Will to Live, to Love and to Be Loved: Meaning of Life - Essay Example

“Will to Live, to Love and to be Loved Meaning of Life Introduction Thom Jones’s story “I Want to Live” puts significant effort in search of ‘what life is’. Meanwhile it deals with some subsidiary themes such as the meaning of life, compatibility between love and duty, etc. The author wants to tell his readers that life is essentially the will to live, to love and to be loved, while being to true to the ultimate reality, death. The narrative style along with some literary tools like symbolism, alliteration, metaphor, personification, etc. greatly contributes to the development of the story’s plot while working out the projected theme. From the beginning of illness, Mrs. Wilson lives on medicines that relieve her of the crushing pains. Though the medication process often seems to be as painful as the growth of cancer, she takes it out of a strong desire to live. Metaphor of Pain and Medication: Sorrow and Joy of Life The surprising turn of the story’s yield is that though she begins to grow hatred for the ritualistic painful process of medication, she cannot but take it since it allows her to be blessed with more scopes to live for few more hours. Indeed the medication process along its benefits and lacking resembles life itself. Mrs. Wilson feels that what one needs to live a life is his or her ‘will to live’, even though it exposes her to the next painful session of her illness and the medication process that is the metaphor of pain and sorrow in life. Before coming to her daughter’s house, she was gradually losing her “will to live”. Whereas in the hospital’s cancer care unit, the anguish of accepting death was continually rising, her “will to live” begins to grow; once she chooses to pass her terminal days. Mrs. Wilson’s shift from the hospital or clinic to her daughter’s house stands for her transport from the care of duty to the care of love. Even though the doctors and the nurses perform their duty well, they cannot fill up the gap, caused by the lack of a close relative at her bedside. Indeed the author shows that the nurses’ and doctors’ care is their duty, whereas her daughter’s and son-in-law’s care is their love. Role of Close Relatives in Forming the Meaning of Life From a medical perspective, it can be said that the care in his daughter’s house more holistic than any professional care in any clinic or medical. In this regard, Laughlin says, “The author depicts a more holistic model of caretaking here, integrating professional health care, knowledge from pharmacological and alternative medicines, and the value of relationships” (7). From a literary perspective, Mrs. Wilson’s near relatives’ presence during the terminal hours rather increases her ‘will to live’. Therefore, the carcinogenic pains are nothing more than a mere ordeal, which can be overcome even by death, amid the ecstasy of being loved by the near and dear ones. In the face of her unashamed integrity, she can even accept the reality of death, the narrator says, “Suddenly she realizes that the hard part was all over now. All she has to do……let go. It really wasn’t so bad. I wasn’t anything special. It just was.” (Jones 179) Indeed such submissive feeling about death or accepting death as it is grows from her companionship with her close ones. She becomes able to feel that they are also going to die like her. Just her death is the end of her part and they also will die when they will finish playing their roles in life, as the narrator again says, “She felt sorry for them. They are the ones who were going to have to stay behind and play out their appointed role.” (Jones 182) Indeed this capability of being ‘sorry’ or the source of ‘sorry’ is essentially their love and care for her. In return, it lessens her angst and anguish for death. Death, the Ultimate Truth of Life and “Will to Live” Mrs. Wilson’s son-in-law plays a crucial role in working out the aforementioned theme of the story. Referring the authenticity of Mrs. Wilson’s son-in-law, the narrator says, “He always seemed upbeat, comical, and ready with a laugh” (183). His unashamed simplicity and authenticity help Mrs. Wilson to find out the ultimate truth of the life. Whereas others visit Mrs. Wilson with fake courtesy of being sorrow at her illness, his ability to laugh and to be comic, while being a considerate and sincere caretaker, provoke her to accept death as an ultimate reality like other reality. Therefore the reality of death should not shroud other realities. The narrator says that Mrs. Wilson’s son-in-law has a “sense of the absurd that she has found annoying back in the old days when she liked to pretend that life was a stroll down Primrose Lane” (183). When she is pretentiously optimistic about life, her son-in-law, in contradiction, cannot avail himself in any pretension about the ultimate truth, death, in human. As a result, he has been able to behave so authentically and to embrace the truth of Mrs. Wilson’s oncoming death, as the narrator says that the son-in-law was “full of life. He was real. He was authentic. He even interjected little pockets of hope.” (177) At the same time, he has admitted the absurd reality of death in his youth, he can feel Mrs. Wilson’s emotional need and behave accordingly. He fights, on her behalf, with the “new doctor to get her an adequate pain killer and he takes care of all sorts of other things, from her will, to how to control her bowels, to telling her the feelings of the daughter with whom she never exchanges “I love yous”( Laughlin 8). Optimism without Pretension about Death Indeed Mrs. Wilson’s optimistic view of life is expressed in another sentence. The narrator comments on her optimism: “If she was not walking down the sunny side of the street, at least she was singing in the rain” (183). Mrs. Wilson’s optimistic view about life is not objectionable, though the pretentious part fuels the depression about the acceptance of oncoming death. When she receives the companionship of her son-in-law, the pretentious part begins to dispel. Hence she realizes that in order to live, one needs to love, to be loved and something to live for, as the narrator says, “The Will to Live was more important than doctors and medicines.” (177) In the way of living, one must acknowledge the presence of death in life in order to be true to oneself, as the son-in-law is aware of the absurd reality of death. The awareness of death and the inspiration to accept it as it is that Mrs. Wilson receives from her son-in-law infuse her with the same vigor and joy of living the terminal hours of her life. Now she can even inspire and “encourage the son-in-law to clown and philosophize” and the son-in-law “flourished when she voiced a small dose of appreciation or barked out a laugh. There was more and more pain and discomfort, but she was laughing more too” (Jones 183). Narrative Technique Working Out the Theme of the Story The narration of the story from a third person point of view that closely verges on the protagonist’s self-expression greatly assists the readers in pursuing the meaning of the story. The narrator describes the whole story in such a manner that the narration allows the readers for most of the time to dwell within the closet of Mrs. Wilson’s mind. As a result, the readers can assimilate themselves with the protagonist situation and experience her feelings without much effort. In this regard, Mike Young says, “This story would never have worked in first person, with readers aware they’re being talked at, feeling like a confessional receptacle. Instead we feel the kinship and heartbreak of a “knowing into”……Mrs. Wilson is a character who earns her exclamatory will, because once we’ve lived inside her, we want to live too!” (1). Jones’s symbolism and use of other literary tools make the story as living as one wants to live. Whereas the cancerous pain and its medication functions as the symbols of life without the without the will to live, her life seems to find its true meaning, the ‘will to live’. But she achieves it by acknowledging death as it is, by being loved and by learning to love. In the way of learning to accept the truth of death, her son-in-law himself appears to be the personification of authenticity and life. Conclusion At the evening of her life, Mrs. Wilson feels that even if life itself is often painful, one’s desire to revel in the little bits of joys is as enormous as to assign a meaning to one’s life. The ultimately revealed truth asserts that man is essentially a fighter or a struggler against the foes of pains and sorrows. In this struggle, one is benefited in two ways: firstly, if one is a winner in this struggle, he or she can revel in the ecstasy of the achievement of a victor; secondly, even if one is a looser, her warrior-self can easily surpass the pain of defeat, since his or her ‘will to live’ remains undaunted. Works Cited Jones, Thom. “I Want to Live!”, The Best American Short Stories of the Century. New York: Mike Publushers, 2003. Laughlin, James R. “Critcism of ‘I Want to Live”, The End of Life: Conversations on Death and Dying for Contemporary Americans. April 6, 2011, available at Young, Mike. “Mrs. Wilson Wants us to Live”, April 6, 2011, available at Read More