My Oedipus Complex

Cuong Vo
Esl 34x
Professor Dowling
14 April 2013
An unhappy father.
In the story My Oedipus Complex by Frank O’Connor, it relates a small’s boy world turned differently when his father returns home from the war. The story is written from a child’s point of view; therefore, it appeals enigmatic aspects of the characters to the audience. In my opinion, the father is a real victim of the main conflict between his son, Larry, who usually annoys him most of the time instead of respecting him, and him. By once again Larry’s attitudes such as jealousy, stubbornness and disrespect expose that his father is the real victim of the story.
First of all, by the fact that Larry is just a five year old kid but his thoughts and actions of jealousy towards his father are unacceptable. It is true that a kid gets jealous when somebody has taken their beloved one’s attention away from them, but this is Larry’s father who just barely returned home from war. Larry clearly doesn’t understand much about his parents’ relationship after years being separated; so, they really miss each other and have a lot of stories they want to share. However, Larry just selfishly cares for himself by the thoughts “talking to Daddy” , “at teatime, “talking to Daddy” began again.” and “It was clear that she either genuinely liked talking to Father better than talking to me” and these details show that Larry compares the appearance of his father towards his mother is more important than him (160). Additionally, Larry asked his mother “Do you think if I prayed hard God would send Daddy back to the war?” indicates the lack of love to his own father and by the jealousy of his father taking his mother, Larry wants his father to be out of his sight (160).
Second of all, the stubbornness of Larry really irritates his father. As a matter of fact, Larry always wants to find a way to annoy his father as the thought “Man for man, I was prepared to compete with him any time for Mother’s attention.” is glued in his mind since his father returned (160). Larry is a kid that doesn’t give up in the battle for his relationship with his mother by the detail of “for several time being I had forgotten about him, and for several minutes I sat bolt upright, racking my brains to know what I could do with him” (161). Throughout his ignorant thoughts, his physical actions to his father have proved he is one disturbing child in the family as “I couldn’t get comfortable, so I gave him several kicks that made him grunt and stretch” (161). At the moment where his mother told him to share a cup of tea with her in the morning, instead of giving it a sip, he drank the whole saucer “I wanted to be treated as an equal in my own home, so, just to spite her, I drank it all and left none for her.” (162)
Last of all, Larry’s disrespectful attitude to his father is a big reason of why father is a victim in this story. Children who would say word “shut up” to his/her parent is very disrespectful; however, Larry does and he even screams at his father “Shut up, you.” and “Smack your own. . . Smack your own! Shut up! Shut up!” (164). He doesn’t see his father as his parent but he always competes with him as one of his friend. Despite that children have their rights to speak up; however, Larry is just a kid, he doesn’t reach to that age to find legitimate reasons to talk back to his parent like that. Additionally, that attitude is considered disrespect to any parents, and they would be hurt and very sad if their children behave ignorantly and rudely in front of them.
Although the other side of Larry’s point of view is that Larry is too young to acknowledge and it is considered as neutral as a kid to have such rude behaviors towards the stranger s. On the hand, it is not his fault that he hasn’t been around with Larry since he was born. Larry’s father’s duty as a man is to protect the country and he could possibly scarify his life to not his family again if he falls on the battlefield. However, Larry doesn’t understand his father’s point of view but only selfishly cares about his. It wouldn’t be a family if parents and kids don’t love each other. Despite Larry hates his father, but he still shows some caring towards Larry as he bought a nice model railway for Larry on Christmas. In fact, Larry’s father doesn’t hate Larry, but he is just depressed of his child being acting all weird way to parents like Harry did.
In conclusion, Larry’s father is a victim in the story because instead of having a warm family welcomes him from a war; he receives the opposite welcome. Especially Larry, who is his own son, dislikes him most of the time. Larry’s attitudes such as jealousy, stubbornness and disrespect have depressed not only his father but his mother who really cares about them.

Work cited:
O’Connor, Frank . “ My Oedipus Complex” A World of Fiction, Twenty Timeless Short Stories, 2nd ed. New York Pearson Education, 2006. 157-173. Print