The Awkward Protagonist

The awkward protagonist

In the story of On a full Sea, I find that having a character like Fan a bit interesting. Coming back to the old idea of dystopian novel, the main character is usually somewhat a martyr. However, in the case of Fan, she is interesting because, while most characters would have somewhat of a resistance. She instead uses desist, in a sense to give up. Most resistance is usually found with the main characters, like, Hunger games, with Katniss who have an active resistant characterization. Rather Fan in a sense desist and lets everything happen. However, this does not mean that Fan is not an active character. Although we do not know her thoughts as a one on one from the narrator but rather the narrator essentially is us telling her story. Certain times of the story, she is quite active for example, when she told Miss Cathy to close her eyes as she essentially grabbed her hand and did not let go. That is an active role because it incites violent reaction out of Miss Cathy. Fan is this awkward protagonist because the fact that we do not actually understand her as the readers or the narrator can. Most of the time, we do not understand why Fan does not get up and leave. Could it be the stereotype of what her race is the fact that she is depicted as Asian, that she cannot leave, because of the Oriental Stereotype like Said’s essay on orientalism? In a sense, the idea of Asian girls to be pushed into this box like idea of being similar like clones, small, petite, and just plain cute? Or the fact that she is painted as this small cute like girl, like the idea of Kawaii, where it is just her as this character to be desexualized because she looks like a twelve year old? It is interesting as most dystonia literature pushes most main characters to be more active in resistance yet she is the embodiment of desistance.