Parent-Child Relationships

This is the first of the play’s two key themes – that is, thematic elements and explorations that play out in the narrative consistently, vividly, and quite apparently. These sorts of relationships are explored in two main ways: through the relationships of people who are actually connected by blood and birth; and the relationships of people who are tied together by affection, physical proximity, or some other form of connection that seems like what a parent-child relationship could or should be – at least in the minds of the characters.

In terms of the first type of relationship, between biological parents and children, the most obvious example is the relationship between Pops and Junior, full of tension and conflict, but also (as in Act 2, Scene 2) full of unspoken affection. This particular relationship has a powerful, vividly contrasting echo in the relationship between Oswaldo and his estranged...