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What Is Changez A Metaphor For America

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Changez is an unreliable narrator simply due to the fact he is the only one telling the story; no other character is telling the story or is their backing up his side. It's a monologue from his point of view and everything that is said by anyone, including the American, is said through him. This creates bias on events that occurred because he might not recite the events exactly as they happened. Furthermore, he is an unreliable narrator as he provides two of his views of America. Erica, the girl he loved, is a metaphor for America. “She attracted people to her; she had presence, an uncommon magnetism … yet one got the sense that she existed internally at a degree of remove from those around her … some part of her … was out of reach, lost in …show more content…

He wants to bring attention to America’s reaction, in which we have a sharp biased towards; many Americans would not even think to address. There are many parallels in modern America, in the sense that we are still dealing with xenophobic policies, and racism. Hamid’s purpose with this book is to help start a conversation that many Americans cannot start, either because they are too scared of political backlash, or it is too sensitive of a topic, or it is just too hard to accept that America may have a problem. A good example of Hamid using Changez to start a conversation is this quote “As a society, you were unwilling to reflect upon the shared pain that united you with those who attacked you. You retreated into myths of your own difference, assumptions of your own superiority. And you acted out these beliefs on the stage of the world, so that the entire planet was rocked by the repercussions of your tantrums, not least my family, now facing war thousands of miles away.” (81). This quote does a great job of invoking resentment and anger towards the speaker in this case chanze’s arrogance and insensitive to those who died in 9/11. His Purpose was not to make a reliable character, that we all trust and relate too. Hamid, got his point across, through Changez. Hamid invoked enough emotion to start a conversation, which ultimately is exactly the purpose of this work. Hamid, made Changez biased and in doing so made him an unreliable character, however this does not mean he is not a relatable character because they are many things Changez does that very American. Changez could have lied about everything; the point is that there is no real way of telling whether or not his stories were true or not. This does not take away from the impact of his statements, and this does not take way from the emotion and train of thought this

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