Review of The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas by Ursula Le Guin

In this amazing short story, “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas”, by Ursula Le Guin. It is all about a society, that has a perfect image of itself and its people. However, there is a dark and twisted secret, a child that sacrifices its life to provide prosperity, equality and happiness between the habitants of this city called Utopia. As a reader, you are challenged to visualize and create your own perfect place in the world, your own Utopia. With the means to embrace this horrible dilemma: The happiness of all, but with a cost, the extreme unhappiness of one. The thesis statement reflects problems that our society has been suffering since the beginning, such as military sacrifice, slavery, and injustice among us.

The author describes that Omelas does not have any type of ruling system, no king or president, political system, technology or many things that engulf our society nowadays. As human beings, we have always fought for freedom, it is encrypted in our D.N.A. But what we see in our world or in this story, is that nobody is truly free. “They know that they, like the child, are not free” the author writes, enlightening the reader that although the citizens live what it seems “free”, within their feelings and thoughts, they are not free. There are no slaves in Utopia, as the author describes. However, this poor child’s freedom is taken from it, just as slavery. This poor child symbolizes slavery in every way, because it does not have any liberty, it is a servant to all citizens of utopia so they could have a happy life. The author offers to us, as readers, a contradiction that says: “… she did it without… the slavery”, but it does not reach the conclusion that the child is a servant of Omelas like a slave to his owner.

All Utopia’s habitants are described as prosperous, equals and filled with joy, off course, excluding this poor child who is mistreated and confined in a tiny basement which is in horrible condition. This child reflects the lives of many slaves in America and the world. Where the son of a slave would have to become a slave as well and will never be freed. Moreover, the terrible and poor condition of this prison where the child lives, reflected how slaves lived back in the day. Another symbol that reflects the slavery in this story would be the smelling rags and buckets next to the closet, which it is a reminder to the child of its role as a slave, and servant of this city.

This amazing story shows that human beings are creatures of habit. That sometimes we continue to participate, or even do not pay attention into harmful practices. Just for the simple fact that we as individuals, feel powerless and unable to stand up against societies in which the behaviors have always been accepted.