However, over the summer, I did manage to get through a few books on my list and today I would like to discus one of them. As you can tell from the title of this post, the book I'll be talking about is The Perks of Being a Wallflower (Stephen Chbosky).
I first heard of The Perks of Being a Wallflower while sitting in a Teaching Young Adult Literature class last April. Each of us students were required to choose a young adult book, read it, and then present it to the class. The book I chose was The Body of Christopher Creed (Carol Plum-Ucci), but one of my classmates had chosen Stephen Chbosky's The Perks of Being a Wallflower. It was while listening to her presentation on Chbosky's work that I became interested in it and decided to check it out.
To say The Perks of Being a Wallflower was an uneasy read would be accurate, in my opinion. The language and writing style -which I will talk about more in depth later -were easy to read, but it was the emotions that sprang from the pages that made it a difficult read. No, difficult isn't exactly the right word. It was like the emotions followed you even after you sat the book down.
Often times I had to leave the book on my bed for awhile just so I could try to wrap my own mind around Charlie's emotions. This book is haunting, no doubt about it.
Before I get into the themes, which will most likely help you understand why I call this book haunting, allow me to introduce you to the characters. Now, there's a decent sized list of characters, but I'm, only going to really explain three of them. These three are the ones I consider to be the main characters.
Characters:
Charlie is the narrator of the story and is a high school freshman. He is just beginning to really understand the world around him and has some dark memories that he has blocked out. He slowly begins to recall theses memories as the book progresses and it's because of the help of his friends that he makes sense of them all.
It's because of his English teacher, Bill, that he discovers his love for literature and writing. This causes Charlie to wish to become a writer and he begins trying to write stories.
Charlie lives with his mom, dad, college age brother, and older sister. He is referred to as a wallflower in the book because of his watch-listen-understand-but-stay-on-the-sidelines personality.
Sam:Sam is Charlie;s crush, as well as one of the first friends he makes. Like Charlie, Sam has a few dark memories, but she didn't block them out like he did.
Because she is three years older than Charlie (being a senior in high school) she tells him that they can't be more than friends and that he shouldn't think of her as anything more. However, it is later revealed that she cares for Charlie as mush as he cares for her.
Sam lives with her mom, step-dad, and step-brother. She is also the owner of the pickup that she, Charlie, and her step-brother use to drive around the city in.
Patrick is first introduced as being called Nothing. Charlie states that someone told him that people use to call Patrick Patty and once day Patrick told the people to either call him Patrick or nothing...so they started calling him Nothing. However, Patrick is only called Nothing by Charlie for a couple 'chapters'.
Like Sam, Patrick is one of Charlie's first friends and he isn't shy about any topics. He often gives Charlie advice and explains some things to him.
Patrick is Sam's step-brother and lives with her, her mom, and his dad. He is also secretly dating the school's quarterback, Brad...which is why he takes an interest in football. Unlike Brad, he is openly gay and doesn't seem to care what people think about him.
Themes:
Now that you know the three main characters, let's discus some themes. This book is packed with themes. There's everything from music to rape in The Perks of Being a Wallflower. In order to get through quite a few of them, I'll be breaking them up into sections. This way we'll be able to discus each one individually instead of having them blend together.
Take note that any italicized words came directly from the book and I do not own them. Stephen Chbosky owns them and whoever owns the pictures I'm using for this post owns them. Claro? Okay, good, let's move on to our first theme...
Rape: Yep, that's right, we're going to start the themes off with this nasty little bugger. Unfortunately, this one is present in one of Charlie's memories.
When talking with Sam and Patrick one night, Charlie recalls a time when he was little and his brother threw a party while their parents were gone. His brother and sister had basically locked him in his room for the duration of the party. This didn't bug him too much because he was good at keeping himself busy.
However, while in the room, a couple of teenagers interrupted him. Up until the night he spoke to Sam and Patrick about it he hadn't realized what had actually happened that night. He hadn't thought on it enough to realize it.
Yet, while telling Patrick and Sam about the memory, he realizes that he had witnessed a rape. Naturally, he's not sure what to think about the realization at first. That is when he starts to see that some of his 'innocent' memories were stained by other people. Like the boy who rapped the girl, while Charlie was int he room, ruined a childhood memory.
Molestation:
This theme I'm not going to touch on too much because to go in depth in it I would have to give you some major spoilers for the book. All I'm really going to say about this topic is that it is very much present in the story. It is manly present in the form of memories...the memories of Charlie's friends. Sam, as well as a few other characters, all recall moments when they or people they know were molested. Charlie even talks about family members of his that were molested.
Music:
Music plays a huge role in The Perks of Being a Wallflower. The reason for this being that Charlie uses music to describe moments and feelings. He believes that there is music for every moment and has a special playlist that fits his life. The song Asleep (The Smiths) is mentioned multiple times in the story and is Charlie's favorite.
Music is even used as a way to define popularity. Charlie states at one point that:
"Patrick actully use to be popular before Sam bought him some good music."
Literature:
Literature, like music, is something that Charlie loves and uses to explain things. His teacher, Bill, introduces him to books such as To Kill a Mockingbird and The Fountainhead. For every extra book Bill gives him -for Bill gives him books outside of class to read -he writes an essay. The essays he writes helps to not only understand the books, but the world around him. Towards the end of the book, Charlie gathers up all the books Bill gave him and separates them into two sets. One set he gives to Patrick, the other to Sam. He makes sure to give them books that he's sure they would either benefit from or find absolutely interesting.
Homosexuality:Homosexuality isn't a hidden theme in this book. In fact, it's pretty obvious. There are two main homosexual characters, as well as a few that are only briefly mentioned. The first main character is Patrick, obviously.
Patrick is openly gay and readers are lead to believe that his parents accept it. This is because the book never states otherwise otherwise. He has a very supportive family and is in love with his boyfriend.
His boyfriend, however, is not as open about his sexuality. Brad, the second main homosexual character, is Patrick's boyfriend. He is the quarterback of their high school's football team and is closested. He at first blames alcohol for hooking up with Patrick but reaches a point where he no longer uses the alcohol as an excuse.
Brad keeps his sexuality hidden from everyone except for Patrick, Sam, and Charlie for the entire book. There is a scene where his dad catches him and Patrick together and it is during that scene that readers learn of the intolerance his family has for homosexuals. What takes place in that scene ends up effecting Brad and Patrick's relationship in a negative way.
Sex:
With the rape, molestation, and a couple scenes, sex is something that's mentioned quite a bit. Everyone of Charlie's friends has their opinion on the topic and their own pasts regarding it. Again, I won't go too in detail on this topic, but it is something that is spoken of repeatedly in the story. Sometimes it is given a good light, others it's placed under the darkest.
Abuse:
Both mental and physical abuse take place in The Perks of Being a Wallflower. Charlie mentions having to attend counseling sessions because of things that have happened to him. You don't find out what exactly it is that causes him to attend the sessions until the end, and all I'm going to tell you is that it falls under this topic as well as another on this list of themes.
Charlie mentions his aunts and grandmothers being abused, as well as witnessing his sister's boyfriend hitting her. He spends a few pages of the book talking about how he can see a trend of abuse in his family and swears that he'll never let his own kids experience what his female family members had gone through.
I'm combing theses two themes/topics because they often take place together.
When Charlie first meets the group of friends that Patrick and Sam hang out with, he is exposed to weed and alcohol. After that, he smokes, takes some pills, and drinks occasionally.
Needless to say, drinking and drugs is not uncommon among his friends. They even know, and party at, a dealer's home.
Common High School events/feelings:
First day of high school... homecoming...football games...driving around town, while blaring music...prom...graduation...feeling alone...feeling like one is an outcast...finding that one group of people you belong in...everything is touched on in this book. Many of the experiences Charlie and his friends experience are things that all high school students experience.The characters find themselves searching for their identities, falling in and out of love, giving up and moving on, and realizing just how big the world is. Despite having depressing and questionable themes, this book would be a great read for high school students. It would not, however, be a book a teacher would want to read aloud with the class. I could, however, see a teacher giving the book as an assignment and giving worksheets/having discussions about it in class.
Friendship/Unity:
Friendship and unity are going to be the last themes I speak of, even though there are more I could. If there is a core theme to this book it is probably a combination of theses two. They are weaved through the book from beginning to end. From the opening words of, "Dear friend, I am writing to you because she said you would listen and understand and didn't try to sleep with that person at that party even though you could have." to the closing ones of, "So, if this does end up being my last letter, please believe that things are good with me, and even when they're not, they will be soon enough. And I will believe the same about you. Love always, Charlie." friendship and unity are present.I could try to explain theses two themes all night but I would not be able to do them justice. It is because of theses themes that I would like to see the book taught in schools. They are so powerful that they outshine all of the darkness in the book. There's no way I could do theses two themes justice with my words, so let me use some of Charlie's words. Here's two quotes from The Perks of Being a Wallflower about them:
"Sam and Patrick looked at me. And I looked at them. And I think they knew. Not anything specific really. They just knew. And I think that's all you can ask from a friend."
"Sometimes, I look outside, and I think a lot of other people have seen this snow before. Just like I think a lot of other people have read those books before. And listened to those songs. I wonder how they feel tonight."
The last thing I really want to speak about is the language and style of The Perks of Being a Wallflower. The author chose to write the book in letter format, meaning there are no chapters...only letters. Each letter is a chapter, in a sense, and are pretty short. It'd be really easy for someone to finish this book in a single day, that is if they didn't have to keep stopping like I did to think about what they've just read.
As an example of the format Chbosky uses, the following is one of the shorter letters from the book. The following is taken directly from the book:
"November 12, 1991
Dear Friend,
I love twinkie, and the reason I am saying this is because we are all supposed to think of reasons to live. In science class, Mr. Z. told us about an experiment where they got this rat or mouse, and they put this rat or mouse on one side of a cage. On the other side of the cage, they put a little piece of food. And this rat or mouse would walk over to the food and eat. then, they put the rat or mouse back on its original side, and this time, they put electricity all through the floor where the rat or mouse would have to walk to get the piece of food. they did this for a while, and the rat or mouse stopped going to get the food at a certain amount of voltage. then, they repeated the experiment, but they replaced the food with something that gave the rat or mouse intense pleasure. I don't know what it was that gave them intense pleasure, but I am guessing it is some kind of rat or mouse nip. Anyway, what the scientists found out was that the rat or mouse would put up with a lot more voltage for the pleasure. Even more than for the food.
I don't know the significance of this, but I find it very interesting.
Love always,
Charlie"
Closing:
In my opinion, The Perks of Being a Wallflower is a great book. I really enjoyed reading it and I found myself relating to the Character of Charlie on a level that I didn't originally think I would. The 'constantly thinking' problem he has is something that I can relate to.
I look forward to seeing the movie when it comes out. Yes, it's going to be a movie :) This makes me excited...I just hope the movie industry doesn't end up butchering it like they have a habit of doing with books they turn into movies.
The trailer looks wonderful for it, though. Here's the trailer if you're interested in watching it.
Well, there you have it, ladies and gents! My thoughts on The Perks of Being a Wallflower. For whatever reason you chose to read this long post about a book that I loved, I hope you enjoyed it :)
I like it. I found this very interesting.
ReplyDeleteThanks :) I'm glad you enjoyed it!
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