Summary Of The Brief Wondrous Life Of Oscar Wao

In his book, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Diaz explores themes of racial and national identity while also examining stereotypes of masculinity. The book is centered around a curse known as fuku that haunts the protagonist of the book, Oscar. Dominican values encompass the life that Oscar tries to live ultimately leading to his depression. Wao can be a parallel to the culture seen today where everyone desires to fit in. In Dominican culture masculinity is an expectation in every male. Oscar is a Domincan male, and being that he is Dominican many people expect him to be a person that he is not. The definition of being a Dominican male in this book is about the looks and women a man attains. Oscar is pressured into fitting in

In Dominican and almost every culture today, relationships are a thing of the past. Woman are viewed as commodities, but Oscar does not view them this way and for this and other reasons he struggles. At seven years old Oscar is described to be chasing all of the girls around. This act of chasing girls and having multiple girls to cling to was accepted in Oscar’s family. In fact, his family actually encouraged the behavior. This is what the typical Dominican man was supposed to be. However, Oscar had one flaw. Oscar lacked the masculinity most men have. The book states “It wasn’t just that he didn’t have no kind of father to show him the masculine ropes, he simply lacked all aggressive and martial tendencies” (Wao 15). Oscar did not have the typical male role model that most boys would have in their life. This in turn leads to Oscar’s

The Mongoose is almost like a guardian angel who is there to pick you up. The first appearance of the Mongoose is when he gets Beli to walk out of the canefields. Later on he is seen when he saves Oscar from himself after jumping off the New Brunswick bridge. Another occurrence of the supernatural involves the Man Without a Face. The faceless man are Trujillos victims who haunt the story. “Most of the time they took turns striking him… the faceless man from in front of the colmado was joining them” (31). The faceless man is another symbol of the supernatural coming to play in Oscar’s