“Story of the Lost Son” & “A Father's Story” - Comparison and Contrast

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“Story of the Lost Son” & “A Father's Story” - Comparison and Contrast

Introduction

This paper compares the two stories namely, A Father's Story by Andre Dubus and Story of the Lost Son from Gospel of Luke. Both the stories cite the passionate love of fathers for their children. While the two stories share a common theme, both are different in several ways. The time of their publication, intensity of love for children, the touch of religion and many other aspects is different in the two. Story of the Lost Son is comparatively several folds shorter than A Father's Story. Story of the Lost Son depicts the love of a father for his son while in A Father's Story the love of a father for a daughter is projected. Andre Dubus included an in depth touch of religion into his story and placed the main character, the father in his story in dilemma to chose between religious, moral and ethical obligations and safety and security of his daughter. While in Story of the Lost Son, the offensive behavior of a child for his father is cited which follows the citation of his sins, his regret, the reunion of the two and father's open hearted acceptance and forgiveness of his child. Although both the stories are published in two completely different times, the main purpose of the stories is almost same, the love of father for their children and their willingness to accept and forgive their children even after worst of their actions. Both the stories uses worst sins and misdeeds performed by the children, and then nature of fathers to cover them, ignore the mistakes and the sins and willingness to carry on the beautiful relation between a father and a child even in the worst scenarios (Clugston, 2010).

Thesis Statement

The purpose of this paper is to identify the common aspects and differences between the two stories by in depth analysis.

Discussion

To compare both the stories, they will be analyzed one after another while taking into consideration the influence and impact of the time they were published and the main points contained within each of them. During the analysis of the second story comparison with the first one will be made.

Story of the Lost Son

This literary parable is found in the third book in the Gospel of Luke or the New Testament. The writer of this testament, Luke is considered as a famous physician and writer from the first century. It is said that, this parable is added into the Gospel of Luke to attribute the position of the father to Jesus of Nazareth (Dubus, 1996).

Impact of the Time of Publication

The author of this parable is the author of the New Testament, Luke the Evangelist. Luke is considered and stated among the highest of the positions among the followers of Christianity as the author of the canonical Gospels of Jesus Christ. He belonged to the Hellenistic city ...