A response in essay form comparing and contrasting the stories...

A response in essay form comparing and contrasting the stories "Separating" by John Updike, "Weekend" by Ann Beattie and "Babylon Revisited" by Scott Fitzgerald

Consider the broad concept of "family" as a key element of these later stories. Most of our later works deal with a family situation; but don't just re-tell the stories, here. Instead, think of some recurring idea that ties at least two or three of them together: Failure of the father figure? (In what ways is he a failure, and how does it matter? [Failure of authority, perhaps.]) Or: Symbolic isolation of the mother, perhaps: maybe everyone "values" the mother, but this leaves her out of the picture in terms of power/authority; women, by extension of this concept, might seem de-valued, whether they are mothers or not. (Adapt this question/answer to focus on "marriages" and not necessarily on families or parents, if you need to cover stories that you have not yet covered in the previous essay-answer.) As needed or if it helps as a prompt for your ideas to compare: you might think about how younger characters resemble or contrast with older characters, not so much physically but in terms of identity, roles, values, expectations, and more.