Accepting mortality as an inevitable part of life is an obstacle that every must undertake at some time in his or her life. Author E.B. White encounters such a struggle in his essay “Once More to the Lake”, in which he recalls taking his son to a lake retreat in Maine that his father took him to every first week of August in his youth. During the trip, White sees the lake through his son’s eyes but notices variations in the environment as a result of time. He begins to feel more like his father as he watches his son, but has trouble accepting that he, just like the lake, is changing and aging as time passes on.
White’s essay, “Once More to the Lake”, White comes to realize his own mortality through a visit to the lake, a setting of both White’s past and present. While White initially perceives the lake as unchanged on the surface, he realizes a significant difference – he himself has changed. Through vivid details of the lake, White conveys his realization that time causes change inevitably. Using imagery depicting movement, White presents his initial perception of an unchanging lake. When White takes his son fishing, he enters an illusion that convinces him he is his childhood self: “ I lowered the tip of mine into the water, tentatively, pensively dislodging the fly, which darted two feet away, poised, darted two feet back, and came to rest again a little farther up the rod.
The narrator stepped forward many times to take responsibility for his life but each time his parents influence changed his actions. For example, the father was in need of help on "the boat" and the narrator stepped into help. When he knew this was not enough he decided he was to quite school and to fish full time with his father. The father then told him he would "go back tomorrow." (Page 272) He returned to school the following morning.
Second, White mentions many of the things he would do at the lake as a child and so these are the things his son also loves to do. Everything he sees his son do makes it seem as if the son was he. A lot of the times White gets confused because he is not sure which shoes he’s in. For example, they go fishing and White says, “I felt dizzy and didn’t know which rod I was at the end of.” This reminds him of what he used to do at the lake
Vanessa Benedetto The Boat The short story, “The Boat,” by Alistair MacLeod is written in first person. MacLeod writes about the life in Cape Breton from a boy’s point of view. The man remembers his childhood with his family on the wharf. From the way the man tells the story he gives the reader the impression that as a child he had a strong relationship with his father, and admired his selfless, hardworking actions. Clearly his father had more of an impact on his life because he talks more about his father.
James Moloney’s novel A bridge to Wiseman’s Cove is all about the adventures of the protagonist Carl Matt. Carl is the son of Kerry and the brother of Sarah and Harley Matt. When Sarah and Kerry abandon him there’s only one place for him to go, Wattle Beach. His Aunt is waiting there for him and his brother. In Wattle Beach he will learn and overtake the curse of Matt’s, free the Bird of Osprey and visit Wiseman’s Cove.
Trout Lake is located near the Adirondack Mountains in upstate New York, surrounded by massive white birch and maple tress, beautiful meadows, and crystal clear water, so clear you can almost see the bottom. It was a place to get away from everyday life, for the weekend or just for a week or two. Trout Lake holds a special place in my heart and I have some really fond memories of spending time there. It's a place where memories are made, like the first time I learned how to swim, the family BBQ'S, sitting around the campfire roasting hotdogs and marshmallow's for s'mores, and holidays, especially the Fourth of July. Spending time at Trout Lake changed my perspective on what the "word" family means.
White talks about the experience as a child camp out with his father in 1904 on the lake in Maine. During this White gets the great state of mind that he one time had as a child camp out and determined to release them again. “I took along my son, who had never had any fresh water up his nose who had seen lily pads only from train windows” (White 724). White is now a father and has a child and he decided to take his son to the lake as his father did to him. He keeps reminding the memories that he shared with father, and since he cannot go back to his childhood he teaching his son to follow the same path as he did.
Bible says “…when I became a man, I put away childish things” A young boy could want to be like his father when he grows up, or a girl could long to be like her mother; Walter’s desire is to be like his employer. Maybe that’s the reason he must his ambitions on his son? Because the maturity of everyone else in the household is too advanced to entertain said ambitions? In the passage, Walter tells his son of his dream as if he were selling it to him. This is done to get his son to agree and want the same thing.
28th February 2011 Turning to God Question: Like real people fictional characters have beliefs and values that influence what they say and do. Discuss the importance of beliefs and values in a literary work you have studied. “I turned to God. I survived.” (Martel, 391) Those were the words of Piscine Moliter Patel in a later interview, he who had lost everything he ever loved or knew at sea. He who endured years of hunger and thirst in the endless body of water, he who cooked beneath the scorching rays of the sun, and froze under the icy storms of the ocean.