Growing up, Fred works for the butcher near Fox Corner and eventually becomes a train fireman. He and Ursula reunite during the war, when he is working as a fireman with the rescue squads, and they begin a brief romance before he is crushed by a wall in one of the bombing incidents.
Fred Smith Quotes in Life After Life
The Life After Life quotes below are all either spoken by Fred Smith or refer to Fred Smith. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
A Long Hard War, Nov 1940
Quotes
Some hours later they had both woken up at the same time and made love. It was the kind of love (lust, to be honest about it) that survivors of disasters must practice—or people who are anticipating disaster—free of all restraint, savage at times and yet strangely tender and affectionate.
Related Characters:
Ursula Todd, Crighton, Ralph, Fred Smith
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire Life After Life LitChart as a printable PDF.
Fred Smith Character Timeline in Life After Life
The timeline below shows where the character Fred Smith appears in Life After Life. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Armistice (II), 12 November 1918
...to school. Mrs. Glover makes them do schoolwork at the table until the butcher’s boy, Fred Smith, arrives with a hare. The children all like Fred—Pamela had once declared that Maurice...
(full context)
Like a Fox in a Hole, May 1926
...University to study chemistry. There are dances in the village hall on Friday evenings, and Fred Smith is waltzing with Ursula when the memory of the back stairs overwhelms her. She...
(full context)
...pregnant but doesn’t know where to turn. She walks to the train station and finds Fred Smith, who offers her a free ride. She gets on and spends the afternoon walking...
(full context)
A Lovely Day Tomorrow (III), November 1940
...into the street. Two firemen—one of whom looks like (and is later revealed to be) Fred Smith—are attaching a hose to a hydrant when one of them yells, “the wall’s coming...
(full context)
A Long Hard War, September 1940
At the station, Ursula says goodbye to Hugh, promising to take care of herself. Fred Smith offers Ursula a ride, though he only has an engine without carriages, and so...
(full context)
Fred walks Ursula to the front gates of King’s Cross, and she remembers having a crush...
(full context)
A Long Hard War, November 1940
Just then, Ursula runs into Fred Smith, who is enraged rather than grieving over the needless deaths of the rescuers crushed...
(full context)
Fred offers to walk Ursula home. They set out, hand in hand, the dog walking behind...
(full context)
Ursula returns home, telling Millie about her time with Fred. She says she is a bit disappointed, though; she wanted something “transcendent,” but instead she...
(full context)
A Long Hard War, May 1941
...the same raid, Herr Zimmerman and Mr. Simms are killed. At the funeral, Ursula finds Fred Smith and they rent a room at a nearby hotel and have sex. When they...
(full context)
...affected her in a different way than other incidents. Then the siren goes off, and Fred hastily flies out of the room, as he is supposed to be on duty. A...
(full context)
A Long Hard War, June 1967
...funeral, Ursula had wondered who would remember the names of the dead—Miss Woolf, Emil, Renee, Fred Smith. Ursula had already forgotten so many names, so many young lives lost. Ursula had...
(full context)
