Having sold over 2 million copies, The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky is a #1 New York Times Bestseller novel that has captured millions of people’s attention worldwide. Taking place in the early 90’s, a fifteen-year-old boy named Charlie is experiencing his first year of high school. Unfortunately, Charlie has lost his only friend and now has to navigate his own way to fit in. As a person who is naturally withdrawn, Charlie finds himself struggling to discover and maintain his new friendships, love life and sexuality. With the secret of having an abusive childhood, Charlie’s past slowly begins to haunt him. The Perks of Being a Wallflower is a spectacular novel because of the cathartic installments, a compelling main character …show more content…
Chbosky has the ability to allow the reader experience a wide variety of emotions, in particular; anger, frustration, joyfulness and sadness. For instance, just after Patrick was caught with his secret boyfriend Brad, Brad began to throw some spiteful comments towards him at school. Since the school was still clueless about their relationship, Brad developed the need to retain his popularity, which resulted into Brad and his friends beating up Patrick in front of the whole entire student body. As a caring friend, Charlie made sure to stand up to Brad by fighting back and personally threatening him that if he ever did a stunt like that again, Charlie would expose his secret. As a reader, you could feel a great deal of anger towards Brad for turning against Patrick and becoming a bully. At the same time, you would feel happy for Charlie as he went out of his comfort zone and stood up for his hurt friend, whom you would also feel sorry for. Chbosky made this book with the intended purpose of keeping the audience eager to read more of his novel. He simply did this by having them experience an absorbing, emotional rollercoaster ride with all of his cathartic segments that would keep them keen. Allowing the audience to experience an emotional discharge, this opens up the opportunity for the reader to become deeply attached to the main
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.
“I just need to know that someone out there listens and understands and doesn’t try to sleep with people even if they could have. I need to know that these people exist” (Chbosky 2). The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky is a very moving coming to age story about a teenage boy named Charlie. The author, Stephen Chbosky noted, “The Charlie character is very personal to me. Not everything that he goes through is something I went through, and there are things that I went through that I did not include, but he’s very personal to me.” (Author information). This novel goes into many hard-hitting details about the struggles a young adolescent may face once they enter high school. The author uses certain experiences that Charlie has
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
The Perks of Being a Wallflower Stephen Chbosky is a compilation of letters written to us by Charlie (the main character). Charlie writes to us telling us anything that went on that day. It could be something good or it could be something bad. Basically, in these letters, Charlie would tell us his feelings about events that occurred on that particular day. It’s in these letters that we see what I believe to be the two most important themes are friendship and coming of age. I believe that Charlie is a very pleasant person. I believe that because I trust he is a person true to his word. There is no deceit or ill intensions in what he says, to my knowledge.
This modern, coming-of-age novel written by Stephen Chbosky follows the teenage life of a new freshman named Charlie. Through his letters to a mysterious stranger, readers follow his typical and not-so-typical experiences as he learns about friendship, relationships, sexuality, drugs, and everything that teenagers are often faced with growing up. Charlie gives insight into the non-glamorous life of a so-called “wallflower”. The use of “Point of View” in this novel not only creates the entire story line, but also adds a personal affect and relatable connection between Charlie and the reader. It is seen through his letters, and the way he writes them.
Emotional Instability is most often caused by a traumatic event in life. This leads to an individual growing up to have drastic mood swings without reason. Examples of these mood swings are lashing out, dangerous/reckless behavior, crying randomly, isolating oneself from society and experimenting with alcohol/drugs. Stephen Chbosky’s book, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, follows the socially awkward Charlie entering high school after his only companion ,Michael, commits suicide.Under those circumstances, it is evident that this experience impacted Charlie because in various parts of the book he often becomes overly aggressive or breaks down crying for no reason. Similar to the Perks of being a wallflower J.D Salinger’s ,Catcher in the rye,
Charlie is the main character in the movie; The Perks of Being a Wallflower. This movie depicts an adolescent’s (Charlie) struggle with trauma and grief. Past experiences are revealed gradually bit by bit, all tying into each other. The movie starts off in Charlie’s room; it is a neat and tidy little room. Charlie is fifteen years old and entering his freshman year of high school. He is innocent, hopeful, awkward, and likable to everyone but his classmates. He sits at his desk, writing a letter as he tapes songs through the radio on a cassette. His letter appears to be anonymous; it mentions that he was in the hospital and he did not want anyone to know so that no one would think he was weird. He also says that he has not spoken to anyone outside of his family all summer. He wants to turn himself around/find himself while in high school. He seems hopeful and counts down the days until graduation.
Passivity in The Perks of Being a Wallflower There are many life lessons to learn from in Stephen Chbosky’s, “The Perks of Being a Wallflower”. One of them being, “Do as you wish. Be as you are”. Charlie, the protagonist of the novel, is a high school freshman just trying to fit in. Throughout the novel he is faced with many difficulties as a teenager.
The Perks of Being a Wallflower is the story of a unique high school student named Charlie and his journey of self-discovery throughout his freshman year. Charlie’s personality changes drastically from the beginning of the book to the end of it; and this is what I want to focus on. First I am going to detail Charlie’s personality at the beginning of the book and then use Erik Erikson’s theory of Psychosocial Development, Kohlberg’s theory of Moral Development, Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development and an article about adolescent bulling to analyze them. I will then use examples from the book and film to illustrate his growth in the respected areas. Through these major theories of psychology I will show Charlie’s evolution from a wallflower to a human being.
Stephen Chbosky’s film “The Perks of being a Wallflower” and J. D. Salinger’s book “The Catcher in the Rye” are two coming of age texts which link to the theme of alienation through the ‘coming of age experience ' . Both protagonists in the film and novel experience alienation from their respective societal expectations. Charlie from “perks” is a reserved teenage boy who is tormented by his past of sexual abuse and death of his aunt and best friend. Although isolated by his own reality, Charlie seeks out to gain relationships and has stable reliable support systems. Holden Caulfield from “catcher” is an ostracised vulnerable teenage boy who is growing up in the 1950s being extremely at odds with his identity and self belonging. Holden’s
We chose to write about Patrick. Patrick is played by Ezra Matthew Miller at the age of 20. Patrick is a senior at the same high school Charlie goes to and shares wood class with him. He jokes a lot and doesn’t take things seriously and therefore he isn’t a very good student. In the beginning of the movie Patrick is joking around and leads him to getting the nickname nothing and soon everyone at school start calling him that. He has a stepsister named Sam who’s one of the main characters and they share their love with music. Patrick is homosexual and has a boyfriend named Brad. He doesn’t struggle with being gay but his boyfriend does so they keep their relationship a secret. When Brad’s dad
During my English 2070 course over the summer, we explored different aspects of personal relationships and finding our true self by studying several of literary works. Taking this class wasn’t exactly what I had I mind to take over the summer. Surprisingly, I actually enjoyed the class. As I watch these characters come to life, I couldn’t help but relate to some the struggle they faced as life goes on. Some the struggles I share with the characters are: Loneliness, Depression, and finding personal meaning to life. The themes I will mention is this essay show some the darker moments of my life I personally called: The Dark Abyss.
The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky is the unapologetically honest story of the teenage protagonist, Charlie, facing the challenges that come with growing up. Though the novel does not cover themes unheard of to teenagers, Chbosky was able to masterfully create a heartwarming and heartbreaking story that many people, young and old, can easily relate to. Such a convincing story was created by using a series of letters sent from Charlie to an anonymous recipient. Through Charlie’s eyes, the reader is able to experience his perspective on issues such as introversion, sexuality, rape, and drug use. Charlie addresses every letter with “dear friend,” and lets the reader in on the intimate details of his encounters.
Matos analyses The Perks of Being a Wallflower as a novel that progresses as the protagonist, Charlie, progresses. He states that not only does Charlie learn how to overcome his past as a wallflower, but as he matures, his writing does as well. The novel is written entirely in letters from Charlie to an unknown recipient, addressed by “friend,” so readers are subjected to Charlie's view on the world and himself, and not the view the world has on Charlie. He self reports everything going on in his life which, Matos points out, might cause a slight bias in writing and the exclusion of certain events. The novel starts when Charlie is about to begin high school, a time when he was very alone after the suicide of a close friend, and ends at the
Due to various backgrounds, experiences and mindsets people who read the book might interpret the message dissimilarly. In my opinion, one of the most important themes in the story is coming-of-age. Every child should learn how to become the leading character of their own life. By doing that, they can create their own paths. Being a ”wallflower” might be safer, but in the end, you will have wasted your precious life. You might not get a second chance to do what you want to do. For instance, Charlie was dishonest with Mary Elizabeth about his feelings for her. This caused him to hurt her badly when he kissed Sam at a party. By being with Mary Elizabeth, Charlie wasted time not being with the love of his