Big Fish: A Novel of Mythic Proportions

"The day he was born things changed."

William means two things with this statement. First, in a practical way, Edward's birth made two people parents. In a fantastical way, his birth coincided with the first rain during the driest drought Ashland had seen in decades. From his first day on Earth, it seems that Edward has such a strong presence that it can affect even the weather.

"He was a big fish even then."

This quote references both Edward's abnormal adolescent growth spurt, and the larger-than-life reputation that he, at a young age, has already earned. Referring to Edward as a 'big fish' shows that he is not only an impressive success from humble beginnings, but that his stories have variable degrees of truth to them.

"It was as though he lived in a state of constant aspiration."

William reaches this conclusion as he tries to find the impetus for his father's need for constant movement and work. He makes plenty of money, he has a house with a pool, a number of cars, and is his own boss. Williamrealizes that it's not material possessions that motivate his father, but an inner need to stay striving for the next thing. It doesn't matter where Edward ends up; rather, it's how he gets there.

"He became just a man, a man without a job, without a story to tell, a man, I realized, I didn't know."

When Edward returns home from his business excursions, he quickly loses his animated presence, having no source for new experiences. William understands that without a sense of purpose, which his father derives from interacting with new people and getting to tell his jokes and stories, Edward suffers. Because of this, he stays away from home more than not. Hence, William never gets a real chance to know his father.

"It seems not to be a matter of thirst so much as it is a desire for this element, to feel it on his tongue, his lips: he loves the water."

In each imagined scenario of Edward's death, he asks William for a glass of water. William realizes that water is life-sustaining for his father, not only in a literal sense, but in a metaphorical sense, too. Drinking water, being close to it, and swimming in it are what allow Edward to continue to be a 'big fish,' and is the common element in most of his fantastical stories.

"Remembering a man's stories makes him immortal, did you know that?"

Edward says this to William on his deathbed. He's made this belief clear by dedicating his life to not only creating new experiences but to sharing them with his son. William often reflects that his father is closer to an immortal demigod than a human, and this statement seems to support that belief.

"A big fish in a big pond—that's what I wanted."

Whether Edward's stories about his life are true or not, they present him as a man with a huge presence. He seems never to have done anything ordinary, even having a job cleaning dog kennels is, for him, extraordinary. Because he believes that a man's stories, rather than his actual deeds, are what makes him immortal, Edward manipulates his memory so that he will always be remembered as a 'big fish.'

"He just liked people, and people liked him. It was that simple, he said."

Edward has a "flair for understatement" (28) that balances out the outrageousness of the stories he tells about his life. While his charm may be as simple as being likable, it seems that it would take a special person to charm an insatiable, carnivorous giant into not eating a town of defenseless humans. Edward doesn't use his stories to aggrandize himself; rather, he uses his stories to provide entertainment to others.

"He never told anybody about this. He couldn't. Because who'd believe him?"

The truth of this statement is brought into question by the mere fact that this story has been shared with at least one other person: William. Because it's said by William in his retelling of the story in question, it seems that Edward often ends the story in this way, understatedly claiming to never have told anyone. This perceived exclusivity, in a way, adds to the mystique of the story itself.

"Dying, he has that look dying people get in their eyes sometimes, happy and sad, tired and spiritually blessed, all at the same time."

Eyes hold significance for both William and Edward. William typically describes those around him in terms of the look in their eyes, as he does here about his father. Edward had a significant encounter with a prophetic glass eye as a youth, and both he and Jenny Hill are described as having eyes that glow in the dark.

"In the past year, we have switched places; I have become the father, and he the sickly son, whose comportment under these extreme circumstances I value."

During Edward's illness, he loses his independence, and is forced to stay put and allow himself to be cared for by William, Sandra, and Dr. Bennett. William acts maturely in the face of this, telling his father that he's proud of the way he's handling things, thus reversing the traditional roles of father and son. He often tries to get Edward to stop being so silly, to take things more seriously, as a parent usually does with a child.

"This is the way it has gone from the beginning: every time we get close to something meaningful, serious, or delicate, he tells a joke."

Though William perceives his father's humor as a way to shirk responsibilities or maturity, he comes to see his humor as a gift. He sees that his father uses it to connect with others, including William. By the end of the book, William is the one telling jokes as Edward lays in his hospital bed.

"It wasn't her desire to be loved by so many men—one would do fine."

Sandra's portrayal as a young woman being constantly followed around by gang of suitors echoes the gang of suitors who surround Odysseus' wife, Penelope, when he's unable to return home to Ithaca after the Trojan War. Just as Odysseus slays the suitors when he finally does return, so Edward steps in as the one man who wins her heart.

"He had told amazing stories about her since she was little, and now that he was old and had lost some of his mind it appeared that he had begun to believe them."

Edward is not the only practitioner of storytelling in the novel. Sandra's father, Seth, also tells stories, but he tells them about his daughter, to her. Whereas Edward's storytelling seems to serve purposes of posterity, Seth's seems more concerned with helping his daughter form both a sense of identity and wonder.

"He felt, in an odd way, that the world rested on his shoulders."

In another allusion to Greek mythology, Edward expresses a feeling like Atlas, the titan condemned to forever hold the sky upon his shoulders. The origin of Edward's feelings about bearing the weight of the world seems self-imposed. He had, as he said, always wanted to be a 'big fish.'

"We believe he is somehow divine, a god, the god of laughter, the god who cannot speak but to say, There was this man…"

Because he's worked all of his life to construct and disseminate such a grand version of his life, Edward appears, not only to William, a kind of divine entity. No mortal man could survive underwater for more than a minute, as Edward did. Nor could they rip the beating heart of a rabid dog from its chest, as Edward did.

"You're not supposed to believe it…You're supposed to believe in it."

It's clear that it's unimportant to Edward whether anyone actually believes he did the things that he says. Rather, what matters to him is to build a legacy to leave behind, and to bring a bit of magical thinking to an otherwise ordinary life story. He tries to get William to understand this point, rather than be so insistent on hearing the truth.

"Of all his great powers, this was perhaps the most extraordinary: at any time, at the drop of a hat, he could really break me up."

Of Edward's alleged superhuman powers, his humor is the only one that William witnesses regularly. It is also the one that allows him to interact with all kinds of people in a non-heroic way. William also believes that, more than anything, Edward wants to be remembered for his ability to make people laugh.

"As he approaches the waters draw back, the ground hardens, a path is there for him to follow."

Edward's entry into the swamp in which Jenny Hill lives echoes Moses' parting of the Red Sea, thus adding to his mythic persona. Given Edward's lifelong connection with water, it seems fitting that he must wade through it to find his true love. Later, in his absence, water surrounds Jenny’s home again, thus parting them forever.

“‘You?’ he says. ‘But you're just a—'”

The men and women in Big Fish maintain traditional gender roles. The women stay at home, cooking and caring for the children, while the men work on the farm, or away from the home. Jenny Hill, however, owns her home and land, and, until Edward shows up, doesn't rely on a man to support her. This startles Edward.

"In Specter, history becomes what never happened."

William's thoughts about Specter also apply to Edward's stories of his own life. Possibility and imagination come to matter more than the truth of events. This not only builds mystique but allows for more people to enter into the stories, with their own versions.

"I remember thinking what a sad and horrible life she must lead, to spend even a moment of it cleaning up these dusty distant frames."

Because William acts as narrator, and his stories have come from Edward, who rarely spent time at home, Sandra's thoughts and feelings get left out of most of the novel. When William does finally consider his mother's life as Edward's wife, forever waiting for him to return, then leave again, he realizes that it must not be a great life to live.

"I took some solace from the fact that all of this was happening for the good, that a happy ending would somehow occur, that even this illness was a metaphor for something else: it meant that he was growing weary of the world."

Through Edward's personal mythology, William has learned to see metaphor in all kinds of occurrences, even his father's death. In this case, he believes that Edward's illness is a metaphorical ticket for his departure from a world that has lost its magic for him.