Romulus My Father
Midcourse Practice Essay HSC 2014
It is very true that for an individual to feel they truly belong requires the ability to embrace change. Belonging is a complex process and concept; it is not something that is felt strongly or sustained unless many elements work together. At times, one may need to compromise decisions and embrace change to achieve a sense of belonging. It is also true that these changes may be a result of relationships with those surrounding an individual, and they may have to compromise part of themselves in order to belong within a group. This is very true of the way in which we see Raimond and his father come to feel they belong to each other and to other members of their community in Gaita’s memoir, ‘Romulus, My Father’. It is also true of the way Charlie is made to feel he belongs within his new friendship group at school in Stephen Chbosky’s epistolary novel, ‘The perks of being a wallflower’, and the reason why he had trouble being accepted by his peers earlier in his life.
Changes need to be embraced before an individual can belong, as changes and compromises are necessary to establish commonality and connections. Without making small or large adjustments to an individual’s personality and interests, it can become difficult to find shared interests with others, making it difficult to belong to a group. In ‘Romulus, My Father’, we see the effects on a person if they struggle to embrace personal changes in Gaita’s mother Christine. Christine’s behaviour and feelings on arrival in Australia demonstrate the way in which she felt no sense of belonging to her new country, and often her neighbors did not see her as someone who ‘fits’ their community, “the occasional conversation with a local farmer or a trip to Maldon could not support her in her struggle against her demons”. The metaphor of Christine’s mental health as ‘demons’ emphasizes how strong a barrier this was to her, and how she had reached a point where she was unable to make
It is very true that for an individual to feel they truly belong requires the ability to embrace change. Belonging is a complex process and concept; it is not something that is felt strongly or sustained unless many elements work together. At times, one may need to compromise decisions and embrace change to achieve a sense of belonging. It is also true that these changes may be a result of relationships with those surrounding an individual, and they may have to compromise part of themselves in order to belong within a group. This is very true of the way in which we see Raimond and his father come to feel they belong to each other and to other members of their community in Gaita’s memoir, ‘Romulus, My Father’. It is also true of the way Charlie is made to feel he belongs within his new friendship group at school in Stephen Chbosky’s epistolary novel, ‘The perks of being a wallflower’, and the reason why he had trouble being accepted by his peers earlier in his life.
Changes need to be embraced before an individual can belong, as changes and compromises are necessary to establish commonality and connections. Without making small or large adjustments to an individual’s personality and interests, it can become difficult to find shared interests with others, making it difficult to belong to a group. In ‘Romulus, My Father’, we see the effects on a person if they struggle to embrace personal changes in Gaita’s mother Christine. Christine’s behaviour and feelings on arrival in Australia demonstrate the way in which she felt no sense of belonging to her new country, and often her neighbors did not see her as someone who ‘fits’ their community, “the occasional conversation with a local farmer or a trip to Maldon could not support her in her struggle against her demons”. The metaphor of Christine’s mental health as ‘demons’ emphasizes how strong a barrier this was to her, and how she had reached a point where she was unable to make