Ursula LeGuin's The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas Essay

A utopia is a place of ideal perfection. However, according to the Merriam-Webster, it is also an impractical scheme for social improvement. Though dating back to the earliest days of U.S. history, utopian communities became a part of American thought by the 1840s. Various groups that were struggling because of urbanization and industrialization, challenged the traditional norms of American society with a desire to create a world without capitalism, immigration, and the tension between communities. However, these attempts failed due to individualism, materialism, the lack of growth, and little balance.

The book, Reviving Ophelia, is about the hardships girls go through when they are growing up and trudging through puberty. As the author Mary Pipher states it, adolescent girls tend to lose their “true selves” in order to fit in and comply with the standards that society sets for women. Pipher, a practicing therapist, uses her own case studies to show how pressures put on girls forces them to react in often damaging ways. In most case studies she tells the audience how she helped these girls heal and regain control of their lives. It seems that her primary goal is to warn people of what certain effects can have on girls and what not to do. The one thing that Pipher tends to overlook is what parents can do right to raise healthy

Including these parts into the play, it shows just how affected people can be, and how many really do react to the unpleasant tragedies. Once Ophelia, a smart, young woman found that her father had been slain, she went mad in grief, singing sorrowful tunes and drowning herself in the river, not being able to bear any more of the sadness that she felt. All happening so soon, in this story characters are faced with corruption, but not all know how to bear with it. Ophelia is just one of many that faces this kind of heartbreak, however all people experience it in different ways. The frailty also will lead to anger, and confusion in actions, allowing many, including Laertes and even Hamlet, to pursue rebellious acts without remorse until it has been done. Shakespeare demonstrates that people are not invulnerable, and many of the ominous feelings we face can lead to terrible

By exploring the responses Ophelia and Laertes had to their father’s death, other aspects of human nature are revealed. Their responses to

The boy “needs” to be in pain and live in horrible conditions so Omelas can stay beautiful, so all the citizens in Omelas can live happy, and all the children can live healthy. “They all know that it [the boy] has to be there...that their happiness, the beauty of their city, the health of their children, the wisdom of their scholars, the skill of their makers” (Le Guin 282). As the short story reveals, most of the citizens in the town knows the existence of this boy, knows the condition “it” lives in, knows that “it” begs every night to be let out; but just because of one slightest speculation, the boy has to suffer for his entire life in underground Omelas. The definition of Omelas is a city of togetherness, peacefulness, and happiness but the boy does not possess any of these traits. As the narrator puts it “The terms are strict and absolute; there may not even be a kind word spoken to the child” (Le Guin 282). This rejects the trait that Omelas is together. On the surface, it seems like citizens in Omelas are enjoying their time together, but they all possess more or less a feeling of guilt if not pity. Later on in the passage, the narrator reveals “Often the young people go home in tears, or in a tearless rage, when they have seen the child and faced this terrible paradox” (Le Guin 282). The

Oates's story, according to its ambiguous ending, can have several interpretations. The most literally one depends upon the problem of rape in today's culture. Connie is a pretty, young and inexperienced girl. She is being seduced by an older man, who finally achieves his goal, rapes her, and probably murders. The story can be a kind of warning that there are thousands of women harmed through this crime every day, and more often they are innocent and naive teenagers and girls. It may also call for not only reacting to a victim of a horrible rape, but for searching out the rapists, seeking the causes of rape in the society, and stopping this epidemic at its source.

    Orual is writing a book as her complaint against the gods and all the wrong that they have done to her. Through her narrative she demonstrates to the reader her erroneous thinking, which she realizes later in her life. . She sees her own face in the second section of the book when the veil in front of her spiritual face is removed and her true self  is exposed. She realizes that she was not as righteous as she believed herself to be. The things that she thought were right had been wrong. She hurt a lot of people with

She cannot come to terms with the fact that her son was brought back crippled. She questions why there is evil in the world and why good people have to suffer. Oriel does not understand why God had punished her since she was such a devoted and hard working woman. She becomes disappointed and angry with

Ophelia begins the play as an average girl growing up in a place that would predispose her to Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Her father’s murder did not drive her insane, but shook an easily shaken system. “First her father slain: Next your son gone; and he most violent author Of his own just remove…. Poor Ophelia Divided from herself and her fair judgment, Without the which we are pictures, or mere beasts” (Shakespeare).

She starts off by comparing Omayra’s entrapment to her own daughter’s, who fell ill and is now trapped in her own ailing body. Allende also mentions that Omayra never once asked for help. Her saying this confirms my thought that Omayra is accepting her fate at this moment. Thanks to Allende we are also able to delve into the details of what occurred before the photo was taken; which is obviously something that the image can only hint at. Based on the information provided by Allende, we now know that this little girl was stuck in between two branches and her brothers’ dead bodies and some sort of environmental disaster had caused her house to crumble. She also points out how “elegant’ Omayra’s hands are in a time of chaos. Allende explains that Omayra’s family is not around. She is surrounded by photographers, cameramen and other strangers. We know that her family is poor and that life expectancy where she is from is low before tragedies liked this even

She directly says, “Men who would eat your children…” which is used to tighten and warp the reader's stomach into pieces. This type of diction, not only makes the reader squeamish, but also makes the reader image the horror of these times. Next, the city is “held by cores of blackened looters”, which really explicates the condition of the town. When conditions become brutal, people must do what

            You see, the citizens are aware of the child’s presence. They are aware, as well , that it is a necessity. They all know that it has to be there. Some understand why, and some do not, but they all understand that their happiness, the beauty of their city, ...the health of their children, the wisdom of their scholars...even the abundance of their harvest...depend wholly on this child’s abominable misery. Somehow, the oppression of the child makes possible the advancement of Omelas. The citizens need to keep the child down so that they can rise. It is the existence of the child, and their knowledge of its existence, that makes possible the nobility of [Omelas]. They all know that if the child were to be freed, Ò...in that day

After that, people may suffer conflict, starvation and warfare, even use the nuclear weapon and other advance technology. Basically, people who want to leave the city because they cannot stand that child suffer all the bad things, so if they bring the bad things back by releasing the child, everyone would suffer the same encounter as the child. In other words, that makes the circumstance more complex and harmful result in they have to leave rather than help the child get rid of the situation. One last reason people choose to leave the Omelas is that people try to find another place.

To begin, in the first part of the story, a city called Omelas and its inhabitants are described as one happy community, but a negative connotation on the city and its people is implied as the story progresses.”They

Olunde attempts to reveal to Jane the greatness of his father 's sacrifice for his peace and the peace of his own people, his father is going to commit suicide to save his community from destruction. However, Jane cannot understand the implication of that sacrifice which she regards as a ' 'barbaric custom ' ' or even ' 'feudalistic. ' ' Olunde 's long conversation with Jane reveals the arrogance, vulnerability, disintegration and hypocrisy of the English people. He expresses the terrible conditions of war he underwent during his stay in England. As a medical student there, Olunde has seen ' 'the West on its own grounds, complete in its wartime vulnerabilities. He attends to English soldiers wounded on World War II and has therefore