A Quest in a Degenerating Cycle: John Cheever's "The Swimmer"

?The Swimmer? begins in the prosperous suburbs of Westchester County, New York, and centers on the valuable character Neddy Merrill. Though no long-dated y out(a)hful, Neddy attempts to preserve it, conduct he is a vibrant individual and possibly displume down a hired gun. In his terminaleavor to forgo middle-aged age, he chooses to embark on a spare-time activity of driftming his c ar domicil. Water resource is an important aspect of the take in ?The Swimmer?, as it symbolizes the outward need of swimming the county, and the innermost degenerating cycle of relationships in the denial of aged(prenominal) age. Water mental imagery becomes appargonnt at the very beginning of the story; Neddy Merrill, a lithesome and young-looking man, sits near the consortium with a glass of gin. Although mobs are frequently considered a luxury, in this community they are commonplace. In fact, pussys are so prevalent in this neighborhood that Neddy back perform the eight-m ile quest home by swimming. He call the chain of mountains of ponds the ?Lucinda River? afterward his wife Lucinda, and thus water imagery here emphasizes this fantasy of being a romantic champ on a quest who is a great chivalier lover. The swim with the neighbours? pools is symbolic of his quest through life. At first, Neddy is accept in his neighbours? backyards and pools, but after finding a dehydrated pool and waiting for a storm to pass in a gazebo, he begins to feel tired and disillusi peerlessd with his quest. The twenty-four minute of arc period turns darker and colder, and Neddy is portrayed as unprepared and exposed. Although he is determine to come to on, he can hardly flirt with the redness he first had closely his quest. Neddy is disturbed to find out that the Welchers? pool is dry and their house for sale. He recognizes that his memory must be failing him or is repressing unpleasant memories of the Welchers. At the Halloran residence, Mrs. Halloran tell s Neddy she sympathizes to taste of his mis! fortunes; Neddy also cannot remember. Mrs. Halloran mentions that Neddy is selling his house and something about his children. At the Biswangers? he is unsolicited, up to now the attendant treats him with disrespect, and he doesn?t understand as to the meaning of such ill treatment. set ahead in his quest, Neddy visits his designer mistress Shirley Adams, whom he cannot even remember having an affair with, unaccompanied to find he has been replaced. His encounters through this quest highlight the spoil of his relationships over his life. Several signs on this quest indicate that quantify is passing more rapidly than Neddy realizes, symbolically representing his denial of old age. He determines that each successive pool is significantly colder and progressively difficult to swim. He notices tree leaves tolerate turned yellow, even though Neddy believes it is only midsummer. At one level off he smells a wood stove in the distance, wondering who could be burning a fire at that time of the year. At the Sachses?, Neddy asks for a drink, but Helen Sachs tells him they no longer keep alcoholic beverage in the house after her husband underwent heart surgical operation three historic period earlier, which Neddy has no memory of. By the end of the story, Neddy is incapable of recognizing the constellations in the sky, alternatively finding the northern constellations Andromeda, Cassiopeia and Cepheus, indicating the vary of season.

When Neddy is alienated from the norm, and ejected of his palmy candor, he arrives home to a dark, empty, and locked house. At some point along his quest, while swimming the ?Lucinda River? or River of Light, as Lucinda is Latin for lig ht, he finds himself alone and in phantasm; a quite! ironic outcome for someone who envisions himself a romantic hero and lover. ?The Swimmer? presents many aspects of water imagery, as it symbolizes the outward quest of swimming the county, to the inward degenerating cycle in the denial of old age. The story follows Neddy?s quest from pool to pool, allowing the contributor to intimacy his initial exhilaration and subsequent exhaustion. end-to-end ?The Swimmer?, the reader is left uncertain of time, as an afternoon deceptively turns into months and years. At the quest?s conclusion, Neddy is presented with the confrontation of disintegration in his life. Cheever?s purpose in delaying the revelation about Neddy?s family and home is designed to show readers the false reality that Neddy has built in his mind. A Quest in a Degenerating Cycle: outhouse Cheever?s ?The Swimmer?Written by: OCdt Wotherspoonsm0985ENE 110, section 1For: Dr. M. HurleySubmitted: 2 Oct 2009Works CitedCheever, John, ?The Swimmer,? in Ann Charters (ed), The Stor y and Its Writer capital of Massachusetts: Bedford / St. Martin?s, 2007, 133-141. bodge Names World. Parents Connect. 26 Sept 2009 http://babynamesworld.parentsconnect.com/meaning_of_Lucinda.html. If you indispensableness to get a full essay, order it on our website: OrderEssay.net

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