Transformation of Emotion helps Bishop Appreciate the Fish.
In Elizabeth Bishop's "The Fish," she tells of her experience with catching a fish. Although she seems to enjoy catching the fish at the beginning, we can see that she undergoes an emotional transformation towards the fish as she examines him at a closer perspective. Because her examination helps her to develop an appreciation for the beauty of the fish, the torture he has gone through, and the sympathy she feels for him, she finally sets the fish free.
By examining the fish at a closer prospective, Bishop becomes aware of its beauty. In the beginning, we can see that she does not really notice the beauty of the fish because she compares the fish's skin to something that is inanimate. According to her, the fish's skin is like "brown skin hung in strips like ancient wall paper" (87). By comparing its skin to ancient wallpaper, we see how she sees the fish: as old and distasteful. But as she looks at him more closely, she begins to see the living characteristics of the fish. She goes on to comparing his skin to "full-blown roses" (87). Later in the poem she goes on comparing his skin to "the coarse white flesh packed in like feathers" (88). By comparing the fish's skin to an object that comes from living nature, we can see that she is looking at the fish more intensely; therefore the fish is growing more beautiful in her eyes.
Bishop realizes the pain and tortures the fish goes through his entire life by noticing the shape of the fish's lower lip. On his lip, as described by the Bishop, "hung five old pieces of fish-line with all of their five big hooks grown firmly in his mouth" (88). By this description of the fish's lip, we can see that Bishop realizes that this is not the first time the fish has encountered a human being. The five hooks on his mouth explain that he has escaped from many human conquests before, but each of his escapes left him with a painful memory and scar.
