The Perks of Being a Wallflower
by Stephen Chbosky
|
List Price: Our Price: $8.12 You Save: $5.88 (42%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $6.30 (click here) Category: Book See more book details and other editions |
|---|
Book Reviews of The Perks of Being a Wallflower
Book Review: Kind of Cheezy and Implausible, But Provocative
Summary: 3 Stars
Even though I have a bit of a penchant for the coming-of-age genre, it's unlikely I would have picked this debut novel up had it not been selected for my book club to read. That said, it's one of those paradoxical books that isn't objectively all that great, and yet managed to provoke fairly strong reaction in everyone I know who read it, and was a great springboard for conversation. As I later discovered, it's a very controversial book in that it's made its way onto assigned reading lists at high schools around the country, while also being one of perennially the most "challenged", according to the American Library Association. The story is told by Charlie, a 15-year-old boy starting his freshman year of high school in some medium-sized Pennsylvania city. From the very beginning, the reader learns he's got a whole host of issues, including the recent suicide of his only friend, and a recent spell at a mental facility following the death of a beloved aunt. The book takes the form of letters he writes to an unnamed person as a form of self-therapy. Presumably the format is intended to draw the reader into Charlie's world, to make the reader the confidante, but it's somewhat clumsily executed. From a stylistic standpoint, the letters often lapse into verbatim dialogue found in novels (and never in letters), and one suspects Chbosky would have been better off just writing it as a straight first-person novel.
In any event, soon after school starts and it's established that Charlie is utterly alone, he manages to befriend two seniors (a brother and sister). They cheerfully-and completely implausibly-take him under their wing and induct him into their established circle of "outsider" friends (the kind who go see Rocky Horror Picture Show every Friday). The likelihood of a group of relatively cool outsider seniors actively tanking in an utterly awkward freshman stretched credulity too far for everyone I know who's read the book. But you have to accept it to continue and soon, despite being the titular wallflower, he is well on his way to learning about the classic themes of sex, drugs, and rock and roll (although it's admittedly a bit of a stretch to call The Smiths rock and roll...). Much of the story revolves around how numb Charlie is to life, and his halting attempts to "participate" in life. Alas, his social skills are completely retarded, and while he is completely nice and full of love for his friends, his cluelessness to social norms continually confuses and thwarts him. And lurking behind all of this is some heavy duty emotional damage that has him always on the verge of bursting into tears, the underlying cause of which is revealed with a grand flourish at the end.
The book moves right along at a rapid pace, however if one steps back at the end, one realizes that Charlie has managed to encounter almost every teen issue out there in a kind of smorgasbord of afterschool special issues. There's drug experimentation, sexual experimentation, homosexuality and homophobia, abusive relationships, teen pregnancy, bullying, suicide, depression, social ostracization, and so on-basically every coming-of-age topic is covered in the span of a school year. It all becomes a bit much, and Chbosky would have been much better served focusing on only a few of these instead of throwing the kitchen sink at Charlie.
Charlie's account of all this is certainly likely to generate a great deal of empathy in certain kinds of readers (a number of people in my bookgroup reported having cried at times while reading it) and a certain degree of introspection on one's own teen years. However, elements of the story read strongly of author-fantasy, of being the kinds of things that Chbosky wishes had happened to him. For example, there's the cool Teach for America teacher who gives Charlie all these extra "advanced" books to read and eventually tells him that he's not just the most brilliant kid he's ever met, but he most brilliant person! And then there's Charlie's first kiss, set up in heart-rending perfection by the much older girl he's in love with, which reads like a textbook entry of what everyone in the whole world wishes their first kiss could have been.
So, it's not a great book, there's a lot of really cheezy bits, and one has to suspend a great deal of disbelief. And yet Chbosky does manage to pull off some very nice and sometimes quite funny writing about family, friendship, and figuring oneself out. The sexual themes are perhaps more than many parents might feel comfortable with, and what's especially likely to worry parents is that no judgments are made. (Of course, if judgments were made, it's unlikely the intended audience of teens would respond particularly well to being spoon-fed what they should think and feel.) Still, it struck most people I know as a good book for generating discussion with their own kids at age 13 or 14.
Book Review: If he's a wallflower, then I'm a dust mote...
Summary: 3 Stars
My reaction to this novel is skewed, I admit. I was not able to give it due attention befitting of any work of literature: after reaching the halfway point, I just stashed it back onto the shelf and decided to finish it for some other time.
And, of course, when I did deign to pick up where I left off, I knew I already lost the momentum of what Chbosky was trying to convey.
And that's the crux of the matter: the fact that I was only able to bring myself to finish this after a...sabbatical, so to speak, speaks loudly of what I really felt about this story.
The young 'Charlie''s forays into the painful, sublime, befuddling, and intense world of adolescence is a bit of a stereotype--in the sense that the imageries evoked by the author are not that radically different from those that I have seen in Hollywood high-school movies (whether it's authentic or not need not be duly problematized): there is always the jock, the artsy, bohemian clique, the mousy spectacled-girl, the pretentious do-gooder, the depressed misanthrope, and other personas making up that stage of the teenage 'drama'.
I agree with some of the reviews stating that the lead character is not really a wallflower. In my opinion, 'Charlie' is just exceptionally observant, with a healthy level of genuine curiosity and introspection I barely find in people nowadays.
Anyway, I did feel a little cheated by the novel. I consider myself a wallflower (and perhaps one could understand if I'd rather not go into the embarrassing details) that's why I was excited about reading this book--I thought I would be able to form a sense of affinity with 'Charlie', to discover the "perks" touted by the title, if any.
But then, of course, he's not really `outside' of what is deemed the active 'experiencing' of life. He is actually brought into the fold of the 'infinite'--with 'Patrick' and 'Sam' he is able to experience a plethora of emotions--without having to take a step back into the shadows in order to blend with the woodwork.
He became at times drunk with heady giddiness, or morose with excruciating guilt, and sometimes simply patently confused with the boy-girl shenanigans that preoccupy the average teen's waking hours. Certainly, of course, the bit of popularity he earned well into the story, as well as the dramas that unfolded with him at the epicenter, are not symptomatic of someone who lived his life with his back stuck perpetually to the wall, watching everybody else cut a rug out in the middle of the floor.
And so, to (belatedly) make a story short, I was not that engaged with the story. There really was nothing striking or new about it--teenage dystopia is practically a transient rite of passage, whether experienced in seclusion or with a group. 'Patrick's homosexuality, the drinking bouts and drug-laced sessions of the 'infinite' trio, and whatever other highs or lows explored in this novel that are so controversial to so many readers...should really not be all that surprising. However, I am not saying that this is the norm, or something that should just be tolerated. But it is the unflinching reality in many places in modern societies.
I really did not feel uplifted in any significant way after turning the last page. Hence, I found difficulty in what the author was trying to convey to me. If his overall message was profound or infinitely inspirational to *you*, then all well and good.
In my case, I was unsure if Chbosky was simply getting in line with the countless other writers or artists who tried to give concrete form (read here as a piece of writing) to societal reality. Or was he simply depicting (again, like so many others) nothing more than another instance of teenage life seen through the eyes of someone purported to be an introvert?
Or was the message really only at the end: that despite the ridiculously horrid things in life, sometimes the only thing that one needs is to ride the back of a speeding pickup truck and feel the rush of wind on one's face.
And that whatever tears are shed while speeding down that road are simply the same ones that have cleansed one's soul.
What I did enjoy in the novel are the bits of practical curiosities 'Charlie' asked himself (and told the unnamed recipient of his letters) as he observed his family and friends. These observations were so simple and familiar that I did ask myself at times, "why indeed?"
(And, of course, there were the Beatles tunes the author was kind enough to pay homage to.
Sorry. Couldn't help myself.)
Book Review: What's a Wallflower?
Summary: 4 Stars
I found this book's cover what my design and technology teacher would comment as 'aesthetically pleasing'. A nice fresh cover of grassy green that I could almost smell! But something else had also caught my attention, it's title. And the first thing that came to mind came in the form of a question: "What is a wallflower?"I had an idea it must not be anything too glorious for the title included the word 'perks' and did not fail to suggest 'a wallflower' is something that lacks anything good in the first place. So I did what any rational person would do and looked it up in my Oxford study dictionary. I didn't expect to find the word deep down, it sounded new and 'slangish' but I found it on page 783. But I'm not very logical or rational to be honest with you. I actually read the book before looking up the word. I suppose I hoped the book might explain its title better than a dictionary but we all know that not many books explain their titles. They just base themselves around the titles. And this book wasn't much different to my great and satisfactory relief, when I finally realised that if it had then it would have been one very boring book.
Charlie is your average 'Adrian Mole' except he's just a little more of a 'Charlie' than he is 'Adrian'. And of course very intelligent (that's what his English teacher said, he got straight A's all through the year he wrote the letters so I really don't have anything to say to the fact I didn't feel he was completely interllectual). This book is about "Growing Up" and goes on for a year whilst lacking two days. At fifteen years old, Charlie has few friends, generally close family members and a painful past of losing his closest friend: Aunt Helen. Basically, Charlie just has a life. That is until he gets into high school. After Aunt Helen died on his seventh birthday he probably didn't think anything worse could happen. He was right, nothing worse happened. A catch though, things happened that were just as bad. His friend Michael, commits suicide and Susan who was a friend too decides to become popular. The lights go out and Charlie is alone. But he meets new friends older than him and grabs his English teacher's attention. His family has their crisis' and become closer and everything that seemed as if it was going to make things worse make life better. He falls in love, he breaks hearts, he breaks his own and he starts to understand and learn how to be a true friend. That he must give as much as he is giving now but also speak for himself and have a voice, that he decides later is a true friend. And he realises that his life from the moment of Michael's death or maybe even earlier from the moment of his Aunt's death had become one of those very old and slow, ancient records. By the last letter he sends he throws away the record and starts living again.
This is the clearest pocket encyclopedia of high school divided into four parts and decorated with a soothing epilogue.
Maybe it's because I read ANTHEM by AYN RAND before this book but Mr. Chbosky's book seemed almost relaxing. I felt I was reading from a regular diary belonging to a friend and as time passed I felt that I was reading real letters. By the end of the book Charlie becomes a true human being in reality. And yet you don't grow too fond of him that by the time you finish you feel that empty surge of lonliness cover you steadily. But if you do as I did then Charlie writes something at the end that relaxes you. Relaxes you because he assures you he'll be OK and that he'll make it through in one piece and make living worth it and most of all that he knows you will too. And somehow you know he's right-because he's Charlie.
Oh..by the way, I looked it up and this is what it said:
wallflower n.1 a garden plant blooming in spring, with clusters of fragrant flowers. 2 (informal) a woman sitting out dances for lack of partners.
but I didn't bother to ask anyone for the real meaning that I was looking for. I already knew it without the book having to explain it to me. I had Charlie explain it to me instead. Of course I didn't really need one, I don't think you will either.
[[[please remember to read the excerpts listed to the sidebar, it'll help loads]]]
Book Review: A technical flop, and a great read...
Summary: 4 Stars
I probably wouldn't have written this, Amy, unless I thought you'd read it as well, so here it is...
The Perks of Being a Wallflower
(four stars)
"A Technical Flop and a Great Read"
First off, I will say that this is pulp. It's not high literature. The fact that this is being treated as such by the reviewers on this site confuses the hell out of me. If you want downer brilliant art, try reading Doesteovsky's Brother's Karamazov, or Hemingway's Farewell to Arms... or any of the books that Charlie reads off of Bill in the course of the book.
So I wouldn't call it art. To think it is is to sort of miss the point. This book fails terribly on all technical levels.
The prose are weak and simplistic. They are written by a 15 year old, but he's supposed to be a literary genius. He reads Fountainhead by Ayn Rand in less than a week while maintaining a 4.0 grade average, and hanging out with his disfucntional friends nearly every day.
The problems are all straight out of after school specials.
Teen abortion: Which was done as a boring plot device to waste pages and didn't do much to move the story along.
Drug use: (Which the author portrayed in the most ridiculous over the top manner. The LSD scene involved something as absurd as someone doing a line of crystal meth and then taking a nice relaxing nap. But this is not Electric Koolaid Acid Test or a Timiothy Leary book, so this misses the point.)
Homosexual love affairs/homophobia/hate crime: Out of all the teen melodrama stuff in the book, this part really works. It's been done to death, but done well here.
Sexual abuse: done in the standard hackneyed manner
...and so on...
But here's the rub for you high browers out there that were giving this one and two stars... you didn't get the point.
This book, like The Stranger and all the other books, if you folks didn't get it, had a large part to do with the structure of the book.
Ludwig Wittgenstein used to say that pulp books had more and richer philosophy than that which came from the ivory towers of academia.
You just have to look for it.
Let's take one of the books Bill gives Charlie, and look at it briefly.
The Stranger by Albert Camus.
All the complaints against this book can be put on to The Stranger, and those of you that maligned Perks and say you liked The Stranger probably only say so because you think you should like it.
The plot of The Stranger can be summed up almost entirely in three sentences.
A man commits a murder.
A man goes to trial.
A man is executed.
Now this is the important part of The Stranger and Wallflower.. (even though I wouldn't actually compare them directly on merit. I highly doubt that Wallflower will be taught in university literature or philosophy classes a hundred years from now, but it's the same idea)
The important part is that you're seeing these cliche events through the eyes of the narrator. In both cases deeply disturbed people in very different ways.
Charlie, the main in wallflowers, is weak, nervous, frail, and has no self perspective. If people hate him, he hates himself. If people love him, he feels great, etc. He sobs very often at what would be fairly trivial events for most people. He's hyperliterate to almost the point of absurdity. He's frightened by many things. And he finds exaltation in things as simple as a song by the Smiths or how a friend looks dressed up as Doctor Fraken Furtur...
The story isn't about the plot, it's about seeing the cliches that we're used to in this current zeitgeist (as was the case with Camus and the then over used cliche of the murder/trial novel) through the eyes of a truly unusual individual.
That's the art, and that's the philosophy.
So stop complaining about the prose or the lack of originality in the plot. That's not the point.
Book Review: The Perks of Being a Wallflower
Summary: 4 Stars
The Perks of Being a Wallflower, by Stephen Chbosky, is narrated by a young boy name Charlie. Charlie is a 15 yr old boy with an endless amount of questions about life, love, and the world in general. Wallflower is strongly reminiscent of JD Salinger's Catcher in the Rye. The book is a series of letters written by Charlie to an anonymous reader. Charlie tells the reader about his life. These letters ultimately lead up to a major turning point in Charlie's life. The themes in the book deal with the coming of age of a young adolescent boy, as well as the desire to fit in and become accepted by his peers. You, as the reader, are unaware of whom Charlie is writing these letters to, only that "... she said you listen and understand and didn't try to sleep with that person at the party even though you could have."(p. 2) I found this book to be a classic coming of age story with a surprisingly tragic twist in the end, and I thoroughly enjoyed reading it.
Chbosky's use of tone and diction contributes to the overall effectiveness of the book. Chbosky uses an adolescent tone to convey the image of a young writer. Charlie has a very free form of writing. His English teacher Bill, tells him that he uses improper grammar and punctuation. "Bridget who is crazy said that sometimes she thought about suicide when commercials came on during TV."(3) He is constantly running his sentences together, and often uses unnecessary words. "First of all, Bill gave me a C on my To Kill a Mockingbird essay because he said that I run my sentences together. I am trying no to practice not to do that."(14) The way he speaks is very similar to the way two teenagers would hold a conversation. Charlie doesn't For example, he often precedes his sentences with the word "incidentally." These small additions to the text help to convince the reader of the narrator's age. Chbosky effective use of diction and style gives a strong message of the audience that he is appealing to.
Chbosky also has the ability to help the reader relate to Charlie. Throughout the book, Charlie experiences many "firsts." At one point, Charlie goes to his first party with his new friends, Sam and Patrick. He describes his feeling by saying, "I have since bought the record, and I would tell you what is was, but truthfully, it's not the same unless you're driving to your first real party, and you are sitting in the middle seat of a pickup with two nice people when it starts to rain."(33) When Charlie describes this feeling, the reader can almost feel the excitement and anticipation that he is feeling. Chbosky effortlessly conveys the feelings and emotions of Charlie. It is so easy to relate to Charlie that at times, it feels as if he is a close friend, sharing his feelings.
The book is extremely well written and is able to draw the reader in and hold their interest until the last pages of the book. However, there are several things that I would like to have been told. Near the end of the book, there is a twist in the plot. It is something that Charlie realizes at the same time as the reader. When reading this book, it is important to pay attention to the subtlety used by the author. When I first read the book, I almost missed the turning point in the book because of how discreet the author was. I would also have liked to have more detail on the events that preceded the author's realization.
In The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Stephen Chbosky is successful in persuading the reader that he is an average fifteen year old boy. Chbosky does this by providing the reader with a voice reflective of an adolescent. He also draws the reader in by putting the narrator in situations which many readers can relate to. Altogether, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, is an extremely interesting, well written book about the struggles of a young boy's coming to peace with himself.