All social interactions have an active effect on all individuals involved, so relationships are important to the concept of identity, specifically between family and adversaries. The relationships between families are strong and often the connection is rooted in a foundation of love. The same can be said for the relationship of enemies except that the connection is one of hate. That is the case for The Grinch, the mean old Who lives on the mountaintops north of Whoville. The Grinch has hated the Whos for years and no one really understands why, many people believe that his heart is simply too small. Though The Grinch hates Christmas most of all, he hates the presents, the feasts, and most importantly the singing. He devises a plan with his trusty dog Max to go and steal Christmas away from the Whos in the hopes that he can have a quiet Christmas. The Grinch dressed as Santa and went down to whoville and stole every part of christmas. He meets Cindy Lou Who (a little girl in town) who questions “Santa” wondering why he is doing this. The Grinch lies to Cindy promising to bring it back but his interaction with the young girl stays with him as he starts to second guess his actions. After he completed his grand heist he went to the mountaintop expecting to hear the wonderful sounds of “boo hooing” from his completed scheme, but instead he heard singing! He heard the same caroling he despised. The Grinch thought about how this was possible for a long time and realized that there could be more to Christmas than the gifts or the tree. Then as some say, his heart grew three sizes that day! He went and returned all of the presents and trees and joined the Whos for their holiday feast.
The story of The Grinch highlights the importance of the relationships between people and how the lack of relationships can affect someone. The Grinch started off the story by hating the Whos potentially because he was jealous of them. They had loved ones and rubbed it in his face every year at Christmas time. This hate spiraled for years until he decided to pull off his scheme, then when he did he realized that he did not hate Christmas or the Whos. He was jealous of all that they had that he did not have, and was angry that he did not allow himself to open his heart to new relationships. That is why he returns the gifts and more importantly joins the Whos feast. He found his family and was invited into the celebration. This changes his relationship with the Whos from a hateful one to a loving one. The Grinch also went through his transformation with the help of Cindy Luo Who. She questions the Grinch on his motives for stealing Christmas and spends time with him (in the movie version) which causes him to second guess his actions. That allows his heart to grow later on, turning him into more of a father figure for Cindy and the other Whos. That is similar to the role of maturity in identity, because The Grinch goes through his own evolution with the help of Cindy similar to that of Mr. Fredrickson and Russel in UP. With The Grinch’s personality change also came an identity change because he no longer was the hateful man on the top of the mountain. His anger for the Whos and Christmas had become a core part of who he was, and when he learned to love the Whos like family his identity morphed to fit that new found bond. This change in his personality allowed for the major change in his identity. Our family and our adversaries are people that we hold close in either love or hate, and those relationships can change quickly or stay stagnant. Whichever the case we hold those relationships with importance as they help to define who we are making this important to our study of identity.
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Work Cited
“How the Grinch Stole Christmas – Read Aloud Picture Book Bringhtly Stories.” Youtube, uploaded by Bringhtly Storytime, 6 December 2017, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YOpKuQO1FkA
How the Grinch Stole Christmas. Directed by Ron Howard, preformances by Jim Carrey, Taylor Momsen and Kelley, 20th Century Fox, 2000.