The
story of “Reunion” by John Cheever shows how he struggled with his own
alcoholism and his life as a young boy with his own father. The story projects how alcohol can interfere
with one’s attitude and relationship with his son. John Cheever will be showing the story
through the main character Charlie, who will meet his father after the divorce
of his parents 3 years later.
In
the beginning of the story, Charlie writes to his father letting him know that
he will be in New York for an hour and half and wants to meet up with him. Charlie is told by his father’s secretary
that he will meet him at 12 o’clock.
When they do meet up, Charlie feels the strangeness that he has with his
father and how he knew that he was his father; “but as soon as I saw him I felt
that he was my father, my flesh and blood, my future and my doom”. This is where he shows the love that he has
for his father.
In the second part of the story, his father
suggests they go to a restaurant so they can spend time together. As they go to the restaurant, this is where
his father shows his true self with his drinking and boisterous attitude. At the first place, Charlie’s father shows
how rude his behavior is to the service staff, Charlie stated “his
boisterousness in the empty restaurant seemed out of place”. This is when his father’s alcoholism is
first seen in the story. He ask the waiter to bring him a couple of Beefeater Gibson’s,
when the waiter tells him that he should go somewhere else, due to the rudeness
that was shown to him by Charlie’s father.
Charlie’s father had been clapping his hands for service, calling the
waiter names and stating “I have a whistle that is audible only to the ears of
old waiters”. As they go from
restaurant to restaurant, his father is acting ruder and ruder with each
waiter, while getting drunker. Knowing
that his father is getting oblivious, he decides that it was time to leave
saying goodbye to his father, his father wants to buy him a paper for his trip
but instead of doing something so simple by getting the paper, he feels that he
needs to be rude to the newspaper clerk.
As Charlie is ready to get away from his boisterous father, his father
states, “Just wait a second. I want to
get a rise out this chap”. This is when
his alcoholism comes to light action. He wants to show off to his son that he
is better than anyone that is in the service industry. This is also the same time that Charlie
decides that he does not ever want to see his father again.
As
stated in the beginning, Cheever shows the story about a father and son who
have not seen each other in three years.
Father and son come together, thinking this will be a good visit, but it
turns into a disaster where alcohol destroys a father/son relationship.
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