In conclusion, looking at LeGuin’s short story “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas’, through a Marxist lense allows the reader to relate the story to real-life society. They are the people in society that take a stand for the workers that are pushed down by the weight of their job and futureless life. Activism is not seen in Omelas but the reader can assume that it is what the deserters will be doing. It is difficult for regular citizens that have accepted the fate of the boy or the workers to understand what the deserters will be doing. LeGuin asserts the deserters of Omelas “seem to know where they are going” (LeGuin 756). It is a hard life, but they know what they are going to do. A real world connection to the citizens that leave are the people in American society that refuse to buy products made by the sweatshops and go help the mistreated workers.
However, there are exceptions to this as people leave Omelas. It is not moral, but they have no guilt when choosing what makes them happy. They are willing to let him suffer to get the products that make them happy. They are much more concerned with the society’s happiness than the happiness of one suffering boy in a closet. This is seen in LeGuin’s explanation of the terms of happiness in Omelas “To exchange all the goodness and grace of everyday life in Omelas for that single, small improvement: to throw away the happiness of thousands for the chance of the happiness of one: that would be to let guilt within the walls indeed” (LeGuin 756). Everyone eventually comes to terms with what the boy is going through. There are also real world connections to our society concerning the ones who leave Omelas. Yet very few people, as seen in the short story also, leave the city. People know that their amazing, utopian society is built on the tears and suffering of others. They have somber feelings for them but in the end ignore them. LeGuin highlights this when she says, “It is the existence of the child, and their knowledge of its existence, that makes possible the nobility of their architecture, the poignancy of their music, the profundity of their science”(LeGuin 756). Due to this, nothing is done and the miserable workers have to keep working in awful conditions. This proves that the center of society is the socioeconomic system. Most people think that the benefits of the products outweigh the suffering the workers go through. Almost all Americans know about the consequences of the process called offshoring, but very few actually try to stop it. they all understand that their happiness depend wholly on this child’s abominable misery” (LeGuin 755). LeGuin explains this when she states the people of Omelas, “all know it is there, all the people of Omelas. The working conditions in those factories make the people miserable and put them in a cage they cannot escape just like the boy. In our society, many products are made overseas in factories that pay very little for the amount of work that is done. To see this, they have to figure out how the boy relates to everyday life. One can see from LeGuin’s use of the boy that the socioeconomic system is at the center of our society. Instead, she gives us the freedom to make our own happy place with no guilt. If LeGuin did not want us to imagine our own world, she would have laid Omelas out so the reader can better understand their society. We all have different interests and she even goes to say that even if you want drugs, you can in your perfect, utopian world (LeGuin 754). By saying this, we can assume that LeGuin wants the reader to see Omelas as their own world. In the Story LeGuin states, “Perhaps it would be best if you imagined it as your own fancy bids, assuming it will rise to the occasion, for certainly I cannot suit you all” (LeGuin 753). Omelas, like the United States, is a place of freedom and for the most part, happiness. We first have to look at the similarities between them. To see the connection between the two societies. LeGuin uses Omelas to point out the faults in our real-life capitalistic society and show that the socioeconomic system is at the center of our society by comparing the United States to Omelas’ citizens and the tortured boy to mistreated adults and children who work in factories to make our products overseas.
Marxism is a literary criticism used to explore class differences and how our socioeconomic system is at the center of our world. Through a Marxist lense, one can see that the author’s purpose is to expose the truth about our capitalistic society.
However, the one catch to this “flawless” city is a tortured boy their happiness depends on. This story portrays a seemingly perfect utopian society with everything anyone can ever imagine. The short story “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” was written by Ursula LeGuin in 1973 to show some insight to our capitalistic society.