One aspect of The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao that I found interesting was the relationship between his struggles with his weight and his prodigy in writing. In his early childhood Oscar was praised by friends and family for his skill with girls, he was “something of a Casanova” (Diaz 1). He was more interesting in hitting on every girl he laid eyes on than writing. Once Oscar hit early adolescence he became immensely overweight and girls no longer found him attractive. It was then when his interest in writing and reading flourished. Diaz describes how Oscar differed from the other typical high school kids. He states, “Back when the rest of us were learning to play wallball and pitch quarters and drive our older brothers cars…he was gorging himself on a steady stream of Lovecraft, Wells, Burroughs, Howard, Alexander, Herbert…moving hungrily from book to book” (Diaz 21). Because Oscar was so ostracized from the other kids he turned to reading as a source of entertainment. Much of what he read was Science Fiction. Reading for Oscar was an escapist tactic that took him away from his life of loneliness and nerdiness. His growing passion for reading led him to gain an intense interest in writing.

           When Oscar went to visit La Inca in Santo Domingo he brings empty notebooks with him with the intention of filling them all up with his writing. His cousins invite him multiple times to hang out with them, however, Oscar is so focused on writing that he declines. When he returns from Santo Domingo there is a shift in how he views himself and the relationship that he has with his “friends”. Diaz describes this change stating, “In the old days…he always crawled voluntarily back into the abuse, out of fear and loneliness, something he’d always hated himself for, but not this time. If there existed in his high school years any one moment he took pride in it was clearly this one” (Diaz 33). Before he began writing Oscar was crippled by insecurities about his weight and physical appearance. He felt inferior even to the people who were supposed to be his friends. His writing gives Oscar something to be proud of, and a feeling of self-worth that he did not possess before.