Prompt #1:
In The Sympathizer, the unnamed narrator has two main romantic relationships: with Ms. Mori, and with Lana. While these relationships differ from one another, they are united by the narrator’s inability to turn them into something sustainable or healthy. What does the narrator’s identity have to do with this romantic difficulty? How does this difficulty, related to his manifold identity, manifest itself in each relationship, even if it appears in different ways?
Prompt #2:
“Nothing is more important than freedom and independence” – this ostensibly straightforward statement acts as a riddle, chewed on by the narrator throughout the course of the novel, and finally as a catalyst for his “enlightenment” by way of interrogation. In your essay, describe how the meaning of this phrase changes for the narrator over time, and how it relates to his eventual enlightenment – what does it mean at the beginning? What does it mean at the end? How does that meaning evolve?
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