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Summary Of Lucy Grealy Masks Essay

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“Masks”- Lucy Grealy
Language is an essential aspect of human life. Through utilization of creativity, people can establish personal connections to their surrounding environments or scene. Similarly, language is a powerful tool for the authors in that they use it to distinguish their own identity. For instance, Lucy Grealy uses language to expose the journey of her life. Having been diagnosed with cancer at a very tender age of nine, Lucy was forced to go through multiple chemotherapies for a considerably long time. Due to the effects of chemotherapy, the author ended up experiencing massive hair loss and developed a deformed face. On the other hand, the author explains her difficult moments while at school as …show more content…

Skin grafts were performed on her though they all failed. At this point, the author describes that she realized that she never met the standards of beauty set by the society. Notably, through reading this essay, one realizes that beauty is not a personal view, rather, beauty is culturally construed. The author’s society definition of beauty was based on the perfection of the outer looks. Her being scary was thought to be the source of ugliness, “What on earth is that?” “That is the ugliest girl I have ever seen” (Grealy 45), said one of the …show more content…

She believed that no one would ever love her for who she is, “I wanted nothing to do with the world of love; I thought wanting love was a weakness to be overcome” (Grealy 45). However, with time the situation changes and the author begins to be hopeful by accepting who she was. “My hair was growing…. By this time my hat had become part of me… but I assumed that one day my hair would grow in, and on that day the teasing would end (Grealy 43). This statement shows that self -acceptance is essential for psychological and emotional growth of any individual. “I told myself again and again how good I had it in comparison, what a wonder it was to have food and clothes and home and no one torturing me” ( Grealy

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