The Journey of Self-discovery Brian Moore's The Luck of Ginger Coffey

The Journey of Self-discovery Brian Moore's The Luck of Ginger Coffey

When Ginger Coffey brought his family to Canada from Ireland, little did he know that he would attain partial triumph by discovering "himself and the refugee among the lame and the old". With the aid of those around him, Coffey pursued personal freedom and status in his adopted country. He stumbled through a journey of self-discovery while materialism obstructed his vision. The importance of his family rooted Coffey to his homeland and to his moral values while he tried to discover himself as an immigrant.

All the world appeared hostile to Ginger Coffey when he tried to carve a niche for himself in this new country, for he felt insecure as a New Canadian—and he was faced with midlife crises to boost. As a schoolboy, Coffey had been warned by old Father Cogley that boys who didn’t settle like everyone else would sink in this world and the next, "because that class of boy is unable to accept his God-given limitations…has no love of God in him…is an ordinary, lazy lump and his talk of finding adventures is only wanting an excuse to get away and commit mortal sins." (The Luck of Ginger Coffey, 18) Coffey dreamed of a world in which "all men had reached the top of the hill; there were no dull jobs, no humiliating interviews, no turndowns; no man was saddled with ungrateful daughters, there were unlimited funds to spend…You were free." (40) Indeed, Coffey was a dreamer who longed for personal freedom.

Having hopped from job to job because he detested being a "glorified office boy," (13) Coffey could not face the "misleading facts of a life" (7) and he was unprepared to scale the steep ascent to a successful career. While hunting for a job, Ginger Coffey no...

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...use she needs [him]; it’s knowing [he] and she will still care about each other when sex and daydreams, fights and futures—when all that’s on the shelf and done with." (243)

Mingling amongst the "lame and the old," Ginger Coffey saw reflections of himself as a New Canadian everywhere. He had learned that life was the victory, and that going on was the victory. The little triumphs in life have liberated him. Coffey, in his adjustment period as an immigrant, has found materialism to have a negative impact on his life. Concerned with the welfare of his family, Coffey was able to discover his tender-most self. Certainly, the weak and the poor have acted as the best guides for Ginger Coffey who, through a tumultuous journey, found himself at last.

Work Cited

Moore, Brian. The Luck of Ginger Coffey. Boston and Toronto: Atlantic-Little, Brown and Company, 1960.