Le Guin's 'The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas'

Out of oppression rises resilient individuals whose voices cannot be silenced. Though the exact circumstances may vary, both Frederick Douglass and Martin Luther King Jr. were empowered in the face of persecution. Both came from a place of suffering and restriction, were inspired by the brutality the observed, and attacks institutions which allowed these atrocities and others to continue. Their words, powerful and thought-provoking, will serve as pieces that will not soon be forgotten.

As human beings, we strive for freedom, and as we see in both our world and the one in the story, no one is truly free. “They know that they, like the child, are not free,” writes the narrator, showing the reader that although the citizens apparently live “free” in a perfect society, inside their souls, they are not free. There are no slaves in this utopia, as described by the narrator, but in actuality, the child’s freedom is taken from it, similar to slavery.

From the beginning of time, society has made the “moral” perspective the desired response or reaction to all situations and scenarios. The term moral means concerned with the principles of right and wrong behavior, and the integrity or dishonesty of human character. To be morally sound, one must address the true meaning and purpose of morality. In the story “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas,” citizens often leave due to the reality of their society. The ones who walk away from Omelas are cowards, not “moral” heroes of any manner. By leaving Omelas the former residents are abandoning the child to suffer in Omelas, its bitter reality, which involves no one changing the course of its life.

At the beginning of this paper, I stated that freedom was a key concept in the

James A. Honey’s “The World’s Reward” and Maya Angelou “Caged Bird” tell about how freedom is feasible of physical enslavement.

“The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion,” is a quote written by Albert Camus, which displays the complexity of defining the term freedom. Jean-Paul Sartre’s play “The Flies,” defines the concept of freedom as the accountability of one’s own guilt, which allows individuals to recognize their own freedom. Furthermore, an individual that accepts accountability for one’s own guilt and responsibility for the city, or complete isolation, is living in freedom. Likewise, Zora Neal Hurston’s novel Their Eyes Were Watching God explores the notion of being or becoming absolutely free, finding her voice,

Symbolism is commonly used by authors that make short stories. Guin is a prime example of how much symbolism is used in short stories such as “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas” and “Sur.” In both of these stories Guin uses symbolism to show hidden meanings and ideas. In “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas” there is a perfect Utopian city, yet in this perfect city there is a child locked in a broom closet and it is never let out. A few people leave the city when they find out about the child, but most people stay. Furthermore, in “Sur” there is a group of girls that travel to the South Pole and reach it before anyone else, yet they leave no sign or marker at the South Pole. Guin’s stories are very farfetched

In “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” by Ursula Le Guin, the informally-speaking narrator depicts a cookie-cutter utopia with perpetually happy citizens that sing and dance in the music-filled streets during the Festival of Summer. However, under one of the beautiful public buildings lays a child, no older than ten years-old, who lays in its own excrement. Although the citizens know the emancipated child is there, they refuse to act upon the child’s suffering, for their happiness depends entirely on the child’s abominable misery. Through ethos, the narrator illustrates this utopian society with a casual tone and frequently asks the audience for their input. Le Guin’s fairy-tale introduction of the story establishes her credibility through her extensive knowledge and understanding of the people of Omelas. Le Guin utilizes logos through the narrator’s second person point of view which incites the audience to draw their own conclusions about the city of Omelas and question their own justifications of the child’s existence. The concept of the happiness of many relying on the necessary suffering of one forces the reader to question their own morals and their justifications for the child’s physical and mental condition. Through ethos, logos, and pathos, Le Guin presents the contrast and divide between the citizens of Omelas and the child in the cellar in order to challenge the reader’s capacity for moral self-conception.

In "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" author Ursula K. Le Guin uses the utopian society of Omelas to symbolically highlight the ugly and unsavory state of the human condition. The stories unidentified narrator paints a colorful picture of Omelas and ironically describes its residents as happy, joyous and not at all barbaric. Although Le Guin describes Omelas as a delightful even whimsical place that affords its citizens “…happiness, the beauty of their city, the tenderness of their friendships, the health of the of their children, the wisdom of their scholars, the skill of their makers, even the abundance of their harvest and the kindly weather of their skies”; we come to discover just the opposite (5). At its core we find a

Utopia is any state, condition, or place of ideal perfection. In Ursula LeGuin's short story "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas" the city of Omelas is described as a utopia. "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas" presents a challenge of conscience for anyone who chooses to live in Omelas.

Freedom is a right that is often taken for granted by those who are fortunate to call themselves free. Although it is underappreciated by many, those who have had it taken away are those who truly understand, and are grateful for, the fortunes of freedom. Freedom to Breathe, written by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, accentuates the importance of truly valuing liberty based upon his own personal experiences. Diction and figurative language accompany the use of symbolism to produce a gracious and peaceful tone that is utilized to demonstrate the importance of appreciating freedom through the eyes of a prisoner.

The term `freedom' is often associated with the notion of living free of restraint and having an unfettered liberty to engage in rational actions with a sense that that our actions will not be controlled or interfered with. Given the above definition of freedom and the principles of positive and negative freedom, this essay shall seek to demonstrate that while they do not experience freedom fully, the proles are more free than Winston in Nineteen Eighty-Four. This essay shall also discuss the reasons why we consider freedom to be important with a particular focus on our assumptions of human nature and its components.

Ursula Le Guin’s short story “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” is a plotless, philosophical fiction. Written in 1973, Le Guin tells the dark narrative of a fictional town which lives in peace with itself. The seemingly happy town houses a dark secret, one so dark that citizen’s of the town leave to escape it. Ursula Le Guin does this by using authorial intrusion, withholding information, and encouraging her readers to think.

Liberation is more than the freedom to move freely and to go where one wants to go whenever one chooses; Marcuse held the body could be free, but the mind could be bound and imprisoned

Nelson Mandela once said, “To deny people their human rights is to challenge their very humanity”. In this short but powerful quote, Mandela advocates for human rights by saying that without them, one would fail to be human. Maintaining humanity is crucial because it is what makes everyone unique. Human rights give people the opportunity to voice their opinions, think freely, and be who they want to be. To take that away from a person is to deny them of being human and restrict them from their freedom. People who have freedom tend to take it for granted as they do not realize the fragility of it. When in fact, there are people around the world every day fighting for those rights. There is no humanity in a society where people are confined and imprisoned by a lack of independence. Similar conditions of confinement and limitations occur in 1984, where author George Orwell satirizes the totalitarian government and what would happen if a government is in total control of its people. And its protagonist, Winston Smith, lives under the oppressive regime led by the Party and in hatred and paranoia of it as well. In the dystopian novel 1984, Orwell uses Winston Smith to present a timeless warning of the injustices that a totalitarian government can impose on a person’s fundamental rights and freedoms.