Analysis Of The Short Story “Swimming” By T. Cooper

For this essay, I will examine the short story “Swimming” published on the website magazine titled “The New Yorker,” which is composed by T. Cooper. I have picked this story because in a way I slightly relate to how the narrator felt. Although I am only 20 years old, I too have experienced the heartbreak of losing a child. Your heart never truly heals from losing a child. After losing a child all you can think about are the what ifs. You think about how your life would be different if your child was still alive. You think about old would your child be today; you think about how your child might look at different ages. The thought of your child is always in the back of your mind. Although the narrator and I are in a similar situation because we both lost a child, his hurt is deeper than I could ever begin to imagine. Killing your own child has to be one of the hardest things to deal with. Throughout the story we see how the narrator chose to reject the emotions that overcome him every day involving the pure sadness it brings knowing you killed your own child. Knowing how it feels to lose a child, I can understand why the narrator chose to leave everything he ever knew behind. I would have done the exact same thing. I would want to run away from the world that reminds me of the precious thing I lost. I too would want to suffer in silence. The narrator chose to disappear from the life he lived when his son was alive, not as a way to forget the things he had done, but to run away from all the people he felt he had burdened with the murder of his own son. It was the narrator’s way of punishing himself for what he did. To him suffering in silence by himself was better, then allowing himself to bother anyone else with the terrible thing he had done. The short story “Swimming” is a story that embodies the heartbreak of death. It shows how death can turn someone’s world upside down within seconds. Some people are never the same after the experienced the death of a loved one. In this story we will see the narrator’s transition into finally accepting what he has done, and realizing that just because he killed his own son, doesn’t mean he can’t find peace and happiness.

As the story begins, we are quickly introduced to the narrator’s darkest part of his past, and probably the worst day of his life. The day he killed his son. The Narrator is an American man that recently moved to Cambodia. He moved there shortly after he killed his own son by accidentally running him over one afternoon in the driveway. The death quickly led to a rocky marriage with his wife, which he briefly explains is one of the reasons he quit his residency as a doctor and moved out of the United States. Once the narrator moved to Cambodia, he jumps right into telling us about a girl named Veata, who we soon learn has a son named Angel. Veata and the narrator have no real relationship expect for the fact that they have sex every once in a while. One day Veata’s son became ill and Veata and her parents begged the narrator for help knowing he had previous medical experience. Once the narrator knew that Angel was going to be okay, he felt he had no other obligation being present at the hospital anymore, because to him he has more important things to do.

This is the first time we see how important it is to the narrator to be able to escape his head. The thoughts he thought to himself in the hospital shows how much he struggled within himself to ignore the feelings he didn’t want to feel. Once a day the narrator chose to go on a brief swim in order to cleanse his brain from all the thoughts and emotions he held trapped inside. Without having the time to cleanse his thoughts with a daily swim he bursts out into rage. He thinks that he has a sort of this “God-given right” to try to escape his feelings and focus on things that make him feel nothing. He refuses to let himself feel until that night when he misses his daily swim and everything begins to change.

The narrator, upset that he missed his previous swim because for some reason he stayed at the hospital with the girl, he has “no obligations” too, woke up early to take an extra-long swim. He needed to use the water to cleanse his thoughts, that were stronger sense he had no time to escape his head yesterday. He explains how he swam longer and harder than he normally does on a daily basis which lead him to this unknown shore. When finally looking around at his surroundings, he realizes that there is a whale shark being poached for parts up on the shore. The bleeding whale shark was leaving the ocean with a red tint. This pool of blood the narrator has found himself in is a metaphor of how the narrator has the blood of his own son on his hands. The whale shark becomes significant in the story at this point, because the narrator again chooses to ignore his emotions. He saw a situation that he knew he could have potentially saved, but decides to hide his emotions, not saying anything to the illegal poachers. When his wife presents him with divorce papers, I think a light in the narrator's head is switched on. He sees how his wife is moving on and is finding peace with their son’s death. He secretly yearns for peace and happiness. His first step in finding peace, is helping the innocent whale shark. The whale shark to the narrator is a representation of his innocent son. Knowing it is illegal to poach whale sharks because they are endangered the narrator turns in the poachers. Leaving the poachers with no money.

All of a sudden, all the narrator’s emotions from his son’s death that he didn’t allow himself to feel come flooding back to him. He starts to come to terms with the death of not only his son but his old life. Later he is invited over to Veata’s house for dinner. The dinner was suggested by Veata’s mother who invited the narrator over to express their gratitude for taking Veata’s son to the hospital. As the dinner progresses the narrator starts to envy Veata’s father. A man who looked to have “been Veata’s grandfather, not her father.” He noticed how her father seemed “peaceful, happy even,” despite that he had close to nothing to provide for his family and guests. Veata explain how her father “lost his family to the Khmer Rouge” who killed his two sons in front of him because he tried to hide them in the house. His previous wife also died leaving her father with nothing. The narrator suddenly realizes that he is “swimming” in regret, and pity for himself because he killed his son. Veata’s father on the other hand had experienced his whole family passing away, and still found a way to make himself a new life, where he could still feel “peaceful, happy even”. The narrator realizes that is something he needs to work toward.

This type of storytelling is raw and straightforward. As the story goes on it isn’t hard to understand what the narrator is thinking, the author doesn’t have to write out the narrator’s every emotion because you can imagine how he is feeling. The narrator shows significant character development, as he slowly comes to terms with the fact that he has been hiding all his emotions and needs to be able to experience and work through them. He finally comes to terms with himself, he killed his child and he can’t go back and change that. It happened there is no going back, but that doesn’t mean that he doesn’t deserve happiness. Moving to Cambodia the narrator thought was a rightful way to punish himself. After physically being in a pool of blood he realized it was time to get his mind right and work toward finding peace even in the fact he killed his only son.

Although in the end I think the author got a clear point across, it was hard to decipher the point that was trying to be made at the beginning of the story. At the beginning, all I could really picture was this man that killed his son and little to no care at all. His attitude was nonchalant and careless. Any father that killed their son, even if twenty years later, would not be able to tell the story in this passive tone. The author makes it hard for you to really understand the guilt that narrator was actually feeling. We know the narrator does everything he can to keep from swimming in his emotions but we also know that any father that ever loved his son is going to feel a good deal of negative emotions after their son’s death. He refuses to let himself feel those negative emotions, we know he is feeling. His way of coping was to try to find things that will take his mind off his thought even if just for a couple minutes. At the beginning you even see him, say it was his “God-given right” to have fun, and have no reasonability’s after having to go through something such a traumatic thing such as killing his son. He believes that he deserves to “fuck the youngest, hottest girl with the tightest pussy in town” and have no “responsibility toward her family” because he deserves to have some light hearted fun after what he had been through psychologically. You think what an entitled, obnoxious man to think that he deserves anything after what he did. Who would think that they have any “god-give right” to do anything after they murdered their son? Most people would be stuck in their own thoughts, wondering how they can make it up to themselves and the people that were affected by the murder. I think it is interesting that the author chose to paint the narrator in this light. It builds up the suspense for the climax of the story. Which ultimately shows the narrator isn’t so tough and emotionless. We see that he was often actually stuck swimming in his emotions, desperately trying to find peace and happiness again.

Although at times the emotions of the narrator were frustrating, it was real and raw. We see the character development throughout the story. We see how the narrator struggled internally trying to figure out if running away from everything he knew was truly what was best for him. He struggled trying to understand if he would ever find peace and happiness again, or if he was going to spend the rest of his life swimming away from his emotions. The title of “Swimming” and its significance to the story was a clever move by the author. It was foreshadowing for the story as a whole. The title “Swimming” did not just literally mean, the narrator went on a daily swim. It shows the whole point of the story, the turning point in the character development of the narrator. He finally got a wakeup call, that put him on a path that helped him realize he could overcome all these negative emotions he had been holding back, he would have to come to terms with what happened and forgive himself. In the end we see the author chose to try and find peacefulness maybe even happiness.