Li-Young Lee A Story Analysis

Fantastical Realization Fantasy and fiction flood most of our childhood but, the older a child gets, the quicker fiction turns to fact as slowly but surely, the rug of fantastical imagination is pulled out beneath them. This is exactly the case in Li-Young Lee’s short poem A Story. A Story is about a father who struggles to tell stories to his son, but as the boy grows older, his coming of age begins to make their relationship complex. Even though the complexity of the relationship is never directly stated, Lee shows this idea through point of view and literary devices. found in the poem. For the entire duration of the poem, the reader is able to infer how the complexity of the relationship changes and how the father feels about his son through the techniques and methods stated above. Within A Story, Lee uses point of view from both characters to convey the idea that the father’s relationship with his son is indeed, increasingly complex. The reader also learns from this point of view technique that the time of thought within the poem constantly changes. The boy’s young age is shown clearly in the beginning of the poem as: “His five-year-old son waits in his lap.” (Line 3) Clearly, the boy is still youthful in this situation. He begins to beg his father to tell him a story. His father, saddened by lack of a story, struggles to figure out something to tell the boy. The man then notes his fear that if he fails to tell his son stories, he will leave his father. Later in the