Once More To The Lake By E. B White Analysis

I chose to compare “A Prison, A Paradise” by John Jeremiah Sullivan and “Once More to the Lake” by E .B. White. There are many reasons to choose to travel; specifically for these two authors, it is to visit a place that has meaning to them on more than the “excursion for a day” level. They temporarily suspend their daily lives to take a trip to spend time in a different environment. Both places they choose to visit can be considered at least somewhat remote, secluded, and, for all intents and purposes, cut-off from the societies that the authors are a part of. The similarities between the two escapades do not end with the surrounding location that the authors chose to visit, however. In addition, both are revisiting the settings. This results in inevitable flashbacks and memories remembered or brought on by a similar occurrence or occasion. These
B. White ventures to Maine with his young son to return to a camp he had spent time with his father in his childhood. White’s self-discovery begins with the confusion of roles with his son. He often has flashbacks to memories he made as a child at the lake triggered when his son does the same actions. He sees much of his younger self in his son and much of his father in his present self. This recognition of the passing of roles that has occurred is the key to White finding himself on his trip back to the lake. The lake and surrounding area attribute to White’s confusion because as they appear just as they were, he really could still be in his son’s role, if it were not for the occasional hint that time had passed such as a motor starting, which ultimately strengthens his understanding of self. White clings to the memory he has of the lake and imagines it in a preserved, pristine, and ultimately unchanged state even after all of this time. This idea of the location remaining untouched by time is shared in Sullivan’s narrative as well, although in a slightly different