualization and the realization and meaning of the word “I”. There is indeed a difference between ego and
self-actualization. Equality 7-2521 never had much faith in the society he lived in. He believed he deserved more, more freedom specifically. He is enslaved by the external force which is his society, he never tries to rebel against it till he meets someone special, Liberty 5-3000. Talking to someone that is not your brother is illegal in this society but both of them were unable to resist talking to each other. As they talked they faced some problems communicating since they had feelings, that they had never experienced before. Later he realized it was love and longing for the Golden one that he felt, this action was also illegal in this society. “The book's title derives from this being an anthem to ego and independent thought. Equality pushes himself above and beyond, regardless of the consequences, and Rand persuades readers to live for themselves.”(Anthem article by Colton F.) After he presents the discovery of the lightbulb and everyone is terrified by it Equality decides that he does not belong in this restricted community and decides to flee, this is another moment where he made a decision of his own. After he fled into the forest that supposedly no one would ever survive in he realized how free he could have been if he had escaped earlier, but he was sad due to the fact that he couldn’t take the golden one with him. But later on she shows up and they find a house from the unmentionable times and they learn so much there. He learns the definition of “I” both literally and figuratively. He goes through self-actualization and he sets the most important goal for himself to rewrite the history of man. His fellow brothers will come to him and together along with his family they will all rebuild the name of man. They will use electricity and technology with out shame, they will fall in love, think for themselves, and live peacefully with all of the world together. The story hits a significant point when the light bulb is lit and this light symbolizes freedom and knowledge for Equality 7-2521 as well as the Golden one. Equality 7-2521 will always be a archetypal Emersonian genius due to the fact that he broke away from the chains that held him and became someone that he could be proud of, not for society but for himself. The author of this novel Ayn Rand makes the main character Equality 7-2521, solely built on self-reliance since that is what gets him to a successful place in life. Along with nature in the forest Equality 7-2521 becomes free this is the state man was born in as Rousseau said. Equality 7-2521 may be seen as the antithetical Emersonian genius in the beginning when he describes the state he is living in with all the terrible laws that imprison him, but he spends most of his time rebelling against the government. For example: going in the underground tunnels, lighting a light bulb, talking with someone from another group, falling in love, and speaking of the unmentionable times. All the the laws he breaks brings him one step closer to making himself free. The next character to be discussed is Mariam, who is a antithetical Emersonian genius. She lives in a place where society and the people closest to her enslave her like Oscar. But unlike Equality 7-2521 she doesn’t make an attempt to escape till the very last minute. Mariam as a child was never taught to think for herself and was constantly told that she had no worthiness in society by her own mother. Her mother told her the story of how Mariam came to be and what she was, a bastard, someone who is an illegitimate child. Her father would come once a week and give her a peek of the world that was hidden away from her by her mother. The turning point of this story came when Mariam decided she wanted to go see a movie with Jalil into the city. But that day he never arrived and Mariam went out into the city by herself to look for him. She was able to find his house but unluckily he wasn’t there so she slept outside waiting for him. When she was taken back to her house, she saw that Nana had hung herself. Mariam was of course devastated and didn’t know what to do. She felt so alone and thought what would have happened if she had not made such a foolish decision. No one treated her as bad as Nana said they would, but she was treated as if she was less worthy than anyone else. After that she was forced into a marriage that was the biggest challenge in her life, since she didn’t want to get married, but wanted to lived with Jalil. “87 percent of Afghan women are illiterate. 1 in every 3 Afghan women experience physical, psychological or sexual violence. 44 years is now the average life expectancy for women across the country. 70 to 80 percent of women face forced marriages in Afghanistan.” (Integrated Regional Information Networks of the United Nations) This information proves that Mariam is not the only one to undergo such a hard life without any source of freedom. At the beginning of their marriage it was not too bad, they lived a decent life even though Mariam never particularly liked Rasheed. They got along till Mariam had a miscarriage and was never able to have children. Rasheed always wanted to have a son to compensate for the son that he lost with his last wife. As time goes on and Mariam suffers more miscarriages Rasheed becomes more abusive and they enter a cycle of violence. Mariam can not runaway from Rasheed since she has no where to go in that society. Till Laila comes she does not attempt to runaway. Even though their first attempt failed they continued to spread apart from Rasheed and eventually Mariam had to make the ultimate sacrifice to let Laila and her family escape to freedom. When Mariam was held in prison even though she was in chains she was actually freer than ever because she had made her own decision. This wouldn’t have happened if Laila hand not induced it she is the archetypal Emersonian genius. But Mariam was for the most part the antithetical Emersonian genius. All in all throughout the analysis of all three characters one can see that there are a variety of people that live in our society. But it is the internal and external forces that make us who we are.
individualism. Based on Emerson’s thinking we can divide people in this world into two groups, the individualists or the Emersonian geniuses and the antithetical Emersonian geniuses. The Emersonian genius described by Emerson is: "To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men, — that is genius”, (Self Reliance pg. 1). The antithetical Emersonian genius is someone who is enslaved to the dictates of society and does not want to think for themselves, they merely listen and adhere to what other people say without a second thought, this is real slavery. The Emersonian genius is the epitome of freedom. Oscar Wao, many may know him as a nerd that will forever be a loner at home, but there is much more to the story than that.
Oscar Wao believes he is such a lowly person: no friends, no life, and no freedom. Another thing that really bothers Oscar is that everyone around him is in a relationship and he is not, when he was small he used to be a very alpha male character someone that all the girls would like. He was known for his dating habits in the Dominican community and was very popular for it. But as he grew up he gained weight and wasn’t particularly attractive to anyone. Oscar had a challenging life throughout the story whether it was his alcohol addicted ruthless mother or his rebel sister. Oscar let the way people looked at him shape his future, which is a characteristic of an antithetical Emersonian …show more content…
genius. Oscar is enslaved by many things, including the wealthy people in society. Due to this he could never get what he wanted which was a stable romantic relationship. He fell in love with Ybón later on in the book while on a visit to Santo Domingo. She was not his first love, but his last. The mutual feeling they shared was really important to Oscar. But since Ybón had a husband, Oscar never got the chance to be with her forever. However Oscar did get the one thing that he thought he would never get, sex. He thought he would remain a virgin for life but he didn’t, after all good things come to those who wait. But that incident wasn’t a good thing for Oscar because Ybón’s husband ordered a hit on Oscar as soon as he found out. If Oscar hadn’t gone after Ybón, and listened to her husband the first time he would have never gotten into the mess he got into and would have lived a decent life. Oscar is so enslaved to love that he ends up being killed for it. And in the end he had to pay for those few moments of pleasure, with his life. If he wasn’t so enslaved he would have escaped from that terrible fate that he went through. His whole life he has been chasing after the most impossible chances of love. He could have prospered so much more in his life if he hadn’t gone after love. Love is like an addiction to Oscar that he can’t escape no matter where he goes, not matter how he tries to isolate himself from society. This almost took him to point where he wanted to put an end to his life himself. Oscar doesn’t realize that there is more to life than love, there is more to life than just depending on someone. He always had the choice to be a strong independent person who can do far more things in life than someone who is dependent on other people. But he chose not to. People shamed him for not being the stereotypical Dominican. “The narrator’s reasoning in alleging the unsightliness of Oscar’s hair appears to be that even Oscar’s blackness is derived from the wrong source, from Puerto Rico rather than the Dominican Republic. His overweight body is unable to perform what is considered masculine movement. In addition to “thr[owing] a ball like a girl” (20), Oscar finds that “kids of color, upon hearing him speak and seeing him move his body, shook their heads” and told him, “You’re not Dominican” (49).” (Dictating Desire, Dictating Diaspora: Junot Díaz’s The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao) This shows that Oscar being overweight and the way he walks and talks in a non manly manner doesn’t fit into what society believes is a Dominican. He is not an alpha male or a muscular hottie, but he is Oscar, someone just as special. However Oscar never realizes this, and it always nags at him. He did try and make a change to his physical appearance, since Yunior forced him to, but other than that Oscar never made an attempt to change himself. Although he was enslaved by so many things, it can also be argued that Oscar was freer than anyone else since it was never in his will to change himself and the way he looked. Which means he didn’t let the names society called him get to him. In that way he could be seen and the archetypal Emersonian genius. But the factors that enslaved him outweigh the factors that made him free by far. Oscar was the antithetical Emersonian genius, but Equality 7-2521 is the opposite of that. He is the epitome of the Archetypal Emersonian genius. “At the heart of Emerson’s idea of self-reliance is the profoundly American idea that self-knowledge is the key to self-improvement and self-realization. Emerson argued that the object of education is to help a person find that in himself that is strong enough to be relied upon. This was not hokey ego-boostering; Emerson proposed quite specific methods of introspective learning, all of them aimed at discovering what is strong and valuable in one’s own mind.”(Self-Reliance vs. Self-Esteem) Emerson believed that learning what one is capable of doing, and self actualization is a big freedom that one can achieve in their life. Equality 7-2521 did exactly that, he learned a lot of things that no one else knew. And he knew that he was capable of much more than what society said he was capable of. Oscar was never self actualized and he was very unsure of what he was capable of doing which is what got him into the mess that got him killed in the first place. But those characteristics are not the only ones that make Equality 7-2521 free. Equality 7-2521 later known as Prometheus, started out as a street sweeper.
The leaders of the collective society he lives in named him a street sweeper since they believed he was not capable of doing anything else. A collective society operates in a completely different way than the way we live today. People that live in a collective society do everything for the good of the society rather than their self-interest. Self-interest does not exist in a society, where one is assigned a time to wake up, eat, shower, and sleep. The people living in this society have absolutely no freedom whatsoever. Citizens are forbidden to learn about or even speak of the unmentionable times, which was the past. This society is so group centered that every subject is required to speak of oneself using the word “we”. This whole novel revolves around self-actualization and the realization and meaning of the word “I”. There is indeed a difference between ego and
self-actualization. Equality 7-2521 never had much faith in the society he lived in. He believed he deserved more, more freedom specifically. He is enslaved by the external force which is his society, he never tries to rebel against it till he meets someone special, Liberty 5-3000. Talking to someone that is not your brother is illegal in this society but both of them were unable to resist talking to each other. As they talked they faced some problems communicating since they had feelings, that they had never experienced before. Later he realized it was love and longing for the Golden one that he felt, this action was also illegal in this society. “The book's title derives from this being an anthem to ego and independent thought. Equality pushes himself above and beyond, regardless of the consequences, and Rand persuades readers to live for themselves.”(Anthem article by Colton F.) After he presents the discovery of the lightbulb and everyone is terrified by it Equality decides that he does not belong in this restricted community and decides to flee, this is another moment where he made a decision of his own. After he fled into the forest that supposedly no one would ever survive in he realized how free he could have been if he had escaped earlier, but he was sad due to the fact that he couldn’t take the golden one with him. But later on she shows up and they find a house from the unmentionable times and they learn so much there. He learns the definition of “I” both literally and figuratively. He goes through self-actualization and he sets the most important goal for himself to rewrite the history of man. His fellow brothers will come to him and together along with his family they will all rebuild the name of man. They will use electricity and technology with out shame, they will fall in love, think for themselves, and live peacefully with all of the world together. The story hits a significant point when the light bulb is lit and this light symbolizes freedom and knowledge for Equality 7-2521 as well as the Golden one. Equality 7-2521 will always be a archetypal Emersonian genius due to the fact that he broke away from the chains that held him and became someone that he could be proud of, not for society but for himself. The author of this novel Ayn Rand makes the main character Equality 7-2521, solely built on self-reliance since that is what gets him to a successful place in life. Along with nature in the forest Equality 7-2521 becomes free this is the state man was born in as Rousseau said. Equality 7-2521 may be seen as the antithetical Emersonian genius in the beginning when he describes the state he is living in with all the terrible laws that imprison him, but he spends most of his time rebelling against the government. For example: going in the underground tunnels, lighting a light bulb, talking with someone from another group, falling in love, and speaking of the unmentionable times. All the the laws he breaks brings him one step closer to making himself free. The next character to be discussed is Mariam, who is a antithetical Emersonian genius. She lives in a place where society and the people closest to her enslave her like Oscar. But unlike Equality 7-2521 she doesn’t make an attempt to escape till the very last minute. Mariam as a child was never taught to think for herself and was constantly told that she had no worthiness in society by her own mother. Her mother told her the story of how Mariam came to be and what she was, a bastard, someone who is an illegitimate child. Her father would come once a week and give her a peek of the world that was hidden away from her by her mother. The turning point of this story came when Mariam decided she wanted to go see a movie with Jalil into the city. But that day he never arrived and Mariam went out into the city by herself to look for him. She was able to find his house but unluckily he wasn’t there so she slept outside waiting for him. When she was taken back to her house, she saw that Nana had hung herself. Mariam was of course devastated and didn’t know what to do. She felt so alone and thought what would have happened if she had not made such a foolish decision. No one treated her as bad as Nana said they would, but she was treated as if she was less worthy than anyone else. After that she was forced into a marriage that was the biggest challenge in her life, since she didn’t want to get married, but wanted to lived with Jalil. “87 percent of Afghan women are illiterate. 1 in every 3 Afghan women experience physical, psychological or sexual violence. 44 years is now the average life expectancy for women across the country. 70 to 80 percent of women face forced marriages in Afghanistan.” (Integrated Regional Information Networks of the United Nations) This information proves that Mariam is not the only one to undergo such a hard life without any source of freedom. At the beginning of their marriage it was not too bad, they lived a decent life even though Mariam never particularly liked Rasheed. They got along till Mariam had a miscarriage and was never able to have children. Rasheed always wanted to have a son to compensate for the son that he lost with his last wife. As time goes on and Mariam suffers more miscarriages Rasheed becomes more abusive and they enter a cycle of violence. Mariam can not runaway from Rasheed since she has no where to go in that society. Till Laila comes she does not attempt to runaway. Even though their first attempt failed they continued to spread apart from Rasheed and eventually Mariam had to make the ultimate sacrifice to let Laila and her family escape to freedom. When Mariam was held in prison even though she was in chains she was actually freer than ever because she had made her own decision. This wouldn’t have happened if Laila hand not induced it she is the archetypal Emersonian genius. But Mariam was for the most part the antithetical Emersonian genius. All in all throughout the analysis of all three characters one can see that there are a variety of people that live in our society. But it is the internal and external forces that make us who we are.