Essay 'The Perks Of Being A Wallflower'

‘If people were rain, I was a drizzle and she was a hurricane.’ Miles Halters feelings about his what he thinks is the love of his life Alaska Young in John Greens Looking for Alaska could quite easily be mistaken for words spoken by Charlie about secret love Sam in the popular film adaptation of The Perks of Being a Wallflower directed by the writer of the book Stephen Chbosky. Both Green and Chbosky chose to place their young protagonists in confronting yet relatable situations in which they must confront death and love all while struggling their way through high school at the same time which not only impacts themselves but those close to them as well. Both books enlighten the readers with the important themes of emotional sanity, love and belonging.

The Perks of being a Wildflower movie is a great demonstration on adolescence and childhood development as it portrays how much we as humans are effected by our early childhood years and how we struggle to make sense of life while navigating through adolescence. We are molded by our environment, but also shaped by the neglect or abuse we suffer as children. The traumatic experiences are life altering and if not dealt with can have dramatic outcomes for our future. The movie has a great story line and walks the audience through the character and identity development of an adolescence. Dissecting Charlies character will be helpful in understanding that part of a human’s life and development.

For my paper, I am diagnosing Charlie from the film, Perks of Being a Wallflower. Before I delve into Charlie’s diagnosis, I will provide some background information about his character. In the film, Charlie is a 15 year old boy who has recently started high school as a freshman. He lives with both parents, and his sister who is a couple years older than him. Charlie also has a brother who has gone away to college. In school, Charlie is seen to be good with academics, particularly in English, since he has an interest in writing. However, Charlie does not have any friends and his best friend had kill himself in the last year. Furthermore, Charlie is seen to be quite socially awkward around his peers and usually keeps to himself.

     The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky is a poignant coming of age story about a teenage boy named Charlie who is entering into his freshman year of high school and trying to cope with death, life, friends, and sexuality. Chobosky does a remarkable job at describing all of these issues through the eyes of a shy, introvert teen. The reader will be shocked, amazed, and grateful to join Charlie in his walk down the road of realization and growing up.

The book and the movie for The Perks of Being a Wallflower are extremely different, and I believe that the movie is much better than the book. The book is written much differently than the movie. There are lots of scenes that are in the book but not in the movie and that are in the movie not the book. The movie focuses less on the bigger, depressing topics than the book does. The characters in the movie are also much different than they are in the book. Their personalities are very different in the movie than the author described them as in the book.

The Perks of Being A Wallflower is a book about the changes teens go through as they mature and the obstacles they face during this time. Charlie comes across changes in his relationships, his own stance in his family, school, and friends, and how he thinks of himself. He learns about his past and makes changes towards how he thinks about himself and why he is who he is.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower is a coming of age film about a 15 year old boy, Charlie, who has been through much trauma. As a freshman Charlie is left with no friends, because of the suicide of his best friend Michael, but he has the support of an english teacher who inspires his dreams of becoming a writer. Eventually, step-siblings Sam and Patrick discover that Charlie is lonely and in need of a friend, so they take him under their wing. Sam, Patrick, and their group of friends have much wisdom about life, because they are older, much of which they share with Charlie. Under the wing of Sam and Patrick, Charlie becomes more excited about life. Although, he still struggles with the side effects of past traumas, and dreads the day his new friends leave for their lives after high school.

‘The Perks of Being a Wallflower’ follows shy and kind-natured Charlie Kelmeckis (Logan Lerman- Percy Jackson, The Butterfly Effect) as he enters high school alone, after the recent loss of his middle school best friend to suicide. Charlie gets befriended by seniors Sam (Emma Watson- Harry Potter-Beauty and the Beast) and Patrick (Ezra Miller- Justice League, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them) and finally feels accepted.

Sociology is the scientific study of being behavior in human groups (Schaefer). There are very many examples of sociology in the movie The Perks of Being a Wallflower, but I view alienation, deviance, and gender roles to be the most prominent. This movie is about the struggles of a teenage boy named Charlie’s freshman year of high school. Charlie is seen as a social outcast and he just barely makes it through the year with the help of his best friends Sam and Patrick. Throughout the movie Charlie experiences most of the basic struggles of starting high school and some. This movie is very relateable since it gives a more realistic view of high school for some people. Charlie , and the audience, learns the importance of love and friendship in growing up in today’s society.

“This freedom, not only to choose what we read, but also to select from a full array of

The Perks of Being a Wallflower is a novel about coming of age that is seen through the perspective of Charlie, a young ‘wallflower’ that is starting high school and experiences the troublesome teenage life filled with drugs, sexuality and love. Charlie writes this book in a series of letters to an anonymous person. Charlie is the main protagonist of the story who is apprehensive and a kind-hearted boy however he has many problems happening in his life that he doesn’t like to concern others with “I just don’t want you to worry about me, or think you’ve met me, or waste your time anymore”. I admire Charlie because he is very considerate of others and although he is shy he overcomes this fear when he tries to find friends and step out of his comfort zone” Normally I am very shy, but (Patrick) seemed like the kind of guy you could just walk up to at a football game even though you were three years younger and not popular”. In return Charlie is rewarded with his first real friend at high school. I also admire Charlie for his mature attitude towards finding new friends and moving on from the death of his friend Michael. Charlie really needed to start interacting more with people, during the story we find out that Charlie misses having a friend and that being alone can be difficult and cause negative effects “It would be very nice to have a friend again. I would like that even more than a date”. I think

During the course of the school year, Charlie has his first date and his first kiss, he deals with bullies, he experiments with drugs and drinking, and he makes friends, loses them, and gains them back. Sam and Patrick smoke very often. Charlie likes Sam a lot but she begins to date an older boy named Craig, until she learns he has been cheating on her the whole time. Craig's friend, Peter, told him enough was enough and that if Craig didn't tell Sam, he would. He ended up telling her and they broke up. Patrick is homosexual. His partner, Brad, is a closeted homosexual that has to abuse drugs

Stephen Chbosky’s The Perks of Being a Wallflower demonstrates how ‘Charlie’, the protagonist drives the narrative through his subconscious exploration of his own mother complex and masculine worth. He analyses his past and current personality in his letters to arrive at how his current attitudes, values and beliefs have been shaped through key events that have happened. As the story develops, it is clearly demonstrated through Charlies exploration that Chbosky utilises the theory of Freudian psycho-analytical criticism and masculine theory. The Perks of Being a Wallflower is an American coming of age text; the protagonist, Charlie is starting the journey of high school. Charlie is a socially awkward boy who as the title says; is a wallflower.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky is about a boy named Charlie. Charlie is a fifteen year old freshmen, who is going through a traumatic loss. The story starts with the news of Charlie’s best friend Michael committing suicide. Michael was basically Charlie’s only friend and losing him makes the beginning of freshmen year troublesome for Charlie. This is not Charlie’s first experience with loss.

“Every life is narrow .Our only escape is not to run away, but to learn to love the people we are and the world in which we find oversleeves”-Mark Haddon. The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky is a story that describes a difficult time for many people specifically high school. Individuals of all age have struggled with fitting in and finding their place in high school , which in this book becomes an issue for characters. In the novel characters manage to find themselves engaging in both negative and positive methods of escape, for instance drug use, reading, writing, and or through suppressing thoughts.All these different methods touch on issues that many teens have explored in their own lives whether directly or indirectly.