Summary Of The Brief Wondrous Life Of Oscar Wao

Intro :

In The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Diaz communicates that nothing ever ends, history repeats itself and everything is a cycle. He demonstrates this through the parallel experiences of the characters in the story and using “fuku” as an explanation for the never ending cycle through the use of motifs like, the canefields, fuku, and the man without a face, which all support the phenomenon behind this never ending cycle.

Taking control and breaking the cycle ---- Oscar trying to break the Fuku curse…

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(LOOK UP QUOTES ON BELIS BEATING)

An instance where history repeats itself is in the canefields with the characters Oscar and Beli due to the relationships theyŕe in and their ties to power. This was

These motifs reflect the occurrence of similar symbols appearing in the lives of the characters; they support the idea of history repeating itself. When Beli was attacked in the canefields, there was said to be a “golden mongoose” that saved her and , “was quite large for its species and placed its intelligent little paws on her chest and stared down at her” (Diaz 149). This was not the last time this mysterious creature would come to the rescue for Oscar’s family. When Oscar was in his canefield crisis, he also saw the golden mongoose, elaborate more on the mongoose and when it appears and the fact that it appears throughout history, same creature, repetitive element which acts as a savior throughout the book. It only appears after something bad has happened and saves Beli and Oscar during their time of suffering. There was a similarity in both situations, which is what happened right before the characters were taken to the canefields. Not only did the mongoose appear, but “a man sitting in a rocking chair in front of one of the hovels had no face… [he] waved at her [Beli] as she passed(135)” Oscar also experienced a moment with the no face man, Oscar, “could have sworn the man had no face, but then the killers get back into the car and drove¨ (Diaz 298). It was a quick encounter, but Oscar was quick to notice this strange feature. This was

This motif is an explanation behind all the hardships. It is especially prominent in the life of Oscar. Once Oscar is tired of living in a vicious cycle, he attempts to break the curse and accepts his death. The question, however, is … does it really ever end? After many years of experiencing mishaps and downfalls, Oscar is fed up with his miserable life. Oscar and pretty much everyone else in the novel was used to his life being that way. The narrator, Yunior, especially noted the unluckiness of Oscar’s life and pointed it out by saying things like, “And then the expected happened…they beat him as best as they could, given the limited space inside the cab.” (Diaz 320) The input of Yunior weighs in on the fact that we, as the audience, almost always expect Oscar to be unhappy and end up in horrible situations, based upon all he has experienced in the past. Oscar tries and tries harder each time to make good of his life, but it always backfires on him. Oscar gets very frustrated and starts to question why his life is so dreadful. Oscar himself starts to believe that Trujillo’s “Fuku Curse” is a big contributor to the way his life plays out. So, Oscar takes charge and tries to put an end to it all. He looks for a way to get back to the canefields and get beat up once again. Not a difficult task for unlucky Oscar, he gets what he wanted. He is taken to