English A – Rodrigo Ayala Alas

Activity
Page 22 – Analysis
There are many situations where what one person considers to be “normal” might not
be for another. This is the case with the story presented here, “Faces” By Aimee
Bender. The story describes a child’s visit to the doctor, the actual reason why he is in
the doctor is never said directly, the story only mentions the fact that the kid struggles to
identify people, he also struggles to recognize the expressions of people presented in
people in front of him and even the expressions of the doctor. This makes the reader
infer that the illness the child suffers is “Prosopagnosia”.
Prosopagnosia is a mental illness that makes the victim unable to recognize the faces of
people they once recognized. This condition is mostly caused because of a mental
trauma the victim has suffered, albeit a car crash or an underlying mental condition, but
there is also the possibility that the victim has lived their entire life with Prosopagnosia,
whether it be because they were born like that or because they suffered the trauma at a
very early age. This seems to be the case for the kid in the story since he does not
seem bothered by his condition in the slightest, even making comments to the doctor
like “Are we done here?” what he seems bothered by is the fact that he thinks the doctor
is making him out to be retarded or mentally ill, which alludes to the fact that the kid
might have had this condition for the entirety of his life, so for him being unable to see
the faces of people or recognize their expressions is something completely normal for
him so he gets angry and irritated at the doctor for thinking that he isn’t.
The mom also seems to be slightly at fault for the kids’ irritation since she does not
seem to have completely accepted the fact her son has this type of condition since she
lashed out at him for pointing out the fact that the doctor has a “long neck” but he does
not say this to insult the doctor, he says this because is one of the few things he can
recognize out of the doctor. The story also mentions the fact that the kid could
recognize that the mom made a “look” at the doctor, but if he has this condition, how
was he able to recognize the mom’s expression at that moment? The answer is
probably that he can recognize different features in different people, like his mom’s lips
and the doctor’s neck.
At the end of the story, it describes how the kid went to a candle shop to smell the
candles alluding to the fact that the kid most likely uses his sense of smell to recognize
things rather than his eyes telling the reader that he has overcome his illness to a
certain extent.