T. S. Garp and Duncan Garp

T. S. Garp’s relationship with Duncan Garp is a central expression of his love as both tenderness and fear: he admires his son’s growing confidence, yet his anxiety about Duncan’s safety repeatedly shapes the family’s choices. From the boy’s response to his missing eye to Garp’s fear when he is briefly out after dark, their bond holds protection and independence in uneasy balance.

Fatherhood and Duncan’s Growing Confidence

After the family’s time abroad, Duncan’s missing right eye is a fact he can acknowledge with ease rather than conceal. When a stewardess suggests that the right side of the airplane is just as nice for a window seat, Duncan pleasantly points out that he does not have a right eye. Garp admires how bold his son is feeling about himself. Duncan’s matter-of-fact reply makes his disability part of ordinary conversation, while Garp’s reaction reveals the importance he places on the boy’s confidence.

As the plane lifts off, Duncan can see his grandmother, Jenny Fields, waving from the observation deck. His attention to her and his comfortable exchange with the stewardess place him within the family’s farewells without reducing him to his injury. Garp, meanwhile, watches Jenny being lifted up by Roberta Muldoon and turns his gaze toward Helen and their new baby. The scene situates Duncan within a family shaped by care across generations, while showing Garp registering his own mother’s age and the next generation’s arrival.

Money, Travel, and Family Security

During the family’s European travel, Duncan asks John Wolf whether his father is going to make a lot of money. John says he hopes so; Duncan answers that they do not really need it because his grandmother has so much. The exchange links Duncan’s concern about his father’s prospects to the family’s financial security, which he understands through Jenny’s wealth. It also shows him speaking plainly with an adult outside the immediate household about Garp’s work and the family’s circumstances.

Duncan’s question does not turn into a demand that Garp earn more. Instead, his answer distinguishes his father’s potential success from the family’s need for money. The moment gives Duncan a perceptive, practical voice and places Garp’s writing career within their relationship: the son notices the uncertainty around his father’s earnings, but recognizes that Jenny’s resources mean the family is not dependent on them.

Protection and Anxiety

Garp’s protectiveness becomes especially visible when Duncan does not return from the park before dark in Vienna. Garp runs out to look for him and tells Helen that this is the final sign: they will leave as soon as possible. His fear is not limited to this one delay. City life in general makes him too fearful for Duncan, and the incident accelerates the family’s departure plans.

The search carries Garp from the Prinz-Eugen-Strasse toward the Russian War Memorial at the Schwarzenbergplatz. He calls Duncan’s name against the stone buildings; the echo recalls the Under Toad, the threatening image through which Garp gives form to his anxiety. Duncan is not lost or harmed: he is happily eating a Grillparzertorte in a pastry shop, despite Garp’s repeated warnings that pastry will ruin his supper. The contrast between a child’s small pleasure and his father’s imagined danger makes the episode a compact instance of their recurring tension: Duncan moves through the world with ordinary independence, while Garp experiences that freedom as a risk he must manage.

A Place of His Own

Back at Steering, Garp takes pleasure in anticipating that Duncan will soon become a student there. He misses having his son in the wrestling room, but he is happy that Duncan has found his place in the swimming pool, where either his nature or his eyesight, or both, seems to fit comfortably. This is a shift from defining fatherhood chiefly through vigilance: Garp recognizes a sphere that belongs to Duncan, rather than requiring him to share his father’s sport.

Duncan still visits the wrestling room sometimes, wrapped in towels and shivering after swimming. He sits on the soft mats beneath a blow heater to warm up, and Garp checks that he is not wet and will not drip on the mat. Duncan answers that he is fine and will not drip. Their small exchange combines Garp’s familiar practical concern with Duncan’s calm assurance. The father keeps watch, but the boy can reassure him and return to his own activity.

Care, Independence, and Loss

Across these episodes, Garp’s affection is expressed through attention: he notices Duncan’s confidence, listens to his questions, searches for him when he is late, and looks forward to his future at Steering. That attention can become overprotective, as the Vienna incident shows, but it also allows Garp to recognize what gives Duncan comfort. The swimming pool is not an extension of the wrestling room; it is Duncan’s own place, and Garp’s pride includes accepting the difference.

The relationship’s enduring tension lies between Garp’s desire to guard his son and Duncan’s growing capacity to meet the world on his own terms. Duncan’s response about his right eye and his uncomplicated assurance in the wrestling room both show a boy who is not simply defined by what he has lost. Garp’s admiration and fear coexist: he wants Duncan safe, but he also takes pleasure in seeing him become bold, self-possessed, and at home somewhere beyond his father’s immediate reach.