The Flawed Man and Identity in The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
Humans have always encountered the idea of the ‘flawed man’ because we see it in ourselves, and in the people around us. The flawed man is never finished and continuously pushes and strives to improve himself or compensate for faults. Diaz’s fascination with the ‘flawed man’ is apparent in all three of his major novels, Drown, This is How You Lose Her, and The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. The majority of his characters all have severe flaws, which individually reveal certain truths about the human experience. The flawed character is more realistic and honest to how people actually live and perceive their lives than perfect or less complex personas. The Brief Life of …show more content…
For example, Beli could not find identity through family because she never knew them so she looks for grounding in love. At thirteen, she has a crush on an upper class boy who only wants to take advantage of her. She “believed in love like a seventy-year-old widow who's been abandoned by family, husband, children and fortune believes in God” (88). The author compares Beli to an elderly widow because she has lost her close family in the same way a widow is let down by family and fortune. Diaz also compares Beli’s crushes and search for love to God because religion and intimacy are both ways people use to find a sense of purpose and being. In a nutshell, the novel covers a Dominican nerd’s quest to get laid. It is not until the final pages that the readers learn he did have sex with a prostitute named Ybon before he died. The author writes, “what really got him was not the bam-bam-bam of sex -- it was the little intimacies that he’d never in his whole life anticipated, … the intimacies like listening to her tell him about being a little girl and him telling her that he’d been a virgin all his life” (334). Oscar realizes that while he’s been looking to get laid for most of his life, he was actually looking for love and intimacy. And, he was looking for love and intimacy because he was looking for identity and a sense of belonging. In this way, Diaz highlights the flawed man’s quest for identity and the euphoric relief that comes with its acquisition. Additionally, the author’s juxtaposition between the harsh ‘bam-bam-bam’ onomatopoeia for sex and the drawn out and more eloquent description of intimacies demonstrates the difference between what Oscar thought he wanted and what he really
Humans have always encountered the idea of the ‘flawed man’ because we see it in ourselves, and in the people around us. The flawed man is never finished and continuously pushes and strives to improve himself or compensate for faults. Diaz’s fascination with the ‘flawed man’ is apparent in all three of his major novels, Drown, This is How You Lose Her, and The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. The majority of his characters all have severe flaws, which individually reveal certain truths about the human experience. The flawed character is more realistic and honest to how people actually live and perceive their lives than perfect or less complex personas. The Brief Life of …show more content…
For example, Beli could not find identity through family because she never knew them so she looks for grounding in love. At thirteen, she has a crush on an upper class boy who only wants to take advantage of her. She “believed in love like a seventy-year-old widow who's been abandoned by family, husband, children and fortune believes in God” (88). The author compares Beli to an elderly widow because she has lost her close family in the same way a widow is let down by family and fortune. Diaz also compares Beli’s crushes and search for love to God because religion and intimacy are both ways people use to find a sense of purpose and being. In a nutshell, the novel covers a Dominican nerd’s quest to get laid. It is not until the final pages that the readers learn he did have sex with a prostitute named Ybon before he died. The author writes, “what really got him was not the bam-bam-bam of sex -- it was the little intimacies that he’d never in his whole life anticipated, … the intimacies like listening to her tell him about being a little girl and him telling her that he’d been a virgin all his life” (334). Oscar realizes that while he’s been looking to get laid for most of his life, he was actually looking for love and intimacy. And, he was looking for love and intimacy because he was looking for identity and a sense of belonging. In this way, Diaz highlights the flawed man’s quest for identity and the euphoric relief that comes with its acquisition. Additionally, the author’s juxtaposition between the harsh ‘bam-bam-bam’ onomatopoeia for sex and the drawn out and more eloquent description of intimacies demonstrates the difference between what Oscar thought he wanted and what he really