NCERT Class 11th Poem: Father to Son by Elizabeth Jennings - Summary
This poem by Elizabeth Jennings is about a father and son's relationship, how a generation gap can sometimes create a rift between two close people. The narrator, a father, is perplexed about his own child. He raised him, but now it seems to the narrator that he doesn't know him, even after living together for so many years in the same house. They are practically living like strangers under the same roof. The narrator couldn't understand him. It seems that the child has changed a lot since he was a little boy. The father fears whether it is he who is responsible for the fracturing of ties, as he might not have nurtured the right values in his son. Or he wonders whether he has been an authoritarian father and interfered in his son's life, who is no longer a child. He questions his own place in his son's life. There is no warmth left in their communication, and they talk like strangers. There is a lack of understanding between them, which further signifies their acr...