In This Boy’s Life , Tobias Wolff hints to the reader that Toby’s desire for escape is developed from his feelings of not being who he wants to be and wanting to escape his problems to start a new life. This Boy’s Life by Tobias Wolff is about a boy trying to escape his problems, searching to find his true identity while still wanting to fit in and attempting to find a
better life for himself. Older Toby opens the book as he reflects on his childhood; while living a
nomadic lifestyle, he tries continually to escape his problems, only to find out that new ones
will arise and the old ones will still exist.
Toby, wishes to start a new life, takes off from his previous life hoping to leave all of his
problems behind him, hoping that they will all be forgotten. Desperately trying to run away from his problems in Chinook, he plans to escape to Alaska. “ I planned to travel alone under an assumed name. Later on, when I had my feet on the ground, I would send for my mother. It
was not hard to imagine our reunion in my cabin: her grateful tears and cries of admiration at the pelt-covered walls, the racks of guns, the tame wolves dozing before the fire”(155). This quote is an example of how Toby fantasizes about taking off from his life into the wilderness.
He is dreaming about the reunion, that he will have with his mother, in his cabin in alaska, yet
does he not realize that it is nearly impossible for a child to one life by himself in a cabin, to buy
or build a cabin with the proper funds, and to find a job that will put him ‘on his feet’. Toby is
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dreaming about an unreal situation, which will never happen. Toby is wanting to start a new life takes off from his previous life hoping to leave all of his problems behind him, hoping that they will all be forgotten. When considering his options, Wolff writes, “I thought that he would actually consider taking me with him, and since I could imagine so reasonable argument against
my going I assumed that he couldn’t either. It was as good as decided. I saw myself riding
shotgun beside Skipper in this fast, beautiful red car the two of us having adventures along the
way and helping people out of situations too tough for them to handle by themselves”(119).
This quote is an example of Toby’s want to runaway from his life, trying to leave behind all of
his problems and issues, which is influenced by his desire to go to Mexico with his step brother
in his newly restored red ford, but is an attempt waiting for failure. Seeing himself and Skipper
help people out of situations ‘too tough for them to handle by themselves’, Tobias Wolff hints
to the reader that he is the one that is trying to escape a situation too tough for himself to
handle when he needs to handle and help himself out of his own problematic situations before
helping others.
Throughout the book, Toby tries to create a better life for himself by leading himself onto a new and better path of success in life. While fantasizing about a new identity, “I thought that in Chinook, away from Taylor and Silver, away from Marian, away from people who had
already made up their minds about me, I could be different. I could introduce myself as a
scholar- athlete, a boy of dignity and consequence and without any reason to doubt me people would believe I was that boy, and thus allow me to be that boy”(89). Toby, is trying to find who he wants to be and who he is through the theme of escape. He is trying to figure out who he is
and who he wants to be in life while figuring out whether escaping his current life in Chinook,
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and going to Hill, will help him form his true identity or will it create a more made up identity,
covering his true self. Even after attempting and fantasizing about escape, his plan of becoming
a new person and creating a new identity fail. In Chinook, he does not transform into the boy
he describes he wants to be. Instead of learning his lesson, that escape does not resolve all of
his problems, he continues to desire escape from his life, trying to find his true self and trying to create a better life for himself. Toby wants to escape his current life, anew, in Chinook in search of finding a better life and path in life to follow. After talking to Geoffrey, Tobias Wolff writes, “Geoffrey told me he would send a list of schools to apply to, along with addresses and
deadlines. I would have to be patient, this wasn’t going to happen overnight. ‘I don’t like the
idea of that guy hitting you,’ Geoffrey said. ‘Think you can hang on out there?’ I said I could”(205). Toby is desperate for a new life, while trying to escape his problems in Chinook, he thinks that once again moving away from the situation will dissolve his problems, allowing
him to have a better life on the path of success. Toby, desperate for a new life, is trying to have
an sincere escape, trying to make this plan actually succeed. When wanting to apply to various
boarding schools, wants to find his true identity and self. TRANSITION?Toby, when preparing for his new life, thinks,“This book explained how the upper class perpetuates itself. Its motive was supposedly democratic, to attack snobbery
and subvert the upper class by giving away its secrets. But I didn’t read it as social criticism. To
seek status seemed the most natural thing in the world to me. Everyone did it. The people who
bought the book were certainly doing it. They consulted it with the same purpose I had, not to deplore the class problem but to solve it by changing classes”(207). This quote is an example of how Toby is trying to find who he is while trying to escape his life. Toby, is trying to prepare
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himself for his new life at Hill by researching how to fit in and move up to the class of the
wealthy, which he will soon join at Hill. He is trying to find out how to change and act as if he
were a member of the class that the boys belong to at Hill, trying to create an identity for his
new life.
Throughout all of his plans of escape, whether it be wanting to set his life on a better
path or a desperate attempt for escape, Tobias Wolff proves to the reader that his desire for
escape is developed from his feelings of not being who he wants to be and wanting to escape
his problems to start a new life. Toby’s plans of escape all end in failure, which Tobias Wolff is
trying to show the reader. By these plans all ending in failure, it shows the reader that through
all of his plans and wants for escape, whether the reasons be wanting to start a new life and to
escape his problems or trying to find who he wants to be, that escape and running away will
not fix and dissolve all of your problems.
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