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Victoria Izabell Lorentzen Hasseris gymnasium 19. January 2020

The perks of being a wallflower

Starting High school is hard for most people. Everything is new, and everything is vulnerable.
People use so much time to show who they are and show their best sides, so they have the chance
to hang out with the most popular groups. But that is not easy when you are not one of the
socially skilled teenagers. That can Charlie relate to, the protagonist in the novel “The perks of
being a wallflower” by Stephen Chbosky.

The novel is an epistolary novel, written throughout a year. Charlie, the main character, and the
narrator in the novel. The story is fully told from Charlie’s perspective as a first-person narrator.
He is writing often to reflect on the things there are happening in his life throughout a year:“I start
high school tomorrow and I am really afraid of going.” (Page. 7) The quote tells that Charlie is
staring in high school. He knows from the beginning, that something is about to change. He’s
thoughts about that are either he is going to be the same lonely person, or then he is finding some
friends he can associate with. So, he starts with a new view of the chapter and gives things a new
chance. The reader's knowledge for the upcoming situations is as shocking for the reader as it is
for Charlie, he is trying to incorporate the reader in the novel by talking to them “I am writing to
you” (page. 3) that’s connecting the reader fully to Charlie's perspective throughout the story.

There is no doubt that Charlie has got some good friends because he has shed his role as the
introverted guy: “Sam sat down and started laughing. Patrick started laughing. I started laughing.
And that moment, I swear we were infinite.” (page. 225) This example shows, that Charlie is
officially a part of a social relation, by comparison to the past, where he was the introverted
wallflower, who participated from the sideline. The way they are laughing together shows, that he
does not stand alone, has found some people he can trust, and the last word he says “infinite”
means he is endless in the situation, everything can not get better.

Sam and Patrick have been Charlie's supporters through his growing the past year. But there are
still some things from his past that make him not fully developed, the influence on the situation:
“So, I kissed her. And she kissed me back. (…) We went over to the bed and lay down. (…) And we
Victoria Izabell Lorentzen Hasseris gymnasium 19. January 2020

touched each other from the waist up over our clothes. And then under our clothes. And then
without clothes. (…) She took my hand and slid it under her pants. And I touched her. (…) That’s
when I stopped her.” (page. 216 - 217) That reveals that Charlie still is inexperienced in social
relations, he has never been in the situation before, and therefore he does not know how he
should handle the sexual and romantic part with a girl. I might also appear to he is still insecure
about himself, after the situation with his aunt, and for that reason, it is hard for him to take the
lead role in that situation.

The first theme that has a huge impact on Charlie in the first part is the feeling of loneliness. As
said in the beginning, Charlie was an introverted guy, that always had been the leftover person,
that stood on the sideline. He had never really had friends besides Michel, that committed suicide
a year ago: “So that’s is what I’m doing until I meet a friend here.” (page. 10) It is here clear to see
that in the beginning, he is lonely, but he still wants a friend(s). Charlie has been a victim, several
times, and then it is easier for him to just stand in the background. Throughout the development,
he is going through he starts to change. He is getting friends, going to parties, being aware of
sexual things, and like an eternity he is going from being an old boy to evolving into a young man.
In connection to that, the novel points out the theme: having a hard time trying new things. There
are many situations where Charlie goes back to his old role, and he stands on the sideline because
he is scared of what might happen: “I cannot imagine that I will ever come home from a
homecoming game after I leave here, but it was fun to pretend.” The quotation shows the
comparisons of how Charlie used to be scared of new things to happen because he was scared
that it will fall back to what I began with, that he would do something stupid, and he then would
be having no friends. He is going through development, which has changed his matureness to
whole new level.

As a conclusion of the novel, Charlie goes through a huge process where he gets to know many
things about himself, he did not know in the beginning. Throughout the year he is changing a lot,
which makes him a much stronger person, even though he ends up in the hospital. But the hole
development underlines the theme of growing up, that Charlie certainly is going through a year,
that had made him more independent, mature and “growing up”.