Political and Emotional Dictatorship within Junot Diaz's Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

In the book Alvarez informs us that this takes place during Trujillo 's reign over the Dominican Republic in the 1930’s to the 1960’s. Throughout history dictators have risen and fallen all across the world. Many have been seen as evil, and sometimes good to others, but no matter what a persons view tend to be there are some who even consider them god. Due to a dictators extensive powers and complete control over every aspect of a persons life this is what comes to be. Trujillo is just the same, at first his true motives were questioned and it wasn’t apparent to all what he really was. As the Mirabel sisters grow up it becomes clear that Trujillo is in control of more of their lives than it may seemed. Trujillo leads a complete authoritarian rule over the Dominican Republic with spies everywhere, this can suggest that he trying to assume the role of a terrible god, who is always watching and ready to punish. While all

invested in the revolution. He eventually has to flee the country to get away from Trujillo. "Lío was

Both these stories show the power Trujillo had on his people. Trujillo wanted to make his presence felt everywhere in the Dominican Republic. This is shown when Diaz states

The Mexican Revolution brought multiple parties and movements out of the woodwork. In John Womack’s Zapata and the Mexican Revolution, a story of one state’s drive for agrarian reform and its people’s evolving mission was told, with Emiliano Zapata as a pivotal leader. The dynamics of the revolution, however, reach deeper than Womack’s account portrays. While Womack documents the revolutionary path of the Zapatistas from the southern state of Morelos, the story of Pancho Villa, an arguably parallel character fighting for states in the North against the repressive powers of General Victoriano Huerta, reads more as a subplot. The writings of Samuel Brunk, Ana Maria Alonso, and Mariano Azuela shed light on the less simplistic dynamics of

Alvarez shows many different ways a dictator affects both politics and daily life. People were afraid to say Trujillo’s name in an uncomplimentary way in fear of the consequences if someone were to hear and it get back to him. They were also afraid of being murdered in public for even threatening him. Trujillo was a harsh man so when Minerva says,” and I can see my hand in an endless slow motion rise---a mind all its own and come down on the astonished, made up face,”(she slaps him)(Alvarez 100) later in the book his revenge is for her to not be able to get her licence. Cruel right, but that is what happened when you messed with Trujillo. She also shows the sisters religions throughout the book, mainly Patria’s. Patria is the most religious sister and goes through the most

Point of view is important in any novel. It allows readers to see and understand the events and characters in a novel. Depending on who is speaking, point of view can drive the plot and convey the thoughts of the characters in a story. In the novel, The Brief Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz, point of view plays a crucial role in narrating the life of the lonesome outsider, Oscar. The novel is narrated in first person, but Diaz chooses to disclose who the speaker is until later in the book. As the story progresses, there are clues that hint to the reader who the outside source narrating Oscars life is. Diaz uses Yunior to narrate a majority of the novel. This point of view lets the readers understand the Dominican culture through Yunior’s commentary and perspective. It also gives an outside perspective on Oscar which helps build Oscar as a character. Instead of using an omniscient third person or generic first person point of view, Diaz uses multiple characters to narrate the story. This ingenious idea gave the story a more personal and up close look at not only the life of Oscar, but also the lives of his sister, Lola, and his mother, Beli.

Patria is exposed to the truth that Trujillo was not the god-like entity she perceived him to be. In Patria’s mind there is no separation between god and Trujillo; they are one. Patria is finally coming face to face with the problems within the Dominican Republic. This revelation foreshadows how Patria will become involved with the regime and what part she might play.

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz is about a Dominican family who lives in Paterson New Jersey and they have been through many tribulations in life. The theme I chose for my essay is Fuku and Love, in the novel these two themes were mainly the reason why the characters got their self in situations they could not overcome. The novel is overall about finding love and overcoming the family curse.

In The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, the reader gets a sense of what the expectations are of Dominican men and women. Junot Díaz uses Oscar in contrast to the other male characters to present the expectations of the Dominican male. On the other hand, Díaz presents the women in the text, especially Belicia, La Inca, Lola, and Jenni, as strong characters in their own rights, but the male characters, with the exception of Oscar, have a desire to display their masculinity to maintain power over these women. It would be unfair to say that the women bring the abuse unto themselves, but rather it is their culture that makes the abuse acceptable and almost to a certain extent—expected.

Furthermore, the tyrannical ways of Trujillo are palpable in the quote, “They stripped me down to my slip… I had never known such terror.”(Alvarez 254) Here, Maria Teresa is being tortured in order to persuade her husband into doing something. Clearly these acts are unacceptable to us, and it was definitely viewed as immoral to Alvarez. The reproving manner is evident here as Alvarez is trying to instill some provocative thoughts in the reader by giving us examples as to the severity and atrocity of Trujillo’s methods. Her use of phrases like these are definitely justified as in reality, Trujillo is doing bad things and should be considered a dictator. Eventually, it comes down to the underlying idea that Alvarez uses words like “terror” and “fear” to connect to the savage ways of Trujillo, making the dictatorial theme apparent.

As children grow up in a dysfunctional family, they experience trauma and pain from their parent’s actions, words, and attitudes. With this trauma experienced, they grew up changed; different from other children. The parent’s behavior affects them and whether they like it or not, sometimes it can influence them, and they can react against it or can repeat it. In Junot Díaz’s “Fiesta, 1980”, is presented this theme of the dysfunctional family. The author presents a story of an adolescent Latin boy called Junior, who narrates the chronicles of his dysfunctional family, a family of immigrants from the Dominican Republic driving to a party in the Bronx, New York City. “Papi had been with

When you see someone characterize someone else as a nerd, what do you generally think about this person, what if this same person is characterized as a geek? Most people generally hold a negative connotation with one of these titles, some see it as the geek and some see it as the nerds. Oscar De Leon and Yunior from Juinot Diaz’s The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao can be classified as members of either of these groups in some ways. There are ways that they fit in and ways that they don’t but first, in order to see how Oscar and Yunior fit into the geek or nerd classifications or not the criteria must be defined.

The Underdogs by Mariano Azuela is arguably the most important novel of the Mexican Revolution because of how it profoundly captures the atmosphere and intricacies of the occasion. Although the immediate subject of the novel is Demetrio Macias - a peasant supporter of the Mexican Revolution -, one of its extensive themes is the ambivalence surrounding the revolution in reality as seen from a broader perspective. Although often poetically revered as a ‘beautiful’ revolution, scenes throughout the novel paint the lack of overall benevolence even among the protagonist revolutionaries during the tumultuous days of the revolution. This paper will analyze certain brash characteristics of the venerated revolution as represented by Azuela’s

In addition, Trujillo was friends with the head of the armed forces, and friends with his wife’s lover. One day Trujillo told the general about his wife having an affair with another man, and Trujillo became the head of the armed forces soon after the general shot his wife and her lover. (17). Even though the sisters didn’t want to believe it the accusations against their president, but began to realize how true they were. Over time the sisters met others that didn’t agree with their president’s ways, and that is how the Mirabel sisters came to join the Virgilio Morales.

Before Night Falls tells the story of Reinaldo Arenas, a Cuban writer who suffered for many years and dealt with tragic circumstances all throughout his life. Living during Fidel Castro’s harsh regime as a homosexual male led to several years of torture, for he was imprisoned, but ultimately set free. Additionally, his writing was bold and went against everything that Castro represented, and he took extreme risks to get his work published in other countries. The world heard the prolific voice of Arenas, while the Cuban government, his fellow writers, and even his lovers tried to silence him. Arenas was an extremely important figure in Latin culture. This is not simply because his work was profound; his life gives us a deeper look at the difficulties of struggling with homosexuality, masculinity, and finding freedom. He embodies resilience, charisma, determination, and at the same time fragility, weakness and pain.