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Fish | Introduction

"Fish" is a short story by American writer Jill Mccorkle. It was published in her third short story collection, Creatures of Habit (2001). "Fish" is the final piece of the collection, in which all the stories are set in Mccorkle's fictional small town of Fulton, North Carolina. Fulton is the setting for many of Mccorkle's stories and novels, drawn from her own experiences of growing up in the South. Mccorkle is an award-winning contemporary writer known for her ability to evoke Southern life with humor and beauty. Critics agree that her talent as a writer is only improving as she continues to write.

"Fish" is a fictional memoir about the end of a man's life, as narrated by the younger of his two daughters. Surrounded by the family, the daughter ponders stories about her father's childhood, his parents, and her own childhood memories. Despite the sad subject of a parent's dying, Mccorkle's short story is uplifting in its conclusion. The title of the story is symbolic, an allusion to the symbol for Jesus Christ. This short story does not show a family torn apart by grief but instead united by love. Through her remembrances, the narrator is able to keep her father close to her heart even as he dies.

Fish Summary

"Fish" begins with news that a man, sixty-four years old, has just found out that he is dying. The cause—whether cancer or something else—is never given. Family and friends gather to comfort the man, including a woman who nursed him back from pneumonia when he was two years old. She saved him then but cannot save him now. His younger daughter narrates this story, and she recalls her father's childhood despair that he might die as did his stillborn brother. He has two older brothers and two older sisters, but his "partner" died. This sense of loss initiated a depression that haunted him for much of his life.

The narrator's eleven-year-old nephew sits with his dying grandfather and tells him all the stories the grandfather made up for him when he was very young. All of his grandchildren are there, and their affection for him is plain to see. The youngest grandchild is the narrator's baby son. Her father asks her to hold him up high so he can see the baby: "I want to see his whole body," her father says.

The narrator recalls her father's fear of water and how, nonetheless, he would wade into the pool up to his chest (the edge within reach) to watch his younger daughter dive and to cheer for her. They also went fishing together, standing in water up to their hips, and he would warn her about all the dangers of ocean fishing. Once she caught a toadfish which swallowed her hook, and her father cut the line to free it. "But just think of the fishtales he'll have for his children and grandchildren. He will always be the one that got away." He made light of it, but his daughter saw sadness in him.

Back in the present, the narrator, along with her mother and sister, Jeannie, sing her father's favorite songs for him. They are well-known love songs from the 1930s.

The narrator remembers that, before she left for college, her father gave her advice on how to be safe, and he assured her that she's never too old to come home. True to his word, when she calls him years later and asks him to come get her because she is leaving her marriage, he overcomes his fear of flying to go to her, pack up her things, and drive her home. Now, at forty years of age, the narrator is the prepared one, ready for any possibility, taking safety precautions as if second nature. It will be her turn now to pass her father's advice on to her... » Complete Fish Summary