The young adult genre of books is generally taken up by vampires, romance, and fantasy worlds where the guy gets the girl and everyone lives happily ever after. The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky is an acceptance to this. It has an interesting plot line, teaches valuable lessons, and is very realistic. Nobody is perfect, and this book teaches us that the people who matter will accept you anyways. 15 year old Charlie Kelmeckis starts the book as a shy introvert with serious social issues. He is trying to cope with the suicide of his best, and only, friend Michael. He starts writing letters to an unknown person who he was told was nice and would listen to deal with the stress and anxiety of starting high school. He befriends …show more content…
One of my favorite quotes from the book: “So, I guess we are who we are for a lot of reasons. And maybe we’ll never know most of them. But even if we don’t have the power to choose where we come from, we can still choose where we go from there.” This quote exemplifies hope, and strength. No matter where you come from, what demons you’ve faces, they are all part of who you are. You can either let it destroy you, or learn from it and let it lead you to where you want to go. There’s no need to dwell on the past, just look towards the future. Another powerful quote from this book comes when Sam is talking to Charlie: “Why do I and everyone I love pick people who treat us like we’re nothing? ‘We accept the love we think we deserve.’” Self-worth is a big theme throughout the book. The characters have troubles with knowing how to love themselves, which is a theme that I think many people have trouble with. There are many other valuable quotes and themes throughout the book. Charlie is an extremely relatable character. Any teenager who has ever experienced pain, confusion, trouble with self-discovery, or social anxiety can relate to him. The setup of the book allows readers to enter Charlie’s thought bringing the readers closer and more intimate with the events of the book. You feel the emotions that Charlie feels, like you are Charlie. Through Charlie, we learn lots of things about ourselves. Our anxiety, our desire to fit in, and our thirst for happiness. And we learn that we’re not alone in those
Charlie also learns love in a way to get him better and set him for life. When his mother makes him dig the hole and fill it back up, this is harsh love and will prepare Charlie for later life as it will teach him respect and manners. Charlie deep down knows this is what his mother is trying to teach him, but at the time he just wanted to believe that she was trying to punish, annoy and make him work. Charlie also discovers the love of peers. When Charlie is dragged into the drama of Laura by Jasper he didn’t know if to trust him. But when the truth came out and Jasper wasn’t a part of it, Charlie loved him for telling the truth and being a good friend. Also when Jasper asks Charlie to leave Corrigan with him when they are older, Charlie loves Jasper for the respect and friendship he is giving him. Charlie also sees the act of false love. This is seen by Charlie when he witnesses his mother cheating on his father in the backseat of a car. Charlie knew his parents relationship wasn’t going too well, but he didn’t expect this. He uses this to overcome his mothers power over him. But this example shows us how Charlie has learnt the difference between real love and false love, this will only help him later in life.
His frustration grows after his friends start heading off to college and has a constant stressor from all the flashbacks he’s having, believing that he himself killed his Aunt. Charlie was close to his aunt as a child and it is obvious that aunt Helen was playing favoritism when it came to charlie. Aunt Helen gave him a special attention and she was kind to him, she told him that she understood him and he was special but this in a way was a ruse. Charlie repressed his memories of aunt Helen 's sexual assault but started realizing eventually, Charlie has a mental breakdown during his first sexual encounter with Sam and the realization of his past comes flooding in after she touched his leg similar to the way his aunt Helen did to him. He was sexually assaulted by his aunt and he tried forgot all of this and he tried to move on with his life but he saw memories that haunted him. This could be the possible reason and explanation as to why he said to her sister that he wished their aunt to die. Afterward, charlie is in a hospital after trying to commit suicide and must start accepting the truth to get past what happened. Charlie is often trying to please people and is always worried about how other people feel but never truly worries about himself, it could be that charlie is very caring but it is possible that charlie has had this way of thinking instilled in his mind: aunt help was very disturbed as charlie knew this and because of this he was constantly
Also Charlie is one of the most menial kids around he would never go with Jasper if he didn’t have courage. All of the choices Charlie makes impact his life in some way for example; if he didn’t go with Jasper his life would be normal, but because of one simple decision his life changed forever with the fact that he hid a body hovering over him at all times.
I absolutely adored Stephen Chbosky's (Beauty and the Beast, Allegiant) ‘The Perks of Being a Wallflower’ for its captivating and emotionally driven storyline that will intensely connect with all. The movie is filled with teen angst and struggles we can all relate to and discusses topics our society shuns from. This is captivating to an audience and makes them think about mental health and trauma in a way they haven’t before.
You can see many of these emotions and mindsets from several parts of the book. For example (annoyingly repetitive words, I know--I really need to improve my vocabulary) on page 47, he said, “It’s like if I get intelligent enough I’ll understand all the words in my mind, and I’ll know about those boys standing in the hallway, and about my Uncle Herman and my parents.” It was almost like it brought each reader or friend of Charlie through almost an entire life, from being a clueless toddler to growing into an advanced, matured man. As a result of all of these things Charlie was definitely not the same for a while, even though his intelligence disintegrated at the end of the book, as he ended up at the Warren State home. But for the most part he changed as a human being and “science experiment”, according to Dr. Strauss and Professor
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.
His mother had taught him to not look at girls, and after the operation when he started to develop more feelings, he had a hard time talking to Alice Kinnian because he had the thought that he liked her, and that he shouldn’t. Due to the hard nature of his mother, Charlie’s emotional life was not maturing with his new-found intelligence. Emotionally, he was still a little kid. “I knew she would give herself to me, and I wanted her, but what about Charlie?” Whenever he would get near Alice, he would start to panic because he felt that there was still a part of his old self within him, keeping him from taking his relationship further with
The realization allows him to learn how selfish and rude he has been acting all of his life. Not only does Charlie experience companionate love for most likely the first time in his life, he also begins to get a feeling for who he really is. This feeling is known as self-actualization. Although the movie ends before the audience can see the aftermath of his journey, it is somewhat understood that Charlie is a changed man afterwards. He begins to see the little things in life that matter.
“The Perks of Being A Wallflower” has been described as a “coming of age novel.” Charlie, who is a highschool freshman, documents his freshman experiences through writing letters to an unnamed friend. Throughout the book, Charlie is considered to be an socially awkward teen/”wallflower”, always watching from the sidelines before he befriends two charismatic seniors, Patrick and Sam. Even though Charlie is a wallflower who mostly sits and watches the lives around him, he tries hard to participate more and to be more in control of his world. Although “The Perks of Being A Wallflower” is frequently challenged/”banned” for its sexual content, depiction of homosexuality, and the glorification of alcohol use and experimentation with drugs, “The Perks of Being A Wallflower” is a widely admired and is still used in many school districts.
Charlie is very far from what most people call normal: he is shy, introverted, awkward, independent, paranoid, confused, respectable and kind; showing many examples of this throughout the book. He keeps to himself for the most part and is constantly in his own head. Aside from the many negative traits he also has many attributes: he is a loyal friend and listens to the people he talks to, he is a caring person and comforts those in need. However he has his flaws as well: Charlie can get very angry and upset at others which causes him to lash out with violence or sadness, he is extremely sensitive, crying frequently and constantly questioning himself. Several of his peers labeled him as nerd or a weirdo, which damaged
He is struggling to fit in and make friends on top of dealing with two major traumatic deaths of his loved ones. He keeps to himself and watches life from the sidelines until he meets two senior students, Sam and Patrick, who later become his best friends. This opened up a whole lot of new experience for Charlie and their influence on him has a profound effect: He participates in more events and become more comfortable
At the beginning, Charlie is without friends and is rather alone. He is very gifted and quite an overthinker which expels him from the usual teenage social groups. This changes, however, when he meets Sam and Patrick at a football game. They expose him to all new experiences. Resulting from his new friendships, is his relationship with Mary Elizabeth, his experimentations with drugs, and new knowledge of being a person. During this time, he is increasingly happy because Charlie was finally living.
Every kid who grows up in the suburbs loves to visit the big city. Stephen Chbosky’s novel, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, is based in the suburbs of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, that is filled with the problems most suburbs face. Further, Chbosky continuously describes different very troubling mental illnesses which directly and indirectly affect his main character Charlie and all the people around him. Moreover, the proximity in which Charlie lives to the city contributes to his relationships with his friends and family. In the cold suburbs of Pennsylvania, life is different than life in the city, this greatly influences the lifestyle of people throughout the novel.
Loneliness is a feeling that everyone will experience at some point in their life. Loneliness can be felt even when you’re in a room full of people. In “The Perks of Being a Wallflower,” the characters, including Charlie, are no exception to this feeling of being lonely. Teenagers are probably the age group that has this feeling the most. This a time in life that you are changing, the people around you are changing, and you’re finally growing up and maturing and each person handles these changes differently. We each will feel this as some point as we grow and realize that the things and the people that we have grown accustomed to won’t be there anymore because it’s time for us to experience new things in life.
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.