The Struggle In John Cheever's The Swimmer

John Cheever and Carlos Bulosan could not be more different. Cheever was born into a well-off family in Massachusetts, and grew up in a large Victorian home. His family did lose most of their fortune when the textile industry declined, but he was still able to attend private school. Carlos Bulosan, on the other hand, was born into a poor farming family in the rural Philippines. He left for America at the age of 17, with the hope for a better life. Instead, he found racism, and he had to struggle to survive. Despite these differences in their upbringing, both authors touched on similar themes in their stories.

John Cheever’s “The Swimmer” deals with the consequences of living an aloof life, ignoring one’s problems, and engaging in distractions instead of confronting and fixing them. The main character, Neddy, tries to “swim across the county” by pool hopping from neighbor to neighbor, stumbling into friends and acquaintances along the way. Through the course of the story, he begins to notice the world around him change, from summer to fall, and then he notices himself changing, with his diminished physical performance and his altered looks. When he finally returns home, he discovers his house in disrepair, and devoid of his family. Instead of the story taking place over an …show more content…
He travels eight thousand miles back to his rural home, and when he finally arrived, he is very hesitant about seeing his family. He finally works up the courage to see them, and at first they do not even recognize him. His sisters cry at seeing him, and his mother remarks on how he has grown. He sits down to eat with them, and realizes that he cannot tell them about his time in America, because he feels that he failed. He learns that his father died, and has a realization that he does not belong in America, but he does not belong at home,

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