Romulus, My Father

ROMULUS MY FATHER ESSAY

The indiviuals in Romulus were shaped by their experiences.

In the biography 'Romulus My Father' the characters encounter many different situations and journey to foreign lands, these experiences shape and change the characters. In the novel some characters endure breakdowns, others conflict with one another and some even die, from these we see characters become independent, stronger, weaker and even loose control and breakdown. Romulus meets a girl called Christine, although he likes her, he doesn't value all the aspects of her personality he changes and adapts to her needs and desires. Romulus later has a metal breakdown and commits himself to a mental institution, because of this he Raimond becomes more independent and sees that his father is not indestructable. These are jus some of the many experiences that change and sculpt the characters throughtout the novel.

Romulus meets a girl by the name of Christine, he is immediately attracted to her but soon becomes aware of her characteristics and does not particularly agree with them. Although Romulus enjoyed reading, the ritual of church and music he mistook Christines passion for theatre for snobbishness. He cared for her a lot

, Christine had particularly bad asthma and Romulus then decided to move to Australia because it could improve her health. although Romulus didn't want to move he did anyway because of Christines health, "the serverity of her asthma convinced him that they must find somewhere better for her health". This passage helps Romulus as he becomes a better provider in this new and different land, he takes on a strong role of provider but as Christine soon becomes flurtatious with the other men at their migrant camp he also becomes a stronger role model as he takes main care over Raimond as Christine is not responsible enough.

This strengthens the realationsip between Romulus and his son, as he teachers his son valuable qualities and traits that will help him later in life. Christine becomes even more independable and Romulus takes Raimond to the working section of the camp with him, swarba is a man that stays in the same buliding as Romulus and one day discovers his aftershave is missing. Raimond is asked if he had taken it and instantly denies any wrong doing, Romulus smacks Raimond as he believes he is lying, Rainmond couldn't believe that the theft of such a small bottle should be punished so harshly. ' I stuck to my denial, and because he believed me to be lying he smacked me harder'.