A Prayer for Owen Meany

Ashley Higgs

Mrs. Arnold

Honors English

16 May 2015

A Prayer for Owen Meany

A Prayer for Owen Meany takes place in Toronto, Canada, in 1987. The narrator, John Wheelwright, looks back on his life in a series of non chronological flashbacks, describing his childhood with his best friend, Owen Meany, in Gravesend, New Hampshire in the 1950s and 60s. His small and bizarre best friend since he was young encourages John to believe in God, but also accidentally kills his mother. The two boys are in a little league game when Owen swings the bat and hits a foul ball that strikes John’s mother in the temple, killing her instantly. John is not mad at Owen, he knows it was a accident and that Owen loved his mother very much. His mother was a beautiful and kind woman that was liked by the whole community, and it is difficult for John to accept the abrupt change in his life. Owen believes that he is, “God’s instrument,” and that the accident happened for a reason, God’s reason. John then lives with his grandmother and stepfather, Dan Needham. He does not have a father, his mother met a man on a train and conceived him there, and she did not tell John or anyone else who his father was. Throughout the novel after his mother’s death, John and Owen seek to find out more about her life and John’s mysterious unknown father. Owen and John go to the same high school, Gravesend Academy, a prestigious school where Owen excels in his classes and is respected and loved by his peers. The boys enjoy their time there together, and Owen always helps John with his schoolwork. Both of them end up going to the University of New Hampshire, even though Owen has scholarship offers from Yale and Harvard. John and Owen enlist in the army and are enrolled in the university’s Reserve Officers’ Training Corps. Owen desperately wants to go to Vietnam and fight in the war, because he believes his purpose in life is to be a hero. John does not want to go, and to make sure he will not get drafted into the war, Owen cuts off John’s right index finger. In the current time of the 1980s in Toronto, John is a teacher at an all girls school. He is constantly upset by the Ronald Reagan Administration and the current affairs of the US.

Two of the main themes in A Prayer for Owen Meany are religion and fate & free will. Throughout the entire novel, religion plays an important role in the two boy’s lives. The boys grow up in a town that is conservatively Christian. I think the path of the religion in the novel is quite confusing, there are multiple churches in Gravesend and many different individuals follow different branches of Christianity. The boys are always involved in church activities, including annual Christmas pageants. In Toronto, John is a dedicated and devoted Christian. John’s experiences with Owen cultivated his faith in God, and John will always be grateful. Fate and free will is a recurring theme in A Prayer for Owen Meany. Owen believes God placed him on this earth for a reason, described when he says, “GOD HAS TAKEN YOUR MOTHER. MY HANDS WERE THE INSTRUMENT. GOD HAS TAKEN MY HANDS. I AM GOD’S INSTRUMENT.” Owen believes he was destined to kill John’s mother, and he also has a special gift where he is able to, “see” some of the future events in his life through his dreams.

John Irving uses a current setting in Canada and unchronological flashbacks in New Hampshire to piece together the story. In my opinion, there is a lot of unnecessary information in the novel that makes the book drag on a bit, but overall it is a fantastic story that is definitely worth reading. The characters are complex and likeable and Irving’s fragmented flashbacks leave the reader eager for more.