Don Tillman's The Rosie Project

1768 Words4 Pages

The definition of love is: “a feeling of warm personal attachment or deep affection, as for a parent, child or friend” (Dictionary.com). Relationships can be difficult when trying to successfully satisfy both partners. It has ups and downs that are caused when there is disagreement in the relationship, but if there is mutual love between the two partners, things can find its way back to how it is supposed to be. The Rosie Project is about geneticist Don Tillman, who is looking for a potential romantic partner. After searching for a long time, he stumbles across Rosie who happens to be on a journey to find her biological father. Don decides to help her. After spending much time together, they fall for each other and decide to be together. The …show more content…

Her expectations of a father are set too high based merely on her not ever knowing who her father was. She reveals to Don that she thinks of her biological father as a hero who would come into her life and fix everything. She fails to achieve happiness, as she reveals later that she wants to seek revenge on her biological father for leaving her. After learning who her biological father is and comparing it with the hero she imagined in her dreams, she becomes angry. She ultimately fails achieving happiness by the results of searching for the perfect father through The Father Project. “‘Funny you should ask,’ said Rosie. ‘I said it was about closure. But I think, subconsciously, I had this fantasy that my real father would come riding in and…deal with Phil. …’I said it was a fantasy,’ she said. ‘I saw him as some sort of hero’ (262). This quote shows when Rosie describes who she wants her father to be and even admits that it is a fantasy. There truly is no such thing as a father being a hero, even for her. These high expectations of a father figure are not realistic and should have never been interpreted that way in the first place. Rosie also does not trust others because of the environment she was brought up in, where she did not ever know that Phil was truly her father. “So I don’t trust men. I don’t believe they say what …show more content…

This is shown through Don’s highly specific questionnaire, Rosie’s high expectations of her father, and the view of Gene’s behaviour as immature. Don has very high hopes for a partner that could meet all his criteria, but in reality, there is no such person that can pass all questions on his test, without a flaw in themselves. Rosie also thought of her father as someone to be there to protect her and to never let her down, not knowing that she was already receiving this from Phil, who in fact is her biological father. It is ironic because she sets high expectations ignoring that she has already achieved the criteria she expects. Gene and Claudia show a different perspective to the high expectations, but it is still evident that Claudia sets high expectations for Gene, who wants to live his life freely with no rules to his relationship. This causes conflicting views between the two and damages a healthy relationship. Overall, the novel shows that high expectations and changing behaviours can help maintain a relationship, and help achieve

Open Document