"A CONVERSATION WITH MY FATHER" (Grace Paley) Grace Paley's s

The female narrator of the story could be Paley herself. She tells of her eighty-six year old father, and how he wants her to write a story in the manner of de Maupassant or Chekhov. The narrator (whom we'll call Paley in this critique) goes ahead and writes a story about a woman whose fifteen-year old son becomes a junkie. Then the woman becomes a junkie as well.

When Paley reads the story to her father, he objects to the lack of detail in the tale. The father feels that Paley's technique in the story reflects her attitudes in real life. He wants to know if the woman had the child out of wedlock. He wants to know more about the woman's parents.

In short, the father wants Paley to have a greater sense of tradition and background. He feels that her life in New York City is too "sketchy," just like the story is. He doesn't understand how she could derive meaning from life-- and the story-- without knowing more about the people who inhabit it.

Paley sets out to remedy what she feels are very legitimate criticisms of her work. In adding more information to the story, she finds that it is her wild sense of humor that takes

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but it is fascinating to see how the father's critique triggers something inside of her. The second draft has perhaps too much detail, but at least it acknowledges the fact that the characters are interesting people, and that to know more about them is a plus and not a minus. Paley is enough of a modernist to debunk some of the traditional storytelling. In this way, she enjoys letting her character nod through an Antonioni film: this is a detail that is really not very important, yet it shows a certain knowing attitude toward the cultural environment that the woman and her son are living in. By the end of the story the reader has the feeling that Paley will be able to complete her "inside story" and make it a success. Certainly Grace Paley herself has at that point completed "A Conversation With My Father," and it is a success. The "inside story" reflects on the "outside story" because the "inside story" tells of a woman who is willing to adopt the patterns of someone in her family in order to learn and grow. When the woman in the "inside story" finds that her son is a junkie, she too becomes a junkie in order to better understand him. At the same time, the narrator of the "outside story" continually listens to her fa
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1591
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page)