
In the short story, This is Water by David Foster Wallace we see different stories and scenarios that help us to try and understand how to look into new perspectives of others. One of the main analogies in the novel is the fish story which helps us understand the perspective of others. The older fish in the story represents a teacher and the younger fishes represent the students in the scenario; it makes us look into the different perspective of the older fish teaching new things to younger generations. This analogy shows us how the older generation teaches the younger generation on learning how to do things that are known as you go through life. During this story we take a look into the new ideals and perspectives of others and try to learn to see through their background.

“There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says, ‘Morning, boys. How’s the water?” (X).  David Foster Wallace gives us a peek into the symbolism of the fish being a way to look at new perspectives throughout society. When taking a look at the background of the line the older fish is taking into context as the teacher to a younger fish who is learning to look through new perspectives through different points of view. The word fish connects with the theme by giving us a new perspective on how we can interpret day to day lives of people around us, their backgrounds, and their lives. When we are looking through in the short novel the fish analogies are similar to each other trying to connect to the theme of looking at people through new and different perspectives.

“The point of the fish story is merely that the most obvious, important realities are often the ones that are hardest to see and talk about” (10). This quote that Wallace symbolizes a new perspective that jumbles our minds to talk about the things that we don’t talk about to anyone except to the people that we are close with. He is using the fish analogy as a clear point out to how we can take a look at others lives and day to day lives by putting ourselves in other’s shoes. The fish analogy ties together with the theme of the entire story by giving us a new way to see how another person goes about their daily lives. Wallace wants us to understand different perspectives of everyone around us so we can become closer as a society. Once we can look through other people’s perspectives the sooner we can become more aware of our surroundings. When Wallace talks about important realities being the ones that are harder to talk about he is trying to tell us that the important realities that we have to face are hard to talk about being the hardest things we have to face. Wallace thinks that our lives would be made easier if we could talk about our important realities to discuss and help with the situation with other people. Making it easier to talk about the important realities in our lives to other people the easier it will make our society grow closer. 

“It is about the real value of a real education, which has almost nothing to do with knowledge, and everything to do with simple awareness; awareness of what is so real and essential, so hidden in plain sight all around us, all the time, that we have to keep reminding ourselves over and over” (XVII). Awareness is a key component in this short story that David Wallace portrays in all the scenarios wanting us to realize that when we are aware of our surroundings we will be knowledgeable of more things. When we gain knowledge from knowing what’s going on around us we can better understand how the world works and how other creatures live out their daily lives. The fish analogy is only one example that gives us a look into being aware of our surroundings and being knowledgeable about what’s going on around us. Taking what the fish analogy stands for with awareness the fish are the younger generation being aware of where they live and what their everyday lives look like. As we go through our lives of education we learn more how to adapt to live and learn about how to understand the daily lives of others. We as students gain knowledge and thus can understand what goes on around us during our lives.

As we look into the short story This is Water by David Foster Wallace we see different scenarios that emphasize the awareness of our surroundings gaining knowledge over time about our day to day lives. David Foster Wallace believes that awareness is the key to becoming more knowledgeable. Our education gives us an edge to gain knowledge through learning about things we need to know about our lives. Our education can help us realize our important realities because we learn what we want to do later in our lives and how we go about achieving those realities. By looking at the fish analogy we gain the knowledge by learning how the fish adapt to their lives. As students we need to learn and gain knowledge about our day to day lives by being aware of our surroundings and becoming successful later in our lives.  