The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Similar to how music becomes a way for Charlie to express his emotions, books become a way for Charlie to understand aspects of himself. Bill continually gives Charlie extracurricular books to read outside of class, and each time he asks Charlie to write an essay on each book. The purpose of the essay isn’t just to become a better writer, but it’s also for Charlie to contemplate each book in relation to himself and his experience. This idea can be seen when Bill gives Charlie Peter Pan. Like Peter Pan, Charlie’s freshmen year of high school makes him feel caught between being a child and being an adult. Charlie says that the book is about “this boy who refuses to grow up, and when Wendy grows up, he feels very betrayed” (28).

Another symbolic book for Charlie is The Catcher in the Rye. Like Charlie, the protagonist faces mental health issues and has a difficult time expressing himself to others. In this way, many of the books that Bill gives him are symbolic of Charlie’s life and what he’s going through.

Charlie spends a lot of time thinking about and giving gifts, and many of his most memorable experiences relate to gifts. This is most dramatically seen in relation to his aunt Helen. Because Charlie’s birthday is the day before Christmas, everyone in his family usually buys him one gift instead of two separate gifts. However, Aunt Helen always made a point to buy him two: one for his birthday and one for Christmas. The night his aunt Helen is killed in a car accident, she was on her way to get Charlie his gifts. Subsequently, the idea that his aunt would have lived if it wasn’t for him plagues Charlie.

Because Charlie felt so loved by his aunt’s thoughtful gifts, he puts a lot of consideration into the gifts he gives those he loves. This can best be seen during the Secret Santa exchange, when each gift he gave to Patrick, Sam, and his friends were specially tailored to demonstrate that he knows them. For example, he gave Patrick a book about Harvey Milk, a gay right’s activist, because he knows Patrick’s struggles of being an openly gay man. This idea can also be seen when Charlie demonstrates anxiety because he doesn’t know what to get his dad for Christmas. For Charlie, the fact that he doesn’t know what to get his dad reveals that he doesn’t really know his dad. In this way, gifts are symbolic of Charlie’s ability to know someone, and they reveal the care he has for a person.