The Achievement of Desire

In Richard Rodriguez's Achievement of Desire he describes how he changed, in twenty years, from a boy who could not speak English, to the reading room of the British Museum.He describes as the scholarship boy. The boy who would emulate the teacher, and do exactly what they wanted and always receive the best grades.And although his parents were the one to send him to school he was still very resentful towards them at first. "I intended to hurt my mother and father.I was still angry at them for encouraging me toward classroom English"(Rodriguez, 519) Rodriguez transforms from resenting the fact that he was in school, to becoming the most eager student you could be.
    The tone of this writing seems to be one that is slightly bitter about the past. Rodriguez speaks of his scholarship boy actions as ones that have not truly allowed him to learn, rather just use other peoples ideas. It seems that he realizes this now, and is finally able to reflect on what he has been doing his entire life. Even from the very beginning he compares himself to the girl sitting in the front row taking notes on what he was saying, and not actually interpreting what was said. He speaks of his accomplishments and graduations, and how people say how his parents must be very proud, and the entire time he tells the true story, that he was ashamed and embarrassed by his parents. That his parents lack of education was his shameful reason for wanting to learn everything and he is finally admitting it. With this writing hopefully Rodriguez will finally be able to accept his family for who they are, and learn for the sake of learning, not just in imitation of others you want to be like.