The Mustache By Robert Cormier Analysis

In the short story “The Mustache,” by Robert Cormier, the main character, Mike, has an epiphany, and shaves off his mustache because he does not want to carry a life filled with guilt and regret to his deathbed. In the story, Mike has grown a mustache as an experiment and has decided that he likes it. However, neither his mother nor his girlfriend is fond of it because it makes him appear older than his true age. Mike however, does not seemed concerned about their feelings and tells his mother that he is “thinking about shaving it off”, even though he was not. On the ride to visit his grandmother at the senior living home, he speeds along in his father’s car, even though he promised to be careful. Once at the nursing home, he lingers in the parking lot and wishes he had not taken this trip. While Mike is clearing …show more content…
Mike’s grandmother begins to talk her own guilt that she carried through her life and to her dying days. She tells Mike, “and I think of that terrible night, Mike, that terrible night. Have you ever really forgiven me for that night?”, letting the reader know that she had wronged her husband one night and never found the forgiveness that she now longed for. Later she says, “and then the accident... and I never had the chance to ask you to forgive me.” This passage indicates that an accident cut the grandfather’s life short and before she was able to apologize. In the quote, “Say you forgive me, Mike. I've waited all these years,” it is clear that the event, as well as the accident, had happened many years ago and that the grandmother has carried this guilt and regret with her for many years and desperately wants her husband to accept her apology. It was especially sad to see his failing grandmother still in pain from an incident so many years earlier. She said it was her pride that prevented her from apologizing. Mike sees the pain that this lingering guilt and regret is causing his grandmother and notes “ My grandmother. My poor,