“A Conversation with My Father” by Grace Paley

Grace Paley combined several elements and devices in her unmindful story A Conversation with My Father. The most striking themes in this short story are desertion and family relationships.In this new story, the fille is describing facts, whereas the let wants a more complete description, full of details. Following this, we see that the girlfriend prefers to be optimistic, while the father prefers true(a)ity.This is illustrated by the following quotes No, Pa, it could really go through that way, its a funny world nowadays, and to this, the father replies No Truth first. She will slide back. Her story describes the life of a stupefy and her tidings, and how she becomes a junkie to remain close to her discussion, who has become a junkie. In the end, the son quits the drugs world, but the mother cannot.Her son leaves her, introducing the element of abandonment in the story. This theme is pursued further, but in amidst lines. For example, the son left his mother at a critical time, when she needed him most, whereas the vote counter stayed with her dad, up to now in his dying days.The father does not believe that the cleaning woman in his daughters story is strong enough and that even though she manages to quit doing drugs, she will fall back. I would tend to accommodate with him, because a lot of substance abusers, who quit, eventually, fall back. Her story is too optimistic, with a sense of denial for the tragedy.As the story ends, the father says Tragedy You too. When will you fancy it in the face? Again, here we wonder whether the tragedy refers to the mother/son situation, or the fact that he will be dying soon. earlier on, the father had said what a tragedy. The end of a person.And again, here the daughter refuses to accept that this is the endwhether it is the end of the mother or her father. This all relates to hope. When she started her story, she was intractable to have hope in her story, to demonstrate that everyonedeserves the open destin y of life. I find it teetotal, as she tries her best to present the story with an open end, with good deal of hope. However, when she read the story, her father says that it does not communicate hope.Its the end. On a lighter tone, there is another obvious pair of ironical sentence. The father says Doesnt anyone have the time to run down to metropolis Hall before they jump into bed and to this his daughter replies In real life, yes. But in my stories, no. I find this ironical, as nowadays the opposite is true.Today, in real life, people jump to bed and and then get married, or never get married. This is a contrast between then and now, and how the people, as well as literature, have changed.