Tommy wilhelm as an anti hero

While a hero is traditionally a fortunate individual of superhuman power or spirit, an anti-hero is by definition the opposite of a hero and is thus a person who is neither strong nor purposeful. An anti hero may be portrayed as having little control over events, seeming aimless or confused, or as being out of step with society. Tommy Wilhelm, the protagonist of Saul Bellow’s Seize the Day is an anti-hero because he is indecisive, less attractive, overemotional, and less powerful. 

The first quality of an anti-hero is indecision. Tommy stumbles and dwindles at every step. He is a dangling man. In Seize the Day, Tommy, being caught in an existential crisis, is in quest of identity or meaningful existence. He is engaged seriously in a struggle for survival. He fails, he suffers, and he is spurned (rejected). He is turned into a puppet at the hands of scrubby opportunist. His hope is ever crossed and his mind suffers the stings of torments. The modern dilemma “to be or not to be” is present in Tommy’s character. He seems to be a genius in bringing calamity upon him. He has always chosen the path that his intuition or intellect warned against. Thus invites bad consequences upon himself. 

Another anti-heroic quality is less attraction. Tommy is hardly attractive. He is large“fair-haired hippopotamus!in his middle forties. He is even filthy-” What a dirty devil son of mine thinks his aged father Dr. Adler. His dress-up style of talking and taking food reveals his flaws. He exhibits symptom of neurosis and his actions and attitudes are symptomatic of his lack of control or loss of order of his being. 

An important quality of an anti-hero is over-emotion. Tommy is too much emotional and childish and these very features make him dependent on others. Being unable to solve his problems, he rushes to his father for substantial support and he gets nothing but rebuff, Dr. Adler likes to appear affable. “Affable! His own son, his one and Only son could not speak his mind or ease his heart to him.” This is also the reason that he gives Mr. Tamkin the power of attorney to deal with his last survival without knowing him perfectly. 

The anti-hero will be less powerful. In Seize the Day the alienated hero is a terribly oppressed individual and it is with the feeling of his Oppression that the fiction begins. The non-human, diabolic forces of Materialism pose serious menace to overthrow him and subdue or demolish bis human traits. Tommy Wilhelm journeys through chaotic Situations, through a metropolis (city) of peril (danger); he fights a solitary battle against what is annihilating for mankind. 

In conclusion, unlike the mythic hero, there is no joyful homecoming for Tommy, or a satisfied sense completion of a mammoth task. He neither has the superhuman dimensions of Shakespeare's unforgettable tragic heroes. So, from all these aspects we can call him an anti-hero.