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Everything I Never Told You Character Development

813 Words4 Pages

Myles Koff
Mr. Schmick
Jan. 24

“Character Development”

At the beginning of the novel “Everything I Never Told You” by Celeste Ng, Lydia Lee is presented as the daughter of the Lee family. Lydia stands out from her siblings as she is the only child who is able to form an acceptable relationship with her parents and connect on a deeper level with them than her siblings. On top of that her father has high hopes for her to be the social person that he was never able to be, despite being mixed in a predominantly white neighborhood. Additionally, her mom wanted her to become a successful woman, particularly in the field of medicine, which she could not be. As a result of this, Lydia goes through a significant character development as she grapples …show more content…

As being part of the only Asian-American family in her neighborhood she feels out of place in her predominantly white school and community. As a result of this, Lydia struggles to fit in with her peers and find friends that she enjoys, which is the only thing her father wanted for her. In order to avoid disappointing her father, Lydia resorts to pretending to have and maintain friendships through constant fake phone calls, as she feels constrained by both her parents’ expectations and does not want to disappoint them. Her parents' expectations and the societal expectations weigh heavily on her and make it difficult for her to find her own identity, which causes her to feel trapped and …show more content…

After exploring the reasoning towards her death it reveals that she had been feeling sort of trapped by her parents' expectations and felt isolated as she had no one after she realized that Jack was in love with her brother instead of her and was using her to get closer to Nath. She was also portrayed as if she was struggling with a sense of self-worth. As a result of this Lydia goes out to the lake one morning and tries to do something she has never done before, on her own, to feel as if she has self-worth. She decided that she would swim to the shore all by herself and was determined to do so considering that she had never swam before. This takes a tragic turn as she doesn't even make it a couple feet from the boat, and drowns to her

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