Pat Conroy Beach music Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Pat Conroy Beach music - Essay Example During the course of the story, his character undergoes several changes. The narration takes the reader through the various stages in the author’s life. The first stage is his childhood, which is abnormal because of his alcoholic father and his fake mother. The atmosphere of constant quarrels and tension turns him into a self protective, isolated human being who is rather cold and unable to adequately express his emotions. The second stage his character goes through us escapism and an inability to face up to the guilt he feels that he may have become partly responsible for his wife’s suicide. This leads him to deny having a family and isolates him with his daughter in Rome, for five long years. During the last stage of the story, through the illness of his mother, he is able to finally face up to his inner demons and rediscover his sense of identity and belonging in his family. When the story commences, Jack McCall is intent on fleeing the memories of his wife’s tragic death. He wants to take his daughter away with him to Italy after a custody battle with his in-laws. South Carolina is the place where both he and his wife Shyla had grown up together, but now the place is rife with tragic memories of his wife and unpleasant ones of the custody battle with his in-laws, who blame him for Shyla’s death.