Oscar Wao Analysis

Beli’s efforts to forget the violence of her early life reflect a greater effort of the Dominican people trying to separate themselves from the Trujillo legacy through forgetting and selective memory. Beli, “Embraced the amnesia that was so common throughout the Islands, five parts denial, five parts negative hallucination” (Diaz 259). As Monica Hanna states, “Forgetting is a seductive prospect when memory seems only to recall pain, but this consistently proves to be a very dangerous choice” (506). Rather than dealing with the pain of a violent past, people choose to forget it and unacknowledged it. Rather than resist, the characters fall victim to the power of fukú. However, the act of forgetting becomes dangerous because characters are doomed …show more content…
As a prostitute, Ybon escorts powerful men from all over the Dominican Republic linking her to the dangerous power structure. Moreover, since Oscar does not live up to the idealized Dominican man, he becomes of a victim of violence within their relationship. In “Dictating Desire, Dictating Diaspora: Junot Diaz’s The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao as Foundational Romance,” Elena Machado Saez states, “Oscar's virginity is a product of his sentimentality, and together these factors invalidate his claim to Dominican masculine identity” (535-6). Arguably, his greatest weakness comes from his demonstration of more feminine qualities, which puts him into a precarious position within a macho male dominated society. The only way for Oscar to gain manhood, is to have sex with Ybon. Once Oscar validates his manhood by having sex with Ybon, he begins to become a true Dominican man. While this act may have lit a fire within Oscar to embrace his more masculine qualities, it also dooms him as death becomes his only way out because of who Ybon associates with. Like Beli and the Gangster, the capitán’s goons take Oscar to the very same canefields. Before he can ever find security within himself, he dies at the hands of the capitán who resents Oscar for loving what he views as his property, Ybon. As a thuggish woman abuser, the capitán acts as a macho man who beats not only women, but Oscar, who …show more content…
She understands the realities of Dominican life and realizes that her best way of survival is to remove herself from the situation. By then instilling the wisdom in her daughter, Lola ensures that Isis can move forward in a healthy manner, unlike the rest of her family. “on a string around her neck: three azabaches: the one that Oscar wore as a baby, the one that Lola wore as a baby, and the one that Beli was given by La Inca upon reaching Sanctuary. Powerful elder magic. Three barrier shields against the Eye” (Diaz 329). As Hanna states, “Lola attempts to shield her daughter from evil by providing her daughter physical reminders of their family history. Memory acts as a sort of talisman for her” (516). While it’s not clear how much Lola has told Isis from Yunior’s narration, hopes for a future free from fukú lie with her understanding of familial history and ultimately Dominican history. This hope starts with the ability to heal deep wounds that do nothing but point to further suffering. The mixture of historical facts, magical realism, and narrative prose allow The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao to be Junot Díaz's plea to his native culture. It allows him to hold up a mirror and to show the dangers of continued complicity in a broken system. Understanding one’s own experience can allow healing and