Short stories go down like ice cream, but they often leave the reader with lingering sensations. What are those sensations? What do they have to do with your experience? Is "Literature" with a capital L a more effective brand of cultural meaning-making than commercials, Twitter, or the news?
Hopefully, we'll get the ball rolling on some of these questions. Featured texts describe utopian visions, bovine rebellion, freezing to death, and school shootings (among other things).
Wednesday, September 11, 2013
Ursula Le Guin's "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas"
When I read this story "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas," the beginning really made me want to visit this place. The first paragraph describes all positive points about Omelas. For example, there are mixes of elderly and young people, horses that pranced in the Green Fields, the silence of the meadows, the music playing in the city streets, and “cheerful faint sweetness of the air.” This would be the perfect city to live in and would accommodate to everyone. The speaker of the story says that “Omelas sounds in my words like a city in a fairy tale, long ago and far away, once upon a time.” The descriptions from the speaker about the city really does make it seem like it’s the ideal city to live in because of all its good qualities. There are buses and trains that take people inside of the city because so many people want to come to this place to visit. Even though there are so many good things about the city, there was a shift in tone when the speaker talked about the basement that was under one of the public buildings in Omelas that a young child was kept down there. This boy was so malnourished and neglected that you could see the bones. People would sometimes go in there and kick the bed to make it stand up. All the people in Omelas know that it is there. “...but they all understand that their happiness, the beauty of their city, the tenderness of their friendships, the health of their children…depend wholly on this child’s abominable misery.” This young child is the “sacrifice” of the well-being of this city in order for it to function. I find that interesting, and wonder why this child was chosen. It just goes to show that even a city so grand and beautiful has its hidden secrets and flaws.
I thought that this story was very strange. The first half of the story was quite peculiar because the author didn’t seem to know much about Omelas. The society was described as complex and joyous, but the author admits in her own writing she isn’t sure about many aspects of their lives. This writing style was weird to me. Possibly this style is implemented in order to leave room for interpretation on behalf of the reader. Maybe it is supposed to send up a red flag for the reader and foreshadow that there is something fishy about this society. The second half of the story was also strange. After I read the paragraph about the child that is locked away, I was thoroughly disturbed. Any child anywhere under any circumstances living in these conditions is horrifying. I think some of the shock value comes from the impracticality of this situation. I cannot think of any situation where something so gruesome would be required in order to support a much larger picture. So, as a reader, my mind has never before been introduced to an idea like this. Some people in Omelas are able to justify the knowledge of this child in their head with the benefit of the rest of the society. Some people cannot get over it and need to physically leave Omelas. I think part of the reason people walk is because the concept of the child is introduced to them at such a young age. They show kids who are between the ages of eight and twelve. I would think you should be well into adulthood before seeing something like this, if ever.
This shot story, “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas”, was another story that left me questioning the ending. It made me curious as to why this civilization leaves a child in the basement away from the thriving civilization above him. He is a little boy deprived malnourished and deprived of the daily life of the Omeas. The story mentioned that people, on rare occasions, would go down to see the child, and when they did, they would be disgusted by the child’s looks and kick him around. For a city that was described in the beginning as “like a city in a fairy tale”, I had a difficult time understanding why in the first place they put a child in the basement to be underprivileged, mal-nurtured, and abused by the city he lived in? Has this form of abuse been going on since the beginning of their time? Why this child? Why did people go down to see him only for the reason him neglected and not to keep him company? These questions were left unanswered. Like our last conversation for the previous short story, I think society does this cruel thing to have the understanding of opposition. To understand what happiness is, there has to be the polar opposite, sadness, to justify what happiness is. The Omelas thrive in the city above the child, with happiness, life, horses, joyfulness, etc., while this child, is robbed and denied of social encountering, love, and joy. For people to understand what the happiness they are living, have to go down to the basement and visit the child, to get and awareness of what there life really is like (I don’t even know if this makes sense). The big question that is confusing me is those who walk away from Omelas. Why do they walk away from this prosperous city after they have seen the child in the basement? What can those people not handle/control that makes them have to leave? Like Gabby put it, I believe too that this child is the “sacrifice” of the well-being for the society to function.
I was confused after reading this story. I didn’t like how it left me with so many questions unanswered. I understand that the child was some sort of sacrifice for the city’s overall happiness and prosperity. I don’t understand why it had to be a child that was sacrificed or why it was that child specifically. Additionally, there were so many people that knew about the child down there. They went to visit it when they felt unhappy to realize what life could be like and that life up above was obviously better so they shouldn’t be upset. I don’t understand why the ones who walked away from the city, walked away from the city. If they walked away because of the injustices down below the city and the secrets hidden, why didn’t they do anything about it? Why couldn’t they ban together and go to help the child? Why did they run away from it? I feel like everyone does feel bad for the child but they are too afraid of going against the grain and saying anything about it. I don’t get why they feel that they have to abuse the child in order for the city to stay as beautiful as it is. I mean the author did a great job describing the different beauties of the city, the extravagance of the streets wouldn’t change if the child wasn’t suffering under the city. I think that the people of the city are just superstitious and believe that it is completely necessary to abuse the child and keep it malnourished in order for the city to continue to flourish.
The story “The Ones Who Walked Away From Omelas”, was very interesting to me, I thought that it was very intriguing that the author spent most of her time describing this “perfect society” and then in the end talks about its one really messed up flaw. She talks about how they have no need for war or rules because everything is so peaceful there and everyone is so happy, yet all this happiness relies on the suffering and misery of one child, without that one child suffering the whole society would crash and burn. I can’t say it was surprising though, I was expecting it, no society can be that perfect without having any deep dark secrets. Personally if I lived in Omelas I think I could go along living happily like everyone else in the city. I mean don’t get me wrong I think that what they were doing to the child was really sick and cruel, but if you were brought up your whole life believing that what they were doing was right and that it had to happen then I guess it’s acceptable. I also agree with the statement that one sacrifice is better than bringing down everyone. I really don’t think it’s too far from our society today a lot of people will throw others under the bus just to get ahead, so who are we to judge ? I also feel that what they were doing didn’t affect people as much because the people never really had a personal connection with the child, just like in the story “The Lottery”, everyone was ok with going along with the yearly sacrifice until the day their family’s name was picked out of the box. Overall I thought this story was very interesting, the one part I will say I didn’t like was the end when they talked about the people who were so traumatized by the sight of the child that they left Omelas. This part didn’t make any sense to me because it seemed like the people left because they didn’t want to show that they supported the treatment that was given to the child, but to me I think they were supporting it in a way. They never went back to save the child and take it to a better place, they just left
The story was bizarre. I was confused by the first page of “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas”. The author was very descriptive, but kept asking questions as if she didn’t know about the city of Omelas. I found the citizens of Omelas to be extremely hypocritical. Author Ursula K. Le Guin states that the city of Omelas doesn’t have any slaves. Though the child that lived in complete darkness is portrayed as a slave. It is a sad realization for children of Omelas when they first come in contact with the undesirable child. Omelan children must grow up quickly after seeing the child in the dark basement. In the eyes of Omelas’ citizens the undesirable child was necessary for the life these citizens. I was disturbed by the Omelan community because they believed that the undesirable child is the reason for the cities happiness. Omelans believe that the undesirable children builds character in others and makes them better people. For instance, the undesirable child will influence a violin player to write an emotional song. I am puzzled by the ideals of the Omelas community. In the beginning of the story the city of Omelas seemed like a nice and joyful community, but further into the story it becomes a dark and twisted community.
The short story, “The Ones Who Walked Away From Omelas,” expressed the idea of sacrificing the well being of one person for the well being of all. Ursula Le Guin starts the story off by describing all the happiness and joy of the town of Omelas. He does this through describing their Festival of Summer. Everyone is happy, the sky is clear and the sun is shinning. Even the horses lined up to race are full of joy and spirit. After describing, in great detail, the happenings of the festival, he asks the vital question of do you accept the joy of the city. Assuming the reader said no, he reveals the dark secrete behind the happy town and their apparent source of joy, a small child locked in a small room and neglected. The city of Omelas keeps a child locked in a room only two paces wide, no light, little food, and “It”, as they call the child, is forced to lay there naked in its own excretions. The way Le Guin describes the scene is by far the most disturbing thing I have ever read. Everyone in Omelas knows it is there, but no one will do anything to stop it. Their reasoning behind having it there is that it makes the city a bright, happy place. Some people choose to visit it and others don’t. Of the ones who visit it, the majority just accept it, but others just begin to walk and never stop until they are leaving the town. They don’t know of the outside world “but they seem to know where they are going, the ones who leave Omelas.” The fact that everyone knows it is there but do nothing about it proves that superstition overpowers reality. The belief that sacrificing the good of one for the good of all, throws all morals aside and is shown strongly in this piece.
Even though I read this story in high school, it is still just as disturbing as the first time that I read it. Omelas seems like an ideal society. Everyone's happy and going about their daily lives, not having a worry in the world. No one and nothing is perfect. The presence of the deprived child in the basement of a building is a disturbing one. It's slightly repulsive. Knowing about this child is depressing. The fact that "it" used to call out for help and no one listened, so “it” gave up, is horrible. It's like the people within this town have to know that the child is there, surviving on its own to know what it's like to be happy. The citizens of Omelas have to understand that there are people who have it worse, like this child, in order to appreciate their own happiness. I guess it's kind of like saying that one person’s suffering is okay if it's for the greater good of people. It's known that the child has to be there or else Omelas wouldn't exist. This perfect ideal society would be nothing without the struggling of this child. It's disgusting to think that people know of this and go about their daily lives and even walk away from Omelas without doing anything. Walking away from a problem isn't going to solve it.
The short story “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas” starts off as a good setting and goes into extreme specific details about everything that is good in the city and right outside of the gates, and then it turns into a sick story. If the story kept going like the beginning, I would have been shocked for one because we don’t read normal stories but it would have been a great story and I could have seen myself living in this city. It sounded like a great city until its true secrets to its success was revealed. It is disgusting that people would keep an innocent child locked up and in that kind of solitude and living in those conditions. On the other hand, if I was in their situation, I would not want to release that child either. Even if it sounds sick, I think the happiness of the whole city is more important than one child being able to live a normal life. But since I’m not in that situation, I think it is disgusting what they are doing. One of the worst parts about this story is that this actually happened to a child but just because the parents thought it was disabled and did not want to take care of it. When it was discovered, the police could not tell of it was a boy or a girl. How could parents lock up their daughter for eight years with minimal human interaction? I do not like this story at all.
The story was very weird and interesting. I thought that at first the city aeemed like a perfect place. as the story unraveled we learned the secrets of the town. this is where the question of morality comes into play. Is it better to hurt one person for the benefit of the group? This story left a bitter taste in my stomach because of the real life story of a child named Anne. This is where a young girl was locked in a closet and fed barely enough to live. This differs though because the society actually benefits I was torn emotionally by this story and questioned my own morality.
“The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” is almost just as strange as the last short story we read, although it is actually more disturbing I find. I found the story to start off very boring and slow for the first three pages at least. These first three pages kept describing the great fortune of the city of Omelas and how beautiful and pleasing it was. I started to suspect something weird would happen because all the stories we have read in class have something strange or sad, but also since the author spent three pages just describing how pleasing the city was, I knew that something messed up had to be coming soon. The secret of Omelas shocked me and I felt disgusted reading the rest of the story after realizing what the town required of one unfortunate child just to keep it the way it was. The one chosen child had to be kept in a room with one locked door and no window. The child was locked in there, and no body ever came down except to kick the child to make it stand up or fill the food bowl and water jug. The child had to live on a half-bowl of corn mill and grease a day, and the child was also naked. I found this part of the story disturbing and I did not even want to read on. What was even more disturbing then that was that the people of the Omelas knew that this child was suffering and most were shocked and disgusted at first but came to turns with it over time to return to their normal lives worth the child suffering. If I knew this, I do not think I would be able to deal with the it and I would leave such place. Its also mentioned that the people who visit and can not handle it, walk away from the town and know where they are headed. I do not understand where they would be going and why they would walk away when they could be trying to stop it. I think that this is not a fair city, and everyone should have freedom. These people who live in Omelas are all so used to the perfect place they live in and do not know what suffering or pain is. My take is that these people would be better off living a moderate life where they can experience suffering and pain because that is what is needed to experience true happiness. Therefore no child would have to suffer for the common good of everyone else, and everyone else can just live a normal life with ups and down and not to the extremes of what the child goes through.
After reading this story, I really didn’t know how I felt about Omelas. At first it seemed like an okay place, not that I would want to live there, but it was not as scary as the society described by Kurt Vonnegut in Harrison Bergeron. However, after I read about the child that they kept in misery and filth, it made me kind of angry, I couldn’t understand why the city would do this, or what the purpose for it was. The only explanation for this that I could find was in several quotes that talk about comparing happiness to evil or pain. “The trouble is that we have a bad habit, encouraged by pedants and sophisticates, of considering happiness as something rather stupid. Only pain is intellectual, only evil interesting.” I thought this quote seemed to show the city’s reason for keeping one child in unending squalor and misery. They keep it so that they will have something to compare their happiness to because happiness is stupid. The society feels that they need something interesting because their happiness is so boring. But if they thought that pain and evil were interesting, then why did some people walk out of the city after they saw the child? I also thought that the quote: “But to praise despair is to condemn delight, to embrace violence is to lose hold of everything else.” explained this in a way. I think that this is the reason that some of the people that saw the child just left. By keeping the child living in unending misery, it destroyed all the previous ideas that they had had about their community. The community was in a way praising despair and the people that walked away just couldn’t continue to live in happiness when there was a person, a child, living in absolute misery.
The story “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas” describes a place that sounds about perfect. The children’s are happy, there are no worriers, soldiers, kings or many rules. It sounds like the place someday I would want to visit but the story shows there is always a price to pay for happiness or beauty. The city of Omelas is the happiest city on earth and it’s not tainted with technology but in order for the city to flourish and the people to be happy a child suffers underground. The child remains underground and locked away to safe him from the truth. The people of Omelas are aware of the child existence and imprisonment. When a child of the right they can go visit the child but not everyone is able to bear the truth and they walk away from Omelas forever. I believe that the prison created in “Omelas” is also a symbol of the truth and innocence. The walls protect the prisoner form the truth of the outside world. If the child is ever let of the prison he will learn the harsh realities of the world and he won’t be able hold on to his innocence. The child has never really known the outside world and what exist outside that room and if he is let out he wouldn’t be able to adjust to the world and the happiness of the people of Omelas depends on the child therefore he must remain underground away form the world.
This story was very disturbing. The author spent a lot of time describing this place as the "perfect society." It was explained as a complex and joyous place where the people who lived in this area were filled with happiness. Later on it explains about the child who is basically a slave and is confined to a dark room and is given little to eat and drink. I felt that there would be a twist to the story when Omelas was being described as such a good place. It almost seemed too good to be true. There is no such thing as perfect, there are flaws to everything. I think the people in this town were experiencing something everyone goes through just on a bigger scale. There are always times you have to weigh out the pros and cons of a situation and decide if it is worth it. For example if you do not feel like going to work but you want the money. You have to decide if staying home and doing nothing is worth it and if you won't need the money later on. The people in Omela are facing something similar. They have to decide if they should help this child get freedom and feel better about themselves for helping or continue to live in the "perfect world" they have because of this child.
"The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" is a short story about a city called Omelas. In Omelas there is events held such as the Festival of Summer, which depends on the misery of a child. There is a child locked up in a cellular who is deprived of human contact. But the people of Omelas believe their happiness and success depends on this child. The people in the city believe that helping the child would destroy the city's prosperity and beauty. So as a result, they just accept the situation to avoid stopping their happiness for one person. I think the moral of the story is people won't stand up for something that doesn't benefit them. Even though the people showed sorrow for the child they didn't do anything to help. The people were afraid that they would risk everything. But I didn't understand the section of the story that stated "It is because of the child that they are so gentle with children." It sounded like the child was a type of experiment. By having the child hidden from any contact they learned that the contact is necessary. Lastly, the people who left Omelas were the only decent people. They were actually getting away from the problem instead of just observing the child. But the story left me wondering about the people who walked away from Omelas. When the story said the people walked away to a place that was less imaginable to us I thought of Heaven. I thought that it seemed like a place that we are not really clear about. Overall the story left unanswered questions.
This short story has some of the same characteristics that we discussed last time in class such as the idea of a “perfect world” with some defects however. The story opens with describing the setting as a beautiful place called the Omelas. Every aspect of the town seems to be perfect and the best place around to live. The author continually stresses the fact that all of the citizens are happy with their lives in the community. This just adds to the idea that the community in which they live is a joyful place to be a part of. However, the Omelas also has a bad side to it. There is one room in the basement of a building where whoever is in there, is separate from the rest of the outside world. There are no windows and the door is always locked. The child who remains in there has no contact with anyone and they are not sufficiently fed. Even though the Omelas are living in a seemingly perfect world I believe this is the contradiction to that world where it gives the citizens a taste of what occurs outside of their community. It is a requirement in the society in order to maintain a perfect world on the outside. This goes to show that even the most perfect society can have its defects. At the end, it describes people walking away from Omelas and that they never return. This reminds me of the idea of an afterlife. It states that they keep walking and never return back to the city. They go to a less imaginable place than the city of happiness and they say that it is possible that it does not exist. This makes me think of the afterlife because it is said to be a place of pureness and happiness although not everyone believes in its existence.
I am going to be honest this was a messed up story. They speak of all this happiness in the world but yet there is torture in it. This small child has to suffer a horrible life in order for everyone else to enjoy their lives. The people of this society manly the young people of this city feel convictions about allow this child to suffer. Yet they realize this torture is for the great good of the people. This story is rather similar to Shirley Jackson's the "Lottery." There is this unchanged tradition that the city participates in. They all fear the tradition but yet they feel that it is a necessity to continue their tradition. However in "The Ones Who Walked Away from Omelas" generally the older men and women will choose to leave the city. They go to a place that gets away from their convictions and maybe does not have such morbid ways to achieve happiness.
“The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” starts off with great imagery about a a beautiful festival going on in this city called Omelas. It is described as “a sense of victory, surely, the celebration of courage.” The reader is brought into this beautiful perfect world that seems surreal. “Like a city in a fairy tale”. The imagery then changes to a small room, with one locked door and no window and the feel of the story completely changes. We learn that there is a little girl about the age of ten sitting in this room that is smaller than the broom closet. They refer to the child as an it and continue to go on about everything that is wrong with the child. The story then becomes disturbing. The child is siting on the floor, locked away with no interaction. Occasionally someone comes to kick the child or fills it’s “food bowl” as is it was a dog. The most disturbing part of this story is when we learn that the child is sitting here for other people’s entertainment and so that dont feel as bad about their own lives and know others have it worse. But everyone in the town knows there is nothing they can do, and they don’t make an attempt to change it. They “walk away from Omelas”.
"The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" is a story that talks about an almost "utopian" society with one major flaw. The story is very disturbing. When you first start reading you believe that the city Omelas is perfect but there is no such thing as perfect. It is obvious that there is something wrong with Omelas. The fatal flaw of the city Omelas is that its prosperity and happiness comes from a small child locked in a cellar. The boy lives in the worst conditions and is barely given enough food to survive. Everyone in Omelas knows that the child is in the cellar but do nothing about it. I found this story similar to “The Lottery” because the people in Omelas follow the tradition and do not speak up about what the boy is going through just like the people in “The Lottery” who accept the fact that someone must die each year. The people in Omelas would rather keep their “perfect world” instead of helping the child. Their prosperity and happiness means more to them. The people are allowed to visit the child and most of them just accept the fact that they are in there. Others are very disturbed and decide to leave the city. The few that leave the city cannot deal with what the child is going through but are not able to speak up about it. Their solution is to leave the city and never come back. Overall, the story is very unpleasant to read.
“The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas,” by Ursula K. Le Guin was about a happy, thriving society. It started as a struggle for the author to describe the type of atmosphere the town of Omelas was experiencing during the Festival of Summer. The town never really faced any type of struggles or wars; so being happy all the time wasn’t unusual. However, smiles were old fashion and deep down people were just happy, they didn’t show it. They had no leaders; they were a self-run society. They didn’t need technology because of lacking intelligence; they just didn’t feel that they needed cars or helicopters. However, the town had a dark “secret” that would make some people cringe. In order to maintain their perfect society, they needed to malnourish, torture, and leave a small child in a dark closet under the streets. Everyone knew about the child so it wasn’t a secret, but most chose to ignore it. They taught about in school and some visited. Some would be traumatized, while others would torture it even more. Those who were traumatized would become very silent (sometimes for days). Then, they would walk, alone, without stopping, and would never come back. Thus the title “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas.” I thought this story was confusing to follow at first because of all the opposites the author used to describe the setting. However, it just became sickening once they showed the kid. The only thing I want to know was what mom volunteers their kid into that situation for the better good? Unless she didn’t have a choice and it was a lot like “The Lottery” short story we read previously. Just like last week, this is a short story that raises more questions than answers.
At first this reminded me of the lottery because everyone was so happy and there had to be something wrong. I first noticed serving was wrong when the author described the cellar. I don't know why they had to lock up an innocent child to keep their perfect world. I get that every happy person always has some darkness in their life but why does this child's unhappiness and pain keep their world going? It doesn't make sense. As for the people walking away maybe it was the parents of the lost child and they realize the horrors of the world that they lived in. They wanted to walk away from the pain and torture or the guilt finally overwhelmed them so much that they just had to leave.
When I read this story "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas," the beginning really made me want to visit this place. The first paragraph describes all positive points about Omelas. For example, there are mixes of elderly and young people, horses that pranced in the Green Fields, the silence of the meadows, the music playing in the city streets, and “cheerful faint sweetness of the air.” This would be the perfect city to live in and would accommodate to everyone. The speaker of the story says that “Omelas sounds in my words like a city in a fairy tale, long ago and far away, once upon a time.” The descriptions from the speaker about the city really does make it seem like it’s the ideal city to live in because of all its good qualities. There are buses and trains that take people inside of the city because so many people want to come to this place to visit. Even though there are so many good things about the city, there was a shift in tone when the speaker talked about the basement that was under one of the public buildings in Omelas that a young child was kept down there. This boy was so malnourished and neglected that you could see the bones. People would sometimes go in there and kick the bed to make it stand up. All the people in Omelas know that it is there. “...but they all understand that their happiness, the beauty of their city, the tenderness of their friendships, the health of their children…depend wholly on this child’s abominable misery.” This young child is the “sacrifice” of the well-being of this city in order for it to function. I find that interesting, and wonder why this child was chosen. It just goes to show that even a city so grand and beautiful has its hidden secrets and flaws.
ReplyDeleteI thought that this story was very strange. The first half of the story was quite peculiar because the author didn’t seem to know much about Omelas. The society was described as complex and joyous, but the author admits in her own writing she isn’t sure about many aspects of their lives. This writing style was weird to me. Possibly this style is implemented in order to leave room for interpretation on behalf of the reader. Maybe it is supposed to send up a red flag for the reader and foreshadow that there is something fishy about this society. The second half of the story was also strange. After I read the paragraph about the child that is locked away, I was thoroughly disturbed. Any child anywhere under any circumstances living in these conditions is horrifying. I think some of the shock value comes from the impracticality of this situation. I cannot think of any situation where something so gruesome would be required in order to support a much larger picture. So, as a reader, my mind has never before been introduced to an idea like this. Some people in Omelas are able to justify the knowledge of this child in their head with the benefit of the rest of the society. Some people cannot get over it and need to physically leave Omelas. I think part of the reason people walk is because the concept of the child is introduced to them at such a young age. They show kids who are between the ages of eight and twelve. I would think you should be well into adulthood before seeing something like this, if ever.
ReplyDeleteThis shot story, “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas”, was another story that left me questioning the ending. It made me curious as to why this civilization leaves a child in the basement away from the thriving civilization above him. He is a little boy deprived malnourished and deprived of the daily life of the Omeas. The story mentioned that people, on rare occasions, would go down to see the child, and when they did, they would be disgusted by the child’s looks and kick him around. For a city that was described in the beginning as “like a city in a fairy tale”, I had a difficult time understanding why in the first place they put a child in the basement to be underprivileged, mal-nurtured, and abused by the city he lived in? Has this form of abuse been going on since the beginning of their time? Why this child? Why did people go down to see him only for the reason him neglected and not to keep him company? These questions were left unanswered. Like our last conversation for the previous short story, I think society does this cruel thing to have the understanding of opposition. To understand what happiness is, there has to be the polar opposite, sadness, to justify what happiness is. The Omelas thrive in the city above the child, with happiness, life, horses, joyfulness, etc., while this child, is robbed and denied of social encountering, love, and joy. For people to understand what the happiness they are living, have to go down to the basement and visit the child, to get and awareness of what there life really is like (I don’t even know if this makes sense). The big question that is confusing me is those who walk away from Omelas. Why do they walk away from this prosperous city after they have seen the child in the basement? What can those people not handle/control that makes them have to leave? Like Gabby put it, I believe too that this child is the “sacrifice” of the well-being for the society to function.
ReplyDeleteI was confused after reading this story. I didn’t like how it left me with so many questions unanswered. I understand that the child was some sort of sacrifice for the city’s overall happiness and prosperity. I don’t understand why it had to be a child that was sacrificed or why it was that child specifically. Additionally, there were so many people that knew about the child down there. They went to visit it when they felt unhappy to realize what life could be like and that life up above was obviously better so they shouldn’t be upset. I don’t understand why the ones who walked away from the city, walked away from the city. If they walked away because of the injustices down below the city and the secrets hidden, why didn’t they do anything about it? Why couldn’t they ban together and go to help the child? Why did they run away from it? I feel like everyone does feel bad for the child but they are too afraid of going against the grain and saying anything about it. I don’t get why they feel that they have to abuse the child in order for the city to stay as beautiful as it is. I mean the author did a great job describing the different beauties of the city, the extravagance of the streets wouldn’t change if the child wasn’t suffering under the city. I think that the people of the city are just superstitious and believe that it is completely necessary to abuse the child and keep it malnourished in order for the city to continue to flourish.
ReplyDeleteThe story “The Ones Who Walked Away From Omelas”, was very interesting to me, I thought that it was very intriguing that the author spent most of her time describing this “perfect society” and then in the end talks about its one really messed up flaw. She talks about how they have no need for war or rules because everything is so peaceful there and everyone is so happy, yet all this happiness relies on the suffering and misery of one child, without that one child suffering the whole society would crash and burn. I can’t say it was surprising though, I was expecting it, no society can be that perfect without having any deep dark secrets. Personally if I lived in Omelas I think I could go along living happily like everyone else in the city. I mean don’t get me wrong I think that what they were doing to the child was really sick and cruel, but if you were brought up your whole life believing that what they were doing was right and that it had to happen then I guess it’s acceptable. I also agree with the statement that one sacrifice is better than bringing down everyone. I really don’t think it’s too far from our society today a lot of people will throw others under the bus just to get ahead, so who are we to judge ? I also feel that what they were doing didn’t affect people as much because the people never really had a personal connection with the child, just like in the story “The Lottery”, everyone was ok with going along with the yearly sacrifice until the day their family’s name was picked out of the box. Overall I thought this story was very interesting, the one part I will say I didn’t like was the end when they talked about the people who were so traumatized by the sight of the child that they left Omelas. This part didn’t make any sense to me because it seemed like the people left because they didn’t want to show that they supported the treatment that was given to the child, but to me I think they were supporting it in a way. They never went back to save the child and take it to a better place, they just left
ReplyDeleteThe story was bizarre. I was confused by the first page of “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas”. The author was very descriptive, but kept asking questions as if she didn’t know about the city of Omelas. I found the citizens of Omelas to be extremely hypocritical. Author Ursula K. Le Guin states that the city of Omelas doesn’t have any slaves. Though the child that lived in complete darkness is portrayed as a slave. It is a sad realization for children of Omelas when they first come in contact with the undesirable child. Omelan children must grow up quickly after seeing the child in the dark basement. In the eyes of Omelas’ citizens the undesirable child was necessary for the life these citizens. I was disturbed by the Omelan community because they believed that the undesirable child is the reason for the cities happiness. Omelans believe that the undesirable children builds character in others and makes them better people. For instance, the undesirable child will influence a violin player to write an emotional song. I am puzzled by the ideals of the Omelas community. In the beginning of the story the city of Omelas seemed like a nice and joyful community, but further into the story it becomes a dark and twisted community.
ReplyDeleteThe short story, “The Ones Who Walked Away From Omelas,” expressed the idea of sacrificing the well being of one person for the well being of all. Ursula Le Guin starts the story off by describing all the happiness and joy of the town of Omelas. He does this through describing their Festival of Summer. Everyone is happy, the sky is clear and the sun is shinning. Even the horses lined up to race are full of joy and spirit. After describing, in great detail, the happenings of the festival, he asks the vital question of do you accept the joy of the city. Assuming the reader said no, he reveals the dark secrete behind the happy town and their apparent source of joy, a small child locked in a small room and neglected. The city of Omelas keeps a child locked in a room only two paces wide, no light, little food, and “It”, as they call the child, is forced to lay there naked in its own excretions. The way Le Guin describes the scene is by far the most disturbing thing I have ever read. Everyone in Omelas knows it is there, but no one will do anything to stop it. Their reasoning behind having it there is that it makes the city a bright, happy place. Some people choose to visit it and others don’t. Of the ones who visit it, the majority just accept it, but others just begin to walk and never stop until they are leaving the town. They don’t know of the outside world “but they seem to know where they are going, the ones who leave Omelas.” The fact that everyone knows it is there but do nothing about it proves that superstition overpowers reality. The belief that sacrificing the good of one for the good of all, throws all morals aside and is shown strongly in this piece.
ReplyDeleteEven though I read this story in high school, it is still just as disturbing as the first time that I read it. Omelas seems like an ideal society. Everyone's happy and going about their daily lives, not having a worry in the world. No one and nothing is perfect. The presence of the deprived child in the basement of a building is a disturbing one. It's slightly repulsive. Knowing about this child is depressing. The fact that "it" used to call out for help and no one listened, so “it” gave up, is horrible. It's like the people within this town have to know that the child is there, surviving on its own to know what it's like to be happy. The citizens of Omelas have to understand that there are people who have it worse, like this child, in order to appreciate their own happiness. I guess it's kind of like saying that one person’s suffering is okay if it's for the greater good of people. It's known that the child has to be there or else Omelas wouldn't exist. This perfect ideal society would be nothing without the struggling of this child. It's disgusting to think that people know of this and go about their daily lives and even walk away from Omelas without doing anything. Walking away from a problem isn't going to solve it.
ReplyDeleteThe short story “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas” starts off as a good setting and goes into extreme specific details about everything that is good in the city and right outside of the gates, and then it turns into a sick story. If the story kept going like the beginning, I would have been shocked for one because we don’t read normal stories but it would have been a great story and I could have seen myself living in this city. It sounded like a great city until its true secrets to its success was revealed. It is disgusting that people would keep an innocent child locked up and in that kind of solitude and living in those conditions. On the other hand, if I was in their situation, I would not want to release that child either. Even if it sounds sick, I think the happiness of the whole city is more important than one child being able to live a normal life. But since I’m not in that situation, I think it is disgusting what they are doing. One of the worst parts about this story is that this actually happened to a child but just because the parents thought it was disabled and did not want to take care of it. When it was discovered, the police could not tell of it was a boy or a girl. How could parents lock up their daughter for eight years with minimal human interaction? I do not like this story at all.
ReplyDeleteThe story was very weird and interesting. I thought that at first the city aeemed like a perfect place. as the story unraveled we learned the secrets of the town. this is where the question of morality comes into play. Is it better to hurt one person for the benefit of the group? This story left a bitter taste in my stomach because of the real life story of a child named Anne. This is where a young girl was locked in a closet and fed barely enough to live. This differs though because the society actually benefits I was torn emotionally by this story and questioned my own morality.
ReplyDelete“The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” is almost just as strange as the last short story we read, although it is actually more disturbing I find. I found the story to start off very boring and slow for the first three pages at least. These first three pages kept describing the great fortune of the city of Omelas and how beautiful and pleasing it was. I started to suspect something weird would happen because all the stories we have read in class have something strange or sad, but also since the author spent three pages just describing how pleasing the city was, I knew that something messed up had to be coming soon. The secret of Omelas shocked me and I felt disgusted reading the rest of the story after realizing what the town required of one unfortunate child just to keep it the way it was. The one chosen child had to be kept in a room with one locked door and no window. The child was locked in there, and no body ever came down except to kick the child to make it stand up or fill the food bowl and water jug. The child had to live on a half-bowl of corn mill and grease a day, and the child was also naked. I found this part of the story disturbing and I did not even want to read on. What was even more disturbing then that was that the people of the Omelas knew that this child was suffering and most were shocked and disgusted at first but came to turns with it over time to return to their normal lives worth the child suffering. If I knew this, I do not think I would be able to deal with the it and I would leave such place. Its also mentioned that the people who visit and can not handle it, walk away from the town and know where they are headed. I do not understand where they would be going and why they would walk away when they could be trying to stop it. I think that this is not a fair city, and everyone should have freedom. These people who live in Omelas are all so used to the perfect place they live in and do not know what suffering or pain is. My take is that these people would be better off living a moderate life where they can experience suffering and pain because that is what is needed to experience true happiness. Therefore no child would have to suffer for the common good of everyone else, and everyone else can just live a normal life with ups and down and not to the extremes of what the child goes through.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading this story, I really didn’t know how I felt about Omelas. At first it seemed like an okay place, not that I would want to live there, but it was not as scary as the society described by Kurt Vonnegut in Harrison Bergeron. However, after I read about the child that they kept in misery and filth, it made me kind of angry, I couldn’t understand why the city would do this, or what the purpose for it was. The only explanation for this that I could find was in several quotes that talk about comparing happiness to evil or pain. “The trouble is that we have a bad habit, encouraged by pedants and sophisticates, of considering happiness as something rather stupid. Only pain is intellectual, only evil interesting.” I thought this quote seemed to show the city’s reason for keeping one child in unending squalor and misery. They keep it so that they will have something to compare their happiness to because happiness is stupid. The society feels that they need something interesting because their happiness is so boring. But if they thought that pain and evil were interesting, then why did some people walk out of the city after they saw the child? I also thought that the quote: “But to praise despair is to condemn delight, to embrace violence is to lose hold of everything else.” explained this in a way. I think that this is the reason that some of the people that saw the child just left. By keeping the child living in unending misery, it destroyed all the previous ideas that they had had about their community. The community was in a way praising despair and the people that walked away just couldn’t continue to live in happiness when there was a person, a child, living in absolute misery.
ReplyDeleteThe story “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas” describes a place that sounds about perfect. The children’s are happy, there are no worriers, soldiers, kings or many rules. It sounds like the place someday I would want to visit but the story shows there is always a price to pay for happiness or beauty. The city of Omelas is the happiest city on earth and it’s not tainted with technology but in order for the city to flourish and the people to be happy a child suffers underground. The child remains underground and locked away to safe him from the truth. The people of Omelas are aware of the child existence and imprisonment. When a child of the right they can go visit the child but not everyone is able to bear the truth and they walk away from Omelas forever.
ReplyDeleteI believe that the prison created in “Omelas” is also a symbol of the truth and innocence. The walls protect the prisoner form the truth of the outside world. If the child is ever let of the prison he will learn the harsh realities of the world and he won’t be able hold on to his innocence. The child has never really known the outside world and what exist outside that room and if he is let out he wouldn’t be able to adjust to the world and the happiness of the people of Omelas depends on the child therefore he must remain underground away form the world.
This story was very disturbing. The author spent a lot of time describing this place as the "perfect society." It was explained as a complex and joyous place where the people who lived in this area were filled with happiness. Later on it explains about the child who is basically a slave and is confined to a dark room and is given little to eat and drink. I felt that there would be a twist to the story when Omelas was being described as such a good place. It almost seemed too good to be true. There is no such thing as perfect, there are flaws to everything. I think the people in this town were experiencing something everyone goes through just on a bigger scale. There are always times you have to weigh out the pros and cons of a situation and decide if it is worth it. For example if you do not feel like going to work but you want the money. You have to decide if staying home and doing nothing is worth it and if you won't need the money later on. The people in Omela are facing something similar. They have to decide if they should help this child get freedom and feel better about themselves for helping or continue to live in the "perfect world" they have because of this child.
ReplyDelete"The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" is a short story about a city called Omelas. In Omelas there is events held such as the Festival of Summer, which depends on the misery of a child. There is a child locked up in a cellular who is deprived of human contact. But the people of Omelas believe their happiness and success depends on this child. The people in the city believe that helping the child would destroy the city's prosperity and beauty. So as a result, they just accept the situation to avoid stopping their happiness for one person. I think the moral of the story is people won't stand up for something that doesn't benefit them. Even though the people showed sorrow for the child they didn't do anything to help. The people were afraid that they would risk everything. But I didn't understand the section of the story that stated "It is because of the child that they are so gentle with children." It sounded like the child was a type of experiment. By having the child hidden from any contact they learned that the contact is necessary. Lastly, the people who left Omelas were the only decent people. They were actually getting away from the problem instead of just observing the child. But the story left me wondering about the people who walked away from Omelas. When the story said the people walked away to a place that was less imaginable to us I thought of Heaven. I thought that it seemed like a place that we are not really clear about. Overall the story left unanswered questions.
ReplyDeleteThis short story has some of the same characteristics that we discussed last time in class such as the idea of a “perfect world” with some defects however. The story opens with describing the setting as a beautiful place called the Omelas. Every aspect of the town seems to be perfect and the best place around to live. The author continually stresses the fact that all of the citizens are happy with their lives in the community. This just adds to the idea that the community in which they live is a joyful place to be a part of. However, the Omelas also has a bad side to it. There is one room in the basement of a building where whoever is in there, is separate from the rest of the outside world. There are no windows and the door is always locked. The child who remains in there has no contact with anyone and they are not sufficiently fed. Even though the Omelas are living in a seemingly perfect world I believe this is the contradiction to that world where it gives the citizens a taste of what occurs outside of their community. It is a requirement in the society in order to maintain a perfect world on the outside. This goes to show that even the most perfect society can have its defects. At the end, it describes people walking away from Omelas and that they never return. This reminds me of the idea of an afterlife. It states that they keep walking and never return back to the city. They go to a less imaginable place than the city of happiness and they say that it is possible that it does not exist. This makes me think of the afterlife because it is said to be a place of pureness and happiness although not everyone believes in its existence.
ReplyDeleteI am going to be honest this was a messed up story. They speak of all this happiness in the world but yet there is torture in it. This small child has to suffer a horrible life in order for everyone else to enjoy their lives. The people of this society manly the young people of this city feel convictions about allow this child to suffer. Yet they realize this torture is for the great good of the people. This story is rather similar to Shirley Jackson's the "Lottery." There is this unchanged tradition that the city participates in. They all fear the tradition but yet they feel that it is a necessity to continue their tradition. However in "The Ones Who Walked Away from Omelas" generally the older men and women will choose to leave the city. They go to a place that gets away from their convictions and maybe does not have such morbid ways to achieve happiness.
ReplyDelete“The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” starts off with great imagery about a a beautiful festival going on in this city called Omelas. It is described as “a sense of victory, surely, the celebration of courage.” The reader is brought into this beautiful perfect world that seems surreal. “Like a city in a fairy tale”. The imagery then changes to a small room, with one locked door and no window and the feel of the story completely changes. We learn that there is a little girl about the age of ten sitting in this room that is smaller than the broom closet. They refer to the child as an it and continue to go on about everything that is wrong with the child. The story then becomes disturbing. The child is siting on the floor, locked away with no interaction. Occasionally someone comes to kick the child or fills it’s “food bowl” as is it was a dog. The most disturbing part of this story is when we learn that the child is sitting here for other people’s entertainment and so that dont feel as bad about their own lives and know others have it worse. But everyone in the town knows there is nothing they can do, and they don’t make an attempt to change it. They “walk away from Omelas”.
ReplyDelete"The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" is a story that talks about an almost "utopian" society with one major flaw. The story is very disturbing. When you first start reading you believe that the city Omelas is perfect but there is no such thing as perfect. It is obvious that there is something wrong with Omelas. The fatal flaw of the city Omelas is that its prosperity and happiness comes from a small child locked in a cellar. The boy lives in the worst conditions and is barely given enough food to survive. Everyone in Omelas knows that the child is in the cellar but do nothing about it. I found this story similar to “The Lottery” because the people in Omelas follow the tradition and do not speak up about what the boy is going through just like the people in “The Lottery” who accept the fact that someone must die each year. The people in Omelas would rather keep their “perfect world” instead of helping the child. Their prosperity and happiness means more to them. The people are allowed to visit the child and most of them just accept the fact that they are in there. Others are very disturbed and decide to leave the city. The few that leave the city cannot deal with what the child is going through but are not able to speak up about it. Their solution is to leave the city and never come back. Overall, the story is very unpleasant to read.
ReplyDelete“The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas,” by Ursula K. Le Guin was about a happy, thriving society. It started as a struggle for the author to describe the type of atmosphere the town of Omelas was experiencing during the Festival of Summer. The town never really faced any type of struggles or wars; so being happy all the time wasn’t unusual. However, smiles were old fashion and deep down people were just happy, they didn’t show it. They had no leaders; they were a self-run society. They didn’t need technology because of lacking intelligence; they just didn’t feel that they needed cars or helicopters. However, the town had a dark “secret” that would make some people cringe. In order to maintain their perfect society, they needed to malnourish, torture, and leave a small child in a dark closet under the streets. Everyone knew about the child so it wasn’t a secret, but most chose to ignore it. They taught about in school and some visited. Some would be traumatized, while others would torture it even more. Those who were traumatized would become very silent (sometimes for days). Then, they would walk, alone, without stopping, and would never come back. Thus the title “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas.” I thought this story was confusing to follow at first because of all the opposites the author used to describe the setting. However, it just became sickening once they showed the kid. The only thing I want to know was what mom volunteers their kid into that situation for the better good? Unless she didn’t have a choice and it was a lot like “The Lottery” short story we read previously. Just like last week, this is a short story that raises more questions than answers.
ReplyDeletefrom Alex
ReplyDeleteAt first this reminded me of the lottery because everyone was so happy and there had to be something wrong. I first noticed serving was wrong when the author described the cellar. I don't know why they had to lock up an innocent child to keep their perfect world. I get that every happy person always has some darkness in their life but why does this child's unhappiness and pain keep their world going? It doesn't make sense. As for the people walking away maybe it was the parents of the lost child and they realize the horrors of the world that they lived in. They wanted to walk away from the pain and torture or the guilt finally overwhelmed them so much that they just had to leave.