Finding a Place in the World

Often times in literature, authors present conflict as being a character’s struggle for belonging. In Mitsuye Yamada’s A Bedtime Story, Joy Harjo’s The Path to the Milky Way Leads through Los Angeles, and Bgaratu Mukherjee’s A Father, the conflict of fitting in is discussed, in the sense of belonging in a new country, a new place, or a changed place. Each character or speaker learns to either adapt to their new surroundings, or is unable to assimilate.
In Mitsuye Yamada’s A Bedtime Story the speaker tells of an old woman who traveled through many villages seeking room for a night. At every door she knocked at asking to stay the night, the residents refused her. She finally found a clearing on a hill and lay down there, where she had an extraordinary moonlit view of the town. She thanked the people of the town for being kind in refusing her a bed, for otherwise she would not have seen the amazing view. The speaker retells this story after it was told to her by her father in their home in Seattle overlooking a valley. Here the father of the speaker is trying to make it easier for the speaker to adapt to their new home by telling her that a home is whatever you make of it, whether on a hill under the stars, or in a new country. The main character of the poem is able to adapt to her surroundings easily because she values the little things in life such as seeing “a memorable sight,” instead of just harping on the fact that she has no room to stay in.
For the speaker of the poem The Path to the Milky Way by Joy Harjo, a city she is accustomed to becomes stranger and more different because of the gradual build up and industrialization of Los Angeles, and the growing destruction of nature. The speaker remarks, “Everyone knows you can’t buy love but you can still sell your soul for less than a song to a stranger who will sell it to someone else for a profit until you’re owned by a company of strangers in the city of the strange and getting stranger.” Here the speaker is talking about how a place that used to be so familiar to her has become so different because of the growing amount of companies and corporations that take away the natural and familiar. The speaker is finding it hard to adapt to a place she was so used to, but now has become different and strange. All the speaker can do is “wait and see,” and even though she is not seeing anything just yet, she looks for the little good she can find, and that is what gives her hope.
In Bharati Mukherjee’s A Father, the main character of the story Mr. Bhowmick, is finding it difficult to assimilate into the American way of life. For his wife and daughter on the other hand, it is easier for them to be caught up in everything “American,” because they are quick to let go of their Indian traditions. Mr. Bhowmick is stuck in the Indian way of life, acting overly superstitious, spending more than the adequate amount of time praying, and still believing in the customary traditions of the home. Because Mr. Bhowmick is unable to grasp, or even take into consideration the “American way,” it ruins his relationship with his daughter and wife who bask in the new freedom of being in Detroit. Because the wife of Mr. Bhowmick embraces the American way, while her husband refuses to leave his customs in the dark, the couple is bitter to one another, always arguing, and eventually showing their daughter that marriage is a materialistic-loveless act.
One of the hardest things in life is figuring out one’s place in the world. It is hard for people to adjust and adapt to new ideas, while being in a new environment. . In Mitsuye Yamada’s A Bedtime Story, Joy Harjo’s The Path to the Milky Way Leads through Los Angeles, and Bgaratu Mukherjee’s A Father, the idea of belonging is presented as a conflict, finding it hard for people to adapt to new settings.