Analysis of Bel Kaufman's 'Sunday in the Park'

” Sunday in the park” is a story written by Bel Kaufman in 1983. The story is about a family from the higher class and a little family from the lower, class having a conflict. The themes in the story are gender roles, social classes, growing up and different parenting styles. In the text we read about two very dissimilar family’s, from two different social groups. The two families behaviors and way of communicating are very different from each other.

The text starts with an aesthetic description of the park “It was still warm in the late-afternoon sun, and the city noises came muffled through the trees in the park.” This shows that the family sees the park as a peaceful place where they can take a break from the hectic city. When we get introduced to the two families, their dissimilarities appear quickly. Morton gets described smart, well-educated and well formulated as he speaks and sophisticated. Compared to the other dad that gets described as big, strong, rude and threatening. These two men are opposites on many points. For example, “He put his Times down carefully on his lap and turned his fine, lean face toward the man, smiling the shy, apologetic smile he might have offered a student in pointing out an error in his thinking.” Morton reads the New Times for entertainment. This shows that he reads nonfiction and informative texts for entertainment. As opposed to the other dad that reads comics “He was a big man, and he seemed to be taking up the whole bench as he held the Sunday comics close to his face.” We can here see one of the opposites between the dads. Then the conflict starts between the two little boys in the sandbox, we can see the big difference of how the families communicate. The fat little kid (Joe) throws sand at Larry, this shows lack of respect for one’s fellow human beings and bad upbringing. Larry’s mom reacts fast” No, no, little boy.” She shook her finger at him, her eyes searching for the child’s mother or nurse. “We mustn’t throw sand. It may get in someone’s eyes and hurt.” Larry’s mom is trying to solve the conflict peacefully between the two boys. This shows she acts mature, responsible, calm and very sensible to Joe and to her own child. When joe throws sand at Larry the second time, Larry’s mother first instinct is to pity Larry and punish the other boy. But she behaves and controlled it for the sake of Larry so he can learn to fight his own at battles and be at great role model. Joes dad finally choose to react to the conflict, he tells Joe to keep doing what’s he’s doing because it is a public sandbox. He only looks at his own son and is completely ignoring the mom. This is the fundamental conflict in the story. Larry’s mom looks over at Morton, she wants him to defend her and Larry. Here the theme “gender roles in the family” appears. Morton confronts the big “You’re quite right,” he said pleasantly, “but just because this is a public place....” the way Morton speaks supports the fact that Morton belongs to the higher class. Morton are speaking down to the big man like they are not on the same level. The big man interrupt Morton and flexes his arm muscles which means he wants to show that he is ready to fight. Morton don’t think it is worth having a fight and he pics Larry up in shame and the family leave the park. Larry didn’t want to go home, and he made a dramatic scene screaming and kicking while his parents dragged him through the park. This makes the hole situation even more embarrassing and shameful for the parents. The parent’s discuses if it would have been worth trying to fight the big man. They agree it wasn’t had been worth it because violence doesn’t solve anything. The story ends with that Morton gets angry “If you can’t discipline this child, I will,” he was about to hit the kid, but Larry’s mom stopped him “Indeed?” she heard herself say. “You and who else?”. Morton is very hypocritical; he says one thing but does another.