A Family Supper

The opening of the story details the narrator’s mother’s death, and how she was poisoned while eating fugu two years prior. From the beginning of the story, Ishiguro makes it clear that death and grief will be primary thematic elements. From the onset, Ishiguro suggests that the titular family is dysfunctional, struggling with open lines of communication and feelings of loss and regret. Regarding his mother, the narrator reveals that he “did not learn of the circumstances surrounding her death until [he] returned to Tokyo two years later” (1). The narrator’s absence from his mother’s funeral is made worse by his father’s refusal to tell him about the circumstances surrounding her death. Both men punish each other with yet another form of loss, the former by refusing to be physically present, and the latter by keeping intimate knowledge about Mother’s passing secret. The three main characters of “A Family Supper” struggle to talk about death and grief. The conversations between the narrator and his father are stilted, “punctuated by long pauses” full of silence (1). Despite the shared loss of Mother, the narrator only offers condolences for his father’s failed business, telling him, “I’m sorry to hear about the firm” (2).