Contemporary Literary Criticism, The Effect of Parents' Attitude to the Children Development seen in "Mnemonic", "The Gift", "A Mother Day" (Poems) and "Big Fish" (movie).

1. Background

Parents have a huge role in educating children and it gives tremendous developmental psychology to the children. Approaching and persuading bring the power to them in order to develop their personalities. Furthermore, the children will be confident in facing challenges. Wise parents have to learn how to be good parents, and can be friends for them. Nowadays, many children feel reluctant to share their feelings because parents cannot be good listeners, and this is a cause of the problem because the children do not feel comfortable to share their feelings. The lack of understanding in giving opinion can make a fence between parents and children. In this case, parents should be sensitive and aware, and do not give an authoritarian attitude toward them. 

Neither easy nor hard to be parent, we have to be patient and have sense of art to express the affections so that the children can learn something from the parents. They also can be wise because they see how parents treat the children. Approaching process or giving a time to discuss about daily activity can make the relationship closer. Authoritarian parenting will give unfavourable impact to the children. Otherwise, the parents who teach about the tenderness will give a good example and it can help to establish the confidence to the children. However, children are the reflection of parents, so parents should be a role model to the children. Respecting each other, forgiveness and willing to admit the mistakes will help them to shape their personality to be mature persons. 

Nowadays, there are many experts of psychology and they give advices and trying to help the parents to understand their children. Beside psychology aspect that has written, there are many expressions in the world of literature. If we observe in work of literature there are many poets, authors or directors reveal the story of relationship between parents and children. They write it into poems, novels, or movies. Usually, they take the inspiration based on reality of life. Some of the poets talk about parent' mistakes, some are trying to express the love between parents and children, and the other one talk about parents' expression to their children and many more. Literature is a tool to convey the feeling, which has purpose to hint between the lines. One of the poems that describe the relation between parents and children are Li Young Lee Poems, the titles are Mnemonic and The Gift and other poem by David Young and it describes about Mother Love, the title is Mother's Day. Another works of literature that reveal on the movie based on novel and its title is Big Fish by Daniel Wallace. This story is the reflection of Father's love to his son, even the son thinks that the story has told is kind of liar but if we take look at the value and we will know the symbols of love itself, because different people will have different perspective. The point is that how the father share a time and describe how to be a man. The message from this movie appear after watching the movie and the writer of this novel try to assume the meaning and it says; "The man who keen to reach something, he will get what he want to be", the scene shows when father chase mother's love. If we analyze it then we will get the meaning inside the story, literature deserves the example of life, including relationship between parents and children, however we can catch and learn from them.

From the movie and poems that have been mentioned above, we can learn something through the messages or values. We can learn how the relationship between parents and children. Therefore, we can learn the values based on literature, and we get the lessons from them. The expression of literary work gives deep meaning and typically has a moral and value inside. We can also learn about the life from the poems, novels or movies. It is undeniable that literature is an expression of human life that can be learned inside the meaning.

2. Discussion

Li Young Lee was born in Jakarta, Indonesia on August 19, 1957. He studied in University of Pittsburgh where he began to love for writing. At the end, Lee began to dive into the art of language. Lee's poets have been influenced by classic Chinese poets. In his poem "Mnemonic", this talks about the relationship between the poet and the father. The poet tries to figure out the feeling to his father, sometimes he feels the father has a little rudeness, but the other times the father does the tenderness, just like to help him to put off the sweater and this memories baffles him.  Probably it happened when he was a child, and he feels that the action come and shadow him. He wonders about what father did, because as a child it can give the impact to the psychology aspects. 

In Mnemonic, the poet wrote, "I won't last, memory is sweet, even when it's painful, memory is sweet". We can split here, even he feels the painful inside but it also gives the meaning to him, the purpose of our parents sometimes give us disagreement, and many of arguments reveal, but what parents want is just the best to the children. I am sure; the poet realizes the purpose and can absorb the meaning after some years, when he becomes mature and he begins to understand. Even the parents have mistakes to the children, and how to convey something wrongly, but at the end he knows that his father does not understand how to express the feeling, how to express the wishes to the children.

 In some other cases, it might be kind of the refusal to the children, because the rudeness gives strongly impact and it can shape the behaviour to the children (Ex: like to spank other people when the anger comes, and this is very bad). The son becomes confused and disoriented; father looks so stern and fierce. On the other hand, the understanding of what he saw will grow well after he is growing. Li Young Lee's poetry can serve as the sample where a rude attitude is not good for children mental development. 

Another poem that describes the relationship between father and son is "The Gift", and it was written by Li Young Lee. This poem is different from the previous one, and it illustrates about father's affection. This also tells about how to show the tenderness towards the son, and the memory gives the impact to the son into adulthood. This poem is very nice packed and gives the deep impression to the readers. If we look at every stanza, it will show the simplicity of the father who read the story when he wanted to pull the splinter out from his son. We can take the point here, the gentleness gives a reference or an example to the son and he will record the sense into adulthood. The poem draws that the son does the same thing after he has a wife; he helps the wife as his father did to him. In other words, the children are innocent and when we give the examples of a good thing, it will be reflected into the future.  This poem is an expression of memories for the writer, and it is a flashback from childhood memory. The poem is very nice because I imagine a little boy who cries when there is a splinter in his hand but his father managed a gentle way by telling a tale to divert the attention, as the result the child stayed calm and was not crying. Another lesson we can get from this poem is how to conquer the pain and it can be reflected into our lives. The unpleasant life always come and go, as long as we have the knowledge to conquer then we can pass the pain. Foremost we can deal and pass it with the calmness and patient. 

The gift is a symbol for the poet, and this is the gift that cannot be seen as a real form but it is a string of gift that is given to him morally. The gift is an abstract lesson and has a huge meaning to the future, and more than this the actions of father influence strongly in order to shape the child's personality.  As we read in this poem, the father is the concrete example in expressing his affection, and proved when the poet expresses his affection to his wife. He does the same way when the father treated him. If we relate the title "The Gift" and the gift itself is the tenderness from his father and I assume that the poet is trying to tell us that we should value the lessons and learning from our parents, and one day we may teach our children, or spouse based on the experience that we have. 

 In here, we can learn from the experiences about the children development in different ways. Firstly, the father's rebuked in and secondly is the father's tenderness then it can produce a point of view to the children. Sometimes parents are not aware about the action that makes the children become confused and make them introvert but the opposite thing is when the parents give full of support, full of affection, automatically the children feel comfortable. The understanding, the tenderness that parents give will be provisions to the future. In here, we learn based on literature and this is a place or it can be said as the media to share the feeling between the reader and the author.  We can dig the lessons about life from literature, because literature is a reflection of life. 

Another literary work that presents the expression of relationship between mother and child reveals in a poem "Mother's Day" by David Young. David Young was born in Devent port, Iowa. He is a professor of English Language. In his poem, he wants to reveal mother's love. Although the poem is short but it has deep meaning, every sentence contains the memory of his mother. This poem addresses to all children, and he wants to depict how mother's love is ever lasting. Mother's love contributes the instrument of children development. Love and compassion is one of the assets that bring the spirit to the life, foremost it brings from the mother. Love, compassion or affection manifests through the children' life and we have known that the real sample we have taken is from mother. In an atmosphere of affection or tenderness, these can educate the situation. In other words, mother is created to be the goddess of love to their children. 

The love and affection of mother love is very wide to define. Every human being should have understood about what mother love is. Someone's life will be so dry without mother's love. Mother's love means eternal. In order to create the love between families, each member should make the happiness to other members. Mother always gives the sense of affection for the father, the sons and the daughters. This will nourish the feelings and can bind to one another. If there is a grief to the family then it would be a grief to all members and vice versa, if there is happiness, then all the members can share the joy.  

Back to the poem "Mother's Day", David Young would like to show the mother's jobs and she does all the matters with sincerity. In the poem itself, the poet depicts the routine job, like paying the bill, lifting a magazine or book into a shelf. Maybe some people will say that this is an easy job but mother can do this without feeling bored. We know that the routine job sometimes makes us tired and bored, and that is the wonderful thing from mother, she always shows the best and never feels tired. If we take a look into the deeply heart, mother's love is the greatest love we have. Mother figure is remarkable and she has the best understanding to the children. The struggle of a mother to her children will never stop and it will continue to all time. Can you imagine, if mother takes off time and she does not take care of the house or the children; anyhow, mother never stops to shower the light to the family, how tired becoming a mother. Mother is an extraordinary person, she is the place where we run to, and she is the place for the family. Mother always provides the warmth when we feel cold. A mother's prayer is the emitted sacrifice to her children and she devotes it to whole lifetime, why she does it, just because she wants the children safe.

David Young as the poet expresses the remorse because, he states in the last sentence "and wish that I could say, and she could hear". Probably as the child, he has the dissident attitude towards his mother, and he hopes that he could mend the mistakes and could meet his mother again. Usually, teenagers have unstable perspective. They easily influenced by friends and surroundings, it is different with adult because adult able to conduct the problems. Other problems appear because the nature of adolescents cannot examine the issues that faced. These can affect to their family, foremost to the mothers. Mothers face the difficulties in handling the adolescents. Kindly, the mothers should be wise in facing the unstable behaviour. In this era, Adolescents construct the attitude become the rebellion. If the mother cannot understand this phase, probably the dispute happens between them. If we relate the reality life between the expressions of David Young's poem is about the mother, her love is like a lamp and never die. It is the symbol to figure out the love itself. 

Another example that can be learned by parents is in The Big Fish Movie. It tells about the relationship between father and son. The movie based on the novel and the author is Daniel Wallace. John August lifted the story into a screenplay. The story revolves around a dying father and his son, who is trying to learn more about his Dad by piecing together the stories he has gathered over the years. The son winds up recreating his father's elusive life in a series of legends and myths inspired by the few facts he knows. Through these tales, the son begins to understand his father's great feats and his great failings. (http://www.werewolfpage.com/multimedia/film/2000/bigfish.htm).  This movie is very interesting and touching.  Realizing or not, the way of parents love cannot be accepted easily and this happens between parents and the children. From the movie "The Big Fish", the problem appears when the son does not believe with what father has said. 

The story of Big Fish has a hyperbole sense, the father wants the son understand about the meaning of life. By telling story, Father gives a myth story and it has a symbol, but the opposite thing, the story looks unreasonable for his son and telling story is continuously into adult. This way shows that the father does not realize that the son is growing. The son tries to prove the story when the father getting sick. Misunderstanding between father and son happened because he felt that his father was telling a lie. The fact, father wanted to teach about the life so that the son can learn about the life based on the story. After some time, when the son grows up the he begun to understand with father's story, and when the son got married and he has a son then he starts to tell the same story to his son, including the myth and all the magic inside the story. Here we can see, the way he told the story is the same with his father. The role of parents was very influential on the psychology development. 

Life lessons and values above are served  in literature, and literature presents many stories and most of them based on the life story as well as the relationship between parents and children. Actually, we can see these topics deeper because literature is a product of the human life and it is reflected into novels, poems, moreover these can be figured to the movies also. Literature is kind of media to express their thought and draw the reality in order to understand about the life. From the life, literature appears, and it is as an expression of thought.  

Conclusion

Children are the gift from God; parents should be responsible to educate the children. Both father and mother have the same role to educate their children. Participation of parents in educating is the best key and it is the earlier of successful in family itself. Parenting is a pattern of behaviour that is applied by parents, and it is consistent to apply. The children can perceive this behaviour, either in the form of positive or negative behavioural patterns. That is why parents should be careful in applying of role and pattern of behaviour. 

There are some patterns in parenting ways:

1. Democratic

Parents who take care of their children with democratic way will produce independent and mature personality. In here, the children learn to determine something in their life and they will know how to be democratic person.    

2. The Authoritarian

Besides democratic way, there is an Authoritarian way that shows the way parents teach the children. It is not good because an authoritarian way stick to the parents rules. The children do not have opinion in giving the ideas; usually the children must follow the orders. 

3. The Carelessness

The parents do not care about children development. Usually the parents are very busy to their works, so the children are served by the material only. Therefore, the children will feel lonely and become introvert. They have problems to interact with the society. Finally, they feel no one beside them. 

Now, we can make a conclusion, which one is good or bad. Every day is a process to mend the mistakes or to make the role better and better if the circumstance has already been managed well then it will easier to shape the children' characters. Good habit or bad habit indicates the quality of family. The character does not happen by itself, the parents have duty to help them in finding identity. In other words, the process of socialization or education is very important to apply. Parents should make the family become a first place to learn the goodness; family is the microenvironment to attach the values of life. Parents have a big contribution to shape the character and to develop their children.

In family, the character of children will grow and it influenced to their future. From the children point of view, parents are the examples that followed by them. However, the parents should be able to handle the children and give attention to them but do not to spoil them; giving correct decision is a good way to help the children to learn when they have to choose something necessary. By taking the right role, the child will grow and develop optimally. Every child want to get attention from their parents, maybe it sounds simple but this the fundamental role in educating the children. The parents should not make any differences between the children (in context of affection). Another aspect that should be avoided is how to press the emotion, sometimes parents forget to conduct the anger and showing the emotion to the children and it makes them blue. 

It is the same as in literature aspects, mostly the author, or the poets would like to show the family life by his writing. These are the reflection of human life, which can be the examples to us. We have to peruse in order to help children psychology aspect. They need support from the parents. Children are parents' reflection; the power they get is from where they live. Family is the first place to develop their strengths, and more over the strengths can build the self-confidence when they want to determine their goals. With love and sincerity they will stand firmly to reach the future. The strengths they have are becoming their provision to face the world and to find their abilities they want to achieve, and let them become what they want to do.  Kids are precious gifts from God. They have beautiful faces, innocent and unique. Parents embraced are the most comfortable place for children.

(Sources; The Poems “Mnemonic, The Gift, Mother’s Day and The Big Fish movie, book: Marcus Buckingham; Find Your strongest Life.)