Themes and message

Loss of innocence and becoming a man

Loss of innocence is the dominant theme in the short story “Just Like That” by Michael Richards. The theme is illustrated through the boy, who loses his innocence in the hunting trip lead by the man (who might be his father).

During the hunting trip, the boy is exposed to violence as he witnesses the man killing kangaroos for pleasure and treating them like objects. The experience is traumatic, yet the boy wishes to shoot a kangaroo himself and to become a man, too. He is initially pressured by the man into shooting kangaroos and, eventually, he succumbs to social pressure by believing that violence will make him a man. Once he kills his first kangaroo, the boy loses his innocence, but still cannot reach the feeling of manhood that he was looking for. Instead, he feels disappointed: “The boy was disappointed. He had expected more, but didn’t know what. He had thought that somehow this would make him a man – but it had made no difference at all.” (p. 26, ll. 35-37).

The story therefore suggests that loss of inno...