Review: The Perks of Being a Wallflower

The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
My rating: 0 of 5 stars

“For when we shall fall in love, we shall make each other our favourite mixtapes, and we shall gift each other our favourite books as presents wrapped in printed paper, and we shall smoke cigarettes perched on the hilltops of the countryside and we shall make each other our favourite milkshakes and we shall talk about things that matter to us, and we shall go on a ride through the tunnels listening to our favourite tunes, and we shall feel infinite…”

These fancies and fracases of sweet sixteen years have been celestially cloaked inside the interior monologues of a school-going boy named Charlie, who appears in the book as the protagonist character, writing letters, thereby, bestowing the author to represent this stirring book in an epistolary format, creating magic with words, which has also found its extension in the form of a blockbuster movie titled the same as the book.

“So, this is my life. And I want you to know that I am both happy and sad and I'm still trying to figure out how that could be.”

Charlie’s life is as happy as sad; as beautiful as traumatic; as sweet as tragic; as frozen as melting; as broken as unified; as lonely as infinite.

Strangling his way amongst the brash high-school parties, Charlie finds his refuge in the friendship of a brother-sister duo namely, Patrick and Sam. While falling for Sam in the first sight, Charlie remains content with her friendship and watches her go on dates with other boys of the school, because, love, to him, meant ‘sacrifice’.

He juggles his time between making tapes for his siblings & his friends, reading books, writing book reports, watching the episodes of The Rocky Movie Horror Show and offering his shoulder to anyone and everyone who would be in need, who, at times, turns out to be talkative debate-loving girl named Mary Elizabeth, while sometimes his sister who has an abusive boyfriend and sometimes his best friend’s brother Patrick who just had, had a break-up with his boyfriend.

Charlie is “that” student of the class who observes more than others yet talks the least. He is someone who listens to things, and knows the art of keeping it to them. He keeps all these secrets, until, he cannot anymore and breaks open and finds himself in the hospital of his psychiatrist.

You see, many a times, we think that living in the present moment is the best thing that we can do. Many a times, we think that the past is in the past. But the past is not really in the past, but actually converging all-together for us to experience this present reality. As Charlie is growing up, he seems to get annoyed when his psychiatrist doesn’t stop asking him questions, all of which, are about his childhood and his past. Even though, as it turns out in the end, the flick of wounding is revealed to be coming only from his past as he bursts apart however, also, it is only then that he forgives and thereupon, heals.

But this book is not only about Charlie’s sentimental life journey, but also a lot about the chronicles of teen-age, about friendships & affairs, parties & drugs, going to school & growing up amongst friends; about proms, farewells & painting the town red; about gifts & get-togethers, about being sensitive & about dysfunctional family dramas; about listening to radio & about making mixtapes; about writing & about reading books. And so on…

Nevertheless, the character of Charlie represents the archetypal schoolboy finding himself amidst a bunch of whippersnappers and teenyboppers, reckoning himself to be a pipsqueak as he stumbles upon everybody’s secrets, yet willfully surrenders his heart as a gingerbread offering, perhaps…

…perhaps because, as his best friend’s brother Patrick told him once, that he, he was a wallflower.

"You see things, you keep quiet about them and you understand. You are a wallflower."

Just like the character of Charlie, this book too is a comforting shoulder for all the wallflowers out there; for all those who feel like losers, but aren’t really so!

And of course, a brilliant piece of writing in contemporary fiction, with words carousing in the dusky shadows of adolescence & teenage lives; pinpricking at the whirlgigging beetle of our entangled psyche; fringing and bobbing like emotional teetotums, at the uniquely tapes of our life’s bittersweet pains & queer concerns. Nevertheless. All’s well that ends well.


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