Finding the Beauty in the Beast (The Secret Life of Walter Mitty by James Thurber Book Analysis)

One of the countless famous Disney movies of all time is Beauty and the Beast. Released in 1991, the movie features not only talking plates, talking furniture, and magic but also its two main characters. The two main characters are Belle, a non-conforming girl who's tired of living her predictable life in her village, and the Beast, a prince turned into a beast for having a rotten personality. The two meet and appropriately, one action leads to another and they fall in love with each other. One of the morals of Beauty and the Beast is to never base your opinion on someone based on what you perceive or what you hear. That moral can be applied to the story of “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” by James Thurber. In his story, we meet a character by the name of Walter Mitty who struggles with switching back and forth from reality to fantasy. Being asked the question of whether or not he would be a good dinner companion, I say yes. Walter Mitty would be a good dinner companion because he could share his experiences with his daydreams and could raise awareness of how he lives his life. 

Firstly, Walter Mitty would be a good dinner companion for the reason that he could share his experiences with his daydreams. In one of Walter’s fantasies, he observes his crew, “bending to their various tasks in the huge, hurtling eight-engined Navy hydroplane,” who look at each other and say, ‘The Old Man'll get us through.’ This shows how in his daydreams, he is a different person from how he ordinarily is in reality. Since in his fantasy world he puts on a new persona, it would be interesting to hear him talk about his fantasies and what he experiences in them. It may even lead to the possibility of him putting on that persona with his real self; leading to interesting conversation starters and stories. Being able to share his experiences can also be satisfactory for him to let off steam and not feel as miserable; since he has been ostracized by everyone, including his wife. We can observe in this story that after she screams at him, “She seemed grossly unfamiliar, like a strange woman who had yelled at him in a crowd.” This shows that his wife has started to become unfamiliar to him and she feels like someone who is like a stranger. It causes one to wonder how different his personality would be if he had people around him who listened to him. Towards the end of the story, it is said that “He took one last drag on his cigarette and snapped it away.” Right after, he starts to smile and faces, “...the firing squad; erect and motionless, proud and disdainful, Walter Mitty the Undefeated, inscrutable to the last.” This shows just how powerful Walter feels when he is in his fantasy and how he is “the undefeated” who was ‘“inscrutable to the last.” Constantly surrounded by a wife who scolds him every time he’s with her does not allow him to ever feel powerful or capable to accomplish something in his life. While it is easy to say that he would never share his experiences as he would be too hesitant to, we need to remember that no one has ever given him a chance to share his opinion and his feelings.

Secondly, Walter Mitty would be a good dinner companion since he could raise awareness of how he lives his life.  Walter seems to have a condition called maladaptive daydreaming when it can be difficult to live everyday life without getting distracted by a daydream. Nevertheless, it seems as if the people around him don’t seem to realize that there is something medically wrong with Walter and we can take a glimpse of that with his wife. She is quoted to have said that Walter is not going to be “a young man any longer,” and that in response to Walter saying that he “is sometimes thinking,” she just looks at him. Not only does this give the impression that Mrs. Mitty believes that Walter is gone off the deep end, but that she has also given up on him. Walter has never been allowed to share his feelings and while his wife might understand to a certain extent what he goes through, ultimately she doesn’t. She doesn’t know how hard it is for Walter to constantly be switching from reality to fantasy with little to no control. It’s hard to imagine how exhausting it would be to constantly switch and it seems almost disheartening to imagine how this impacts his safety, not just his relationships with others. It is described that after taking off the gloves that his wife wants him to put on, he is waiting at a red light and he hears, “Pick it up, brother!” from a cop behind him. This then causes him to have “lurched ahead” and be in a panic. The situation that his daydreams place him in puts his life in danger and if it’s something that he cannot control, it makes it 10 times worse. After the situation with the officer, it is said that “He drove around the streets aimlessly for a time,” showing that even he is starting to lose hope and feels aimless in his life. A person can only take so much and Walter Mitty seems like he just needs to feel like he is being valued and thought about. His condition of maladaptive daydreaming seems to affect him and it could be helpful to manage that off his chest. Being able to have someone to talk to and raise awareness of his condition can be beneficial; not only to him but to everyone around him. Some people might say that Walter Mitty would not be a good dinner companion because he is too unpredictable but if he had someone to share his feelings with, it might make all the difference.

In conclusion, I say that Walter Mitty would be a good dinner companion since all he needs is someone to listen to him and understand him. We should all be empathetic when it comes to people in tough situations, and Walter Mitty is someone who is in a tough situation. Not only is he constantly switching between reality and fantasy, but because of something that he cannot control, he is being ostracized and villainized. Not only does this story allow us to gain insight into a condition as hard as maladaptive daydreaming, but it also stands as a reminder to not instantly jump on a bandwagon. Not only does jumping on bandwagon affect the person who is being hated on but also makes us, as a society, not evolve into being more open about things. While Walter Mitty may not have found a cure to his condition, his story leaves us with the message of never judging a book by its cover and treating everyone with the feeling of making them “be our guest."The only way to grant someone the feeling of being our guest is to invite them over for dinner which I would gladly do with Walter Mitty.