For much of the novel, Isobel goes through life intensely believing that the key to her happiness is belonging: if she is part of a crowd, if she is accepted, she will be "normal", and it is this goal on which she focuses much of her energy. This desperate search for belonging manifests itself in many sincere efforts: her deep concern for social correctness, her determination to be liked and accepted in retirement, her determination to become part of the university crowd, and later in her passive participation in casual sexual intercourse. activity. However, as her attempts to assimilate continually falter, she gradually develops the resilience needed to survive on her own. By finally confronting her past and resurrecting the lost part of herself, she gains the freedom to be satisfied with herself and less worried about the acceptance of others. While I for Isobel may suggest that the strongest human desire is to belong, it ends with the message that true contentment lies in self-acceptance – in a sense, belonging to oneself. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay Isobel is filled with an acute sense of “longing and a sense of exile,” stemming from a belief instilled in childhood that she was “not real,” not a “member of the human race.” As a child, Isobel finds himself perpetually the outsider of the family, outnumbered by the alliance of Margaret and Mrs Callaghan, exchanging "contemptuous and conspiratorial glances", enjoying "well-known jokes" at Isobel's expense the death of her mother, Isobel embarks on her life alone, while Margaret goes to live with her aunt Yvonne, a new family dynamic perfectly encapsulated in the image of Margaret and Yvonne sitting together in the taxi "like mother and daughter" while Isobel sits next to the driver, starkly separated from the comfortable and loving relationship in the back seat. As she grows up and experiences new social situations, Isobel finds herself unable to understand the casual interaction of young people, wondering in amazement “Was that dialogue? Were they acting in a play?" and reflects that "the people spoke poetry", millions of different secret languages ​​full of euphemisms, metaphors and references that Isobel simply cannot understand, building an impenetrable barrier that closes her to interaction. Soon she discovers that the workplace is "like school, therefore bearable, but disappointing", leaving her once again clearly separated from the people around her. Even with Aunt Noelene the conversation is often awkward: there is no real closeness, ed both are "relieved when the phone rings", and breaks the uncomfortable silence. This feeling of being shut out and isolated, of being conspicuously abnormal, causes Isobel to strive to find acceptance in every environment in which she enters. finds, declaring to Frank that all she wants in life is to "be one of the crowd" and live by the "eleventh commandment" – "You shall not be different." Hoping to achieve this goal of conformity, Isobel constantly worries about propriety social, always pausing to check herself and consider what "the right behavior" would be, berating herself for blindly overstepping convention and forcefully imposing on herself: "right behavior first." However, this deep concern for conformity to social conventions causes her to remain trapped in a position of obedient passivity from which she cannot escape. He becomes a sort of "pet" for Mrs. Bowers, with the constant "offeringof a cup of tea she didn't know how to refuse." Furthermore, when she finds herself in environments whose conventions she doesn't understand, Isobel's attempts to remain socially correct invariably falter, forcing Olive to scold her for inappropriate behavior in the workplace." It's just not right that you're so familiar with him, Frank,” Olive says, “…and if you didn't laugh so much at Mr. Richard… These things are more important than you think.” These comments leave Isobel confused and upset, endlessly wondering what she did wrong. She "wants to know where she went wrong" and is unable to understand her mistakes, but she has no guidelines, no one to explain the rules of social correctness to her. Because she inherently lacks the ability to perceive and understand society's unspoken rules, Isobel is never truly able to belong. As she begins her new life in the boarding house, Isobel's desperation to be accepted and loved is revealed not only in her desperation to be noticed by the younger boarders, but subconsciously in her determination to be Mrs Bowers' "favourite daughter", struggling for a new family dynamic in which she is included and loved. Isobel is “delighted to be included in the games the young people played” as she engages in playful banter with Norman, intensely agitated with happiness (“excited… making fun of”) even the smallest sliver of attention. Being noticed allows Isobel to believe for a moment that she is normal, that she interacts with boys in the casual, confident way she sees other girls do. However, when her attempts at flirtatious provocation prove harsher than she intended, Isobel realizes that she simply doesn't know how to play this game properly. Finding Norman's gaze "fixed on her, tense and dull with hatred" is a sort of turning point in Isobel's attitude towards the pension: she realizes that she will never be part of it and, perhaps to demonstrate this point, from here on out he finds "no sympathy anywhere." The boarders become increasingly "hostile" towards her, a cruelty that Isobel describes as "the kind of bullshit I hate most". However, even though Isobel knows she doesn't belong to the group, she can't understand what she did wrong. “This is when I worry,” she laments, “when people don't like me and I don't know why.” The child inside Isobel, the "idiot in the attic" who "played with the real world... behind Isobel's back." ” uses retirement as an opportunity to make up for always being the victim in the Callaghan household, subconsciously striving to be Mrs. Bowers' favorite daughter. His "sucking" of Mrs. Bowers reflects his intense need to belong to a family, a longing for the mother he never had. Despite her desperate attempts to suppress it, this need remained with her, constantly lurking in her mind and weighing her down, expressed succinctly in Isobel's mind through the syllogism “the idiot wants a mother. An idiot can't have one", concluding with the tired conclusion: "Life is very difficult". Isobel reflects: “You left home thinking of freedom… but you didn't move forward, you went back. To fight the old battle and this time to win... to be the favorite son." By taking the place of Madge, Mrs. Bowers' real daughter, Isobel has unknowingly done what she never managed to accomplish as a child, but now she realizes that being the favorite is not a better position: this is not love, it is not closeness, and not even a real sense of belonging; he is simply playing the role of the meek and obedient “pet,” accepted not for who he is but for hisdutiful passivity. Realizing this, Isobel abandons her efforts to belong to this surrogate family, ultimately defying Mrs. Bowers by helping Madge and effectively exacerbating her distress in the family in the process. Isobel is clearly isolated but no longer cares; he doesn't even try to belong here anymore. When Isobel meets the university crowd, she is entranced by their intelligence and what she sees as the wonderful freedom and sophistication of their existence, and is determined to be one of them. He watches them longingly, thinking wistfully “that was living as he longed to know it. Did they know how lucky they were?" When she finds the courage to approach them, Isobel quickly becomes "intoxicated by their attention", feeling "really alive now". Her desperate need to be accepted is evident as she imperiously urges herself to "must entertain, must succeed", and is willing to "offer anything that makes them laugh", even if this means using Mrs Bowers, who has at this stage offered Isobel only kindness and compassion, as an object of ridicule, feeling that "it will make them laughing might have made her acceptable." being "somehow disqualified, for never really being one of them" remains. Although she is welcomed amiably into the group, is she allowed to sit with them in the bar? and follow them around: not there is no real evidence of any warmth or connection that binds her to them. Even with Trevor, while the reader can see from the special attention he pays her that he has some interest in her, Isobel is unable to truly commit to her. friendship: she remains too guarded to truly permeate the distance between them. Isobel consciously realizes the problematic extent of this distance only when Trevor tentatively attempts to transform their relationship into a romantic one. As she wriggles frantically from his embrace, "it was her body that fought, not her," and even as she later contemplates the "fading prospect of being Trevor's girlfriend," of belonging somewhere, she instinctively knows that sacrificing own integrity and sense of self for the sake of conformity is not possible. “It was what it was and nothing could change it, so it's best to end it,” no matter how much you pretend to be someone else, “you'd eventually resurrect yourself.” Isobel ultimately gives up her ambition to belong to the group, resignedly acknowledging that "she did not belong to them, even if they had not excluded her", reflecting her instinctive sense of the impossibility of conformity. Isobel's search for belonging later manifests itself in her engaging in meaningless sexual activities with virtual strangers, striving to behave as “normal” young people do so that she too can become normal, accepted. When Michael angrily asks her why she "does things like that," Isobel is forced to think about what she's doing. She notes of herself that she "likes to join the human race on the only level you can manage... putting on" what she perceives as normal behavior. However, going through the motions doesn't make her like everyone else: as much as she tries to fit in with social norms, Isobel never truly belongs in this kind of situation. He knows this is not a search for love. Although it is possible that he initially thought that physical intimacy could lead to his emotional and mental intimacy, he now knows that the connection between love and sex is "dubious" and is no longer fooled by romantic ideas of sex as a manifestation of love . which he has undoubtedly read about. As she muses, “oh lyrical love, half angel, half bird, or 99% bird,” she recognizes, somewhat despondently, that there is nothing magical or beautiful about this experience; It's a bird, not an angel. He doesn't get any from it..