The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz - Book Report/Review Example

Annotated Bibiliography: Love and Violence in Junot Diaz’s ‘The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao.’ Valdez, Marcela . "SPANGLISH FLY."Artforum International Sep. - Oct. 2007: 35. Print. Marcel Valdez intricately explores the theme of love and violence in Junot Diaz’s literature. To this end, the author points out the mixture of gallow humor and fantasy that depicts his take on the theme of love. In reference to one of the main character, Oscar de Leon, Valdez points out his desperation and difficulty to find a girlfriend. Evidently, Valdez asserts that Oscar’s obese and geeky nature serves as a point of verbal abuse meted out towards him by almost every other character in Wao. Consequently, Valdez asserts that the social torture directed towards Oscar explains the aggressive, womanizing postures adopted by the male characters. A deviation from the machismo character only welcomes brutality. However, Valdez is also perceptive to point out the manner in which machismo equally crushes conformers and non-conformists. Basing her argument on the role point by machismo within Diaz’s text, Valdez shows how the love is perceived within the male population and the perceptions on females as sexual objects. She further draws a connection between machismo and obscenities that depict verbal abuse. The author’s qualification and credibility is drawn from her board membership status within the National Books Critics Circle. Her vast experience in book critic further asserts the credibility of the source in research work. Calvo, Ignacio López. "A postmodern plátano’s Trujillo: Junot Díaz’s The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, more Macondo than McOndo." Journal of Hispanic and Galician Studies 20 (2009): 75-85. Print. Lopez delves into the theme of love within Diaz’s novel by depicting the Dominican men, apart from Oscar Wao, as macho and unfaithful. Furthermore, he asserts that they derive macho pride in their demeanour. Lopez further identifies Trujillo as the typical extra macho character of them all. The author equally notes the aspect of womanizing that is depicted by Yunior’s role. To this end, Yunior is labelled as ‘the greatest player’ who is unable to control his cheating habits, even on Oscar’s sister. Lopez further goes to explain how the shameless chauvinism is perpetuated by Dominican mothers to their children. Lopez is also keen to point out the opposing side of machismo as depicted by Oscar. To this end, Lopez depicts Oscar’s sexual frustration that even evokes suicidal tendencies. The theme on violence is ineptly explored through the political dictatorship led by Joaquin Balaguer.He is accused of who committing a number of political atrocities. His assassination marks the end of his genocide dictatorship. Lopez also elaborates on the gross brutality, rape, torture, suicidal and murderous tendencies depicted throughout the text. For example, Lopez details events of a brutal beat down on the titular Oscar. The review offered by Ignacio Lopez Calvo offers an intricate evaluation on the themes of love and violence throughout Diaz’s novel. His insightful analysis of the machismo, starting from its basic manifestation from mother to child and eventually adulthood, helps one to understand the perception of love among the opposite sex. Lopez holds a Phd in Romance languages which further enforces his credibility in assessing the theme of love. Egelman, Sarah Rachel. "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao | Bookreporter.com." Bookreporter.com |. bookreporter, 6 Sept. 2007. Web. 8 Apr. 2013. . Sarah Egelman explores the theme of love by describing the layout foundations that set the mood for a novel story that is romantic in its own respect. Egelman depicts a love stricken male, a gorgeous woman with a terrible past, and a tropical island. To this end, Sarah Egelman describes Oscar as a man with no luck when it comes to love and relationships. Evidently, Oscar is a man besieged by his misfortunes in establishing a romantic relationship with any woman. Despite him being attracted to and falling in love with repeatedly, most of the women are either repelled by his advances while other only see him as a friend. The only proximity his had to love is through other females who opt to confide their own relationships with him. The author thus presents Oscar as a lonely and romantically deprived man in Junot Diaz’s novel. As far as violence is concerned, Egelman portrays the suffering under the ruthless dictator, Trujillo. Evidently, Egelman points out the suffering meted out on Abelard, who is Oscar’s grandfather. Abelard was literally tortured in prison because he did not submit his daughter to Turjillo. At this juncture, Sarah Egelman brings out the clash between denial of sexual desires of a despote leader and the violent consequence. The sadistic twist of love mixed with violence is also evident when Egelman describes the beat down given to Belicia by goons related to her gangster boyfriend. The article review of Junot Diaz’s novel by Sarah Egelman on love and violence is intriguingly fascinating .Her capability in expounding on love and violence, depicts the nature in which the two are both intertwined in a sadistic turn of events. Peterson, Latoya. "Reflections on Lola [The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao] (Part 1 of 2) | Racialicious - the intersection of race and pop culture."Racialicious - the intersection of race and pop culture. N.p., 25 Mar. 2009. Web. 8 Apr. 2013. . Latoya Peterson uniquely explores the theme of love by focussing on Lola’s reflections and the depiction of women. According to her, Lola’s narrative offers the most compelling piece of reading that elicits emotional reactions, stemmed from ideas and trials that are reflective of a beautiful and troubled girl. To this end, the author contends that as far as perceptions on love is concerned, women are regarded as sexual and fantasy objects of desire. Furthermore, their true worth is scaled based on their sexual allure to men. The sad part is that all the women have accepted this perverted notion of love and romance. She equally depicts the violence enshrined within such perverted relationships. This is whereby nearly all the female characters in relationships are physically abused by their partners. Latoya also delves into the violence meted out against Lola on account of her skin tone and straight hair. To this end, she points out instances when Lola was confronted by her peers with a pair of scissors as they attempted to cut off her straight her and taunting her beauty through abuse. According to Latoya, this form of violence represents a type of internalized racism simply because one does not conform to the ideal standards of race. Evidently, Latoya’s credence in narrating love and violence within Oscar Wao stems from her personal experience as an interracial child and connection with the character of Lola. Furthermore, she is a renowned editor in race and pope culture literature. Jay, Paul . "Transnational Masculinities in Junot Diazs The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao." Global Matters: The Transnational Turn in Literary Studies. Ithaca: Cornell University Press , 2010. 213. Print. Jay Paul intricately links sexualized brutality and suffering during the Trujilatto regime and Oscar’s predicament. To this end, he examines how Oscar falls in love with a lady known as Ybon. Apparently the lady belongs to the Trujillato and in a fit of anger his men track down and murder Oscar. The killing is a déjà vu of sorts to Belicia’s beating in the cane farms. Furthermore, the beatings of Belicia metaphorically depict the violent nature of Trujillo’s regime. In effect, Jay contends that Diaz’s book dramatizes an extremely brutal novel. Moreover, Jay focuses on gender and sexuality as the driving forces that define the themes of love and violence in Diaz’s novel. To this end, he examines the role of the ‘gangster image’ as used in hip hop music to promote a sexualized fascination. Evidently, he believes that the gangster image fuels the sexual desires of the women since many of them wish to be in relationships with such individuals. Furthermore, the gangster image equally defines the precincts of actions taken within such relationships. Consequently, the women are viewed as sexual objects and objects for violence by the men.Furthermore, the acts of physical and verbal violence against the women are largely considered as normal. Thus, love and violence takes up a rather twisted and sadistic dimension among the characters. Paul Jay employs a rather lucid and highly valuable synthesis of Junot Diaz literature. His expertise is equally extended to other tricky and intriguing scholarship such as the Inheritance of Loss by Desai. The author is an English Professor at Loyola University Chicago as well as an author of the ‘The Search for Foundations in American Criticism.’ Bost, Suzanne. The Routledge companion to Latino/a literature. London: Routledge, 2012. Print. The author contends that there is a direct relationship between love and violence in Oscar Wao. According to Suzanne, the connection is evident through domestic violence, and alternates to brutal retaliatory violence. This happens either due to loving the wrong person or placing too much love. Examples pointed out by the author include when Abelard refuses to submit his daughter to the tyrannical Trujillo. Aberlard protected his daughter out of love and in the end suffered an enduring torturous life in prison. Oscar is also a victim of violence when he places his love on the Ybon. Furthermore, Belianca experiences the full wrath of violence from her gangster boyfriend, and hers is a dose of double tragedy because she also loses her unborn child. On the other hand, Lola is depicted as experiencing a contorted form of love from her mother. Evidently, she is unable to distinguish her mother’s love from the physical and emotional abuse meted by her mother. The long years of abuse have left her emotionally scarred that she no longer has hope or confidence in love. To this end, the author strongly asserts that love is an evocative emotion of sorts that is mostly countered by vengeful violence or anger. The irony that is depicted by love is inclined towards hate, pessimism, suffering and death, rather than happiness. The author, Suzanne Bost, specifically delves into Latino literature within the text and transcends the core facets of Latino culture as depicted in the novel by Junot Diaz. To this end, she clearly elaborates on the precincts of Latino sexuality, immigration, race and gender as well as the connection with love and violence. Credibility and expertise of her works is further reinforced by her occupation as a Professor of English at Loyola in University in Chicago, USA. Read More