The portrayal of the father in five selected works of Michael Anthony
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Date
2013-10-15
Authors
Mate, Antony Mukasa
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Abstract
This study explores the portrayal of the father figure in three novels and
two selected short stories by Trinidadian writer, Michael Anthony: The
Year in San Fernando; Green Days by the River; The Games Were
Coming; "The Distant One" and "Drunkard of the River". The five works
are purposively selected from Michael Anthony's corpus of writing
because they aptly cover the subject of the present study. The study seeks to
investigate how the presence or absence of the father impacts on other
characters. This study employs Masculinity and Stylistics theories.
Masculinity theory as advanced by Raewyn Connell has been used to show
how the father has been constructed in the Caribbean family in Antliony's
works while Stylistics theory is used to illuminate the various stylistic
features that Michael Anthony engages to present the father figure in the
selected works. Since the proposed study is qualitative in nature, it heavily
relies on a close reading and analysis of Michael Anthony's selected
works augmented by secondary sources such as journals, dissertations,
internet sources and other relevant materials relating to our area of
study. During our analysis of families where the father is completely
absent, it emerges that Anthony depicts these families as dysfunctional
because the father's role in the family is significant and cannot be
substituted by the mother. It also emerges in Anthony's works that fathers
who are present but cannot, provide for their families show patterns of
irresponsibility and inferiority complex as mothers are left to fend for these
families. We recommend that further study of the phenomenon of the weak
and absent father be carried out in novels by other Caribbean authors both
male and female and in recent publications.
Description
Literature Department 140p. 2013