All American families are different, but share some important similarities; namely, they deal with challenges, and have to find solutions together. These problems can vary in drama, from bad grades in school, the loss of a job, or sometimes the death of a loved one. The World According to Garp by John Irving directly deals with many family dilemmas. The book opens by describing the childhood of his mother, Jenny Fields. She has been raised in a situation, in which leads to her becoming a strong independent women. When working as a nurse, she has a child with a dying war veteran. The name of the veteran is Technical Sergeant Garp. After the soldier dies, Jenny names the child T.S Garp, after the father. It can be seen that right from the…show more content… In fact, many of them involve death. Garp’s mom is assassinated at a rally for feminism. She had a bodyguard but due to crazy timing, she was killed in spite of this. Garp's son also dies in the strangest of ways as explained by William Cosgrove: “key scenes depend upon a combination of chance and coincidence that often ends in tragedy. The car accident on the dark, sleet-slick driveway in chapter thirteen which kills Walt, gouges out Duncan's eye, breaks Garp's jaw, breaks Helen's collarbone and nearly her neck, and amputates Michael Milton's penis necessitates just such an incredible combination of chance, coincidence, inclement weather, forgetfulness, and precision timing. Yet it is, as Garp says elsewhere, exactly the right thing to happen at that time. In exposition of theme and development of narrative it is a powerful dramatization of underlying tensions and conflicting feelings in Garp and Helen at this time. But realistically it is melodramatic and unlikely.” (Cosgrove) The odds of something like this happening in real life are slim to none. But once this happens, the family has to change the way it acts. It is very challenging for a family to deal with this. If the cars had been slightly smaller, or left at different times, or any number of other things, Walt would not have died. The family has to cope with this, a…show more content… When pondering over his own behavior, he thinks “Rape … was an act that disgusted him with himself—with his own very male instincts, which were otherwise so unassailable. He never felt like raping anyone: but rape, Garp thought, made men feel guilt by association.”(Irving 209) He has to deal with this the best he can, but ends up not being able to treat his wife the same again. He goes through many affairs, dealing with the lust that is always so prevalent on his mind, ever since his mother brought it up to him when they were in Vienna. He cannot clear this from his mind, and believes that naturally men will feel guilt when ever rape is brought up, and due to the fact that he has been around multiple rape victims, he cannot escape
