Themes of Old Age in Cheever’s Short Stories The stories of John Cheever have many similar themes. In Cheever’s stories; “O Youth and Beauty” and “The Swimmer”, one of the most prevalent themes is the quest for youth. The main character in each of these stories experience similar characteristics. They are both middle aged men going through life trying to demonstrate to the people around them that they are still the young, strong …showed first 75 words of 1210 total…

…showed last 75 words of 1210 total…Beauty” and “The Swimmer” have the same main theme. The main characters in the story are faced with the problem of dealing with aging. They both try to prove to the others around them that they are still young and strong, they basically fail. In the end they learned that there isn’t anything they can do about entering old age. The challenges they put themselves through did not slow the approaching of that age.