The Glass Menagerie: Irony of Abandonment

"I'm like my father. The bastard son of a bastard! See how he grins? And he's been absent going on sixteen years!" Scene 6

       Fathers that walk out on their families can devastate the children. There is no doubt that growing up, Tom and Laura greatly felt his absence. If not necessarily out of want for a father, it would be because their mother constantly talks about him. Tom is forced to nearly give up his dreams to support the family. He is now the man of the house. However, it is ironic that despite everything his father's abandonment had caused him, Tom was willing to walk away as well. Did he ever worry about how Laura and his mother would survive? He surely must have felt a guilt. Yet he does not necessarily mention a heavy conscience. Perhaps the reason he walked out is because that is what he learned from the only male role model he ever had.