“THE FAMILY SUPPER”, KAZUO ISHIGURO
Describing a character
In the following short text, I am going to describe an important character of this story: the narrator’s father.
Although he is one of the most important characters of the story, in my opinion, we have no idea of his name because he is always referred to as “the father”.
First, I am going to describe his physical appearance. The story tells us that the father is a good-looking man, with a well defined jaw and furious eyebrows. We are told that this character has pure Samurai blood and finally the narrator acknowledges a resemblance between this character and a man naed Chou En-Lai.
Regarding his personality and attitude, we can say that there is more than our eyes can see. We can se almost two distinct personalities of this character, we have references of the narrator’s father as a calm person who cared about his son, and a firm man who even hit his son when he was a child. In general, we know he is a man of values, honour and who is proud of his heritage. In my opinion, most of the changes in this character’s personality could probably be explained by the loss of his wife. We know that nowadays he is still a firm man who has some difficulties socializing with his son, but nonetheless, cares for him as he wants him to stay in Japan.
In conclusion, the narrator’s father is an important character due to his actions throughout the story, to his background and because of the way he treated the narrator.
Tiago Vasconcelos, 11º ano Turma G
Summary of the short story
The story begins with the narrator returning to Japan after having lived in America. When he lands his father picks him up from the airport and he gets to know that his mother died as a consequence of eating Fugu, a poisonous fish. He also gets to know that his father’s company shut down, and his business partner, Watanabe, killed himself because of it. Later the narrator finds out that not only did he kill himself but his family too.
They arrive at the house and the narrator meets his sister, Kikuko. His father goes into the kitchen to cook supper, and the narrator and KIkuko go to the garden. They talk about their separate lives and about a ghost that the narrator saw when he was a child. When they return to the house their father asks Kikuko to finish making supper while he goes with the narrator for a tour in the house.
While doing this the narrator sees a plastic model of a battle ship and his father tells him he would have preferred to be in the air force, as there was always the “final weapon” (meaning suicide – Kamikaze).
They return for supper and when asked what fish it is, the father answers “just fish”, thus creating suspense. The ending is left open on purpose, so that readers never actually know if the fish was Fugu or not.
Julia Vickers, 11º Ano Turma G
Imagine an ending for the story
Kikuko brought the tea to the table and each one of us drank just a little, a family tradition that I still remember. I noticed that my father was staring at me waiting to see if i hadn’t lost the good memories of the times we were all together.
“I really want you to come back, son I want to recover all the time we have lost and get to know you better. It was also your mother’s wish”.
“I’ve already told you, I don’t know yet, there are a lot f things that would have to change again, and I don’t know if I am ready. It was also hard for me not just for you and mom.”
My sister looked at me sadly and took the tea tothe kitchen, my father gave me a glance and I couldn’t understand what he was feeling, he can get very mysterious sometimes.
A few minutes passed, a few hours, a few days, and every day I wake up thinking and feeling sad because I wasn’t comfortable in that house with that tension and sadness. I surely was missing America. I even missed Vicki. I knew I couldn’t stay in Tokyo any longer, but I just didn’t know how to say that to my father and to Kikuko.
One morning I opened my eyes, jumped out of bed, packed and I was determined to leave. I was lying to myself and to my family. I surely would kep in touch with them but I had to have my independence far away from this place. I spoke to my father, kissed my sister goodbye and I left.
With no regret or sadness I left Tokyo inpeace because I knew now everything was all right and everyone was at the place they were supposed to be.
Mariana Luz, 11º Ano Turma G
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