My Father’s Hands

1. My Father’s Hands by Calvin Worthington

2. The word ‘represent’ is made up of the prefix ‘re’ and the base word ‘present’. So we could look at the meaning of the word as being to ‘re-present’ i.e. present an object, idea, person, race, gender, social group in another way or in numerous ways.

3. Analysis of character • How do you think the father is represented? • How do you think the daughter is? • Is this representation fair?

4. Setting • The setting can add to the way the character is represented. Consider: • The type of place the location is • Descriptions • Where in the setting the character is located • What role the character plays in that setting • And also whether the character changes if he/she is in a new setting.

5. In My Father’s Hands • The narrative takes place in a rural and country town setting. • The family move from the farm to a country town – as the narrative spans over a lengthy period of time. • The father has predominantly worked in manual, unskilled occupations.

6. What does this tell you? • Rural and country settings are often associated with lower class communities, isolation and being less modernised. • People from rural communities are often stereotyped as being inferior, ‘red-necks’ or ‘simple’. • In this context, education was seen as out of reach for many people, as they were destined to work in manual occupations. This was seen a ‘man’s work’ and school ‘a waste of time’.

7. Dialogue • When you refer to the use of dialogue you should consider the following: • How have the words been spoken (check for descriptions of how they have spoken)? • Does the character’s dialogue make reference to other events, people, ideas? • What words does the character use? Are they colloquial? Formal? French? Etc • Whom speaks to whom? And how do they speak to each other?

8. In My Father’s Hands • The descriptions of her father’s hands as ‘rough and exceedingly strong’ are juxtaposed alongside her repetition of the ‘special warmth’ the hands delivered. • Repetition of the phrases ‘his hands couldn’t write’, or ‘his hands never learnt to write’.

9. What does this tell you? • The narrator draws the reader’s attention to not only the physicality of her father, but also his personality and nature. • The warmth of her father’s hands is associated with protection, love and tenderness. • The repetition of key phrases acts as reminder to the reader and mimics the constant reminders her father faced as he tried to write with his hands.

10. Descriptions • When considering descriptions think about the following: • How are the character’s physical appearances described? • How are the character’s actions described? • What written devices have been used in the descriptions? (simile, metaphor etc)

11. In My Father’s Hands • The father is said to depart for ‘long, solitary walks’, to have ‘wept’ and is often caught ‘gazing (and) unseeing’. • The rough and strong description of the father at the farm is juxtaposed with the weak and defeated description of his life in the town. • The father’s memory and knowledge are described vividly – ‘his fingers could trace a path across the blueprints while his mind imagined the pipes lacing through the heart of the ship. He could recall every twist and turn of the pipes.’ • Short sentences are used to describe his inability to write.

12. What does this tell you? • The father’s frustration and despair at his inability to write is manifested in his need for isolation and inability to express his inner feelings to his loved ones. • The shift between the farm and the town reflects a movement from ‘old’ to ‘new’. The father is unable to cope in this modernised environment – he is from ‘another time’. • The description of the father’s memory and knowledge highlights that whilst he is illiterate he is still intelligent. • The short sentences used to describe the father’s inability to write are used to highlight the frustration of his plight and the futility of his pursuit to write.

13. Point of View • First Person Point of View • In the first person point of view, the narrator does participate in the action of the story. When reading stories in the first person, we need to realise that what the narrator is recounting might not be the objective truth. We should question the trustworthiness of the accounting.

14. In My Father’s Hands • Why was this point of view chosen? • Is this the most powerful point of view to tell this tale?

15. Irony • Situational irony focuses on the surprising and inevitable fragility of the human condition, in which the consequences of actions are often the opposite of what was expected.

16. In My Father’s Hands • The hands that kept the farm alive were also the hands that sold it away. • Can you think of any other examples?

17. Message/Intended Response • How does the author wish the reader to respond to this text? • What message are we left with? • How is the theme of ‘family’ depicted? • How are we positioned to respond to marginal social groups, like the illiterates?