Why does the narrator view his father’s happiness as a threat (p.17)? What does he mean when he says, “It was not the kind of happiness that children are included in”? The narrator admits that it still troubles him yet he does “not even begin to understand it.” Do you?
I don't think I fullly understand it ... but the mental picture I have is adults sitting around, smoking and drinking, laughing about boring adult stuff and not wanting kids to be anywhere is sight - hardly ever. Wouldn't this threathen any of us if our parents kept such a distance from us? No wrestling, no joking, no getting on the kid's level and relating to them?I remember thinking when I read the book that the narrator didn't have a great relationship with his dad and was maybe having early signs of being homosexual. Tell me if you think I'm crazy. I didn't bookmark any of the descriptions but there were several things, like he didn't get along with many other kids, he didn't like sports -- or maybe he was just kind of a sissy. Anyway, it's too bad because clearly he took the loss of his mother very hard and he wasn't able to find much comfort in his father.
ReplyDeleteTo me it reminded me of the old - if your kids have a choice of their mother spending a week in Hawaii or spending a week curled up in the fetal position in the living room - what are they going to choose?
ReplyDeleteIn the living room curled up in the fetal position, EVERY time.
It doesn't matter that his father has found happiness. Where does he fit in?
It never crossed my mind that he was a sissy. I just didn't get that visual.
ReplyDeleteI think his relationship with his father was more about what father/son relationships were like back then and less about not being great.
Interesting... I think both Patti and Larisa's points are supported in the text. The sissy part comes specifically from the part where an older boy is "commissioned" to spend some time with the narrator. He treats him kindly, but several times whispers "sissy" under his breath. More generally, the narrator admits that he was more comfortable retreating into book than putting himself out on the playing field. So that's where that is coming from. But then, also, the narrator admits that relationships were different back then and that in another time and place, his father/son relationship would be entirely different because now "fathers... kiss their grown sons when they feel like it..." (p. 13).
ReplyDelete