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Duality In E. B. White's Once More To The Lake

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“Once More to the Lake” is an essay about a father and son tradition of going to a lake in Maine. The author recreates the experiences he had as a kid with his own son. In E.B. White’s essay “Once More to the Lake”, the big concept is White is able to accept that he has come to the closer to death when he sees that his son is growing up. E.B White has acknowledged that he will not live forever and the end is near. Throughout his essay, White uses a lot of duality. He reflects back to his past and compares it to the present he is in. During the first morning back at the lake, he “began to sustain the illusion that [his son] was [him], and therefore, by simple transposition, that [he] was [his] father” (White 432). White feels that everything at the lake is the same, but he is playing …show more content…

White said “[he] would be in the middle of some simple act, [he] would be picking up a bait box or laying down a table fork, [he] would be saying something, and suddenly it would be not [him] but [his] father who was saying the words or making the gesture” (White 432). Duality is playing an important part of White realizing he is getting closer to dying because it demonstrates that he was in the same place as his son and eventually his father died but the lake in Maine had been a piece of his father he would always have. White bringing his son to the lake helps continue that tradition and will also leave his son with a piece of his own father when he dies. White believes that when his son is grown and has kids, he will also bring his son there and the cycle would just keep continuing. White refers to the lake as a ‘holy spot’ and a place that was ‘pretty much the same’ but there are many times he is forced to realize that much time has passed

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