“Growing Up” by Joyce Cary

This short story is about a father coming home from a business trip to his family. He expects joy and excitement at his homecoming from his daughters and is surprised by their indifference. He meets his daughters and they begin to behave in an alarmingly violent fashion. He panics but the ‘game’ ceases as abruptly as it had started. Later the girls’ mother arrives with the welfare committee and they conduct themselves like well-educated young ladies should to the bewilderment of their father. After tea, his youngest daughter positions herself in superior posture to examine Quick’s wound, this only increases his confusion and need for male company.

Quick is proud of his neglected, untidy and wild garden. He feels this sets him apart from his neighbours who have neat and trim gardens; “Quick was even proud of it”, “…an original masterpiece among gardens.” This garden symbolizes the overlooked facet of his life and the way he let his children grow freely and savage just like this garden.

The relationship between the garden and the girls is comparable to the association between the schoolboys and the island in William Golding’s novel, The Lord of the Flies. The two girls are taken over by evil and savagery just as the boys were, once rules and order abandoned them. This is particularly felt when Kate and Jenny chase Snort – the dog – around the garden just like Jack hunts pigs on the island in The Lord of the Flies.

Cary questions Mr. And Mrs. Quick’s parental abilities by linking the neglect of their garden with the lack of dedication to the girls’ discipline. This is shown by Quick’s constant demonstrations of surprise at the sudden changes of his daughter’s personalities – he doesn’t know them and runs away from his responsibilities, “Robert was shocked”.

The mother is oblivious to and is more concerned with problems dealt at the welfare committee than what goes on in her own home “…all you children – amusing yourselves while we run the world.” This is extremely well portrayed when the welfare committee discuss the story about the 14 year-old gone wild and how awful that was. The story of the 14 year-old also portrays what the girls may become and the mother’s unconsciousness.

This leads on to the question of whether these parents truly know their children. The girls are young and take on role-playing games therefore their personalities change constantly putting on a performance for their parents, “And at tea, the two girls, dressed in smart clean frocks, handed round cake and bread and butter with demure and reserved looks.”

This contrasts with the type of behaviour Quick had witnessed moments earlier in the garden. Their games led them to an alarming and fierce frenzy that shocked and frightened him. This shows how fast these girls are able to pretend and modify their conduct, “Though still in a mood of disgust, found himself obliged to submit to this new game.”

Towards the end of tea, Quick feels suffocated and ill at ease. He doesn’t understand the female environment that surrounds him and yearns for male company “Quick felt all at once a sense of stiffness. He wanted urgently to get away, to escape. Yes he needed some male company”. He plans to go to a bar and socialize with an acquaintance – Wilkins. The constant presence of Wilkins at the bar suggests that he too is running away from his household troubles and responsibilities. This makes it evident that Quick will probably become like Wilkins as the years go by.

Before Quick leaves to join Wilkins in a pool game and maybe even dinner Jenny approaches him. She adapts an under control attitude and is poised on the wall looking down on her father to examine his wound “Having reached this superior position, she poked the plaster…”. This leads to a complete role-reversal as if she has become the parent and Quick the child.

This short story questions parental skills and the ability to accept and face one’s responsibilities. I feel that Cary made good use of comparing the wild garden to the savage girls by first introducing the garden and Quick’s pride of it and then subtly contrasting it with the girls’ personalities. Quick’s reaction of surprise toward these brutal and sudden changes in his daughters only highlight the fact that he doesn’t really know his children. The girls are shown as innocence gone vicious due to the neglect of their parents though the parents mean well.