'An Analysis Of Teenage Wasteland' By Anne Tyler

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An Analysis of “Teenage Wasteland” by Anne Tyler
In “Teenage Wasteland” by Anne Tyler the story is set in a suburban town in the 1960’s and focuses on a teenager whose name is Donny and his mother Daisy. Donny is a teenager who finds school and following directions a challenge. The story starts off with a meeting with Donny’s mother and his principle and Daisy gets hit with the realization that Donny is being destructive during school. Daisy has done what she thought was “everything she could”. Further into the story, Donny meets his new “tutor” Cal who ends up giving Donny too much freedom, possibly because of his past, and goes by the idea of happiness is more important than his education. Through the characters of Daisy, Donny, and Cal, …show more content…

For instance, he thinks his parents are too strict because he has a curfew on the weekends and his parents call to see if a parent will be supervising a party. Often, “he [Donny] said his parents are too ‘controlling’ – a word that made Daisy give him a sudden look” (Tyler 36). Daisy was only trying to be a good parent by keeping a tight eye on Donny so he can stop getting into trouble. One afternoon, Cal calls Daisy to explain that Donny feels his parents do not trust him and he wants to make more grown up decisions. Daisy entrusted Cal at that moment and she really thought Cal was doing miracle work with Donny. Therefore, “they let Donny stay out later, they didn’t call ahead to see if the parties were supervised, and they were careful not to grill him about his evening” (Tyler 36). Donny already had problems behaving and doing well in school, which is the reason he was not allowed a lot of freedom. More specifically, Donny already did not follow the rules and stay within the boundaries he was given, thus the reason why Donny was not responsible enough to have an inch more of freedom. Time went by and Donny, still, was not making any progress in school: in fact, Donny’s grades were

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