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Part 1: His Great Promise
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Big Fish, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Ambition, Courage, and Personal Fulfilment
Truth, Myth, and Immortality
Love, Flaws, and Acceptance
The Redemptive Power of Laughter
Summary
Analysis
William says “it happens like this.” Dr. Bennett, the old, wrinkling, sagging doctor, comes out the guest room and says there’s nothing he can do. He’s been the family doctor for as long as William can remember. William’s mother smiles bitterly. She’s a shadow of herself. When Edward came home to die, it killed them all a bit. It’s as if Edward’s been digging an inch of his grave every day, and they’ve talked about his progress casually at dinner. William’s mother goes in first. She starts saying she’ll call for William if it seems like Edward is going to die but doesn’t finish her sentence. William reflects that sentences go unfinished in the “land of the dying.”
William’s statement that “it happens like this” will become important later, as William recounts this event (his father’s death) four times in slightly different ways throughout the story. The quote, thus, clues the reader into the fact that it’s not entirely clear if it actually does happen exactly “like this,” though there are elements of truth in each retelling of his father’s death. The clear abundance of sadness and pain emphasize the love that William’s mother and William have for Edward and how difficult Edward’s illness has been.
Themes
William thinks dying is the worst thing to happen to anyone, but especially to his father, because Edward hates being stuck at home and living the same rhythm every day. Before his illness, Edward is an “itinerant dad” who roams the world having all sorts of adventures, pursuing some unknown goal. He comes home as if to refuel, and he shares fantastic stories. One night, Edward describes meeting a beautiful, elusive two-headed geisha. William doesn’t believe him, but Edward continues, explaining how he had to act calm when he met the geisha, so as to not insult her and cause an international incident.
William shows that Edward is an adventurous man who likes to roam rather than live a routine, ordered existence. Edward’s roaming—which is in pursuit of personal fulfilment—makes Edward largely absent in William’s life. This is a source of deep pain for William. The reader learns that many of the embellished stories about Edward’s life come from Edward himself, and that he uses them as a way of communicating with William in between his absences.
Themes
In his illness, Edward seems more ordinary than “magic.” He drinks. His bright eyes have become dim and weary. He has no stories to tell, and he has become “just a man.” William realizes he doesn’t really know his father. William enters the guest room and gives Edward some water. He thinks that Edward—who’s hard to look at, with mottled, scabbed skin—looks like a flawed version of his father. Edward makes a joke but neither of them laugh, and Edward just looks at William sadly. Edward reflects that he hasn’t been there for William growing up. William responds “no” as kindly as he can.
William feels that Edward’s stories are made-up tales that obscure the true story of Edward’s life, so William feels like he doesn’t know his father. Although William wishes his father hadn’t been so absent, he acknowledges that Edward becomes depressed and “ordinary” when he’s confined to the home, implying that had Edward stayed put and been around for William’s upbringing, he might not have been such a “magic” father.
Themes
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Edward says his own father wasn’t around much either, recalling a time when Edward’s father hopped a freight train in search of a seed and didn’t come back for months. William continues the story, saying that he bets a vine grew from the seed, up to the clouds where a giant and a two-headed woman live. Upon hearing this, Edward smiles deeply. Edward thinks a man becomes “immortal” when his stories are remembered. Edward tells William he did try to get home more, but things happened. One time the earth split, the sky opened many times, and he hasn’t been around because he’s spent his life wanting to be great man: a big fish in a big pond.
The reader learns that Edward finds myths—or made-up stories—valuable because they allow a person to live on and their lessons to be remembered. Edward feels as if he’ll always be with William in some way as long as William can remember his stories. William, in contrast, doesn’t see the same value in these stories yet. Edward explains that his absences were fueled by a lust for personal growth, symbolized by Edward seeing himself as a “big fish” who’s always looking for a big pond so that he can keep growing and stretching himself.
Themes
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Edward recalls starting out “small.” He worked for others and started businesses that failed. Eventually, he got into import/export and his life took off. He even dined with a prime minister. Edward’s proud that he’s been to every continent, though his memory falters over the details, and he asks William, “Do you […] know what makes a man great?” William has no idea but thinks it kind to say that Edward’s greatness is right here and not out there in the world. William says a man is great when he’s loved by his son. William dubs his father a “Very Great Man” and taps Edward’s shoulders as if knighting him, swearing to God—or Fred—or whoever’s up there.
Edward shows that he is the sort of man who perseveres despite setbacks and remains optimistic in the face of failure. Edward feels that his ambition, optimism, and courage have brought him great success in life and made him a great man. William, in contrast, thinks that a father who’s present in his son’s life is a great man. Edward hasn’t been as present as William wants, and William resents Edward for this, but he dubs Edward a great man anyway, though he seems to do so mostly out of pity.
Themes
Edward becomes calm and closes his eyes. It's the beginning of the end. Edward murmurs something about the two-headed lady, and William cuts him off, saying he doesn’t want to hear about her anymore. Edward says he’s not talking about her, he’s talking about her sister. “She had a sister?” William asks, taking the bait. Edward opens his eyes, as if getting a second wind, and says he wouldn’t kid about that.
William is frustrated because he thinks Edward uses fabricated stories as a way to create distance between father and son and avoid real, honest conversation. Yet at the same time, William is deeply fascinated by Edward’s stories, which fill him with wonder. William’s fascination shows that Edward’s stories are a very real part of what William loves about his father, despite William’s reluctance to accept the stories as meaningful.
Themes
