What Do Fish Have To Do With Anything

Willie, in the short story, What Do Fish Have To Do With Anything? Undergoes a metamorphosis as he matures from the beginning to the end of the story. Willie changes due to his interactions with other characters in the plot as well as major events that sculpt him into a more mature, broad-minded person than he was at the start of the story. Firstly, when Willie sees the begging man, Willie’s mother is quick to make sure that he avoids looking at the man. Once they get home, Willie asks the reason for the man begging. To that question, his mother made a terse reply saying that the man was probably unhappy, and she said “maybe you can’t buy happiness, but you can rent a lot of it.” After hearing that response, Willie begins to understand that people can be unhappy and he becomes less naive to the rest of the world. …show more content…
When Willie asks why she had to be so exact with her measurement, she replies saying “It’s on the box, so you can believe what it says,” and then she explains how scientists study people and that they are always right. Soon after, when Willie offers the begging man a piece of cake, just like his mother, he measures an exact ½ piece of cake. When the man asks him why he was doing that, he tells the man what his mother told him about the box. However the man insists that the writing on the box are lies and that Willie should give the man the amount of cake that he thinks the man should have. So Willie cuts the man a bigger piece and he literally learns how to ‘think outside the