Lovely Literature

This poem kind of hits home for me and probably every other girl who has felt pressure to conform to what society dictates. This girl in the poem is described as "usual" in the first line of the first stanza. The first stanza shows how naive and innocent the girl was as a young child until she went to school and met her other girl classmates. Honestly, I think girls are much more vicious than boys are, so this made perfect sense to me that the girl in the poem was innocent and happy with how she looked until she went to school and people told her of her imperfections.

This is definitely a shot at society.

"She went to and fro apologizing
Everyone saw a fat nose on thick legs."

Isn't it ridiculous the emphasis that society puts on being "perfect?" I mean, WHAT IS PERFECTION and who gets the right to decide that? Girls seem to have such a terrible time with the pressure of perfection in nearly every aspect, but especially outside appearance. It becomes quite ironic as the poem goes on because the last stanza states:

"Doesn't she look pretty? everyone said.
Consummation at last.
To every woman a happy ending"

Personally, I don't think death necessarily equals a happy ending. It's ironic that she finally got her wish while literally laying on her deathbed: to be pretty and to have people notice her. It is difficult for me to tell though whether or not she killed herself or if she had some sort of plastic surgery that went wrong. Either way...I think this is a desparate cry to a society that values appearance rather than intelligence and inner beauty.

I love that O'Brien brings in his daughter to this story. Sometimes you need the innocent child perspective in life.

"The war was as remote to her as cavemen and dinosaurs.
One morning in Saigon she'd asked what it was all about. "This whole war," said said, "why was everybody so mad at everybody else?" [page 175]

The truth and innocence that comes out of a blunt child's mouth is astounding. Seriously, why was everybody so mad at everybody else? If only it was that easy to pinpoint the time that things began to go downhill.

It's impossible to make everyone happy. I think that's why wars begin. Someone is so unhappy with what is going on that they have to let the world know about it. Oh, that and world domination [good luck with that].

I wish adults could wake up and look at life through a child's eyes. They see everything as happy and beautiful, and who wouldn't want to see life like that? I think it would do people good to take a happier perspective on life. Then maybe they wouldn't be so regretful about their lives.