School of Distance Education - university of calicut

APPRECIATING LITERATURE

ENG5 D03

(Open Course)

V SEMESTER

(For candidates with core course

other than B.A. English)

(2019 Admission)

UNIVERSITY OF CALICUTSchool of Distance Education

Calicut University- P.O,Malappuram - 673635, Kerala.

19017

School of Distance Education

Appreciating Literature 2

University of CalicutStudy Material

(For candidates with core course other thanB.A. English)

V SEMESTER

Open Course

CBCSS UG (2019Admission Onwards)

ENG5D03: APPRECIATING LITERATURE

Prepared by:

Sabina K Musthafa,Assistant Professor on Contract,Department of English,SDE, University of Calicut.

Scrutinized by:

K.J. Thomas,Associate Professor & Head (Retd.)Dept. of English,MESKVM College, Valanchery

DISCLAIMER“The author shall be solely responsible for thecontent and views expressed in this book”



CONTENT

MODULE I: POETRY 5 – 54

1. The Waking :Theodore Roethke

2. The Enchanted Shirt : John Hay

3. Peacock and Nightingale : Robert Finch

4. Ozymandias : P B Shelley

5. Night of the Scorpion : Nissim Ezekiel

MODULE II PROSE 55 – 72

1. On Doors :ChristopherMorley

2. On Running After One’s Hat : G. K Chesterton

MODULE III: SHORT STORIES 73 – 126

1. The Gift of the Magi : O Henry

2. Mark of Vishnu : Khushwant Singh

3. Happy Prince : Oscar Wilde

MODULE IV 127 – 154

1. The Monkey’s Paw : W. W Jacobs



MODULE I

POETRY

THE WAKING

Theodore Roethke

ABOUT THE POET

THEODORE ROETHKE (1908- 1963)

Theodore Hurbner Roethke was born in Saginaw, Michigan.He is the son of Otto Roethke and Hellen Hurbner. As a child, hespent much time in the greenhouse observing the beauty ofnature. Roethke attended Arthur Hill High School, where hegave a speech on the Junior Red Cross that was published intwenty-six different languages.

From 1925 to 1929 Roethke attended the University ofMichigan at Ann Arbor. He quit law school after one semesteragainst the wishes of his family. From 1929 to 1931 he spent atthe University of Michigan in the process of graduating and laterthe Harvard Graduate School. There he met and worked withfellow poet Robert Hillyer. When the Great Depression hitRoethke was forced to leave Harvard.

He began to teach at Lafayette College and stayed there from1931 to 1935. it was here where Roethke began his first book,Open House. By the end of 1935, Roethke was teaching atMichigan State College at Lansing. His career, however, did notlast long. Later, Roethke was hospitalized due to bout of mental



illness. However, the depression, as Roethke found, was usefulfor writing because it allowed him to explore altogether adifferent mindset.

By the time he was teaching at Michigan State Roethke’sreputation as a poet had been established. In 1936, he shifted histeaching career to Pennsylvania State University, where hetaught for seven years. During his time there, his works werepublished in such prestigious journals as Poetry, the NewRepublic, the Saturday Review and Sewanee Review.

His first volume of verse, Open House, was finally publishedand released in 1941. The second volume, The Lost Son andOther Poems was published in 1948 and included greenhousepoems. He penned Open Letter in 1950 and explored criticismand sexuality. He later wrote Praise to the End! in 1951 and anessay, How to Write Like Somebody Else in 1959.

Roethke was awarded Guggenheim Fellowship in 1950, thePoetry Magazine Levinson Prize in 1951 and major grants fromthe Ford Foundation and the National Institute of Arts and lettersthe year after. In 1953, Roethke married Beatrice O’ Connell. Healso published The Waking: Poems 1933-1953 in 1953 and wonthe Pulitzer Prize for the same in 1954.

In 1957 he published a collection of works that included forty-three new poems entitled Words for the Wind, which won theBollingen Prize, the National Book Award, the Edna St. VincentMillay Prize, the Longview Foundation Award and the PacificNorthwest Writer’s Award for it.

Roethke began a series of reading tours in New York andEurope. In 1963, while visiting friends at Bainbridge Island,Washington, Roethke suffered a fatal heart attack. During thelast years of his life he had composed the sixty-one new poems



that were published posthumously in The Far Field in 1964which received the National Book Award and in The CollectedPoems in 1966.

In short, he is widely regarded as the most accomplished andinfluential poets of his generation. Roethke’s work ischaracterized by its introspection, rhythm and natural imagery.The comic and serious sides of his temperament and hisbreakthroughs in the use of language are some of his qualitiesthat document the development of an extra-ordinary creativesource in American poetry.

THE WAKING

(Poem)

I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.

I feel my fate in what I cannot fear.

I learn by going where I have to go.

We think by feeling. What is there to know?

I hear my being dance from ear to ear.


Of those so close beside me, which are you?

God bless the Ground! I shall walk softly there,

And learn by going where I have to go.



Light takes the Tree; but who can tell us how?

The lowly worm climbs up a winding stair;


Great Nature has another thing to do

To you and me; so take the lively air,

And, lovely, learn by going where to go.

This shaking keeps me steady. I should know.

What falls away is always. And is near.


I learn by going where I have to go.

ANALYSIS OF THE POEM

HISTORICAL CONTEXT

Theodore Roethke’s ‘The Waking’ was written in 1953 and ispart of his Pulitzer Prize winning collection from the same year.The poem was composed shortly after World War II ended andas the world entered the Cold War, Roethke challenges people inthis poem to understand their place in the changing world and tocomprehend that they should appreciate each moment in life.This focus on life appreciation could stem from a fear of theworld ending due to the nuclear weapons programmes buildingup during the time.

“The Waking” is written in the form of a villanelle. A villanelleis a form of poetry based on repeated lines (or refrain) thatconnect each stanza as the poem progresses, a reflection of the



original meaning of the word. For example, a peasant song fromItaly, taken up by the French. “The Waking” is a nineteen-linevillanelle composed of five tercets and a single quatrain. Thepoem is mostly written in iambic pentameter and has five beatsper line.

It is a self-reflexive poem that describes waking up from sleep.The poem comments on the unknowable with a contemplativetone. Life is compared to waking and death to that of sleeping.In this puzzling villanelle, he puts forward various ideas aboutlife and how to live it.

In stanza one, the speaker introduces to the reader a paradox.Here is someone awake yet asleep. This confused state suggestsenlightenment. The statement can be interpreted in two ways:either the speaker is awake and simply feels as if he is stillasleep, operating almost robotically, or he takes the entire day,or his entire life, to fully awaken. The second line presentsreaders with alliteration, which also occurs later in the 15th and16th lines of the poem, “I feel my fate in what I cannot fear.” Inthis line, the emphasis is on feeling, fate, and fear. The speakerseems to ascertain that there is nothing to be afraid of, so hesounds more awake and certain than he did in the first line. Inthe last line of the stanza, the feeling of fear has been overcomeand the speaker is now taking things, or his life lessons, as theycome and doing what he has to do. The things the speaker has todo can be interpreted as a job or education, or other items peopletypically encounter in everyday life. In short, the speaker clearlyhas strong feelings and is emotionally certain of what the futureholds. Learning will come naturally, if he goes with the flow’. Itcould even be an educational learning. It could also be thespeaker learning about himself because he is following his heart.



Much like stanza one, stanza two also opens with a paradox. Thespeaker is stating that people’s logical thoughts come out oftheir feelings—which most people view as a contradiction. Ofcourse, humans are emotional since they experience feelings.But they can also be rational, or logical, at times. However,asserting that feelings are a result of logic is a definitecontradiction.

In line 2 of stanza two, the speaker is hearing himself andlistening to himself, while smiling and internally dancing. Here,the reader is being challenged to interpret this dance, which canbe seen parallel to the dance of life. How much do people reallyknow about this dance, and how deeply do they experience it?These are things the speaker wants the reader to consider. Theopening line’s paradox repeats itself at the end of the stanza, asthe speaker is trying to make readers realize how important themoments of our life actually are.

Stanza three starts off with the speaker asking a personalquestion, to both himself and the reader. It is possible that thespeaker is either with somebody as he contemplates this line, ortaking a close look at the reader, since the speaker of the poemcannot function without a reader. Or, it is possible that thespeaker is asking the reader to consider how well he or sheknows personal acquaintances.

Blessing the ground suggests the speaker is now on holy ground,and capitalizing “G” implies that the ground, to the speaker, isfar more than dirt. To the speaker, the ground is part of theEarth, and the speaker shows respect for the planet by walkinglightly. The line can be interpreted as a link to environmentalismand taking care of the planet, or as the pantheistic belief thatGod is in all of nature, so humans should respect all of it, eventhe dirt they might find lowly or annoying.



“And learn by going where I have to go.”

We now get a near repeat line to reinforce the concept thatpeople must do things in life whether they want to or not, butcan find education and learn in their every day required actions.

In Stanza four, we have moved from the association with theground now to a higher level, the light, and the trees, whichintroduces nature into the poem besides the dirt. The capital “T”of tree also suggests that this tree is something special, perhapsthe Tree of Life. The question “who can tell us how?” impliesthe mysteries that God has in nature, and that to understandnature better, people should look to God. Again, the pantheisticconnection of God and nature stand out in this line.

The speaker uses another reference to nature in line 2 of stanzafour with “lowly worm,” but suggests that even creatures thatseem low on the human totem pole can climb up in the world.This can be a reference to evolution, spiritual or otherwise, orthe fact that even people who seem to have little can stillachieve much, like the worm. We know, in the last line of thestanza, that the speaker is still alive and therefore stillexperiencing learning. In this stanza, he took time to learn fromthe worm, the light, the tree, and the ground. So the speaker isstill, in a sense, waking up slowly as he finds knowledge ineveryday aspects of life.

In Stanza five, we get the sense that through the process ofalways learning through everyday requirements, the speaker isalways obtaining knowledge and thus waking up. He knows thatnature will eventually create his end, as well as the reader’s end,with death, which is why he is again suggesting that peoplecherish the moments of their lives. The repeat of the verb “take”



implies the speaker is wanting others to also live and learnthrough experience.

In Stanza six, with the “shaking” the speaker suggests that itcould refer to love, or the many difficulties of life, or evenRoethke’s own mental challenges (since Roethke suffered frommental breakdowns). Either way, the comment “I should know”means again that the speaker is speaking from his lifeexperience and the lessons he learned, which was alreadycovered in the poem.

Also, the suggestion that the things that fall away are gone forgood refers to time, people, things —anything we can losethrough the mere act of living. We might have these things closeby, but they can still vanish forever before we realize it.

Also, the references to shaking and falling away make readersthink of leaves on trees and link back to the earlier Tree of Lifereferred in the poem. So, in essence, the speaker is saying thatfrom his experiences learning, the Tree of Life is never steady,which most people would ultimately agree is a true assumption.The last quatrain, which repeats earlier lines of the poem,emphasizes again the speaker’s waking or learning, by goingwhere he has to go, or completing the things he must do everyday.

In short, death is certain for every living creature. Human beingshave to have a strong faith in their fate. Instead of being afraidof death, human beings have to choose to live their lives andlook for experiences. In the end, life is a lesson that we learn byliving it.



MUSICAL DEVICES OF THE POEM

“The Waking” is a villanelle as mentioned in the beginning. Inthe poem there are six stanzas consisting of five tercets with A-B-A rhyme scheme and a concluding quatrain with A-B-A-Arhyme scheme. The first and the third lines of the first tercet, “Iwake to sleep and take my waking slow” and “I learn by goingwhere I have to go”, are repeated in the other four tercets andbecome the final two lines of the quatrain. As the refrain, thetwo sentences establish haunting echoes which manifest either aself-reminder or a self-encouragement.

THE TONE OF THE POEM

In the poem, Roethke’s attitude or the tone of the poem issuggested in every line of it. From its musical devices,combined with some descriptions about nature. It can be saidthat its tone is calm and peaceful, yet encouraging. Roethkehimself shows that he accepts his fate realizing that he cannotfear it or run away from it. The keywords or the main thoughtsof the poem are the refrain:

“I wake to sleep and take my waking slow

I learn by going where I have to go”

The reason why Roethke keeps on repeating those sentences isbecause both sentences, like what I said before, manifest either aself-reminder or a self-encouragement which indicates thatRoethke is on his meditation or his muse about life, death, andeverything in between. We can say that Roethke wants us tocatch his feeling through those rhymes, to feel our own fate, andto sense particular thing about living. The words takes, the, treeand tell draw a melody for the poem together. If we talk aboutthe meaning of the stanza. It surely talks about cycle of life,



which is showed by the Tree, the lowly worm, and I – human.Roethke mentions about nature, and combines it with human’slife, which gives enlightenment to his mind that every livingcreature has, indeed, their own cycle of life.

CONCLUSION

After analysing “The Waking” regarding its musical devices andtone followed by a short explanation of the poem’s meaning init, we can know that Theodore Roethke has a strong spirituallife. His childhood, his father’s death, his uncle’s death, what heknows about nature, and all experiences he had are all combinedin a deep thought about life and death throughout his poem. Herealizes that every living creature has its own fate and will die inthe end. By realizing that, Roethke has a higher spirit to live hislife well before facing his God. Using beautiful musical deviceswith its repetition and many variations in it means that Roethkewants to reinforce his state of mind beautifully and calmly toobecause we know that life can be understood by learning itslowly, not in a hurry. In the end, we can say that “The Waking”is one of Theodore Roethke’s greatest poems because it hasbeautiful aspects of music or rhyme and a deep meaning.

GLOSSARY

Alliteration : alliteration is a technique that makes use ofrepeated sounds at the beginning of multiplewords grouped together. It is used in poetry andprose.

Paradox : A paradox is used in literature when a writerbrings together contrasting and contradictoryelements that reveal a deeper truth.



Quatrain : A verse form that is made up of four lines withdifferent possible rhyme schemes.

Repetition : Repetition is an important poetic technique thatsees writers reuse words or phrases, images, orstructures multiple times within a poem.

Tercet : A tercet is a three-line stanza. It is a commonstanza form, although not as common as thecouplet and quatrain.

Villanelle : A villanelle is a nineteen-line poem that isdivided into five tercets or sets of three lines, andone concluding quatrain; or a set of four lines.

QUESTIONS:

1. What is a villanelle?

2. What is the tone of the poem “The Waking”?

3. What does Roethke mean with “I wake to sleep” in thepoem?

4. What does the poet mean by “God bless the Ground! Ishall walk softly there”?

5. Write a short note on the use of paradox in the poem“The Waking”.

6. Write an essay on “The Waking” as a villanelle.

REFERENCE

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43333/the-waking-56d2220f25315



https://owlcation.com/humanities/Analysis-of-Poem-The-Waking-by-Theodore-Roethke

https://www.bachelorandmaster.com/britishandamericanpoetry/the-waking-summary-analysis.html#.YQqtp70zbIU

https://rukhaya.com/poetry-analysis-theodore-roethkes-the-waking/



THE ENCHANTED SHIRT

John Hay

ABOUT THE POET

JOHN HAY (1838-1905)

John Milton Hay was an American diplomat, author, journalistand private secretary and assistant to Abraham Lincoln. He wasan American statesman and official whose career in governmentstretched over almost half a century. Beginning as a privatesecretary and assistant to Abraham Lincoln, Hay's highest officewas United States Secretary of State under Presidents WilliamMcKinley and Theodore Roosevelt. Apart from this, Hay wasalso an author and biographer and wrote poetry and otherliterature throughout much of his life. He composed simpleballads and poems.

He became an editor and writer for The New York Tribune. Hisexciting new poetry, Pike Country Ballads, were published in1871 before he returned to government service. He is the first ofseveral gifted American authors whose realism and naturalismderived from a uniquely American frontier experience. His wittyworks revealed to an appreciative domestic and internationalaudience all the colourful turbulence of the Midwest, South, andWest.

Hay was selected in 1904 as one of the seven charter membersof the American Academy of Arts and letters. His literary statureis well recognised. In his later years Hay served his countrywell, negotiating major treatises and directing America's active



foreign policy on the world stage. For many years his literarycontribution to the school of American Realism has receivedvirtually no attention. The unique dialect in the poetry of JohnHay's home country in Illinois brought a new emphasis onauthenticity through dialect and character. He introduced readersto distant Midwestern and Southern rural locales.

Mark Twain was a longtime friend of Hay. Twain regarded Hayas the earliest author of this specific style of colloquialism.Besides, interplay of realistic language and events to form anentertaining picture of rural life can be seen in his writings. Hefilled his writings with picturesque slang, humour, and details ofdaily life.

John Hay was also a literary influence on the developingAmerican Realism Movement. He is remembered for hismemorable literary influence in giving us "a new, earthyvernacular". Interestingly, John Hay's ballads live on and itssignificance as a ground-breaking new idiom and their impacton developing American Realism should be acknowledged bytoday's scholars of history and literature.

THE ENCHANTED SHIRT

(Poem)

Fytte the First: wherein it shall be shown how the Truth is toomighty a Drug for such as be of feeble temper

THE King was sick. His cheek was red

And his eye was clear and bright;

He ate and drank with a kingly zest,

And peacefully snored at night.



But he said he was sick, and a king should know,

And doctors came by the score.

They did not cure him. He cut off their heads

And sent to the schools for more.

At last two famous doctors came,

And one was as poor as a rat, —

He had passed his life in studious toil,

And never found time to grow fat.

The other had never looked in a book;

His patients gave him no trouble,

If they recovered they paid him well,

If they died their heirs paid double.

Together they looked at the royal tongue,

As the King on his couch reclined;

In succession they thumped his august chest,

But no trace of disease could find.

The old sage said, "You're as sound as a nut."

"Hang him up," roared the King in a gale, —

In a ten-knot gale of royal rage;

The other leech grew a shade pale;



But he pensively rubbed his sagacious nose,

And thus his prescription ran, —

The King will be well, if he sleeps one night

In the Shirt of a Happy Man.

Fytte the Second: tells of the search for the Shirt and how it wasnigh found but was not, for reasons which are said or sung

Wide o'er the realm the couriers rode,

And fast their horses ran,

And many they saw, and to many they spoke,

But they found no Happy Man.

They found poor men who would fain be rich,

And rich who thought they were poor;

And men who twisted their waists in stays,

And women that shorthose wore.

They saw two men by the roadside sit,

And both bemoaned their lot;

For one had buried his wife, he said,

And the other one had not.

At last as they came to a village gate,

A beggar lay whistling there;

He whistled and sang and laughed and rolled

On the grass in the soft June air.



The weary couriers paused and looked

At the scamp so blithe and gay;

And one of them said, "Heaven save you, friend!

You seem to be happy to-day."

"Oh, yes, fair sirs," the rascal laughed,

And his voice rang free and glad,

"An idle man has so much to do

That he never has time to be sad."

"This is our man," the courier said;

"Our luck has led us aright.

I will give you a hundred ducats, friend,

For the loan of your shirt to-night."

The merry blackguard lay back on the grass,

And laughed till his face was black;

"I would do it, God wot," and he roared with the fun,

"But I haven't a shirt to my back."

Fytte the Third: shewing how His Majesty the King came at lastto sleep in a Happy Man his Shirt

Each day to the King the reports came in

Of his unsuccessful spies,



And the sad panorama of human woes

Passed daily under his eyes.

And he grew ashamed of his useless life,

And his maladies hatched in gloom;

He opened his windows and let the air

Of the free heaven into his room.

And out he went in the world and toiled

In his own appointed way;

And the people blessed him, the land was glad,

And the King was well and gay.


INTRODUCTION

The poem tells us about the fate of a king who was irresponsibleto his subjects. It is the tale of a king who was sick, and thestrange cue was prescribed for treating him. The vast searchthroughout the realm for an enchanted shirt needed to cure thesick king ends with surprising results.

OUTLINE OF THE POEM

There was a king who was ill for long. He was diagnosed bymany physicians, but they could not trace the disease, whichresulted in the loss of their heads. At last, two famous doctorswere called, one used his knowledge to check on patients whilethe other depended on the books. They too couldn't diagnose thedisease, so the king hanged them.



Finally, a sage suggested that the king would be fine if he sleepsa night in the shirt of a happy man. The next day the king ordershis soldiers to bring the shirt of the happiest man. The soldierswent in search of the shirt, but they did not find one. At last,they found a man who sounded happy but to their surprise hehad no shirt. Finally, the king realized that the happiness is aninside job and nothing outside can make anyone happy.

The poem is a narrative ballad and tells us the story of a kingwho lived a self-centred life and never bothered to think ofothers. In this poem no person is the happiest.

NARRATIVE BALLAD

A ballad is a poem or song narrating a story in short stanzas.Traditional ballads are typically of unknown authorship, havingbeen passed orally from one generation to the next. Eg.,Vadakkan Pattukal (or Ballads of North Malabar) is a collectionof Malayalam Ballads of medieval origin.

The musical form of a ballad is a song that tells a story, and it isoften set to slow music. A ballad in the realm of poetry still tellsa story but is not set to music. A ballad is a narrative poem madeup of strong rhythm and rhyme and often includes repetition ofcertain lines. The ballad evolved and grew from severalmedieval roots, most notably Provencal folk music. The formhad been known orally for centuries prior, with storytellers usingthe line breaks and rhythm to enrapture their audiences as theypassed along tales and histories – many of them important tosurvival.

A ballad tells a story and has specific rhythm, rhyme, andrepetition. There are other key elements to look for. One is thepresence of dialogue within the poem. Just as stories generallyfeature dialogue among characters, so do most ballads. Also, the



four-line stanzas have a set pattern: the first and third lines willhave four beats, and the second and fourth lines will have three.Usually, the rhyme scheme will be ABCB, though ABAB is alsoacceptable.

IMPORTANT THEMES

1. Honesty Vs deception

2. Truth (reality) vs. dishonesty (illusion)

3. Highlights the necessity of social mingling

4. Conveys the message that one should find happinesswithin oneself.

5. We should be satisfied with whatever we have and enjoythe beautiful moments of life cheerfully.

FIGURES OF SPEECH

● Simile – first doctor is compared to “a poor rat” and thesage compares the king as “a sound nut”

● Onomatopoeia – in the sentence “roared the king in ga-la”, roar is onomatopoeia

● Imagery – “Free heaven” can imagine a scene of freeheaven.

● Metaphor- “King is sick” – means king is not physicallysick. He is mentally sick because of his useless life andhe is compared to a sick man.

● Form: quatrain- four lined poem

● Rhyme – line 2 and line 4 rhymed



● Anaphora – the poet used anaphora at the beginnings ofsome neighbouring lines. The same words ‘if’, and ‘are’repeated. This is a kind of anaphora.

The author used lexical repetitions to emphasize a signifi-cant image: and, he, they, has, to, of, his are repeated.

To conclude, “The Enchanted Shirt” is a very clever, sarcastic,and inspirational poem.

WORD MEANING:

Fytte : a section of the poem

Enchanted : under a spell, magical

Thump : hit or strike heavily, especiallywith the fist or a blunt implement

As poor as a rat : very poor, destitute

As sound as a nut : to be very healthy or in a verygood condition

QUESTIONS:

1. What was the king’s condition before the arrival of thedoctors?

2. Why was the beggar a happy man?

3. Define a narrative ballad

4. What is the message of the poem?



5. Write a critical appreciation of the poem “TheEnchanted Shirt”

REFERENCE

http://www.english-for-students.com/the-enchanted-shirt.html

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/382383824610402335/



PEACOCK AND NIGHTINGALE

Robert Finch

ABOUT THE POET

ROBERT FINCH (1900-1995)

Robert Duer Claydon Finch was an American-born Canadianpoet and an academician whose gift for satire found an outlet inlyrics characterized by irony, metaphysical wit, compleximagery, and a strong sense of form. Finch was educated at theUniversity of Toronto, to which he returned as a professor ofFrench after three years in Paris. He worked there for fourdecades from 1928 to 1968. He was an expert in French poetry.

He began writing poetry in the early 1920's. His first collection,Poems (1946), won a Governor General's Award. His secondwork Acis in Oxford (1961), a series of meditations inspired by aperformance of G. F Handel's dramatic oratorio Acis andGalatea. Dover Beach Revisited (1961), treating the World WarII evacuation of Dunkirk and issues of faith, contains 11variations on Matthew Arnold's poem. In another collection,Variations and Themes (1980), Finch describes in 14 poemvariations the fate of a rare pink water lily. His later worksinclude Has and Is (1981), The Grand Duke of Moscow'sFavourite Solo (1983) and Sail-boat and Lake (1988).

He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada in1963. The Society awarded him it's Lorne Pierce Medal in 1968.Robert Finch's eye is fundamentally of artist, a painter who hashad many successful exhibitions to his credit between 1921 and



1978. He was also a musician and in his academic persona he isa critic of aesthetic theory.

A combination of visual experience, musical aptitude, andunderstanding of the creative process in the work of others isunusual in Canada. Finch brought a fresh perspective into theCanadian poetry of the 1930s and 1940s. Importance of form isa vision in his poetry. He has been an artist for as long as oreven longer than he has been a poet. We can find a fusion of twomodes of consciousness in his poetry. He uses pictorial terms toconjure up the image. Finch has experimented with many stylesof painting but the element which ties them together and relatesthe work to the poetry is a sense of structure as firm as it isunobtrusive.

No human beings are given importance at all in his continuingpanorama of ideas. Finch always executed works arising out offantasy and dreams where figures of people do indeed play acentral role. A direct reference to the subconscious is rare in hisworks. There are certainly dream worlds in his poetry. Hisobservant eye did closely weave a network of images, feelings,sensations, and comments. Birds become part of the religiousdoubt. He is completely aware of the complexity inherent in thepoetic process as well as the ultimate mystery of the origins ofthe word.

PEACOCK AND NIGHTINGALE

(Poem)

Look at the eyes look from my tail!

What other eyes could look so well?

A peacock asks a nightingale.



And how my feathers twist the sun!

Confess that no one, no, no one

Has ever seen such colour spun.

Who would not fall in ecstasy

Before the gemmed enamelry

Of ruby-topaz-sapphire me?

When my proud tail parades its fan,

You, little bird, are merely an

Anachronism in its van.

Let me advise that you be wise,

Avoid the vision of my eyes.

And then the nightingale replies.


As the poem begins, a boastful peacock is talking about itsbeautiful tail to a nightingale. The peacock is so proud andclaims that no other thing in this world is as beautiful as its tailwith eyes. In the second stanza, the peacock continues to explainabout its feather which is woven so beautifully, and it is spun asa colour spectrum that make the sun jealous. In the third stanza,the peacock asserts that everyone would fall in ecstasy becausethe peacock is so beautiful like the rare combination of preciousstones such as ruby, topaz, and sapphire. In the fourth stanza, thepeacock belittles the nightingale by saying that when the



peacock spreads its feathers like a fan, the nightingale would benothing as it is small and is an anachronism. In other words, thenightingale does not belong to there. In the last stanza, thepeacock advises the nightingale to be wise and to avoid the sightof the peacock. But the poem ends ambiguously when thenightingale begins to reply. We the readers are not able to hearthe nightingale’s reply.

The poem is allegorical and metaphoric in nature and it gives aglimpse of the political system in our world. The size of thebirds also matters. The size of peacock is equivalent to thestrength and power it holds whereas, the size of the nightingaleshows that it is small and weak. Nightingale’s reply is not givenmaybe because it is the voice of the marginalised or maybenightingale does not want to be boastful or to show off just likethe peacock. Inner beauty matters and it doesn’t need arecognition from the peacock. Idea of colonial superiority canalso be seen in the poem. Peacock is the symbol of coloniser andnightingale is the symbol of colonised. The language of thenightingale is different from that of the peacock. So, either it isnot recorded or it is deliberately ignored. Unrecorded voice ofthe nightingale symbolizes the unrecorded voice of themarginalized. Recorded history is always that of the winners. AsWalter Benjamin said “History is written by winners”.Throughout this poem we see and hear only the voice of thepeacock who is powerful. In addition to this, aaa bbb ccc dddeee is the rhyme scheme of the poem.

QUESTIONS

1. What does peacock and nightingale symbolize?

2. What is the rhyme scheme of the poem “Peacock andNightingale”?



3. Short note on the theme of the poem

4. Write an essay on “Peacock and Nightingale” as apostcolonial poem.

REFERENCE

https://www.poetrynook.com/poem/peacock-and-nightingale

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Robert-Finch

http://canadianpoetry.org/volumes/vol18/trehearne1.html

https://www.rem.routledge.com/articles/finch-robert-1900-1995



OZYMANDIAS

P B Shelley

ABOUT THE POET

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY (1792 - 1822)

P B Shelley was born in Sussex, the heir to a baronetcy and agreat fortune. He was educated at Eton and Oxford. From a veryearly age he showed great eccentricity of character. Hefrequented graveyards, studied alchemy, and read books ofdreadful import. While he was at the University he wrote severalextraordinary pamphlets, one of which, The Necessity ofAtheism, caused him to be expelled from Oxford. His beliefsconcerning love, marriage, revolution and politics caused him tobe considered a dangerous immorality by some.

HIS MAJOR WORKS

HIS POETRY

His earliest effort is Queen Mab (1813)

Alastair or The Spirit of Solitude (1816) which is a kindof spiritual autobiography.

Loan and Cythna (1817)

The Revolt of Islam (1818)



Then he left for Italy. The first fruits of his new life wereapparent in Prometheus Unbound (1818-19, published1820). This is a combination of the lyric and the drama.

The Cenci (1819)- formal drama

The Masque of Anarchy (1819, published 1832)

Adonais (1821)-laments for the death of Keats.

HIS PROSE

The Defence of Poetry (1821, published 1840) is equally skilful.His prose style is somewhat heavy, but always clear andreadable.

FEATURES OF HIS POETRY

His lyrical power is equal to the highest to be found in anylanguage. Shelley's choice of subjects makes it convenient todivide his work into two broad groups, the one consisting of hisvisionary prophetic works such as Alastor, or the Spirit ofSolitude, The Revolt of Islam, Prometheus Unbound and similarpoems, and the other of his shorter lyrics. Shelley lacks thehomely appeal of Burns. He loves to roam through space andinfinity. He rejoices in nature, but nature of a spiritual kind.Frequently, he is concerned with the thought of death or his ownsense of despair or loneliness. His descriptive power at oncestrikes the imagination. The effect is instantaneous. His style isperfectly attuned to his purpose. It is simple, flexible, andpassionate. It has a direct clarity, an easy yet striking, lucidityand a purity of language.



Shelley's limitations are almost as plain as his great abilities.During his lifetime Shelley's opinions obscured his power as apoet. After his death his reputation rose rapidly and by themiddle of the 19th century his position was assured.

In short, Shelley is a revolutionary poet. He was a true-bornchild of the French Revolution. The spirits of that revolutionfound its expression in Shelley's poetry. He was a dreamer ofdreams and was always at war with the existing world ofcomplete chaos and confusion. He led a ceaseless war againstthe existing political, social and economic institutions. Shelleywas the only passionate singer of the Revolution. The age ofromanticism is one of the great uproars in which Europe facedthe greatest and frightful uprising of the French Revolution.Besides, he was a rebel and a reformer. He was also a poet oflove. His love for nature is remarkable. As a lyrical poet,spontaneity is one of the remarkable features of his lyricalpoetry.

OZYMANDIAS

(Poem)

I met a traveller from an antique land,

Who said— “Two vast and trunkless legs of stone

Stand in the desert. . .. Near them, on the sand,

Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,

And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,

Tell that its sculptor well those passions read

Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,

The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;



And on the pedestal, these words appear:

My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;

Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!

Nothing beside remains. Round the decay

Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare

The lone and level sands stretch far away.”

LITERARY CONTEXT

Shelley was a Romantic poet, and as such, was very interested inthe sublime power of nature and both individual’s and art'sconnections to it. This poem addresses those concerns on agrand scale. Shelley was also a political writer. Several yearsafter the publication of “Ozymandias”, he published a pamphletentitled "A Philosophical View of Reform" in which he calledfor an end to tyranny and discussed the history of empirescrumbling over time. “Ozymandias” displays many of Shelley'sconcerns, both in terms of its depiction of man versus nature andits apparent politics.

“Ozymandias” has several literary predecessors andcontemporaries. Shelley and his friend and fellow writer HoraceSmith challenged each other to write about Ozymandias and hisdestroyed statue after reading about the statue in a descriptionwritten by the ancient Greek writer Diodorus Siculus. Siculusdescribed the pedestal of the real-life statue as containing aninscription that read "King of Kings am I, Osymandias. Ifanyone would know how great I am and where I lie, let himsurpass one of my works." Shelley's poem is a re-telling of analready told story.



HISTORICAL CONTEXT

The historical Ozymandias’ legacy was not actually entirelydead when Shelley wrote this poem. In fact, Shelley may havebeen inspired to write this poem by newspaper reports that theBritish Museum had attained the large head of an Egyptianstatue. It was the statue that later turned out to be of Ramses II,also known by his Greek name, Ozymandias. This fragment of asculpture of Ozymandias produced not despair at the futility ofhuman achievements, but rather excitement, enthusiasm, andultimately, preservation in a museum, where the artefact wouldbe protected from the elements and, as much as possible, fromtime itself. Some critics believe that the poem is partly—thoughcertainly not entirely—a response to the rise and fall of theEmperor Napoleon, in France. In this reading, the poem servesas a warning to those who seek political and military power, thatthey will fall be eventually be forgotten, just as Ozymandiaswas.

EXPLANATION

Line 1

By introducing the narrative with this line, the speaker makesthe story that follows more or less reliable. Because thefollowing description comes from someone who went to Egyptand actually saw the statue, the story seems more credible. Atthe same time, however, the fact that the reader hears the storyfrom 'the friend of a friend' could make its validity seemquestionable. These two vastly different perspectives on how thetale is told anticipate the many crossroads of interpretation in"Ozymandias".



Lines 2-3

As soon as the traveller begins describing the crumbling statue,the rhyme and meter of the poem begin to fall apart. Hissentences, in their broken ruptures, help to distinguish his voicefrom the speaker's, to show how excited he is about hisdiscovery, and to recreate vocally the fragmented statue.

Lines 4-7

The depiction of the statue's face introduces the poem's centralirony. The power that Ozymandias meant to capture for eternityhas, instead, become a testament to the flexibility of such power.The lines also suggest that the sculptor was a keen observer thanthe king himself. Probably the king might have objected to theportrayal of himself had he understood the effects of his ownfrown.

Line 8

This difficult line is composed in the traveller's typical,fragmented style. Here, the reader should note that it is thetraveller, not the speaker or Shelley, who is struggling so withlanguage. Taking into account that the "hand" is the sculptor's,the "heart" is the king's, and "them" refers to the "passions" ofOzymandias in line 6, the statement becomes more clear. Whilethe sculptor "mocked" his subject's intensity of emotion,Ozymandias continued to feed his pride though he was already"full of himself."

Lines 9-11

The inscription was initially Ozymandias' own idea and later thesculptor provided an artistic interpretation of the words, in thepedestal as well as the face of the statue. The traveller observed



the wreckage and passed along the information to the speaker.Ozymandias' words have indeed survived through time, butchange and time have created a new context and thus a newmeaning for his words. His "Works" might now just berepresented by the crumbling image of himself, instead of thevast creation that would have caused subsequent rulers to knowthey could never match his power. The "Mighty" might be theaverage visitor to the site, instead of those younger rulers, sincealmost anyone has to look down to see Ozymandias' face now.Perhaps viewers feel "despair" not because Ozymandias' fate isimpossible, but because it will be shared by all humankind.

Lines 12-14

In these lines, a sense of stillness, timelessness and infinitedistances accomplished through alliteration ("boundless" and"bare", "lone" and "level") and long vowels sounds ("decay","bare") reflects the depiction of the vast desert where processesof growth and decay are extremely slow in Egypt. It is acivilization even older than ancient Greece or Italy.


One of the most well-known and oft-anthologised works ofShelley, Ozymandias is a sonnet that defies the claims of theemperors and their empires that they are going to inspiregenerations to come and glorifies the timelessness of art. It wasfirst published in 1818 in the issue of The Examiner in Londonunder the penname Glirastes. It was later incorporated inShelley’s collection Rosalind and Helen, A Modern Eclogue;with Other Poems in 1826. After his death, it was included in aposthumous compilation of his poems published in 1826.



TITLE OF THE POEM

‘Ozymandias’ is the name for the Egyptian pharaoh Ramesses II.It also represents a transliteration into Greek of a part ofRamesses’ throne name User-maat-re Setep-en-re. The word‘Ozymandias’ also appears in the inscription on the base of thestatue, given by Didorus Siculus. Shelley chose the name‘Ozymandias’ in place of ‘Ramesses II’ probably because it isassociated with the Greek civilization. This leads to the sharingof cultures between the two greatest civilizations of the westernworld, Greek and Egyptian. Aaron Biterman says, Ozy comesfrom the Greek ‘ozium’ which means to breathe, or air. Mandiascomes from the Greek ‘mandate’, which means to rule.(Biterman 2000). Connecting this to Shelley’s poem, Bitermanadds, Ozymandias is simply a ‘ruler of air’, or a ‘ruler ofnothing’. It is then obvious that the king of kings spoken of inthe poem is actually Nature itself. (Biterman 2000)

THE TIMELESSNESS OF ART

The masterful sonnet has an elusive, sidelong approach to itssubject. The poem begins with the word ‘I’ that hastens to fadeaway in favour of a traveller who comes from an antique land.The wayfarer then takes up the narration. “The two vast andtrunkless legs of stone” without the trunk in the strange, desolatelandscape described by the explorer introduce us to the ruins ofa vast empire. The visage is half-sunk in sand and shattered,describing the time’s ruinous force.

Shelley then brings up the facial expression. There is the“Frown, / And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command.” The“cold command” is the symbol of the tyrannical empire buildingruler. The focus now shifts from the explorer to the sculptor. Hebecomes the mediating figure as he communicates the tyrant’s



passions hidden beneath the cold exterior. The ruler has thisinsatiable urge to conquer the world and bring it under hiscontrol and power. The sculptor “well those passions read” andthese intense emotions are reflected in his work, the statue. Theartist’s mockery lies in his depiction of Ozymandias in thestatue. “The heart that fed” refers to the sculptor’s own ferventway of nourishing himself on his project.

The sestet shifts our attention from the shattered statue to itspedestal with the inscription:

“My name is Ozymandias, King of kings. Look on my

works ye Mighty, and despair. (Ozymandias)”

The irony of the situation is that around the statue no works arevisible. It is just a vast desert wasteland. The kings thatOzymandias challenges must be the rival rulers of the countriesthat he has enslaved. The pedestal stands in the middle of aninfinite empty space, described by two phrases: “boundless andbare”, and “lone and level”. His life work is as barren and emptyas the vast expanse. The once great king’s proud boast has beenreduced to dust. His works have crumbled and disappeared. Theall-powerful Time ruins everything with its impersonal,indiscriminate and destructive power. Thus, the statue becomesan epitome of the ephemeral political power and of pride andhubris of all humanity. However, a glaring contrast to these ruinsof a great empire is provided by a work of art and a group ofwords. Civilisations and empires are wiped out from the surfaceof the earth and forgotten but there is something that outlaststhese things and that is art. Eternity can be achieved by thepoet’s words, not by the ruler’s will to dominate.



FORM

‘Ozymandias’ is a sonnet, a fourteen-line poem written inIambic Pentameter. It is not strictly a Petrarchan sonnet.However, it interlinks the Octave (the first eight lines) with theSestet (the last six lines) by gradually replacing the old rhymeswith the new ones. The Rhyme Scheme is ABABACDCEDEFEF.

IMAGERY AND METAPHORS

The entire poem is devoted to a single metaphor: the shattered,ruined statue in the desert wasteland, with its arrogant,passionate face and inscription. It becomes a metaphor for thefallen and destroyed dream of the powerful, cruel ruler and theironic and hollow words etched onto the statue’s base. Shelley’suse of imagery reconstructs the figure of the “King of kings”. Atfirst, the two legs are described, then the “shattered visage”, andthen the face itself with its “frown / And wrinkled lip and sneerof cold command.” The sculptor then comes alive in front of ourmind’s eye. We are able to imagine the living man sculpting alive king, whose face bore the expression of patience. The imageof the desert, boundless and bare, with the lone and level sandsstretching far away, demolishes the picture of the mighty kingwho boasted of his works.

NARRATION

Shelley uses the technique of Distanced Narration. The sonnet isframed as a story told to the speaker by a traveller. This addsobscurity to the position of Ozymandias. Neither the reader northe narrator has seen the statue. Even the narrator hears it fromsomeone else who has seen it. Thus, the ancient king is renderedeven less commanding. It absolutely undermines his power.



CONCLUSION

Shelley’s poetic rendering of the legend of Ozymandias is evenmore memorable than the original story itself. It is also anemphatic political statement indicating the cruel and destructivenature of the empires of man and their outcomes. This beautifulsonnet outlasts the so-called mighty empires based on controland terror. These empires get eroded and destroyed leading todisintegration of civilization and culture. However, neither timenor distance can obliterate the works of art making the artistimmortal.

GLOSSARY

Antique : belonging to or lasting from timeslong ago

Vast : unusually great in size or amountor extent or scope

Visage : face refers to someone’s face andfacial features

Sneer : facial expression of contempt orscorn

Passion : a strong feeling or emotion

Pedestal : an architectural support or base

Colossal : so great in size or force or extentas to elicit wonder

Level : having a surface without slope



QUESTIONS

1. Who was Ozymandias?

2. What words appear on the pedestal of the sculpture?

3. What does the poet mean by “two vast and trunkless legs ofstone”?

4. Identify the setting of the poem

5. Critically appreciate the poem “Ozymandias”

REFERENCES

Biterman, A. (2000). Analysis of Ozymandias." Personal webpage. Analysis of Ozymandias. Dec. 2000. Web. 12 Mar. 2012.http://chelm.freeyellow.com/ozymandias1.html.

Glirastes (Percy Bysshe Shelley), (1818). Original Poetry.Ozymandias”. The Examiner, A Sunday Paper, on politics,domestic economy and theatricals for the year 1818 (p. 24).London: John Hunt.

Shelley, P. B. (1826). Ozymandias" in Miscellaneous andPosthumous Poems of Percy Bysshe Shelley (p.100). London: W.Benbow.

Shelley, P. B. (1876). Ozymandias”. Reprinted in Rosalind andHelen - Edited, with notes by H. Buxton Forman, and printed forprivate distribution (p. 72). London: Hollinger.

Shelley, P. B. (1820). To a Skylark.http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/174413.



NIGHT OF THE SCORPION

Nissim Ezekiel

ABOUT THE POET

NISSIM EZEKIEL (1924 - 2004)

Nissim Ezekiel is one of the prominent poets who has enrichedthe modern Indian English Poetry.

His poetry ranges from personal emotions and lyricism tocomplex linguistic experiments and satire. He was also arenowned playwright, art critic, lecturer and editor.

Nissim Ezekiel is considered to be the Father of Post-Independence Indian poetry in English. He is a prolific poet,playwright, critic, broadcaster and social commentator. He wasborn on December24, 1924 in a Jew family. His father was aprofessor of botany and mother was the principal of her ownschool. Ezekiel was inclined to the poets such as T.S. Eliot.Yeats, Ezra Pound in his school days. The influence of all theseliterary personalities was apparent in his early works. His formaluse of the English language was linked to colonialism andresulted in controversy.

His first collection of poetry Time to Change was published byFortune Press (London) in 1952. His poetry has all the elementsof love, loneliness, lust, and creativity. He joined The IllustratedWeekly of India as an assistant editor in 1953. Sixty Poems washis next book followed by The Unfinished Man. He startedwriting in formal English but with the passage of time his



writing underwent a metamorphosis. As the time passed, heacknowledged that 'the darkness has its own secrets which lightdoes not know. His poem “The Night of Scorpion” is one of thebest works in Indian English poetry and is used as a studymaterial in India and British schools.

He worked as an advertising copywriter and general manager ofa picture frame company. He was the art critic of ‘The Times ofIndia’ (1964-66) and editor of ‘The Poetry India’ (1966-67). Hewas also the co-founder of the literary monthly ‘Imprint’.Ezekiel was awarded the Sahitya Academy award in 1983. In1988, he received another honour, ‘Padma Shri’, for hiscontribution to the Indian English writing. He died on January 9,2004, in Mumbai after a prolonged illness.

MAJOR WORKS OF NISSIM EZEKIEL:

* Time to Change (1952)

* Sixty Poems (1953)

* The Third (1959)

* The Unfinished Man (1960)

* The Exact Name (1965)

* The Three Plays (1969)

* Snakeskin and Other Poems, translations of the Marathi poetIndira Sant (1974)

* Hymns in Darkness (1976)

* Latter-Day Psalms (1982)

* Collected Poems 1952-88 (1989)



NIGHT OF THE SCORPION

(Poem)

I remember the night my mother

Was stung by a scorpion. Ten hours

Of steady rain had driven him

To crawl beneath a sack of rice.

Parting with his poison – flash

Of diabolic tail in the dark room –

He risked the rain again.

The peasants came like swarms of flies

And buzzed the Name of God a hundred

Time to paralyse the Evil one.

With candles and with lanterns

Throwing giant scorpion shadows

On the mud-baked walls

They searched for him; he was not found.

They clicked their tongues.

With every movement that the scorpion made

his poison moved in Mother’s blood they said.

May he sit still, they said



May the sins of your previous birth

be burned away tonight, they said.

May your suffering decrease

the misfortunes of your next birth, they said.

May the sum of all evil

balanced in this unreal world

against the sum of good

become diminished by your pain.

May the poison purify your flesh

Of desire, and your spirit of ambition,

They said, and they sat around

On the floor with my mother in the centre,

The peace of understanding on each face.

More candles, more lanterns, more neighbours

more insects, and the endless rain.

My mother twisted through and through

groaning on a mat.

My father, sceptic, rationalist,

trying every curse and blessing,

powder, mixture, herb and hybrid.

He even poured a little paraffin

upon the bitten toe and put a match to it.



I watched the flame feeding on my mother.

I watched the holy man perform his rites

to tame the poison with an incantation.

After twenty hours

it lost its sting.

My mother only said

Thank god the scorpion picked on me

and spared my children.


INTRODUCTION

“Night of the Scorpion” had been taken from Nissin Ezekiel'svolume of poems entitled The Exact Name which was publishedin 1965. The poem is presented like a story. The speaker in thepoem narrates an incident of how his mother was stung by ascorpion one night when it was raining heavily. The speakermay be the poet himself or some other person, real or imaginary.The incident itself may also be actual or imaginary. But it isperfectly realistic and convincing incident.

OUTLINE OF THE POEM

The speaker's mother was stung by a scorpion one night. TheScorpion had crawled into the house and hidden itself beneath abag full of rice. It had been forced to enter the house because ofthe rain outside. It had then crept towards the speaker’s motherand had stung her. After stinging her, the Scorpion had swiftlymoved away from her and gone out into the rain again, though itwas because of the rain that it had come into the house.



The peasants in the neighbourhood, on learning about a womanhaving been stung by a scorpion, had come to the woman toexpress their sympathy and to relieve her of her pain if theycould. They chanted the name of God again and again in orderto nullify the effect of the scorpion's sting. The scorpion was adevil whose sting could be rendered ineffective only by thismethod, they thought. Then the peasants tried another devicealso to relieve the woman's pain or, at least, to prevent the painfrom becoming more acute. They began to search for theScorpion in order to kill it because, according to a general belief,with every movement which the scorpion made, the poisoninjected by it into the woman's blood through its sting, wouldalso move and would increase her pain. Then they all wishedkeenly that the scorpion should remain motionless wherever itwas. They also expressed the wish that the sins, which thiswoman had committed in her previous life, should be burnedaway that night by the pain of the sting. Furthermore, the painwhich she was suffering that night should lead to a decrease inthe misfortunes which she might have to undergo in her nextlife.

The peasants gave utterance to some more wishes of the samekind. They expressed the wish that the woman's pain shoulddiminish the sum total of evil in this world which is unreal (or akind of illusion). They expressed the wish that the poison shouldrid the woman of her bodily or physical desires and should alsofree her of all worldly ambition.

The peasants sat around the speaker's mother on the floor withthe mother in the centre. They had an expression of tranquillityon their faces, indicative of their belief that they understood thesituation well. Then they brought more candles and more



lanterns to look for the scorpion. The light of the candles andlanterns threw huge shadows on the walls of the house. But theydid not find the scorpion. More neighbours came and joined theones who were already present there. The woman in themeantime suffered all the agony of the sting; and she twistedand turned her body this way and that way, groaning all thetime. The rain continued outside, and the woman continued tosuffer.

The speaker's father was a man with a scientific attitude to life.He did not share the views of the peasants who weresuperstitious. The speaker's father was a rationalist. He applied aherb to his wife's flesh and, next a combination of the juice ofcertain herbs. He even went to the length of pouring a littleparaffin over the affected flesh; and applying a burningmatchstick to it in order to burn away the sting from thewoman's bitten toe. The speaker watched the flame burning hismother's flesh; and he also watched a religious-minded manperforming certain rites to subdue the poison of the sting with anincantation. After a lapse of twenty hours, the effect of thepoison wore off and the woman ceased to experience the pain ofsting.

At the end of it all, the speaker's mother simply thanked God forallowing the scorpion to choose only her for the sting and fornot allowing the scorpion to sting any of her children.

STRUCTURE AND LANGUAGE

The poem uses free verse narrative structure. The poem ispresented in a relaxed and open form with a new quality ofnatural colloquialism in diction and tone. The use of capitalletters is abandoned at the start of each line.



Structure: The poem is written in free verse narration withvarying line lengths and no rhyme. The first part is long and fullof activity - the scorpion's bite and the reaction of the villagers.The second part reaction - is just three lines long.

LANGUAGE

The title is in some ways deceptive. It leads us to believe we arein for a frightening and dramatic tale with a scorpion takingcentre stage. In fact, the poem is not about the scorpion at all,but about the reactions of different people to its sting. The poemstarts off in the first person. Ezekiel describes an event thatreally happened. However, he does not give his own feelings orreactions: we realise he is merely the narrator. Most of the poemis in the third person. Ezekiel does not portray the scorpion as avillain. However, the villagers are more superstitious and linkthe scorpion to 'the Evil One' (line 10). They claim that thepoison will help in many ways. For example, by burning awaythe sins of the woman's former life - 'her previous birth' (line 19)- and ease her life after this one - 'her next birth' (line 22). Theevents of the night are described in rich detail such as the mudhut and the candles and lanterns but, we know little about theindividual neighbours. Ezekiel clubs the neighbours together as'they'. Ezekiel's father is usually a sceptic and a rationalist - inother words, he does not believe in superstitions and is notreligious. The final three lines are poignant. We hear Ezekiel'smother's exact words through her simple speech which is incontrast to the blabbering neighbours. She doesn't show anybitterness about her ordeal: she is just grateful that she was theone who was hurt rather than her children and she thanks God.



IMAGERY AND SOUND

Ezekiel uses a simile

Simile can be defined as an explicit comparison of one thing toanother, using the words 'like' or 'as'. He compares the villagersto 'swarms of flies' (line 8). It is striking that he uses an insectimage to describe the people's reaction to an invertebrate's sting.He develops the simile in the following line: 'they buzzed thename of God' (line 9). The neighbours' candles and lanternsthrow 'giant scorpion shadows' on the walls (line 13). A scorpionhas eight legs, so the shadow of a small group of peoplestanding together could look like a scorpion. There is a contrastbetween the neighbours' 'peace of understanding' (line 31) andthe mother who 'twisted... groaning on a mat' (line 35). It isironic that they are at peace despite her discomfort.

SOUND

Alliteration can be defined as words strung together withrepeated, often initial consonants. Alliteration can be seenthroughout the poem that helps to link or emphasize ideas: thescorpion is seen 'Parting with his poison' (line 5), Ezekiel'sfather tries 'herb and hybrid' (line 38), Ezekiel sees 'flamefeeding' (line 41) on his mother. Besides, there is a lot ofrepetition, so that we hear the villagers' prayers and incantations.Furthermore, Ezekiel uses direct speech, 'May...', to dramatizethe scene and the echoed 'they said' is like a chorus. Now achorus can be defined as a group of characters in classicalGreek drama who comment on the action but don't take part init. In a song, the chorus is a section that is regularly repeated.

In addition to this, much of the meaning of a poem is conveyedby the attitude it expresses towards its subject matter. The ideas



in this poem concern our difficult feelings towards aspects of thenatural world that seem to threaten us - the frightened insectbecomes the Evil One! - and the complex ways in whichindividuals and communities respond when disaster strikes oneof their number. Moreover, Ezekiel shows his mother'sselflessness. He chooses her simple words to end the poem tohighlight his love and admiration for her. The syntax andgrammar of the lines in the poem are straightforward and thevoice we hear is obviously the poet’s own. The imagery is vividand sensitive with more than usual clarity.

The themes in this poem is given multiple treatment. There is aconflict between the traditional world and the world ofrationalism. The poem has as its setting a tender familysituation. The theme of the poet’s mother, stung by a scorpion, istreated in multiple ways such s the world of magic andsuperstition, science and rationality, and maternal affection. Toconclude, the poem shows the characteristic qualities of Ezekiel.He works consciously within the range of his experience andthereby attains the poetic personality peculiar to him.

GLOSSARY

Diabolic : cruel and wicked – often related tothe devil – used in the poem todescribe the scorpion’s tail.

Rationalist : the poet’s father is this – meaninghe usually relies on reason ratherthan religion

Rites : a religious act – performed by theholy man in the poem

Swarms : a large group of insects or people



Incantation : a spell or charm used by the holyman

Sceptic : this refers to his poet’s father and

QUESTIONS

1. Why are the peasants compared to a swarm of flies?

2. What happened to the speaker’s mother in the poem?

3. What type of man was the father? How did he treat his wife?

4. Examine the theme of the poem “Night of the Scorpion”

5. What was the mother’s reaction after her recovery?

6. Critically appreciate the poem “Night of the Scorpion”.

REFERENCE

http://dcac.du.ac.in/documents/E-Resource/2020/Metrial/17renusingh2.pdf

https://poemanalysis.com/nissim-ezekiel/the-night-of-the-scorpion/

https://owlcation.com/humanities/Analysis-of-Poem-The-Night-of-the-Scorpion-by-Nissim-Ezekiel

https://ardhendude.blogspot.com/2011/01/analysis-of-night-of-scorpion.html

https://www.litgalaxy2019.com/2020/05/critical-appreciation-night-of-the-scorpion--nissim-ezekiel.html



MODULE II

PROSE

ON DOORS

Christopher Morley

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

CHRISTOPHER MORLEY (1890 - 1957)

Christopher Morley (5 May 1890–28 March 1957) was anAmerican journalist, novelist, and poet. He was born inHaverford, Pennsylvania. Morley studied at Haverford College,where he obtained a BA in 1910. He was a Rhodes Scholar atNew College, Oxford from 1910 to 1913. Morley got his start asa newspaper reporter and then columnist for variouspublications in Philadelphia and later New York City.

He was one of the founders and long-time staff member of theSaturday Review of Literature. A highly gregarious man, he wasthe mainstay of what he dubbed the Three Hours for LunchClub. Out of enthusiasm for the Sherlock Holmes stories, hebecame the founder of the Baker Street Irregulars and wrote theintroduction to the standard omnibus edition of The CompleteSherlock Holmes. In 1936 he was appointed to revise andenlarge Bartlett's Familiar Quotations (1937, 1948). Author ofmore than 50 books of poetry and novels, Morley is probablybest known as the author of Kitty Foyle (1939), which was made



into an Academy Award-winning movie. Other well-knownworks include Thunder on the Left (1925), and The HauntedBookshop (1919) and Parnassus on Wheels (1917), his twosemi-biographical novels of a fictional bookseller.

In later years he lived in Nassau County, Long Island,commuting to the city on the Long Island Rail Road, aboutwhich he wrote affectionately. In 1961, a 98-acre park wasnamed in his honour in Nassau County. This park preserves hisstudio, the Knothole, as a point of interest, his furniture andbookcases available to the historically interested public.

ON DOORS

(Text)

The opening and closing of doors are the most significantactions of man’s life. What a mystery lies in doors!

No man knows what awaits him when he opens a door. Even themost familiar room, where the clock ticks and the hearth glowsred at dusk, may harbor surprises. The plumber may actuallyhave called (while you were out) and fixed that leaking faucet.The cook may have had a fit of the vapors and demanded herpassports. The wise man opens his front door with humility anda spirit of acceptance.

Which one of us has not sat in some ante-room and watched theinscrutable panels of a door that was full of meaning? Perhapsyou were waiting to apply for a job; perhaps you had some“deal” you were ambitious to put over. You watched theconfidential stenographer flit in and out, carelessly turning thatmystic portal which, to you, revolved on hinges of fate. Andthen the young woman said, “Mr. Cranberry will see you now.”



As you grasped the knob the thought flashed, “When I open thisdoor again, what will have happened?”

There are many kinds of doors. Revolving doors for hotels,shops and public buildings. These are typical of the brisk,bustling ways of modern life. Can you imagine John Milton orWilliam Penn skipping through a revolving door? Then there arethe curious little slatted doors that still swing outside denaturedbar-rooms and extend only from shoulder to knee. There aretrapdoors, sliding doors, double doors, stage doors, prison doors,glass doors. But the symbol and mystery of a door resides in itsquality of concealment. A glass door is not a door at all, but awindow. The meaning of a door is to hide what lies inside; tokeep the heart in suspense.

Also, there are many ways of opening doors. There is the cheerypush of elbow with which the waiter shoves open the kitchendoor when he bears in your tray of supper. There is thesuspicious and tentative withdrawal of a door before theunhappy book agent or peddler. There is the genteel andcarefully modulated recession with which footmen swing widethe oaken barriers of the great. There is the sympathetic andawful silence of the dentist’s maid who opens the door into theoperating room and, without speaking, implies that the doctor isready for you. There is the brisk cataclysmic opening of a doorwhen the nurse comes in, very early in the morning – “It’s aboy!”

Doors are the symbol of privacy, of retreat, of the mind’s escapeinto blissful quietude or sad secret struggle. A room withoutdoors is not a room, but a hallway. No matter where he is, a mancan make himself at home behind a closed door. The mindworks best behind closed doors. Men are not horses to be herdedtogether. Dogs know the meaning and anguish of doors. Have



you ever noticed a puppy yearning at a shut portal? It is asymbol of human life.

The opening of doors is a mystic act: it has in it some flavour ofthe unknown, some sense of moving into a new moment, a newpattern of the human rigmarole. It includes the highest glimpsesof mortal gladness: reunions, reconciliations, the bliss of loverslong parted. Even in sadness, the opening of a door may bringrelief: it changes and redistributes human forces. But the closingof doors is far more terrible. It is a confession of finality. Everydoor closed brings something to an end. And there are degreesof sadness in the closing of doors. A door slammed is aconfession of weakness. A door gently shut is often the mosttragic gesture in life. Everyone knows the seizure of anguish thatcomes just after the closing of a door, when the loved one is stillnear, within sound of voice, and yet already far away.

The opening and closing of doors is a part of the stern fluency oflife. Life will not stay still and let us alone. We are continuallyopening doors with hope, closing them with despair. Life lastsnot much longer than a pipe of tobacco, and destiny knocks usout like the ashes.

The closing of a door is irrevocable. It snaps the packthread ofthe heart. It is no avail to reopen, to go back. Pinero spokenonsense when he made Paula Tanqueray say, “The future isonly the past entered through another gate.” Alas, there is noother gate. When the door is shut, it is shut forever. There is noother entrance to that vanished pulse of time. “The movingfinger writes, and having writ”–

There is a certain kind of door-shutting that will come to us all.The kind of door-shutting that is done very quietly, with thesharp click of the latch to break the stillness. They will thinkthen, one hopes, of our unfulfilled decencies rather than of our



pluperfected misdemeanors. Then they will go out and close thedoor.

*******

ANALYSIS OF THE ESSAY

Christopher Morley's essay On Doors describes the mostsignificant action of man's life that is "the opening and closingof doors". The meaning of a door is to hide what lies inside, tokeep the heart in suspense. No man knows what awaits himwhen he opens a door. Even the most familiar room, where theclock tickles and the hearth glows red at dusk may hidesurprises. The wise men is often seen to open his front door withhumility and a spirit of acceptance. Perhaps if you were waitingto apply for a job you have a question "when I open this door,what will have happened?"

There are many kinds of doors such as revolving doors forhotels, shops, and public buildings. There are the curious littleslattered doors that still swing outside the damaged bar-rooms.There are trap doors, sliding doors, double doors, prison doors,glass doors and so on. The function of these doors differsdepending upon the situation. Besides, the symbol and mysteryof a door resides in its quality of concealment. A glass doorcannot be considered as a door at all. It can be considered onlyas a window. There are many ways of opening doors:

1. The cherry push of the elbow - for instance, a waiterpushing the door with his elbow when he is moving witha tray of food in his hands.

2. Suspicious and uncertain withdrawal of a door before anunhappy salesman.



3. Gentle and carefully modulated recession.

4. Sympathetic and awful silence of the dentist's maid whoopens the door into the operation room.

5. Sudden and violent opening of a door when the nursecomes in, very early in the morning and says, "it's aboy!"

In addition to this, doors are symbols of privacy, of retreat ofmind's escape into blissful quietude or secret struggle. A roomwithout doors is not a room, but a Hallway. It's said that themind works best behind closed doors. Even in sadness, openingthe door may bring relief. It changes and redistributes humanforces. Similarly, closing of doors is more terrible and it is aconfession of finality.

A door gently shut is often the most tragic gesture in life.Everyone knows the seizure of mental suffering that comes justafter the closing of a door. The loved ones might be near, yet faraway.

The opening and closing of doors is a part of the stern fluency oflife. Life will not stay still and let us alone. We are continuallyopening doors with great hope and sometimes close them withgreat despair. Furthermore, the opening of doors is a spiritualact. It has in it some strangeness, some sense of new moments ora new pattern of commotion. It includes the highest glimpse ofhuman gladness, reunion of friendly relationships and so on.

To conclude, there is a certain kind of door shutting that willcome to us all. This way of door shutting is done very quietly. Atthat moment they will think of the unfulfilled moral behaviour,rather than the minor mistakes done earlier. And finally, they



will move out and close the door which is symbolic of deathfrom which no man can escape.

GLOSSARY

Pluperfect : utterly perfect or complete

Misdemeanour : a minor wrongdoing

Reconciliation : the process of making two peopleor groups of people friendly again

after they have argued seriously orfought and kept apart from eachother, or a situation in which thishappens

QUESTIONS

1. What are the various kinds of doors mentioned in the essay“On Doors”?

2. Critically analyse “On Doors”

3. “The opening and closing of doors are the most significantactions of man’s life”- explain.

REFERENCE

https://readandripe.com/on-doors-by-christopher-morley/

https://bloggingeinstein.wordpress.com/2016/07/18/christopher-morley-and-portals/

https://www.jstor.org/stable/803748



https://www.ebooks-library.com/author.cfm/AuthorID/964

https://www.poemhunter.com/i/ebooks/pdf/christopher_morley_2012_3.pdf

ON RUNNING AFTER ONE’S HAT

G K Chesterton

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

G.K. CHESTERTON (1874- 1936)

G.K. Chesterton was the best writers of the twentieth century. Hewas a critic, novelist and a poet but he was an essayist also. Hebegan his career as a journalist and to write weekly articles fornewspapers and magazines. He became a reputed figure in theDaily News. He used to sit in Fleet Street cafe and write hisarticles and essays with the help of his imaginative andintellectual power. Chesterton possessed some literaryimplements in which mainly he used to use wit and paradoxicalarrows to win and with these weapons, he smartly dealt his duty.His quizzical humour, stylish use of wit, delightful mentalcreativity like a gymnastic which were in paradoxical andepigrammatical way and his whole-heartedly defensive mannerfor old, cheerful romantics are the things which regard hiswriting style and spill different from any other contemporariesof his time. Hence, he was called the “prince of paradox”.

G.K. Chesterton easily can handle with literary andsocial criticism, history, politics, economics, philosophy and



theology. There are so many essays and columns which arecherished in the form of books and the collections, titles are like:All Things considered, All is Grist. He spent a month of 1927 inPoland and then two years later, he visited Rome and resulted inThe Resurrection of Rome (1930). His more successful books ofthat period were The Thing (1929), a Catholic Essay and twovolumes of general essays, Come to Think of It (1930) and All isGrist (1931). He disclosed the antithesis, identities, distinctions,and absurdness. He argued with the help of examples andAnecdotes. He wrote on the qualitative facts, knowing the habitsof people to be a reporter, he did not forget what his eyes hadseen at the first time. He shows his ideas in natural way withoutany kind of artificial polish.

Some of his important works include The Defendant (1901),Twelve Types (1902), Robert Browning (1903), Heretics (1905),Charles Dickens (1906), George Bernard Shaw (1909) andRobert Louis Stevenson (1927).

His essays have also possessed the touch of humour. In theessay, A Piece of Chalk when the lady offered him with nosepaper, supposing that he would not like his notes on old brownpaper wrappers having the nation of economical aspect. In histhought, the pocket-knife is also a kind of tool used by humanbeing for their purposes. He says that a knife is a baby of asword. There is a fine example of his humoristic style when hesays that to write on those things which he has possessed in hispocket is not an easy task because it would be too long to writeand writing of those things would be turn into an epic and itwould be the great epic for the future. It would be a matter ofgreat fun for the readers whenever he will be introduced by himabout that things which he kept in his pocket. In fact, thisthought of writer is humorous and interesting and all of thesevarious shades and thoughts are reflected in his style.



ON RUNNING AFTER ONE’S HAT

(Text)

I feel an almost savage envy on hearing that London has beenflooded in my absence, while I am in the mere country. My ownBattersea has been, I understand, particularly favoured as ameeting of the waters. Battersea was already, as I need hardlysay, the most beautiful of human localities. Now that it has theadditional splendour of great sheets of water, there must besomething quite incomparable in the landscape (or waterscape)of my own romantic town. Battersea must be a vision of Venice.The boat that brought the meat from the butcher’s must haveshot along those lanes of rippling silver with the strangesmoothness of the gondola. The greengrocer who broughtcabbages to the corner of the Latchmere Road must have leantupon the oar with the unearthly grace of the gondolier. There isnothing so perfectly poetical as an island; and when a district isflooded it becomes an archipelago.

Some consider such romantic views of flood or fire slightlylacking in reality. But really this romantic view of suchinconveniences is quite as practical as the other. The trueoptimist who sees in such things an opportunity for enjoyment isquite as logical and much more sensible than the ordinary“Indignant Ratepayer” who sees in them an opportunity forgrumbling. Real pain, as in the case of being burnt at Smithfieldor having a toothache, is a positive thing; it can be supported,but scarcely enjoyed. But, after all, our toothaches are theexception, and as for being burnt at Smithfield, it only happensto us at the very longest intervals. And most of theinconveniences that make men swear or women cry are reallysentimental or imaginative inconveniences—things altogether ofthe mind. For instance, we often hear grown-up people



complaining of having to hang about a railway station and waitfor a train. Did you ever hear a small boy complain of having tohang about a railway station and wait for a train? No; for to himto be inside a railway station is to be inside a cavern of wonderand a palace of poetical pleasures. Because to him the red lightand the green light on the signal are like a new sun and a newmoon. Because to him when the wooden arm of the signal fallsdown suddenly, it is as if a great king had thrown down his staffas a signal and started a shrieking tournament of trains. I myselfam of little boys’ habit in this matter. They also serve who onlystand and wait for the two fifteen. Their meditations may be fullof rich and fruitful things. Many of the most purple hours of mylife have been passed at Clapham Junction, which is now, Isuppose, under water. I have been there in many moods so fixedand mystical that the water might well have come up to mywaist before I noticed it particularly. But in the case of all suchannoyances, as I have said, everything depends upon theemotional point of view. You can safely apply the test to almostevery one of the things that are currently talked of as the typicalnuisance of daily life.

For instance, there is a current impression that it is unpleasant tohave to run after one’s hat. Why should it be unpleasant to thewell-ordered and pious mind? Not merely because it is running,and running exhausts one. The same people run much faster ingames and sports. The same people run much more eagerly afteran uninteresting little leather ball than they will after a nice silkhat. There is an idea that it is humiliating to run after one’s hat;and when people say it is humiliating they mean that it is comic.It certainly is comic; but man is a very comic creature, and mostof the things he does are comic—eating, for instance. And themost comic things of all are exactly the things that are mostworth doing—such as making love. A man running after a hat isnot half so ridiculous as a man running after a wife.



Now a man could, if he felt rightly in the matter, run after his hatwith the manliest ardour and the most sacred joy. He mightregard himself as a jolly huntsman pursuing a wild animal, forcertainly no animal could be wilder. In fact, I am inclined tobelieve that hat-hunting on windy days will be the sport of theupper classes in the future. There will be a meet of ladies andgentlemen on some high ground on a gusty morning. They willbe told that the professional attendants have started a hat insuch-and-such a thicket, or whatever be the technical term.Notice that this employment will in the fullest degree combinesport with humanitarianism. The hunters would feel that theywere not inflicting pain. Nay, they would feel that they wereinflicting pleasure, rich, almost riotous pleasure, upon the peoplewho were looking on. When last I saw an old gentleman runningafter his hat in Hyde Park, I told him that a heart so benevolentas his ought to be filled with peace and thanks at the thought ofhow much unaffected pleasure his every gesture and bodilyattitude were at that moment giving to the crowd.

The same principle can be applied to every other typicaldomestic worry. A gentleman trying to get a fly out of the milkor a piece of cork out of his glass of wine often imagines himselfto be irritated. Let him think for a moment of the patience ofanglers sitting by dark pools, and let his soul be immediatelyirradiated with gratification and repose. Again, I have knownsome people of very modern views driven by their distress to theuse of theological terms to which they attached no doctrinalsignificance, merely because a drawer was jammed tight andthey could not pull it out. A friend of mine was particularlyafflicted in this way. Every day his drawer was jammed, andevery day in consequence it was something else that rhymes toit. But I pointed out to him that this sense of wrong was reallysubjective and relative; it rested entirely upon the assumptionthat the drawer could, should, and would come out easily. “But



if,” I said, “you picture to yourself that you are pulling againstsome powerful and oppressive enemy, the struggle will becomemerely exciting and not exasperating. Imagine that you aretugging up a lifeboat out of the sea. Imagine that you are ropingup a fellow-creature out of an Alpine crevass. Imagine even thatyou are a boy again and engaged in a tug-of-war between Frenchand English.” Shortly after saying this I left him; but I have nodoubt at all that my words bore the best possible fruit. I have nodoubt that every day of his life he hangs on to the handle of thatdrawer with a flushed face and eyes bright with battle, utteringencouraging shouts to himself, and seeming to hear all roundhim the roar of an applauding ring.

So I do not think that it is altogether fanciful or incredible tosuppose that even the floods in London may be accepted andenjoyed poetically. Nothing beyond inconvenience seems reallyto have been caused by them; and inconvenience, as I have said,is only one aspect, and that the most unimaginative andaccidental aspect of a really romantic situation. An adventure isonly an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience isonly an adventure wrongly considered. The water that girdledthe houses and shops of London must, if anything, have onlyincreased their previous witchery and wonder. For as the RomanCatholic priest in the story said: “Wine is good with everythingexcept water,” and on a similar principle, water is good witheverything except wine.

****

ANALYSIS OF THE ESSAY

The essay On Running After One’s Hat talks about theinconveniences of the life and the attitude we have to inculcatetowards them. In the beginning of the essay Chesterton



expressed his sorrow as London was flooded when he was awayin the countryside. His town Battersea, when flooded, wouldhave resembled Venice. The butcher and the greengrocer musthave brought things riding in boats. The inconvenience of floodcould be an opportunity of enjoyment for a true optimist,whereas the ordinary people always complain about suchsituations. Similarly, there are people who complain for waitingfor a long time in railway stations but we never see childrendoing so. Maybe because it’s a place of wonder for children. Forthem the red light and the greenlight are like the sun and themoon. Here, the narrator was like a boy. He had spent his mostjoyful hours in such places, especially Clapham junction. He hadbeen there in his various moods being immersed in deep thoughtseveral times and not even noticed when water level raised tillhis waist. It is the attitude towards the inconveniences thatmatters. There are many people who feel that it is unpleasant torun after one’s hat. He wonders why people should feel so whenpeople run much faster in games and sports. When people say itshumiliating to run after one’s hat., in other words, they mean itis comic. According to Chesterton, man is a comic creature.Most of the things that he does are comic. For example, makinglove. A man running after a hat is not half ridiculous as a manrunning after a wife.

To avoid the shame, one feels when running after a hat, he canthink of himself as a huntsman pursuing a wild animal.Chesterton assumes that the hat-hunting may become sport forthe upper classes in the future. The event will be held in front ofa huge crowd. The hunters of the hat do not inflict any pain onothers instead they give pleasure to the onlookers.

When the narrator saw a man running after his hat in Hyde Park,he told him that he should be happy because he is giving a lot ofpleasure to the crowd watching him. The same principle can be



applied to every other domestic worry such as removing a flyfrom the milk or getting a cork out of the glass of wine etc. Insuch circumstances people should think about the patience of theanglers.

Chesterton knew people who were distressed over silly things. Afriend of him was so distressed that way because his drawer wasso tight, and he couldn’t pull it out. In situations like this one hasto imagine that he is fighting against some powerful enemy, orpulling a lifeboat out of the sea, or pulling out a man from acrack in the Alps.

According to Chesterton, one can enjoy the floods if she or hehas a right attitude despite the fact that they cause someinconvenience is an adventure wrongly considered. A RomanCatholic priest in a story said, “Wine is good with everythingexcept water” but it can be reversed and say that water is goodwith everything except wine.

In short, On Running after One’s Hat is a skilful effort. Theessay shows psychological situation and status of human being.Everything has its own faces, but it depends on us and how wetake them because everyone has his own view point and attitudedriven by the different circumstances. In this essay, the writertries to express his view through examples. The small things asrunning, driving to open any jammed drawer, to wait for a trainare common but irritating events amongst people. However, itcan be made simpler and enjoyable to keep ourselves cheerfuland delighted. To chase a ball or to chase a hat is not a differentsport we regard to chase a ball as a good sport, while we think tochase a hat is funniest game. The plot of the story is tightlywoven and the arrangements of the events according to the



movement of story is remarkable. Our reaction towards thethings made them positive and negative. However, London wasgirdled by the water, yet writer was trying to enjoy that momentto keep himself calm and by this method he wants to say thatpeace of mind made our decision more effective rather thanaggressive mind. The writer has not raised any single characterin this essay. He has shown the full picture of the society.

His language is very simple and leaves an impression on ourmind and compel to think about the problems of the society. Heraises a question and answers himself. He says that our thoughtsmade the events adventurous and inconvenient, but it dependson us how we take it. The theme of this essay deals with thesocial problem; connecting personal life of people. As the storybegin, we come to know that London is struggling with theproblem of flood, but writer visualizes the whole scene in apoetical method and then throw light on the small problem withthis example.

After every paragraph, he presents a new incident and connectsit with main story after a short while by using simple andfamiliar examples of every common man. He has used figures ofspeeches too, to clarify his statements as: “red light and greenlight on the signal are like a new sun and a new moon.” “As if agreat king had thrown down his staff as a signal and started ashrieking tournament of trains.” His humoristic style to dictatethe event is appraisable; “Their meditations may be full of Richand fruitful things. Many of the most purple hours of my lifehave been passed at Clapham Junction.” He not only leaves tothink the people what he wants to say; but he also clarifies hisconcept in these words; As I have said, everything depends uponthe emotional point of view.” He gives a psychological andmoral support to deal with our problems. Every exampleglimpses a solution to face bravely our problems without losing



our temper. The title of the essay is also appropriate and justifythe story line. As we run after our problems and think that it isRight to do so. We chase for that thing in our life which is quitenecessary. But our psychological satisfaction in it and we againand again follow this sequence as a runner runs, as a bowler runswithout thinking another idea in our mind.

GLOSSARY

Grumble : to complain about someone orsomething in an annoyed way

Trivial : having little value or importance

Battersea : a place in London

Gondola : a long and narrow boat

Archipelago : a group of islands, or an area ofsea where there are many islands

QUESTIONS

1. What makes G. K Chesterton to romanticize flood?

2. What according to Chesterton can turn everyday nuisancesand irritations into a joyful act?

3. Is running after one’s hat a moment of embarrassment?

4. Discuss G. K Chesterton’s prose style with reference to “OnRunning after One’s Hat”



5. Chesterton’s essay “On Running After One’s Hat” is enrichedwith humour. Substantiate.

6. “An inconvenience is only an adventure wronglyconsidered”. Discuss

REFERENCE

https://www.britannica.com/biography/G-K-Chesterton

http://essays.quotidiana.org/chesterton/running_after_ones_hat/

http://sittingbee.com/on-running-after-ones-hat-g-k-chesterton/

http://www.jiwaji.edu/pdf/ecourse/language/G.K.%20Chesterton.pdf



MODULE III

SHORT STORIES

THE GIFT OF THE MAGI

O Henry

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

O HENRY (1862- 1910)

William Sydney Porter is better known by his pen name OHenry. He was an American short story writer. He changed thespelling of his middle name to Sydney in 1898. He was born inNorth Carolina and later moved to Texas in 1882. It was there hemet his wife, Athol Ester and he had two children. In 1902, afterthe death of his wife, Porter moved to New York, where he soonremarried.

As a child Porter was always reading everything from classics todime novels. His favourite works were Kane's translation of OneThousand and One Nights and Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy.

Porter's most intensive writing period occurred while he was inNew York and he wrote about 381 short stories. He also wrotepoetry and nonfiction. Some of his major works are TheFurnished Room, The Last Leaf, The Gift of the Magi, The Copand The Anthem, The Green Door, After Twenty Year, ARetrieved Reformation, The Third Ingredient, The Princess and



The Puma, Buried Treasure, An Unfinished Story, Babes in theJungle, and The Call of the Tame. These selected stories do notonly give the reader a chance to read some of the best known ofhis works but also bear ample evidence of the wide range of hiswritings. Humorous and energetic, O. Henry's stories are markedby coincidence, witty narration and surprise endings. They offeran insight into human nature and the ways it is affected by love,hate, wealth, poverty, gentility, disguise, and crime.

As a tribute to Porter's contributions to American literature, theSociety of Arts and Letters, in 1918, founded the O. HenryMemorial Award to be awarded annually to the author of thebest American short story.

Porter was a heavy drinker, and by 1908, his markedlydeteriorating health affected his writing. In 1909, Sarah left him,and he died on June 5, 1910, of cirrhosis of the liver,complications of diabetes, and an enlarged heart. After funeralservices in New York City, he was buried in the RiversideCemetery in Asheville, North Carolina. His daughter MargaretWorth Porter had a short writing career from 1913 to 1916. Shemarried cartoonist Oscar Cesare of New York in 1916; they weredivorced four years later. She died of tuberculosis in 1927 andwas buried next to her father.

THE GIFT OF THE MAGI

(Text)

ONE DOLLAR AND EIGHTY-SEVEN CENTS. Thatwas all. She had put it aside, one cent and then another and thenanother, in her careful buying of meat and other food. Dellacounted it three times. One dollar and eighty-seven cents. Andthe next day would be Christmas.



There was nothing to do but fall on the bed and cry. SoDella did it.

While the lady of the home is slowly growing quieter, wecan look at the home. Furnished rooms at a cost of $8 a week.There is little more to say about it.

In the hall below was a letter-box too small to hold aletter. There was an electric bell, but it could not make a sound.Also, there was a name beside the door: “Mr. James DillinghamYoung.”

When the name was placed there, Mr. James DillinghamYoung was being paid $30 a week. Now, when he was beingpaid only $20 a week, the name seemed too long and important.It should perhaps have been “Mr. James D. Young.” But whenMr. James Dillingham Young entered the furnished rooms, hisname became very short indeed. Mrs. James Dillingham Youngput her arms warmly about him and called him “Jim.” You havealready met her. She is Della.

Della finished her crying and cleaned the marks of itfrom her face. She stood by the window and looked out with nointerest. Tomorrow would be Christmas Day, and she had only$1.87 with which to buy Jim a gift. She had put aside as much asshe could for months, with this result. Twenty dollars a week isnot much. Everything had cost more than she had expected. Italways happened like that.

Only $ 1.87 to buy a gift for Jim. Her Jim. She had hadmany happy hours planning something nice for him. Somethingnearly good enough. Something almost worth the honor ofbelonging to Jim.



There was a looking-glass between the windows of theroom. Perhaps you have seen the kind of looking-glass that isplaced in $8 furnished rooms. It was very narrow. A personcould see only a little of himself at a time. However, if he wasvery thin and moved very quickly, he might be able to get agood view of himself. Della, being quite thin, had mastered thisart.

Suddenly she turned from the window and stood beforethe glass. Her eyes were shining brightly, but her face had lostits color. Quickly she pulled down her hair and let it fall to itscomplete length.

The James Dillingham Youngs were very proud of twothings which they owned. One thing was Jim’s gold watch. Ithad once belonged to his father. And, long ago, it had belongedto his father’s father. The other thing was Della’s hair.

If a queen had lived in the rooms near theirs, Dellawould have washed and dried her hair where the queen couldsee it. Della knew her hair was more beautiful than any queen’sjewels and gifts.

If a king had lived in the same house, with all his riches,Jim would have looked at his watch every time they met. Jimknew that no king had anything so valuable.

So now Della’s beautiful hair fell about her, shining likea falling stream of brown water. It reached below her knee. Italmost made itself into a dress for her.

And then she put it up on her head again, nervously andquickly. Once she stopped for a moment and stood still while atear or two ran down her face.



She put on her old brown coat. She put on her old brownhat. With the bright light still in her eyes, she moved quickly outthe door and down to the street.

Where she stopped, the sign said: “Mrs. Sofronie. HairArticles of all Kinds.”

Up to the second floor Della ran, and stopped to get herbreath.

Mrs. Sofronie, large, too white, cold-eyed, looked at her.

“Will you buy my hair?” asked Della.

“I buy hair,” said Mrs. Sofronie. “Take your hat off andlet me look at it.”

Down fell the brown waterfall.

“Twenty dollars,” said Mrs. Sofronie, lifting the hair tofeel its weight.

“Give it to me quick,” said Della.

Oh, and the next two hours seemed to fly. She was goingfrom one shop to another, to find a gift for Jim.

She found it at last. It surely had been made for Jim andno one else. There was no other like it in any of the shops, andshe had looked in every shop in the city.

It was a gold watch chain, very simply made. Its valuewas in its rich and pure material. Because it was so plain andsimple, you knew that it was very valuable. All good things arelike this.



It was good enough for The Watch.

As soon as she saw it, she knew that Jim must have it. Itwas like him. Quietness and value—Jim and the chain both hadquietness and value. She paid twenty-one dollars for it. And shehurried home with the chain and eighty-seven cents.

With that chain on his watch, Jim could look at his watchand learn the time anywhere he might be. Though the watch wasso fine, it had never had a fine chain. He sometimes took it outand looked at it only when no one could see him do it.

When Della arrived home, her mind quieted a little. Shebegan to think more reasonably. She started to try to cover thesad marks of what she had done. Love and large-hearted giving,when added together, can leave deep marks. It is never easy tocover these marks, dear friends—never easy.

Within forty minutes her head looked a little better. Withher short hair, she looked wonderfully like a schoolboy. Shestood at the looking-glass for a long time.

“If Jim doesn’t kill me,” she said to herself, “before helooks at me a second time, he’ll say I look like a girl who singsand dances for money. But what could I do—oh! What could Ido with a dollar and eighty-seven cents?”

At seven, Jim’s dinner was ready for him.

Jim was never late. Della held the watch chain in herhand and sat near the door where he always entered. Then sheheard his step in the hall and her face lost color for a moment.She often said little prayers quietly, about simple everydaythings. And now she said: “Please God, make him think I’m stillpretty. “The door opened and Jim stepped in. He looked very



thin and he was not smiling. Poor fellow, he was only twenty-two—and with a family to take care of! He needed a new coatand he had nothing to cover his cold hands.

Jim stopped inside the door. He was as quiet as a huntingdog when it is near a bird. His eyes looked strangely at Della,and there was an expression in them that she could notunderstand. It filled her with fear. It was not anger, nor surprise,nor anything she had been ready for. He simply looked at herwith that strange expression on his face.

Della went to him.

“Jim, dear,” she cried, “don’t look at me like that. I hadmy hair cut off and sold it. I couldn’t live through Christmaswithout giving you a gift. My hair will grow again. You won’tcare, will you? My hair grows very fast. It’s Christmas, Jim.Let’s be happy. You don’t know what a nice—what a beautifulnice gift I got for you.”

“You’ve cut off your hair?” asked Jim slowly. He seemedto labor to understand what had happened. He seemed not to feelsure he knew.

“Cut it off and sold it,” said Della. “Don’t you like menow? I’m me, Jim. I’m the same without my hair.”

Jim looked around the room.

“You say your hair is gone?” he said.

“You don’t have to look for it,” said Della. “It’s sold, Itell you—sold and gone, too. It’s the night before Christmas,boy. Be good to me, because I sold it for you. Maybe the hairs of



my head could be counted,” she said, “but no one could evercount my love for you. Shall we eat dinner, Jim?”

Jim put his arms around his Della. For ten seconds let uslook in another direction. Eight dollars a week or a milliondollars a year— how different are they? Someone may give youan answer, but it will be wrong. The magi brought valuable gifts,but that was not among them. My meaning will be explainedsoon.

From inside the coat, Jim took something tied in paper.He threw it upon the table.

“I want you to understand me, Dell,” he said. “Nothinglike a haircut could make me love you any less. But if you’llopen that, you may know what I felt when I came in.”

White fingers pulled off the paper. And then a cry of joy;and then a change to tears.

For there lay The Combs—the combs that Della had seenin a shop window and loved for a long time. Beautiful combs,with jewels, perfect for her beautiful hair. She had known theycost too much for her to buy them. She had looked at themwithout the least hope of owning them. And now they were hers,but her hair was gone.

But she held them to her heart, and at last was able tolook up and say: “My hair grows so fast, Jim!”

And then she jumped up and cried, “Oh, oh!”

Jim had not yet seen his beautiful gift. She held it out tohim in her open hand. The gold seemed to shine softly as if withher own warm and loving spirit.



“Isn’t it perfect, Jim? I hunted all over town to find it.You’ll have to look at your watch a hundred times a day now.Give me your watch. I want to see how they look together.”

Jim sat down and smiled.

“Della,” said he, “let’s put our Christmas gifts away andkeep them a while. They’re too nice to use now. I sold the watchto get the money to buy the combs. And now I think we shouldhave our dinner.”

The magi, as you know, were wise men—wonderfullywise men— who brought gifts to the new born Christ-child.They were the first to give Christmas gifts. Being wise, theirgifts were doubtless wise ones. And here I have told you thestory of two children who were not wise. Each sold the mostvaluable thing he owned in order to buy a gift for the other. Butlet me speak a last word to the wise of these days: Of all whogive gifts, these two were the wisest. Of all who give andreceive gifts, such as they are the wisest. Everywhere they arethe wise ones. They are the magi.

****

ANALYSIS OF THE STORY

STORYLINE

The Gift of the Magi penned by American short story writer O.Henry is one of the most beautifully written short stories in theworld. It has been adapted into several films and has become apart of many short story anthologies. ‘The Gift of the Magi’ is avery unusual and surprising story central to a Christmas theme.O. Henry, also known as William Sydney Porter, published thisshort story in 1905.



Jim and Della are a husband and wife living in a rented room inNew York. They are quite poor and recently Jim has had hissalary cut back to only $20 a week from the $30 a week he usedto make. After rent and groceries, the couple hardly have anymoney left. Christmas is only a day away and, for a Christmaspresent, Della wants to buy Jim a gold watch chain for his goldwatch. They do not have much to be proud or happy about, butJim is very proud of that watch. And Della? Della is most proudof her beautiful long hair. But she really wants to buy that goldchain for Jim's watch. Too bad she only has $1.87. So, shedecides to sell her hair to a woman who makes wigs and otherhair articles. The woman pays Della $20 for her hair. The chaincosts $21, so she now has enough money. She buys the chain togive to Jim. She goes home and prepares Jim's dinner and waitsfor him to come home, a little bit worried that Jim will beshocked when he sees her with all her beautiful hair cut off.When Jim comes home, he does look shocked when he seesDella with short hair. He stares at her in a strange way and itscares her. She explains to Jim how she sold her hair to buy hima nice Christmas present. Jim tells her not to worry and thatnothing can change his love for her. The reason he is shocked tosee her without her long hair is that he also wanted to get a niceChristmas present for Della. He gives her the present wrapped inpaper and Della unwraps it to see that Jim had bought her a setof beautiful combs for her hair. She had seen them in a shopbefore, but they were so expensive. How was Jim able to affordthem? Suddenly, she remembers Jim's present. She gives him thegold chain. The chain is beautiful, but when Della asks Jim toput it on his watch, Jim surprises her. He sold the watch to buyher those nice combs. Were they both foolish to sell theirfavourite possessions? O. Henry tells us that, no, they werewise. They were wise because they had each sacrificed theirmost valuable possessions for the person they loved. They were



like the three wise men — the Magi—who brought presents forJesus Christ after he was born. Keep in mind, that this is whyChristians still give presents on Christmas Day: to remember thegifts the Magi brought Christ on that very first Christmas.

PLOT

In The Gift of the Magi, the exposition happens when the maincharacter is introduced. There was a woman named Della. Shewas counting her money and realized that it was not enough tobuy a present for Jim, her husband. She felt really sad that thenext day would be Christmas and she still did not know what todo. She really wanted to buy Jim a present.

After exposition, the story goes on to rising action. It happenswhen Della was totally in deep confusion about what she coulddo. She only got $1.87 as the result after she had saved everypenny for months. She knew that $1.87 would never be enoughfor such a great present. She cried for a while but then she foundout that she had to take a risk. It is told that Della had anextremely long brown hair. She immediately went out of herhouse and searched for any store that would buy her hair. Whileshe was walking through the street, she suddenly stopped sinceshe read a sign said “Mme. Sofronie. Hair Goods of All Kinds.”She rushed into the store, met a woman named MadameSofronie, and asked her if she wanted to buy her hair. MadameSofronie then examined her hair and quickly told Della that herhair was worth $20. After Della got the money, she went to astore where she finally found the right present for Jim. It was asimple platinum fob chain, and she thought it would be perfectfor Jim’s watch. The chain reflects the simplicity and quietnessof Jim. Della bought it for $21 and got back home with her 87cents.



The rising action always lead the story to the climax. The climaxin this story happens when Jim finally went home from work.Seeing his wife’s hair cut off, he suddenly just stands still at hisplace without being angry, surprised, or disapproval. He askedhis wife to make sure that her hair had been really gone. Dellacried and told him that she cut it off and sold it.

The climax goes down to the falling action. The falling action inthis story is when Jim took out a package from his coat andspoke to Della. He seemed to feel alright. He did not mind aboutDella’s short hair. He asked Della to unwrap the package tomake Della understand why Jim was like that at the first time hesaw Della. She opened the package and cried hysterically. It wasa set of comb made of pure tortoise shell with jewelled rims. Itwas all that she had dreamed for long time. After that, Dellagave Jim the chain that she bought, and asked him to try it on hiswatch. However, Jim did not obey that. He threw himself on acouch and smiled.

The ending of the story can be considered as resolution sinceJim and Della were happy in the end. Jim finally told his wife toput the presents away for a while and stated that they were toonice to be just a present. While sitting on the couch, he toldDella that he had sold his watch to buy the comb set for Della.Now, Jim asked his wife to prepare the dinner for them both.

CHARACTERS

Character is personality or attitude for a person in story. Thetypes of character are divided into two categories there are roleand personality from role are divided into two major and minorcharacters. Meanwhile from personality, there are flat, round,static, dynamic, stock, hero, anti-hero, and allusion.



There are major and minor characters in the story based on theirroles. Della and Jim is the major characters. Della is consideredto be the major character since she is the one who appears fromthe beginning until the end of the story. It seems that thebeginning of the story is telling about Della’s confusion to buypresent for Jim, her husband until she finally did a sacrifice inorder to be able to buy a nice present. Meanwhile, Jim can bealso said that he is major character as he is another person whohas a relationship with Della, the first major character. Jim alsohas interactions with Della that create a good flow of the story.Besides, there is actually one minor character. She is MadameSofronie who was the woman buying Della’s hair for $20. Thereason why she is the minor character is that she only appearedin the middle of the story for a moment.

The next explanation is based the characters’ personality. Thereare only three kinds of characters, which are flat, dynamic,static, and stock characters. Della is dynamic character in thestory since her physical appearance changed in the end of thestory. In the beginning, it is described that she has a beautifullong brown hair. It looked like a brown waterfall. However, shecut off her hair in order to buy a present for her husband, so herhair became very short. Besides, Della is a flat character sinceher way to interact with other characters throughout the storytends to be the same from the beginning until the end.

Next, Jim can be considered as a flat and static character. Jim’sway of talking remains the same since he only appeared almostin the end of the story. He is static character because his physicalappearance did not change at all. The last kind is stock character,which is Madame Sofronie. She is considered as stock charactersince she tends to be the only complement character.



SETTING

The definition of a setting in a story is where the story takesplace and when the story happens. Every story has a setting.Moreover, setting it is not only about place.

In The Gift of the Magi, the story takes place at Della and Jim’shouse, Madame Sofronie’s store, and the store where Della gotthe chain for the present. It took place at Della and Jim’s housewhen Della was counting her money to buy a perfect present forJim, and when Della and Jim were finally meeting and talkingabout their presents in the end of the story. Next, it took place atMadame Sofronie’s store when Della finally decided to cut herhair off and sold it to Madame Sofronie for $20. Lastly, therewas one store when Della finally found the platinum fob chainto be the right present for Jim.

The time setting of the story is considered to be in a ChristmasEve since it was explained that Della was confused about whatshe was going to buy Jim’s Christmas present on the followingday. Specifically, it was in the afternoon when Della wascounting money, going to Madame Sofronie’s store, and buyingthe fob chain for Jim’s watch. In the end, it seemed to be in theevening when Della and Jim finally met and talked about theirpresents.

POINT OF VIEW

Definition of point of view is the position of the narrator, whichis relation to the story, as indicated by the narrator’s outlookfrom which the events are depicted and from the attitudetowards the character. There are two types of narrator, which areparticipant and non-participant narrator. Participant narratortakes a role in the story. It tells the story from the first-personpoint of view and uses the pronoun “I” while non-participant



narrator does not take any role in the story. It only tells the storyfrom the third person point of view and uses the pronoun “she”,“he”, “it”, and names as well. Non-participant narrator is alsodivided into three branches, which are omniscient or all-knowing, limited omniscience, and objective.

The narrator of The Gift of the Magi is non-participant. It usesthe limited omniscience third person point of view. The narratortells the story by using the pronoun “she”, “he”, “it”, and namesto mention all the characters and other things. It is considered tobe limited omniscience as the narrator only knows all about themajor characters, which are Della and Jim. The narrator explainsthe physical appearance and all the feelings of Della and Jim.

THEME

Beauty Della is worried that Jim won't think she is beautifulwith short hair, but Jim loves her for more than just her beautifulhair and how she looks. If you really love somebody, they arebeautiful no matter how they look.

Family Jim and Della are husband and wife and they love eachother. Jim's watch was given to him by his father and has been inhis family for many years. Still, he sacrifices it out of love forDella.

Giving Della and Jim both feel that it is important to give nicegifts to each other to express their love.

Identity Della learns that Jim loves her for just for beingherself, not because of her hair or the Christmas present shebuys him.

Love Because Jim and Della love each other, there is really noneed to prove their love by buying gifts for each other.



Love is the greatest gift. Money Della and Jim sell valuablethings to get money to buy gifts for each other, because they arepoor.

Sacrifice Both Della and Jim give up valuable possessions sothey can buy Christmas gifts for each other.

Wisdom Della and Jim were wise because they were willing tomake sacrifices to show their love for each other.

To conclude, The Gift of the Magi is considered part of theRealism and Naturalism literary period of American History.The story has a beautiful and clever twist in the end, whichbrings out O. Henry’s genius and narrative skills. He comparesthe gifts that the Magi or the three wise men of the East broughtto the Baby Jesus in the manger to the gifts Della and Jim giveeach other on a rather dismal winter Christmas Eve. Althoughthe Magi chose their gifts wisely, they gave their gifts out oftheir plenty without sacrificing much. In comparison, there wasa deep sense of sacrifice and most important love in the giftsbought on Christmas Eve by Della and Jim. The sixth of Januaryis celebrated in most Christian countries as the Epiphany of theLord Jesus, the day when the three Magi or Wise men from theEast travelled a great distance to ratify Lord Jesus’ love forhumankind by offering their symbolic spiritual gifts. However,if we have people like Della and Jim in our midst, they are betterMagi than the three wise men because of the love they share intheir gifts.

Because of selfless loves like Della and Jim’s, the Lord Jesus ismanifested every day in our midst. Also, note that Della and Jimbought gifts for each other by sacrificing articles that were verymuch dear to them. Della sacrificed her long brown hair to buy agold watch chain for Jim’s watch, while Jim sacrificed his watch



to buy a set of tortoise-shell jewel-rimmed combs for Della’shair.

Coming to the gifts; they were symbolic gifts given to representthe three different aspects of Lord Jesus’ as an entity here onEarth: gold as a symbol of kingship on Earth, frankincense anincense as a symbol of deity, and myrrh an embalming oil as asymbol of death. Other than the gold, the other two gifts were ofno use to Lord Jesus or his little family. The Magi gifted them tothe Lord Jesus out of respect and honour. However, Della andJim’s gifts were given out of love for one another, which is thelove manifest in the basic teachings of Lord Jesus Christ.

Della’s and Jim’s gifts were gifts of sacrifice and true love foreach other. The Magi may have revered the Baby Jesus but maynot have loved him so much. But that is what O. Henry isdrawing to our minds, for it is not wisdom that prompted Dellato cut off her hair and Jim to sell his watch. Wisdom is good to acertain extent, but love is even greater. And most of the time,love knows no wisdom. The wise men from the East inventedthe art of gifting presents on Christmas. Della and Jim gave notwhat they could spare, but they gave their best possessions tothe one they loved most. Therefore, O. Henry, the master writer,claims that Della and Jim were wiser than even the Magibecause of this element. Note that both Biblical names aresynonymous with wisdom in the Bible – the Queen of Shebaused to come to Israel to hear the wisdom of King Solomon.There is a hint given by the author O. Henry that love wouldtriumph over wisdom in this short story titled ‘The Gift of theMagi’.



GLOSSARY

Parsimonious : not willing to give or spend money

Mendicant : someone who belongs to areligious group that lives by askingthe public for food, money etc.

Falter : to stop being effective or makingprogress

Flutter : to move up and down or from sideto side with short, quick, lightmovements, or to make somethingmove in this way.

Trip : to move with quick light steps

Wriggle : to move or make something moveby twisting or turning quickly

QUESTIONS

1. Why did Della cut hair and sell it?

2. What was Jim’s gift for Della?

3. What are the important themes discussed in the story TheGift of the Magi?

4. Significance of the title The Gift of the Magi



REFERENCE

https://owlcation.com/humanities/Analysis-of-The-Gift-of-the-Magi-by-O-Henry

https://english.binus.ac.id/2014/11/07/a-critical-analysis-of-o-henrys-the-gift-of-the-magi/

https://americanliterature.com/the-gift-of-the-magi-study-guide

https://www.enotes.com/topics/gift-magi/in-depth

https://www.academia.edu/34677353/The_Gift_of_the_Magi_Analysis

https://magadhuniversity.ac.in/download/econtent/pdf/the%20gift%20of%20Magi,Summary,charector%20analysis.pdf



THE MARK OF VISHNU

Khushwant Singh

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

KUSHWANT SINGH (1915-2014)

Khushwant Singh is an Indian author, lawyer, politician, andjournalist. He was born in a Sikh family in Hadali, KhushabDistrict, Punjab (which now lies in Pakistan). He was theyoungest son of Sir Sobha Singh and Veeran Bai. KhushwantSingh’s grandmother named him Khushal Singh that means‘Prosperous Lion’. He was called by nickname, Shalee. He hadnamed himself Khushwant, in order to rhyme with his brother’sname Bhagwant. Khushwant Singh studied at Delhi ModernSchool and went on to pursue higher education at theGovernment College, Lahore followed by St. Stephen’s College,Delhi and then at King’s College London.

Later, he married Kawal Malik and blessed with a son RahulSingh and a daughter Mala. He began his career as a practicinglawyer at High Court in 1939. And then he joined All IndiaRadio as a journalist in 1951 till 1956 he worked at theDepartment of Communication of UNESCO at Paris. Soon hebegan to edit various Indian Newspapers and journals thatincludes Yojana, a journal of Indian Government, The HindustanTimes, The Illustrated Weekly of India and many such moremagazines and journals. He went on to edit, various magazinesof literary and journalistic repute through 1970s and 1980s. hiscareer in Mass Communication and Journalism spurred thewriter in him and very soon he embarked on this literary journeywhich resulted in much fame and fortune to him. KhushwantSingh also participated in the political milieu of the country



from 1980-1986. He was the member of Rajya Sabha, the UpperHouse of Indian Parliament.

HONOURS AND AWARDS

He has won a number of national and international awards. Hewas honoured with

Padma Bhushan (1974)

Padma Vibhushan (2007)

The Honest Man of the Year (2000)

Punjab Rattan Award (2006)

Sahitya Academy Fellowship (2010)

Lifetime Achievement Award by Tata Literature Live!The Mumbai Lit fest (2013)

The international awards such as

Rockefeller Grant in 1966

Fellowship at King’s College, London (2014)

He was a prolific and versatile writer who has written a largenumber of short stories, novels, essays, columns in leadingnewspapers and journals etc.

HIS MAJOR WORKS

The Mark of Vishnu and Other Stories (1950)

The History of Sikhs (1953)



Train to Pakistan (1956), a novel

The Voice of God and Other Stories (1957)

I Shall Not Hear the Nightingale (1959)

Delhi (1990), a novel

Women and Men in My Life (1995)

The Portrait of a Lady, a short story and so on.

THE MARK OF VISHNU

(Text)

"This is for Kala Nag," said Gunga Ram, pouring the milk intothe saucer. "Every night I leave it outside the hole near the walland it’s gone by the morning." "Perhaps it is the cat,” weyoungsters suggested.

"Cat!" said Gunga Ram with contempt. "No cat goes near thathole. Kala Nag lives there. As long as I give him milk, he willnot bite anyone in this house. You can all go about with bare feetand play where you like."

We were not having any patronage from Gunga Ram.

"You’re a stupid old Brahmin," I said. "Don’t you know snakesdon’t drink milk? At least one couldn’t drink a saucerful everyday. The teacher told us that a snake eats only once in severaldays. We saw a grass snake which had just swallowed a frog. Itstuck like a blob in its throat and took several days to dissolveand go down its tail. We’ve got dozens of them in the lab, inmethylated spirit. Why, last month the teacher bought one froma snake charmer which could run both ways. It had another head



with a pair of eyes at the tail. You should have seen the funwhen it was put in the jar. There wasn’t an empty one in the lab.So the teacher put it in one which had a Russel's viper. Hecaught its two ends with a pair of forceps, dropped it in the jar,and quickly put the lid on. There was an absolute storm as itwent round and round in the glass, tearing the decayed viper intoshreds."

Gunga Ram shut his eyes in pious horror.

"You will pay for it one day. Yes, you will."

It was no use arguing with Gunga Ram. He, like all goodHindus, believed in the Trinity of Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva,the creator, preserver, and destroyer. Of these he was mostdevoted to Vishnu. Every morning he smeared his forehead witha V mark in sandalwood paste to honour the deity. Although aBrahmin, he was illiterate and full of superstition. To him, alllife was sacred, even if it was of a serpent or scorpion orcentipede. Whenever he saw one he quickly shoved it away lestwe kill it. He picked up wasps we battered with our badmintonrackets and tended their damaged wings. Sometimes he gotstung. It never seemed to shake his faith. More dangerous theanimal, the more devoted Gunga Ram was to its existence.Hence the regard for snakes; and above all, for the cobra, whowas the Kala Nag.

"We will kill your Kala Nag if we see him."

"I won’t let you. It’s laid a hundred eggs and if you kill it all theeggs will become cobras and the house will be full of them.Then what will you do?"



"We’ll catch them alive and send them to Bombay. They milkthem there for anti-snakebite serum. They pay two rupees for alive cobra. That makes two hundred rupees straightway."

"Your doctors must have udders. I never saw a snake have any.But don’t you dare touch this one. It is a phannyar - it is hooded.I’ve seen it. It’s three hands long. As for its hood!’ Gunga Ramopened the palms of his hands and his head swayed from side toside. ‘You should see it basking on the lawn in the sunlight."

"That just proves what a liar you are. The phannyar is the male,so it couldn’t have laid the hundred eggs. You must have laid theeggs yourself."

The party burst into peals of laughter.

"Must be Gunga Ram’s eggs. We’ll soon have a hundred GungaRams."

Gunga Ram was squashed. It was the lot of a servant to beconstantly squashed. But having the children of the householdmake fun of him was too much even for Gunga Ram. They wereconstantly belittling him with their new-fangled ideas. Theynever read their scriptures.

Not even what the Mahatma said about non-violence. It was justshotguns to kill birds and the jars of methylated spirit to drownsnakes. Gunga Ram would stick to his faith in the sanctity oflife, he would feed and protect snakes because snakes were themost vile of God’s creatures on earth. If you could love them,instead of killing them, you proved your point.

What the point was which Gunga Ram wanted to prove was notclear. He just proved it by leaving the saucerful of milk by thesnake hole every night and finding it gone in the mornings.



One day we saw Kala Nag. The monsoons had burst with alltheir fury and it had rained in the night. The earth which had lainparched and dry under the withering heat of the summer sun wasteeming with life. In little pools frogs croaked. The muddyground was littered with crawling worms, centipedes andvelvety ladybirds.

Grass had begun to show and the banana leaves glistened brightand glossy green. The rain had flooded Kala Nag’s hole. He satin an open patch on the lawn. His shiny black hood glistened inthe sunlight. He was big—almost six feet in length, and roundedand fleshy, like my wrist.

"Looks like a King Cobra. Let’s get him."

Kala Nag did not have much of a chance. The ground wasslippery and all the holes and gutters were full of water. GungaRam was not at home to help.

Armed with long bamboo sticks, we surrounded Kala Nagbefore he even scented danger. When he saw us his eyes turneda fiery red and he hissed and spat on all sides. Then, likelightning Kala Nag made for the banana grove. The ground wastoo muddy and he slithered. He had hardly gone five yards whena stick caught him in the middle and broke his back. A volley ofblows reduced him to a squishy-squashy pulp of black-and-white jelly, spattered with blood and mud. His head was stillundamaged.

"Don’t damage the hood," yelled one of us. "We’ll take KalaNag to school."

So we slid a bamboo stick under the cobra’s belly and lifted himon the end of the pole. We put him in a large biscuit tin and tiedit up with string. We hid the tin under a bed.



At night I hung around Gunga Ram waiting for him to get hissaucer of milk. ‘Aren’t you going to take any milk for Kala Nagtonight?’

"Yes," answered Gunga Ram irritably. "You go to bed."

He did not want any more argument on the subject.

"He won’t need the milk anymore."

Gunga Ram paused.

"Oh, nothing. There are so many frogs about. They must tastebetter than your milk. You never put any sugar in it anyway."

The next morning Gunga Ram brought back the saucer with themilk still in it. He looked sullen and suspicious.

"I told you snakes like frogs better than milk."

Whilst we changed and had breakfast Gunga Ram hung aroundus. The school bus came and we clambered into it with the tin.As the bus started we held out the tin to Gunga Ram.

"Here’s your Kala Nag. Safe in this box. We are going to puthim in spirit."

We left him standing speechless, staring at the departing bus.

There was great excitement in the school. We were a set of fourbrothers known for our toughness. We had proved it again.

"A King Cobra."

"Six feet long."

"Phannyar."



The tin was presented to the science teacher.

It was on the teacher’s table, and we waited for him to open itand admire our kill. The teacher pretended to be indifferent andset us some problems to work on. With studied matter-of-factness he fetched his forceps and a jar with a banded Kraitlying curled in muddy methylated spirit. He began to hum anduntie the cord around the box.

As soon as the cord was loosened the lid flew into the air, justmissing the teacher’s nose. There was Kala Nag. His eyes burntlike embers and his hood was taut and undamaged. With a loudhiss he went for the teacher’s face. The teacher pushed himselfback on the chair and toppled over. He fell on the floor andstared at the cobra, petrified with fear. The boys stood up ontheir desks and yelled hysterically.

Kala Nag surveyed the scene with his bloodshot eyes.

His forked tongue darted in and out excitedly. He spat furiouslyand then made a bid for freedom. He fell out of the tin on to thefloor with a loud plop. His back was broken in several placesand he dragged himself painfully to the door. When he got to thethreshold he drew himself up once again with his hoodoutspread to face another danger.

Outside the classroom stood Gunga Ram with a saucer and a jugof milk. As soon as he saw Kala Nag come up he went down onhis knees. He poured the milk into the saucer and placed it nearthe threshold. With hands folded in prayer he bowed his head tothe ground craving forgiveness. In desperate fury, the cobrahissed and spat and bit Gunga Ram all over the head—then withgreat effort dragged himself into a gutter and wriggled out ofview.



Gunga Ram collapsed with his hands covering his face. Hegroaned in agony. The poison blinded him instantly. Within afew minutes he turned pale and blue and froth appeared in hismouth. On his forehead were little drops of blood. These theteacher wiped with his handkerchief. Underneath was the Vmark where Kala Nag had dug his fangs.

****


OUTLINE

The story opens with the old Brahmin Gunga Ram pouring milkinto a saucer and placing it near the hole in which Kala Naglived. Gunga Ram is convinced that the milk is drunk everynight, a belief that is mocked by young boys of Gunga Ram’svillage. The boys ridicule Gunga Ram’s superstitious beliefsaying that it is a scientific fact that the snake does not drinkmilk. But Gunga Ram nearly shuts his eyes in pious horror andwarns the boys of inviting God’s wrath making fun of the sacredcreatures like snakes. The story is about this Gunga Ram and hisardent devotion towards Vishnu, a deity of Hindus. Gunga Ramhad faith in the trinity of Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva, who arethe creator, preserver and destroyer respectively in Hindureligion. He was particularly devoted towards God Vishnu andthus every morning smeared his head with the V mark withsandalwood paste as a sign of reverence for the deity. Besides,he was highly superstitious and believed that all life on earth issacred, even that of a serpent, scorpion or centipede. Thus, hewould never allow the young boys to beat such creatures. Manya time these creatures sting Gunga Ram but his faith remainedunwavering. This accounts for Gunga Ram’s deep regard for thesnake, particularly the Cobra or the Kala Nag.



On one occasion when the boys threatened Gunga Ram to killhis Kala Nag, he resisted and reasoned that if they kill the KalaNag it will not serve any purpose as the Nag had already laid ahundred of eggs that would soon become cobras. To teaseGunga Ram, the boys in return said that they would catch all thecobras alive and send to Bombay where they would be milkedfor anti-snake bite serum. In this manner Gunga Ram was oftenridiculed by the boys for his blind and unflinching devotiontowards snakes. Despite all these, he continued to feed andprotect snakes because according to him snakes were the vilestof God’s creatures on earth and if one could love them, oneproves one’s point.

It was monsoon time, when finally, the boys got to see the KalaNag. Heavy rains had flooded Kala Nag’s hole forcing it tocome out of it and sit in an open part of the lawn. The momentboys saw the Nag, they surrounded it with bamboo sticks intheir hands, though the Nag tried its best to evade danger, theboys managed to damage its back, leaving the head touched. Theboys then lifted it with the stick and put it in a large biscuit tinsecuring it with string. All this while, Gunga Ram was awayfrom home and had no clue as to what had happened to KalaNag.

The next morning as the boys climbed their school bus, theyheld out the tin to Gunga Ram shouting that the tin contained hisKala Nag which they would now put in spirit at school. GungaRam stood speechless and helpless. The boys presented the tinand their teacher with immense sense of pride and achievement.

As soon as the teacher untied the string around the tin, the lidflew into air and Kala Nag jumped at him. The teacher waspetrified while the boys in the class enjoyed the scene laughingand yelling. The Nag’s back had been broken by the boys, but it



somehow dragged itself to the door of the classroom and sat atthe threshold with its hood outspread. Gunga Ram was alreadystanding there with the saucer and jug of milk. The moment hesaw the Nag, Gunga Ram keeled to pour the milk into the saucerand placing it near the Nag folded his hands and bowed hisheading seeking the Nag’s forgiveness, but Kala Nag hissed andspat and bit Gunga Ram all over his head. Dragging itself to thegutter where it finally disappeared. Gunga Ram groaned inagony, turned pale and blue and froth appeared on his mouth.There were little drops of blood on his forehead which werewiped away by the teacher. Underneath was the V mark wherethe Kala Nag had dug its fangs.

STRUCTURE OF THE STORY

The plot of the story is quite simple. The old Brahmin is a firmdevotee of God Vishnu but at the same time he is superstitiousenough to believe that even venomous creatures like serpentsand scorpions can harm nobody and must be revered by all. Thestory follows the traditional pattern of storytelling that isexposition, rising action, falling action and climax.

The story begins in the middle of the conversation between theBrahmin, Gunga Ram and the young boys. The boys are seenscientifically proving that the Kala Nag or Cobra can neverdrink milk as against the belief of Gunga Ram. Thisconversation aptly exposes the theme of the story on which isthe action is based. The conflict between the science andreligion. The rising action reveals the identity and beliefs of themain character, Gunga Ram.

The falling action, however, is missing in the story. The climaxthat is quite extended includes Gunga Ram’s efforts to seek



forgiveness from Kala Nag for having been troubled by the boysthat finally results in his death.

MAIN THEMES

Conflict between science and religion, the old and the newgeneration, and the traditional and the modern are themes.Throughout the story we see that Gunga Ram who represents theold generation and religion enters into verbal arguments withyoung boys who represent the new generation and science. Themain cause of disagreement between the two is the former’sbelief based on religion or rather superstition such as snakesdrink milk or that they are sacred. While the latter are based onscientific reason and facts that snakes eat only once in severaldays.

Another important theme of the story is concerned withblindfolded belief in anything or anybody that is likely to incur alot of consequences. Gunga Ram meets his end for his foolishbelief that venomous serpents would never harm anyone. Hefails to draw a line between religious beliefs and superstition.

CHARACTERS

The main character of the story is Gunga Ram, an old andilliterate Brahmin. Gunga Ram is an ardent devotee of lordVishnu who would smear his forehead with a V mark withsandalwood paste everyday as a sign of his reverence for theLord Vishnu. He knows nothing about scientific facts and wetrace his ignorance time and again in the story. For instance, heis unable to relate to the fact that snakes are milked for anti-snake bite serum. He is also confused whether the cobra is amale snake or a female snake. But what is the distinguishingtrait of Gunga Ram is his blindfolded reverence for all creatureseven the serpents and the scorpions. It is this trait that prevents



him from making a distinction between the dangerous and theinnocent, religion and superstition, and eventually leads to hisdeath.

Another character of the story is the group of young boysincluding the narrator of the story who are most of the ties seenridiculing and belittling Gunga Ram and his superstitions. Theboys are depicted as mischievous lot who are in the habit ofhaving fun at the expense of others. They are extremely amusedwhen Gunga Ram says that cobra has laid hundred eggs thatwould soon turn into hundred cobras. They refute Gunga Ram’sassertion by saying that it is not possible since the cobra being amale cannot lay eggs. They burst into piece of laughter as theysay they would have hundreds of Gunga Rams. Similarly, theboys laugh and yell in the classroom when the teacher topplesover his chair as Kala Nag flies out of the tin in which it hasbeen captured by the boys and makes for the teacher’s face. Theboys also represent the new generation whose beliefs and ideasare based on scientific reason. Thus, the refusal to accept GungaRam’s conviction that Kala Nag drinks milk or that lays eggs.But what is quite unbecoming of the boys is the disrespectfulway in which they behave towards Gunga Ram who isundoubtedly an elderly man. Often they mock at him and makehim a laughing stock. That shows their insensitivity towards theelderly.

SIGNIFICANCE OF THE TITLE OF THE STORY

The title of the story is interesting and pricks the curiosity of thereaders. It raises certain questions in the minds of the readers.What is the mark of Vishnu all about and who applies this mark,why where, how, and when?



On the surface, the title refers to the V mark where ‘V’ standsfor Lord Vishnu that Gunga Ram makes on his foreheadeveryday with sandalwood paste as a sign of deep reverence forthe Hindu deity Vishnu.

On a deeper and more significant level, the V mark conveys thevery essence of the story. Towards the end of the story we findthat the Kala Nag had bite Gunga Ram at the very place on hisforehead where the V mark was. This conveys the message ofthe story that Gunga Ram’s superstitious belief that issymbolized by Kala Nag had the potential to harm him. Despitehis undying faith in God Vishnu represented by ‘V’ mark on hisforehead.

STYLISTIC DEVICES

Humour- the story is characterised by humour that evokes suchfun and laughter. There are various such instances in the story.There goes a conversational between Gunga Ram and youngboys, when Gunga Ram says that Kala Nag had laid hundredeggs that would soon become a hundred cobras. To this theboy’s reply that since the Kala Nag is a male it couldn’t havelaid eggs. They make fun of Gunga Ram by saying that thoseeggs must have been laid by Gunga Ram and thus soon therewould be a hundred eggs.

Another instance of pure humour is the situation when theteacher in school unties the tin in which the boys had broughtKala Nag than the lid of the tin flies off and just misses theteacher’s nose. The entire scene that describes Kala nag flyingcauses the teacher to topple over his chair with the boyslaughing and yelling is a source of much amusement to thereaders.



SATIRE

Another stylistic device used by Khushwant Singh in the story.Khushwant Singh has satirised rigid beliefs of the peoplebelonging to old generations represented by Gunga Ram and theheartlessness of the new generation represented by the youngboys. Throughout the character of Gunga Ram, he has exposedthe folly of religious faith that robes a person of his ability todiscern what is harmful and what is innocuous. On the otherhand, the story through the boy’s characters lay bare theweaknesses of the new generation. The boy’s argumentsregarding snakes may be scientifically sound but their behaviourtowards Gunga Ram were just on disrespect and insensitivity.

DICTION

Diction is also employed. As a postcolonial writer in IndianEnglish, a remarkable feature of Khushwant Singh’s style is theuse of Hindu words in the story such as Kala Nag, and Phanyaar.Such usage imparts an Indian flavour to the story and helps thereader, specially, an Indian reader to relate to a particular objectmore closely. Besides, Khushwant Singh chooses to write in asimple language that despite being easy to comprehend is highlyeffective. The intelligibility of the language also shows thatKhushwant Singh’s works like the story Mark of Vishnu are readwidely not just by the intelligentsia even the common man.

QUESTIONS

1. Major themes discussed in the story The Mark of Vishnu

2. How could you justify the title The Mark of Vishnu?

3. Describe Kala Nag



4. What happened to Ganga Ram in the end?

5. Khushwant Singh shows the danger of falling into the pit ofblind faith and superstition through the portrayal of GangaRam. Explain

REFERENCE

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/328094732_The_Mark_of_Vishnu_A_Critical_Study

http://sittingbee.com/the-mark-of-vishnu-khushwant-singh/

https://primestudyguides.com/the-mark-of-vishnu/analysis/characters/gunga-ram

https://entranciology.com/mark-of-vishnu-khushwant-singh-summary-english-language/

http://englishdepartmentnewcollege.blogspot.com/2016/09/summary-mark-of-vishnu-325-words.html



THE HAPPY PRINCE

Oscar Wilde

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

OSCAR WILDE (1854-1900)

Oscar Wilde was born in Dublin, Ireland on October 16, 1854.He was educated at Trinity College, Dublin and MagdalenCollege, Oxford. He was considered a brilliant student. In 1878,his poem Ravenna won the Newdigate Prize. Shortly afterleaving university his first volume of poetry was published. Hemoved to London in 1879. Wilde married Constance Lloyd, thedaughter of a wealthy Dublin barrister, in 1884 and the couplehad two sons.

Wilde wrote fairy stories for his boys. These were laterpublished as The Happy Prince and Other Tales. After beingmarried for 11 years, Wilde had left his wife and began having ahomosexual affair with Alfred Douglas. In May 1895, Wildewas prosecuted and imprisoned for homosexuality under theterms of the Criminal Law Amendment Act. He served twoyears in Old Bailey in London. Regrettable, his mother diedwhile he was still in jail. In 1897, after being released fromReading Prison, Wilde moved to France. A year later he wroteThe Ballad of Reading Gaol, a poem inspired by his prisonexperience. Wilde’s time in prison badly damaged his health andhe died on November 30, 1900, in Paris, France, three yearsafter leaving prison. He is buried in Pere Lachaise Cemetery inParis, in a tomb designed by Epstein.



Wilde’s work is full of self-reference. As Wilde wrote, ‘I tookthe drama, the most objective form known to art, and made itpersonal a mode of expression as the lyric or the sonnet”

(Complete Works of Oscar Wilde, 1994)

He has been the subject of increasing critical attention over thelast decade. He has been identified as a key figure with gaycriticism. He is now recognised as a highly professional writer,acutely aware of his readership at a variety of levels, and alsoone who deliberately and systematically explored the oraldimension. His position as an Irish writer gives him status in thecontext of postcolonial criticism.

Major Works:

Vera or the Nihilists (1880)

The Happy Prince and Other Tales (1888)

The Portrait of Mr. W.H (1889)

The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890)

The Soul of Man Under Socialism (1891)

The Sphinx (1894), poem

The Importance of Being Ernest (1899)

A Woman of No Importance (1894)



In short, the duality of Wilde in all aspects fascinates, confuses:The Anglo- Irishman with Nationalist sympathies, the Protestantwith lifelong Catholic learnings, the married homosexual, themusician of words and painter of language. He is the artistacross not two but three cultures, an Anglo-Francophile and aCelt at heart. In addition to this, there is a Faustian elementabout this classical scholar who thirsted for sensation andexperience. Wilde is most often compared with the philosopher,Nietzsche. On the whole, we can say Wilde is a figure ofparadox and contradiction, participated in both modern valuecritique and postmodern perspectives.

THE HAPPY PRINCE

(Text)

High above the city, on a tall column, stood the statue of theHappy Prince.

He was gilded all over with thin leaves of fine gold; for eyes hehad two bright sapphires, and a large red ruby glowed on hissword-hilt.

He was very much admired indeed. “He is as beautiful as aweathercock,” remarked one of the Town Councillors whowished to gain a reputation for having artistic tastes; “only notquite so useful,” he added, fearing lest people should think himunpractical, which he really was not.

“Why can’t you be like the Happy Prince?” asked a sensiblemother of her little boy who was crying for the moon. “TheHappy Prince never dreams of crying for anything.” “I am gladthere is someone in the world who is quite happy,” muttered adisappointed man as he gazed at the wonderful statue.



“He looks just like an angel,” said the Charity Children as theycame out of the cathedral in their bright scarlet cloaks, and theirclean white pinafores.

“How do you know?” said the Mathematical Master, “you havenever seen one.”

“Ah! but we have, in our dreams,” answered the children; andthe Mathematical Master frowned and looked very severe, for hedid not approve of children dreaming.

One night there flew over the city a little Swallow. His friendshad gone away to Egypt six weeks before, but he had stayedbehind, for he was in love with the most beautiful Reed. He hadmet her early in the spring as he was flying down the river aftera big yellow moth, and had been so attracted by her slenderwaist that he had stopped to talk to her.

“Shall I love you?” said the Swallow, who liked to come to thepoint at once, and the Reed made him a low bow. So he flewround and round her, touching the water with his wings, andmaking silver ripples. This was his courtship, and it lasted allthrough the summer.

“It is a ridiculous attachment,” twittered the other Swallows,“she has no money, and far too many relations”; and indeed theriver was quite full of Reeds.

Then, when the autumn came, they all flew away.

After they had gone he felt lonely, and began to tire of his lady-love. “She has no conversation,” he said, “and I am afraid thatshe is a coquette, for she is always flirting with the wind.” Andcertainly, whenever the wind blew, the Reed made the mostgraceful curtsies. “I admit that she is domestic,” he continued,



“but I love travelling, and my wife, consequently, should lovetravelling also.”

“Will you come away with me?” he said finally to her; but theReed shook her head, she was so attached to her home.

“You have been trifling with me,” he cried. “I am off to thePyramids. Goodbye!” and he flew away.

All day long he flew, and at night-time he arrived at the city.“Where shall I put up?” he said; “I hope the town has madepreparations.” Then he saw the statue on the tall column. “I willput up there,” he cried; “it is a fine position with plenty of freshair.” So he alighted just between the feet of the Happy Prince.

“I have a golden bedroom he said softly to himself as he lookedround, and he prepared to go to sleep; but just as he was puttinghis head under his wing a large drop of water fell on him. “Whata curious thing!” he cried. “there is not a single cloud in the sky,the stars are quite clear and bright, and yet it is raining. Theclimate in the north of Europe is really dreadful. The Reed usedto like the rain, but that was merely her selfishness.” Thenanother drop fell.

“What is the use of a statue if it cannot keep the rain off?” hesaid; “I must look for a good chimney-pot,” and he determinedto fly away.

But before he had opened his wings, a third drop fell, and helooked up, and saw- Ah! what did he see?

The eyes of the Happy Prince were filled with tears, and tearswere running down his golden cheeks. His face was so beautifulin the moonlight that the little Swallow was filled with pity.



“Who are you?” he said.

“I am the Happy Prince.” “Why are you weeping then?” askedthe Swallow; “you have quite drenched me.” “When I was aliveand had a human heart,” answered the statue, “I did not knowwhat tears were, for I lived in the Palace of Sans Souci, wheresorrow is not allowed to enter. In the day time I played with mycompanions in the garden, and in the evening I led the dance inthe Great Hall. Round the garden ran a very lofty wall, but Inever cared to ask what lay beyond it, everything about me wasso beautiful. My courtiers called me the Happy Prince, andhappy indeed I was, if pleasure be happiness. So I lived, and so Idied. And now that I am dead they have set me up here so highthat I can see all the ugliness and all the misery of my city, andthough my heart is made of lead yet I cannot choose but weep.”“What, is he not solid gold?” said the Swallow to himself. Hewas too polite to make any personal remarks out loud.

“Far away,” continued the statue in a low musical voice, “faraway in a little street there is a poor house. One of the windowsis open, and through it I can see a woman seated at a table. Herface is thin and worn, and she has coarse red hands, all prickedby the needle, for she is a seamstress. She is embroideringpassion-flowers on a satin gown for the loveliest of the Queen’smaids-of-honour to wear at the next Court-ball. In a bed in thecorner of the room her little boy is lying ill. He has a fever, andis asking for oranges. His mother has nothing to give him butriver water, so he is crying. Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow,will you not bring her the ruby out of my sword-hilt? My feetare fastened to this pedestal and I cannot move.” “I am waitedfor in Egypt,” said the Swallow. “My friends are flying up anddown the Nile, and talking to the large lotus-flowers. Soon theywill be going to sleep in the tomb of the great King. The King isthere himself in his painted coffin. He is wrapped in yellow



linen, and embalmed with spices. Round his neck is a chain ofpale green jade, and his hands are like withered leaves.”“Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow,” said the Prince, “will younot stay with me for one night, and be my messenger? The boyis so thirsty, and the mother so sad.” “I don’t think I like boys,”answered the Swallow. “Last summer, when I was staying on theriver, there were two rude boys, the miller’s sons, who werealways throwing stones at me. They never hit me, of course; weswallows fly far too well for that, and besides, I come of afamily famous for its agility; but still, it was a mark ofdisrespect.”

But the Happy Prince looked so sad that the little Swallow wassorry. “It is very cold here,” he said; “but I will stay with you forone night, and be your messenger.” “Thank you, little Swallow,”said the Prince.

So the Swallow picked out the great ruby from the Prince’ssword, and flew away with it in his beak over the roofs of thetown.

He passed by the cathedral tower, where the white marble angelswere sculptured. He passed by the palace and heard the sound ofdancing. A beautiful girl came out on the balcony with her lover.

“How wonderful the stars are,” he said to her, “and howwonderful is the power of love!” “I hope my dress will be readyin time for the State-ball,” she answered; “I have orderedpassion-flowers to be embroidered on it; but the seamstressesare so lazy. “He passed over the river, and saw the lanternshanging to the masts of the ships. He passed over the Ghetto,and saw the old Jews bargaining with each other, and weighingout money in copper scales. At last he came to the poor houseand looked in. The boy was tossing feverishly on his bed, and



the mother had fallen asleep, she was so tired. In he hopped, andlaid the great ruby on the table beside the woman’s thimble.Then he flew gently round the bed, fanning the boy’s foreheadwith his wings. “How cool I feel,” said the boy, “I must begetting better”; and he sank into a delicious slumber.

Then the Swallow flew back to the Happy Prince, and told himwhat he had done. “It is curious,” he remarked, “but I feel quitewarm now, although it is so cold.” “That is because you havedone a good action,” said the Prince. And the little Swallowbegan to think, and then he fell asleep. Thinking always madehim sleepy. When day broke he flew down to the river and had abath. “What are markable phenomenon,” said the Professor ofOrnithology as he was passing over the bridge. “A swallow inwinter!” And he wrote a long letter about it to the localnewspaper. Every one quoted it, it was full of so many wordsthat they could not understand.

“To-night I go to Egypt,” said the Swallow, and he was in highspirits at the prospect. He visited all the public monuments, andsat a long time on top of the church steeple. Wherever he wentthe Sparrows chirruped, and said to each other, “What adistinguished stranger!” so he enjoyed himself very much.

When the moon rose he flew back to the Happy Prince. “Haveyou any commissions for Egypt?” he cried. “I am just starting.”“Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow,” said the Prince, “will younot stay with me one night longer?” “I am waited for in Egypt,”answered the Swallow. “To-morrow my friends will fly up to theSecond Cataract. The river-horse couches there among thebulrushes, and on a great granite throne sits the God Memnon.All night long he watches the stars, and when the morning starshine she utters one cry of joy, and then he is silent. At noon theyellow lions come down to the water’s edge to drink. They have



eyes like green beryls, and their roar is louder than the roar ofthe cataract.” “Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow,” said thePrince, “far away across the city I see a young man in a garret.He is leaning over a desk covered with papers, and in a tumblerby his side there is a bunch of withered violets. His hair isbrown and crisp, and his lips are red as a pomegranate, and hehas large and dreamy eyes. He is trying to finish a play for theDirector of the Theatre, but he is too cold to write any more.There is no fire in the grate, and hunger has made him faint.” “Iwill wait with you one night longer,” said the Swallow, whoreally had a good heart. “Shall I take him another ruby?” “Alas!I have no ruby now,” said the Prince; “my eyes are all that Ihave left.

They are made of rare sapphires, which were brought out ofIndia a thousand years ago. Pluck out one of them and take it tohim. He will sell it to the jeweller, and buy food and firewood,and finish his play.” “Dear Prince,” said the Swallow, “I cannotdo that”; and he began to weep.

“Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow,” said the Prince, “do as Icommand you.” So the Swallow plucked out the Prince’s eye,and flew away to the student’s garret. It was easy enough to getin, as there was a hole in the roof. Through this he darted, andcame into the room. The young man had his head buried in hishands, so he did not hear the flutter of the bird’s wings, andwhen he looked up he found the beautiful sapphire lying on thewithered violets.

“I am beginning to be appreciated,” he cried; “this is from somegreat admirer. Now I can finish my play,” and he looked quitehappy.



The next day the Swallow flew down to the harbour. He sat onthe mast of a large vessel and watched the sailors hauling bigchests out of the hold with ropes.

“Heave a-hoy!” they shouted as each chest came up. “I amgoing to Egypt!” cried the Swallow, but nobody minded, andwhen the moon rose he flew back to the Happy Prince.

“I am come to bid you good-bye,” he cried.

“Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow,” said the Prince, “will younot stay with me one night longer?” “It is winter,” answered theSwallow, “and the chill snow will soon be here. In Egypt the sunis warm on the green palm-trees, and the crocodiles lie in themud and look lazily about them. My companions are building anest in the Temple of Baalbec, and the pink and white doves arewatching them, and cooing to each other. Dear Prince, I mustleave you, but I will never forget you, and next spring I willbring you back beautiful jewels in place of those you have givenaway. The ruby shall be redder than a red rose, and the sapphireshall be as blue as the great sea.”

“In the square below,” said the Happy Prince, “there stands alittle match-girl.

She has let her matches fall in the gutter, and they are allspoiled. Her father will beat her if she does not bring home somemoney, and she is crying. She has no shoes or stockings, and herlittle head is bare. Pluck out my other eye, and give it to her, andher father will not beat her.” “I will stay with you one nightlonger,” said the Swallow, “but I cannot pluck out your eye. Youwould be quite blind then.” “Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow,”said the Prince, “do as I command you.” So he plucked out thePrince’s other eye, and darted down with it. He swooped past thematch-girl, and slipped the jewel into the palm of her hand.



“What a lovely bit of glass,” cried the little girl; and she ranhome, laughing.

Then the Swallow came back to the Prince. “You are blindnow,” he said, “so I will stay with you always.” “No, littleSwallow,” said the poor Prince, “you must go away to Egypt.”“I will stay with you always,” said the Swallow, and he slept atthe Prince’s feet.

All the next day he sat on the Prince’s shoulder, and told himstories of what he had seen in strange lands. He told him of thered ibises, who stand in long rows on the banks of the Nile, andcatch gold fish in their beaks; of the Sphinx, who is as old as theworld itself, and lives in the desert, and knows everything; of themerchants, who walk slowly by the side of their camels, andcarry amber beads in their hands; of the King of the Mountainsof the Moon, who is as black as ebony, and worships a largecrystal; of the great green snake that sleeps in a palm-tree, andhas twenty priests to feed it with honey-cakes; and of thepygmies who sail over a big lake on large flat leaves, and arealways at war with the butterflies.

“Dear little Swallow,” said the Prince, “you tell me ofmarvellous things, but more marvellous than anything is thesuffering of men and of women. There is no Mystery so great asMisery. Fly over my city, little Swallow, and tell me what yousee there.” So the Swallow flew over the great city, and saw therich making merry in their beautiful houses, while the beggarswere sitting at the gates. He flew into dark lanes, and saw thewhite faces of starving children looking out listlessly at theblack streets. Under the archway of a bridge two little boys werelying in one another’s arms to try and keep themselves warm.“How hungry we are!” they said. “You must not lie here,”shouted the Watchman, and they wandered out into the rain.



Then he flew back and told the Prince what he had seen.

“I am covered with fine gold,” said the Prince, “you must take itoff, leaf by leaf, and give it to my poor; the living always thinkthat gold can make them happy.”

Leaf after leaf of the fine gold the Swallow picked off, till theHappy Prince looked quite dull and grey. Leaf after leaf of thefine gold he brought to the poor, and the children’s faces grewrosier, and they laughed and played games in the street. “Wehave bread now!” they cried.

Then the snow came, and after the snow came the frost. Thestreets looked as if they were made of silver, they were so brightand glistening; long icicles like crystal daggers hung down fromthe eaves of the houses, everybody went about in furs, and thelittle boys wore scarlet caps and skated on the ice.

The poor little Swallow grew colder and colder, but he wouldnot leave the Prince, he loved him too well. He picked upcrumbs outside the baker’s door when the baker was notlooking, and tried to keep himself warm by flapping his wings.

But at last he knew that he was going to die. He had just strengthto fly up to the Prince’s shoulder once more. “Good-bye, dearPrince!” he murmured, “will you let me kiss your hand?” “I amglad that you are going to Egypt at last, little Swallow,” said thePrince, “you have stayed too long here; but you must kiss me onthe lips, for I love you.” “It is not to Egypt that I am going,” saidthe Swallow. “I am going to the House of Death. Death is thebrother of Sleep, is he not?” And he kissed the Happy Prince onthe lips, and fell down dead at his feet.



At that moment a curious crack sounded inside the statue, as ifsomething had broken. The fact is that the leaden heart hadsnapped right in two. It certainly was a dreadfully hard frost.

Early the next morning the Mayor was walking in the squarebelow in company with the Town Councillors. As they passedthe column he looked up at the statue: “Dear me! how shabbythe Happy Prince looks!” he said.

“How shabby indeed!” cried the Town Councillors, who alwaysagreed with the Mayor, and they went up to look at it.

“The ruby has fallen out of his sword, his eyes are gone, and heis golden no longer,” said the Mayor. “in fact, he is little betterthan a beggar!” “Little better than a beggar,” said the TownCouncillors.

“And here is actually a dead bird at his feet!” continued theMayor. “We must really issue a proclamation that birds are notto be allowed to die here.” And the town Clerk made a note ofthe suggestion.

So they pulled down the statue of the Happy Prince. “As he isno longer beautiful he is no longer useful,” said the ArtProfessor at the University.

Then they melted the statue in a furnace, and the Mayor held ameeting of the Corporation to decide what was to be done withthe metal. “We must have another statue, of course,” he said,“and it shall be a statue of myself.” “Of myself,” said each of theTown Councillors, and they quarrelled. When I last heard ofthem they were quarrelling still.

“What a strange thing,” said the overseer of the workmen at thefoundry.



“This broken lead heart will not melt in the furnace. We mustthrow it away.” So they threw it on a dust heap where the deadSwallow was also lying.

“Bring me the two most precious things in the city,” said God toone of His Angels; and the Angel brought Him the leaden heartand the dead bird.

“You have rightly chosen,” said God, “for in my garden ofParadise this little bird shall sing for evermore, and in my city ofgold the Happy Prince shall praise me.”

*****

ANALYSIS

INTRODUCTION

The Happy Prince is the story about a beautifully decoratedstatue of a prince who lived a very happy life. He learnt aboutsorrow after his death, when his statue was placed at a highpoint from where the misery of the entire city could be seen.Moved by the plight of the poor, the Happy Prince gave away allhis possessions to the needy with the help of a kind swallow.This compassionate bird sacrificed his life for the noble cause ofthe Prince.

STORYLINE

Once in a town there lived a prince. He was called the HappyPrince because he had been happy all his life. After his death,his statue covered with gold, two precious sapphire stonesembedded in the eyes and a ruby stone fitted into the handle ofhis sword was erected on a tall pedestal in the middle of the



town. From there, he could see all around the place and realizedthat the people lived in a lot of poverty and misery. This sightsaddened the prince and being helpless, he would weep to seethe plight of his people. One day a swallow was flying throughthe city, on its way to Egypt to meet its friends. On the way, ittook shelter for the night at the feet of the statue of the happyprince. The bird realized that the statue was weeping and uponinquiry, realized the plight of the prince. The helpless princerequested the bird to help it by becoming its messenger. Afterinitial refusal, the bird agreed and took the ruby stone out of thesword hilt and delivered it to a poor seamstress. The nextmorning, as he went to bid goodbye, the statue convinced him tostay back for one more day. That day, the bird was asked toremove the sapphire stone from one of the statue’s eyes anddeliver it to a young playwright. Also, on the third day the birdhad to pull out the second sapphire stone for a poor match girl.By this time, the weather had become cold and the bird haddeveloped an attachment with the statue. The bird did not wantto leave the statue which had now become blind. The happyprince asked the bird to go around the city and inform him thecondition of the people living there. The bird told him that therich were making merry while the poor lived in misery. As thehappy prince did not have any more precious stones, he orderedthe bird to remove the gold foils from his body and distributeamong the living who needed money for survival. Gradually, thestatue of the prince lost its covering of gold and became dull andgrey. On the other hand, the poor became joyous as they gotbread to eat. The bird was now unable to withstand the coldweather and realized that death was approaching. It informed thestatue that it had to leave and the statue, who loved the birdasked it to kiss him. As the bird died and fell at the statue’s feet,a strange sound came out of the statue and it was the sound ofthe breaking of its heart. Although the statue’s heart was made



of lead, it broke as it was overwhelmed with affection towardsthe bird. When the statue was melted in the furnace, the heartdid not melt and was thrown in the garbage. It landed near theswallow’s body. God’s angels took both the dead swallow andthe broken heart to him as they were the most precious things onland.

THEME

The story is an allegory and is based on the theme thatlove and sacrifice are important values in human life.Happiness comes to those who make others happy.Those who have compassion and concern get as muchjoy as those who receive their kindness and charity.Hence, one must try to live a life guided by the virtues oflove, sacrifice, benevolence, and joy.

The spiritual beauty or inner beauty is more importantthan outward beauty. The real beauty is love, compas-sionate heart and sacrifice. The prince and the swallowlost their outward beauty to attain inner beauty by help-ing the poor and needy.

There is a huge gap between the rich and the poor. Weshould help the poor and needy people in society so thatthey are able to lead a happy life.

MESSAGE

1. The first message is that we must spread happinessaround us if we wish to be happy. It is useless to mountstatues with gold and jewels when the people are hungry.The Prince could be happy only as long as sorrow wasnot allowed to enter his palace. Once he saw pain, suffer-ing and injustice, even his lead heart cried.



2. The next message is that disparity and sorrow in societycan be overcome by compassion, generosity and sharing.The generous prince and the gentle swallow sacrificedthemselves to bring happiness to the poor and the needy.However, their deaths did not end their lives. The re-demptive power of love made them live forever as theprecious and chosen ones of God.

3. The most powerful message or moral lesson given bythis story is that it is very essential to help the poor andthe downtrodden in society. The second message is, wemust be sensitive to the people who are suffering, espe-cially the poor, and help them out. This will reduce theirsuffering and help them to stand up.

JUSTIFICATION OF THE TITLE

The title of the story, The Happy Prince, presents its elements ina symbolic manner. The story is about a prince who used to behappy when he was alive. However, he is very sad after he isplaced atop a column as a statue. The prince appeared to behappy only because he knew nothing of life outside of hispalace. Only after he died and became a statue did he learn ofthe people’s suffering and the disparity between the rich and thepoor. He now sought happiness by sacrificing himself for thehappiness of others. The title thus aptly suggests that theoutward happiness of the prince is symbolic of the superficialjoys in life. Real happiness lies in having a compassionate heart.

The statue of the Happy Prince is adorned with gold andprecious stones. The Happy Prince gets happiness bydistributing the jewellery to the poor of the city. The swallowhelps him to carry out his task. The Prince who was crying whenthe swallow met him, now feels happy that he has been able to



make a number of poor people happy around the city. So, thetitle “Happy Prince” is apt. It is about the inner or real happinessof the prince at the cost of his outer happiness.

SYMBOL

THE LEAD HEART

The Happy Prince has a heart made of lead, which breaks whenhis beloved Swallow dies of the cold. At first, this lead heartappears to emphasize the superficiality of the Prince’s beauty,though it later comes to symbolize the steadfast nature of love.In the beginning of the story, the lead heart reveals that the golddecorating the Prince’s outside does not carry through hisinsides. This advises one to avoid judging by appearances, asthey can be deceitful. Although town officials try to melt theheart down and repurpose it with the rest of the statue, it refusesto melt. And when at the end of the story God asks for the twomost precious things in the city to be brought to him, the leadheart, although broken, ends up being one of them. The leadheart thus ultimately represents both the steadfastness of truelove and the value of compassion. By refusing to melt, the heartalso indicates that some things persist beyond one’s own life—that is, that there exist values greater than the sum of a life.

GLOSSARY

Seamstress : a woman who makes a living bysewing

Thimble : a metal or plastic cap with a closedend worn to protect the finger andpush the needle in sewing



Garret : small dark room at the top of thehouse

QUESTIONS

1. Why do the courtiers call the prince “the Happy Prince”?

2. What does the swallow see when it flies over the city?

3. Why did the swallow not leave the prince and go to Egypt?

4. What are the precious things mentioned in the story? Why arethey precious?

5. Justify the title Happy Prince

6. What are the major themes discussed in the story The HappyPrince?

REFERENCES

https://interestingliterature.com/2021/03/oscar-wilde-the-happy-prince-summary-analysis/

https://www.learncram.com/english-summary/the-happy-prince-summary/

https://fictionistic.com/the-happy-prince-by-oscar-wilde-brief/

https://study.com/academy/lesson/the-happy-prince-themes-analysis.html

https://www.litcharts.com/lit/the-happy-prince/characters



Module IV

THE MONKEY’S PAW

W.W Jacobs

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

W.W JACOBS (1863-1943)

William Wymark Jacobs was born on September 8, 1863 inLondon, England. An author, humourist and dramatist, Jacobs isbest remembered for the enduring classic tale of horror called“The Monkey’s Paw”.

As a youth, Jacobs grew up near the Wapping docks in London,where his father was a wharf manager. Although he grew upsurrounded by poverty, Jacobs himself received a formaleducation in London, first at a private prep school and later atthe Birkbeck Literary and Scientific Institute (now part of theUniversity of London and known as Birkbeck College).

Jacobs’ adult working life began with a clerical position at thePost Office Savings Bank. The job was not a stimulating oneand Jacobs started writing short stories, sketches and articles,many of which appeared in the Post Office house publication“Blackfriars Magazine.” Although Jacobs did receive his fairshare of rejection slips at the beginning of his career, manyworks written during this period of clerical employment



appeared in the “Idler” and “Today” magazines, both edited bynoted humorist Jerome K. Jerome, who had taken a liking toJacobs’ stories. From 1898, Jacobs also published stories in“The Strand”, a monthly fiction and general interest magazine.The arrangement stayed in place for most of his life and many ofthe works in Jacobs’ subsequent collections – including thenautical serialization A Master of Craft (1899-1900) -- appearedhere first.

Jacobs’ first volume of collected works was published in 1896.Many Cargoes, a selection of sea-faring yarns, establishedJacobs as a popular writer and humorist with a penchant forauthentic dialogue and trick endings (critics of the day referredto him as the “O. Henry of the Waterfront”). He then published anovelette, The Skipper’s Wooing, in 1897 and another collectionof short stories titled Sea Urchins in 1898. These works paintedvivid, if farcical, pictures of dockland and seafaring Londonwith colourful characters that now seem archetypal.

By 1899, Jacobs was able to quit the post office and finallybegin making a living as a full-time writer. He married notedsuffragist Agnes Eleanor Williams (who had been jailed for herprotest activities) the next year, 1900. They set up a householdin Loughton, Essex as well as living part of the year in centralLondon. The couple went on to have five children togetherthough their marriage was considered an unhappy one.

The publication of two short novels: At Sunwich Port (aromantic tale of rival sea captains in the fictional seasidecommunity of Sunwich standing in for the actual East Englandcommunity of Sandwich, Kent) and Dialstone Lane (anothersmall town romance involving intrigue and buried treasure), in1902 and 1904 respectively, cemented Jacobs’ reputation as oneof the leading British authors of the new century. These were



followed by a string of successful publications, includingCaptain’s All (1905), Night Watches (1914), The Castaways(1916), and Sea Whispers (1926). Jacobs published eighteenbooks in all during his lifetime, thirteen collections and fivenovels.

As a storyteller, Jacobs is perhaps better remembered for ahandful of brief tales of the supernatural than for his popularnautical-themed works. The most famous of these, The Monkey’sPaw, originally appeared as part of the 1902 short storycollection The Lady of the Barge. It is an economically writtenstory about a shrivelled talisman, a monkey’s paw that bringsgrief and horror in the wake of all too literal wish granting. Thestory has been adapted for other media repeatedly, starting witha one-act play performed at London’s Haymarket Theatre in1903. There have been multiple film adaptations of the story inthe modern era; some of us are familiar with its appearance in anepisode of the popular animated series, The Simpsons.

Another macabre gem, The Toll-House, was published as part ofthe collection Sailor’s Knots in 1909. It economically tells thestory of a group of men who spend the night in a famouslyhaunted house on a dare (a noticeably similar narrative conceptwas put to use in the much earlier play The Ghost of JerryBundler, which had launched Jacobs’ parallel career as adramatist back in 1899 when it was produced at the St. JamesTheatre in London). Innovative at the time of writing, thesespare ghost stories are now familiar classics of the supernaturalgenre.

Though prolific in his younger years, Jacobs’ productivitydropped dramatically after the start of World War I. Yet even inself-imposed semi-retirement Jacobs was still recognized as aleading humourist, ranked alongside such writers as P. G.



Wodehouse and George Birmingham. He enjoyed continuinginfluence and elevated status among his fellow writers asevidenced by these comments attributed to his colleague HenryJames:

“Mr. Jacobs, I envy you. You are popular! Your admirable workis appreciated by a wide circle of readers; it has achievedpopularity. Mine never goes into a second edition.”

Though Jacobs would create little in the way of new work after1911, he was still writing. In these later years, Jacobsconcentrated more on writing dramatizations and adaptations ofhis existing stories, including Beauty and the Barge, a filmversion starring Margaret Rutherford was also released in 1937and In the Dark, a one act play that is often bundled with TheMonkey’s Paw adaptation.

Jacobs is universally considered to be a fine and imaginativeliterary craftsman. Nonetheless, Jacobs’ legacy remains solid: hecontinued Dickens’ (a writer with whom he is also oftencompared) tradition for sharing working class stories inauthentic vernacular. And polished narratives such as TheMonkey’s Paw set a standard for the clever use of horror infiction and popular culture that endures to this day.

Jacobs died in a North London nursing home on September 1,1943 a week prior to his 80th birthday.



THE MONKEY’S PAW

(Text)

“Be careful what you wish for, you may receive it.” –Anonymous

PART ONE

Outside, the night was cold and wet, but in the small living roomthe curtains were closed and the fire burned brightly. Father andson were playing chess; the father, whose ideas about the gameinvolved some very unusual moves, putting his king into suchsharp and unnecessary danger that it even brought commentfrom the white-haired old lady knitting quietly by the fire.

“Listen to the wind,” said Mr. White who, having seen a mistakethat could cost him the game after it was too late, was trying tostop his son from seeing it.

“I’m listening,” said the son, seriously studying the board as hestretched out his hand. “Check.”

“I should hardly think that he’ll come tonight,” said his father,with his hand held in the air over the board.

“Mate,” replied the son.

“That’s the worst of living so far out,” cried Mr. White withsudden and unexpected violence; “Of all the awful out of theway places to live in, this is the worst. Can’t walk on thefootpath without getting stuck in the mud, and the road’s a river.I don’t know what the people are thinking about. I suppose theythink it doesn’t matter because only two houses in the road havepeople in them.”



“Never mind, dear,” said his wife calmly; “perhaps you’ll winthe next one.

” Mr. White looked up sharply, just in time to see a knowinglook between mother and son. The words died away on his lips,and he hid a guilty smile in his thin grey beard.

“There he is,” said Herbert White as the gate banged shut loudlyand heavy footsteps came toward the door.

The old man rose quickly and opening the door, was heardtelling the new arrival how sorry he was for his recent loss. Thenew arrival talked about his sadness, so that Mrs. White said,“Tut, tut!” and coughed gently as her husband entered the roomfollowed by a tall, heavy built, strong-looking man, whose skinhad the healthy reddish colour associated with outdoor life andwhose eyes showed that he could be a dangerous enemy.

“Sergeant-Major Morris,” he said, introducing him to his wifeand his son, Herbert.

The Sergeant-Major shook hands and, taking the offered seat bythe fire, watched with satisfaction as Mr. White got out whiskeyand glasses.

After the third glass his eyes got brighter and he began to talk.The little family circle listened with growing interest to thisvisitor from distant parts, as he squared his broad shoulders inthe chair and spoke of wild scenes and brave acts; of wars andstrange peoples.

“Twenty-one years of it,” said Mr. White, looking at his wifeand son. “When he went away he was a thin young man. Nowlook at him.”



“He doesn’t look to have taken much harm.” said Mrs. Whitepolitely.

“I’d like to go to India myself,” said the old man, just to lookaround a bit, you know.”

“Better where you are,” said the Sergeant-Major, shaking hishead. He put down the empty glass and sighing softly, shook itagain.

“I should like to see those old temples and fakirs and the streetentertainers,” said the old man. “What was that that you startedtelling me the other day about a monkey’s paw or something,Morris?”

“Nothing.” said the soldier quickly. “At least, nothing worthhearing.”

“Monkey’s paw?” said Mrs. White curiously.

“Well, it’s just a bit of what you might call magic, perhaps,” saidthe Sergeant-Major, without first stopping to think.

His three listeners leaned forward excitedly. Deep in thought,the visitor put his empty glass to his lips and then set it downagain. Mr. White filled it for him again.

“To look at it,” said the Sergeant-Major, feeling about in hispocket, “it’s just an ordinary little paw, dried to a mummy.”

He took something out of his pocket and held it out for them.Mrs. White drew back with a look of disgust, but her son, takingit, examined it curiously.

“And what is there special about it?” asked Mr. White as he tookit from his son, and having examined it, placed it upon the table.



“It had a spell put on it by an old fakir,” said the Sergeant-Major,“a very holy man. He wanted to show that fate ruled people’slives, and that those who tried to change it would be sorry. Heput a spell on it so that three different men could each have threewishes from it.”

The way he told the story showed that he truly believed it andhis listeners became aware that their light laughter was out ofplace and had hurt him a little.

“Well, why don’t you have three, sir?” said Herbert, cleverly.

The soldier looked at him the way that the middle aged usuallylook at disrespectful youth. “I have,” he said quietly, and hisface whitened.

“And did you really have the three wishes granted?” asked Mrs.White.

“I did,” said the Sergeant-Major, and his glass tapped against hisstrong teeth.

“And has anybody else wished?” continued the old lady.

“The first man had his three wishes. Yes,” was the reply, “I don’tknow what the first two were, but the third was for death. That’show I got the paw.”

His voice was so serious that the group fell quiet.

“If you’ve had your three wishes it’s no good to you now thenMorris,” said the old man at last. “What do you keep it for?”

The soldier shook his head. “Fancy I suppose,” he said slowly.“I did have some idea of selling it, but I don’t think I will. It hascaused me enough trouble already. Besides, people won’t buy.



They think it’s just a story, some of them; and those who dothink anything of it want to try it first and pay me afterward.”

“If you could have another three wishes,” said the old man,watching him carefully, “would you have them?”

“I don’t know,” said the other. “I don’t know.”

He took the paw, and holding it between his front finger andthumb, suddenly threw it upon the fire. Mr. White, with a slightcry, quickly bent down and took it off.

“Better let it burn,” said the soldier sadly, but in a way that letthem know he believed it to be true.

“If you don’t want it Morris,” said the other, “give it to me.”

“I won’t.” said his friend with stubborn determination. “I threwit on the fire. If you keep it, don’t hold me responsible for whathappens. Throw it on the fire like a sensible man.”

The other shook his head and examined his possession closely.“How do you do it?” he asked.

“Hold it up in your right hand, and state your wish out loud sothat you can be heard,” said the Sergeant-Major, “But I warnyou of what might happen.”

“Sounds like the ‘Arabian Nights’”, said Mrs. White, as she roseand began to set the dinner. “Don’t you think you might wish forfour pairs of hands for me.”

Her husband drew the talisman from his pocket, and all threelaughed loudly as the Sergeant-Major, with a look of alarm onhis face, caught him by the arm.



“If you must wish,” he demanded, “Wish for somethingsensible.”

Mr. White dropped it back in his pocket, and placing chairs,motioned his friend to the table. In the business of dinner, thetalisman was partly forgotten, and afterward the three satfascinated as the listened to more of the soldier’s adventures inIndia.

“If the tale about the monkey’s paw is not more truthful thanthose he has been telling us,” said Herbert, as the door closedbehind their guest, just in time to catch the last train, “we shan’tmake much out of it.”

“Did you give anything for it, father?” asked Mrs. White,watching her husband closely.

“A little,” said he, colouring slightly, “He didn’t want it, but Imade him take it. And he pressed me again to throw it away.”

“Not likely!” said Herbert, with pretended horror. “Why, we’regoing to be rich, and famous, and happy.” Smiling, he said,“Wish to be a king, father, to begin with; then mother can’tcomplain all the time.”

He ran quickly around the table, chased by the laughing MrsWhite armed with a piece of cloth.

Mr. White took the paw from his pocket and eyed it doubtfully.“I don’t know what to wish for, and that’s a fact,” he saidslowly. “It seems to me I’ve got all I want.”

“If you only paid off the house, you’d be quite happy, wouldn’tyou!” said Herbert, with his hand on his shoulder. “Well, wishfor two hundred pounds, then; that’ll just do it.”



His father, smiling and with an embarrassed look for hisfoolishness in believing the soldier’s story, held up the talisman.Herbert, with a serious face, spoiled only by a quick smile to hismother, sat down at the piano and struck a few grand chords.

“I wish for two hundred pounds,” said the old man clearly.

A fine crash from the piano greeted his words, broken by afrightened cry from the old man. His wife and son ran towardhim. “It moved,” he cried, with a look of horror at the object asit lay on the floor. “As I wished, it twisted in my hand like asnake.”

“Well, I don’t see the money,” said his son, as he picked it upand placed it on the table, “and I bet I never shall.”

“It must have been your imagination, father,” said his wife,regarding him worriedly.

He shook his head. “Never mind, though; there’s no harm done,but it gave me a shock all the same.”

They sat down by the fire again while the two men finished theirpipes. Outside, the wind was higher than ever, and the old manjumped nervously at the sound of a door banging upstairs. Anunusual and depressing silence settled on all three, which lasteduntil the old couple got up to go to bed.

“I expect you’ll find the cash tied up in a big bag in the middleof your bed,” said Herbert, as he wished them goodnight, “andsomething horrible sitting on top of your wardrobe watching youas you pocket your ill-gotten money.

Herbert, who normally had a playful nature and didn’t like totake things too seriously, sat alone in the darkness looking into



the dying fire. He saw faces in it; the last so horrible and somonkey-like that he stared at it in amazement. It became soclear that, with a nervous laugh, he felt on the table for a glasscontaining some water to throw over it. His hand found themonkey’s paw, and with a little shake of his body he wiped hishand on his coat and went up to bed.

PART TWO

In the brightness of the wintry sun next morning as it streamedover the breakfast table he laughed at his fears. The room felt asit always had and there was an air of health and happiness whichwas not there the previous night. The dirty, dried-up little pawwas thrown on the cabinet with a carelessness which indicatedno great belief in what good it could do.

“I suppose all old soldiers are the same,” said Mrs. White. “Theidea of our listening to such nonsense! How could wishes begranted in these days? And if they could, how could twohundred pounds hurt you, father?”

“Might drop on his head from the sky,” said Herbert.

“Morris said the things happened so naturally,” said his father,“that you might if you so wished not see the relationship.”

“Well don’t break into the money before I come back,” saidHerbert as he rose from the table to go to work. “I’m afraid it’llturn you into a mean, greedy old man, and we shall have to telleveryone that we don’t know you.”

His mother laughed, and following him to the door, watched himgo down the road, and returning to the breakfast table, she felt



very happy at the expense of her husband’s readiness to believesuch stories. All of which did not prevent her from hurrying tothe door at the postman’s knock nor, when she found that thepost brought only a bill, talking about how Sergeant-Majors candevelop bad drinking habits after they leave the army.

“Herbert will have some more of his funny remarks, I expect,when he comes home,” she said as they sat at dinner.

“I know,” said Mr. White, pouring himself out some beer; “butfor all that, the thing moved in my hand; that I’ll swear to.”

“You thought it did,” said the old lady, trying to calm him.

“I say it did,” replied the other. “There was no thought about it; Ihad just – What’s the matter?”

His wife made no reply. She was watching the mysteriousmovements of a man outside, who, looking in an undecidedfashion at the house, appeared to be trying to make up his mindto enter. In mental connection with the two hundred pounds, shenoticed that the stranger was well dressed, and wore a silk hat ofshiny newness. Three times he stopped briefly at the gate, andthen walked on again. The fourth time he stood with his handupon it, and then with sudden firmness of mind pushed it openand walked up the path. Mrs White at the same moment placedher hands behind her, hurriedly untied the strings of her apron,and put it under the cushion of her chair.

She brought the stranger, who seemed a little uncomfortable,into the room. He looked at her in a way that said there wassomething about his purpose that he wanted to keep secret, andseemed to be thinking of something else as the old lady said shewas sorry for the appearance of the room and her husband’scoat, which he usually wore in the garden. She then waited as



patiently as her sex would permit for him to state his business,but he was at first strangely silent.

“I – was asked to call,” he said at last, and bent down and pickeda piece of cotton from his trousers. “I come from ‘Maw andMeggins.’

“The old lady jumped suddenly, as in alarm. “Is anything thematter?” she asked breathlessly. “Has anything happened toHerbert? What is it? What is it?”

Her husband spoke before he could answer. “There theremother,” he said hurriedly. “Sit down, and don’t jump to aconclusion. You’ve not brought bad news, I’m sure sir,” andeyed the other, expecting that it was bad news but hoping he waswrong.

“I’m sorry –” began the visitor.

“Is he hurt?” demanded the mother wildly.

The visitor lowered and raised his head once in agreement.”Badly hurt,” he said quietly, “but he is not in any pain.”

“Oh thank God!” said the old woman, pressing her handstogether tightly. “Thank God for that! Thank – ”

She broke off as the tragic meaning of the part about him notbeing in pain came to her. The man had turned his head slightlyso as not to look directly at her, but she saw the awful truth inhis face. She caught her breath, and turning to her husband, whodid not yet understand the man’s meaning, laid her shaking handon his. There was a long silence.

“He was caught in the machinery,” said the visitor at length in alow voice.



“Caught in the machinery,” repeated Mr. White, too shocked tothink clearly, “yes.”

He sat staring out the window, and taking his wife’s handbetween his own, pressed it as he used to do when he was tryingto win her love in the time before they were married, nearlyforty years before.

“He was the only one left to us,” he said, turning gently to thevisitor. “It is hard.”

The other coughed, and rising, walked slowly to the window.“The firm wishes me to pass on their great sadness about yourloss,” he said, without looking round. “I ask that you to pleaseunderstand that I am only their servant and simply doing whatthey told me to do.”

There was no reply; the old woman’s face was white, her eyesstaring, and her breath unheard; on the husband’s face was alook such as his friend the Sergeant-Major might have carriedinto his first battle.

“I was to say that Maw and Meggins accept no responsibility,”continued the other. “But, although they don’t believe that theyhave a legal requirement to make a payment to you for yourloss, in view of your son’s services they wish to present youwith a certain sum.”

Mr. White dropped his wife’s hand, and rising to his feet, staredwith a look of horror at his visitor. His dry lips shaped thewords, “How much?”

“Two hundred pounds,” was the answer.



Without hearing his wife’s scream, the old man smiled weakly,put out his hands like a blind man, and fell, a senseless mass, tothe floor.

PART THREE

In the huge new cemetery, some two miles away, the old peopleburied their dead, and came back to the house which was nowfull of shadows and silence. It was all over so quickly that atfirst they could hardly realize it, and remained in a state ofwaiting for something else to happen – something else whichwas to lighten this load, too heavy for old hearts to bear.

But the days passed, and they realized that they had to accept thesituation – the hopeless acceptance of the old. Sometimes theyhardly said a word to each other, for now they had nothing totalk about, and their days were long to tiredness.

It was about a week after that the old man, waking suddenly inthe night, stretched out his hand and found himself alone. Theroom was in darkness, and he could hear the sound of his wifecrying quietly at the window. He raised himself in bed andlistened.

“Come back,” he said tenderly. “You will be cold.”

“It is colder for my son,” said the old woman, who began cryingagain.

The sounds of crying died away on his ears. The bed was warm,and his eyes heavy with sleep. He slept lightly at first, and thenwas fully asleep until a sudden wild cry from his wife woke himwith a start.



“THE PAW!” she cried wildly. “THE MONKEY’S PAW!”

He started up in alarm. “Where? Where is it? What’s thematter?”

She almost fell as she came hurried across the room toward him.“I want it,” she said quietly. “You’ve not destroyed it?”

“It’s in the living room, on the shelf above the fireplace,” hereplied. “Why?”

She cried and laughed together, and bending over, kissed hischeek.

“I only just thought of it,” she said. “Why didn’t I think of itbefore? Why didn’t you think of it?”

“Think of what?” he questioned.

“The other two wishes,” she replied quickly. “We’ve only hadone.”

“Was not that enough?” he demanded angrily.

“No,” she cried excitedly; “We’ll have one more. Go down andget it quickly, and wish our boy alive again.”

The man sat up in bed and threw the blankets from his shakinglegs. “Good God, you are mad!” he cried, struck with horror.

“Get it,” she said, breathing quickly; “get it quickly, and wish –Oh my boy, my boy!”

Her husband struck a match and lit the candle. “Get back to bedhe said,” his voice shaking. “You don’t know what you aresaying.”



“We had the first wish granted,” said the old woman,desperately; “why not the second?”

“A c-c-coincidence,” said the old man.

“Go get it and wish,” cried his wife, shaking with excitement.

The old man turned and looked at her, and his voice shook. “Hehas been dead ten days, and besides he – I would not tell youbefore, but – I could only recognize him by his clothing. If hewas too terrible for you to see then, how now?”

“Bring him back,” cried the old woman, and pulled him towardsthe door. “Do you think I fear the child I have nursed?”

He went down in the darkness, and felt his way to the livingroom, and then to the fireplace. The talisman was in its place onthe shelf, and then a horrible fear came over him that theunspoken wish might bring the broken body of his son beforehim before he could escape from the room. He caught his breathas he found that he had lost the direction of the door. Hisforehead cold with sweat, he felt his way round the table andalong the walls until he found himself at the bottom of the stairswith the evil thing in his hand.

Even his wife’s face seemed changed as he entered the room. Itwas white and expectant, and to his fears seemed to have anunnatural look upon it. He was afraid of her.

“WISH!” she cried in a strong voice.

“It is foolish and wicked,” he said weakly.

“WISH!” repeated his wife.



He raised his hand. “I wish my son alive again.”

The talisman fell to the floor, and he looked at it fearfully. Thenhe sank into a chair and the old woman, with burning eyes,walked to the window and opened the curtains.

He sat until he could no longer bear the cold, looking up fromtime to time at the figure of his wife staring through the window.The candle, which had almost burned to the bottom, wasthrowing moving shadows around the room. When the candlefinally went out, the old man, with an unspeakable sense ofrelief at the failure of the talisman, went slowly back to his bed,and a minute afterward the old woman came silently and laywithout movement beside him.

Neither spoke, but lay silently listening to the ticking of theclock. They heard nothing else other than the normal nightsounds. The darkness was depressing, and after lying for sometime building up his courage, the husband took the box ofmatches, and lighting one, went downstairs for another candle.

At the foot of the stairs the match went out, and he stopped tolight another; and at the same moment a knock sounded on thefront door. It was so quiet that it could only be heard downstairs,as if the one knocking wanted to keep their coming a secret.

The matches fell from his hand. He stood motionless, not evenbreathing, until the knock was repeated. Then he turned and ranquickly back to his room, and closed the door behind him. Athird knock sounded through the house.

“WHAT’S THAT?” cried the old woman, sitting up quickly.

“A rat,” said the old man shakily – “a rat. It passed me on thestairs.”



His wife sat up in bed listening. A loud knock echoed throughthe house.

“It’s Herbert!” she screamed. “It’s Herbert!”

She ran to the door, but her husband was there before her, andcatching her by the arm, held her tightly. “What are you going todo?” he asked in a low, scared voice.

“It’s my boy; it’s Herbert!” she cried, struggling automatically.“I forgot it was two miles away. What are you holding me for?Let go. I must open the door.”

“For God’s sake don’t let it in,” cried the old man, shaking withfear.

“You’re afraid of your own son,” she cried struggling. “Let mego. I’m coming, Herbert; I’m coming.”

There was another knock, and another. The old woman with asudden pull broke free and ran from the room. Her husbandfollowed to the top of the stairs, and called after her as shehurried down. He heard the chain pulled back and the bottomlock open. Then the old woman’s voice, desperate and breathingheavily.

“The top lock,” she cried loudly. “Come down. I can’t reach it.”

But her husband was on his hands and knees feeling aroundwildly on the floor in search of the paw. If only he could find itbefore the thing outside got in. The knocks came very quicklynow echoing through the house, and he heard the noise of hiswife moving a chair and putting it down against the door. Heheard the movement of the lock as she began to open it, and at



the same moment he found the monkey’s paw, and franticallybreathed his third and last wish.

The knocking stopped suddenly, although the echoes of it werestill in the house. He heard the chair pulled back, and the dooropened. A cold wind blew up the staircase, and a long loud cryof disappointment and pain from his wife gave him the courageto run down to her side, and then to the gate. The streetlightopposite shone on a quiet and deserted road.

******


The Monkey's Paw is a classic "three wishes" story that doublesas a horror story and a cautionary tale; reminding us thatunintended consequences often accompany the best intentions.This widely read story is a favorite in classrooms around theworld. The story was first published in 1902 and then featured inThe Lady of the Barge, published in 1911. The mystery of theMonkey’s Paw is a cleverly thought-out short story. This storyhad three main parts. These parts were the first wish, the secondwish, and the third wish.

The first wish was the only tragic wish that was granted. Mr.White, his son Herbert, and an old man were sitting aroundplaying chess. There was a knock at the door and Mr. Whiteanswered it to let the man in. His name was Sergeant-MajorMorris. He sat down in the seat nearest the fire, and after severalglasses of whiskey, he began to talk. He talked about some ofhis war experiences, and then of India. His last story was about amagical mummified monkey’s paw. The sergeant-major tells thefamily that the old dried-out monkey’s paw has a spell put on it



by an old fakir. The story continues and then Mr. White and thesergeant-major trade.

Later, Mr. White wishes for 200 pounds. A man comes and visitsthe Whites telling them that their son Herbert had been killed,and then he gives them 200 pounds. The consequence of Mr.White’s first wish is the main reason he uses a second and thirdwish. Mr. White did not want to use a second wish but his wifeinsisted that they wish their son back to life. Mr. White wisheshis son back to life, but nothing happens so they go to sleep.They are sleeping when they hear a knocking sound at theirfront door. Mrs. White goes downstairs to answer the door eventhough Mr. White told her not to answer the door. Mrs. Whiteapproached the door while Mr. White looked for the monkey’spaw. At the very moment Mr. White unlocked the door Mr.White found the monkey’s paw and made his third and finalwish. Just as he made his wish the knocking stopped, and hiswife opened the door. What was the last wish? The author neverreally says, but one can assume that he wished he had nevermade his second wish. The end of the story is open and leavesyou to come up with an end of your own.

To conclude, the storyline was well written and cleverly thoughtout. With the three wishes as to the main parts of the story; theauthor was able to lead you one way and then suddenly changedirection. It has been adapted many times in other media,including plays, films, TV series, operas, stories and comics, asearly as 1903 and as recently as 2019. It was first adapted tofilm in 1915 as a British silent film directed by SidneyNorthcote. The film (now lost) starred John Lawson, who alsoplayed the main character in Louis N. Parker's 1907 stage play.Jacobs provides suspense, a building sense of menace, and realdrama, as well as bringing in such themes as family tragedy andthe problems with imperialism.



THEMES

1. The concept of fate and explores the disastrous consequencesof attempting to challenge one's destiny.

2. Another theme could be greed. The Whites are greedy formoney and pay for that greed with their son's life. Then, they aregreedy to have their son back from the dead without thinkingwhat a horrible experience this will be.

3. The danger of wishing beyond one’s need

4. The clash between domesticity and the outside world

Jacobs depicts the Whites’ home and domestic sphere in generalas a safe, cosy place separate from the dangerous world outside.The Whites’ house is full of symbols of happy domesticity: apiano, knitting, a copper kettle, a chessboard, a fireplace, and abreakfast table. But the Whites repeatedly invite trouble into thiscosy world. Sergeant-Major Morris—a family friend, seasonedveteran, and world traveller—disrupts the tranquillity in theWhites’ home with his stories of India and magic and warningsof evil. He gives Mr. White the monkey’s paw, the ultimatetoken of the dangerous outside world. Mr. and Mrs. White marthe healthy atmosphere of their home again when they invite theMaw and Meggins representative inside, a man who shatterstheir happiness with news of Herbert’s death. The final would-beinvader of the domestic world is Herbert himself. Mr. White’sterrified reaction to his dead son’s desire for entrance suggestsnot just his horror at the prospect of an animated corpse, but hisunderstanding, won from experience, that any person comingfrom the outside should be treated as a dangerous threat to thesanctity of the home.



SYMBOLS

THE MONKEY’S PAW

The monkey’s paw is a symbol of desire and greed—everythingthat its owner could possibly wish for and the unrestrictedability to make it happen. This power makes the paw alluring,even to unselfish people who desire nothing and have everythingthey need. Mr. White, for example, hastily retrieves the pawfrom the fire, even though he himself admits that he wouldn’tknow what to wish for if he owned the paw. Its potential alsoprompts Herbert to half-jokingly suggest wishing for money theWhites don’t really need, ostensibly just to see what happens.The paw grants Mr. White’s wishes by killing Herbert andraising his corpse from the grave in an unexpected and highlysinister twist. At the same time, however, the paw’s omnipotentpower may be misperceived, because Herbert’s death may havebeen entirely coincidental and the knocks on the door may befrom someone other than his living corpse

CHESS

Chess symbolizes life in The Monkey’s Paw. Those who play adaring, risky game of chess, for example, will lose, just as thosewho take unnecessary risks in life will die. When the storyopens, Mr. White and Herbert play chess by the fire, and thegame’s outcome mirrors the story’s outcome. Mr. White, thenarrator explains, has a theory of “radical changes” concerningchess. He takes terrible, unnecessary risks with his king, risksthat make his wife nervous as she watches the game unfold. Ashe plays, he notices that he has made a mistake that will provedeadly. The risks and mistakes Mr. White makes playing chessparallel the risks and mistakes he makes wishing on the



monkey’s paw. These mistakes ultimately lead to Herbert’sdeath, the most “radical change” of all.

MOTIFS

GROUPS OF THREE

Jacobs’s story is structured around a pattern of threes. Thecentral force of the story is the monkey’s paw, which will grantthree separate owners three wishes each. The White family ismade up of three people. Mr. White is the third owner of thepaw. (The second owner is Sergeant-Major Morris; the firstowner used his third wish for death.) Sergeant-Major Morrisbegins talking about his adventures in India after three glasses ofwhisky and urges Mr. White three times not to wish on the paw.The representative from Maw and Meggins approaches theWhites’ gate three times before he musters up the courage towalk up the path to their door. Mrs. White orders her husbandthree times to wish Herbert alive again before he retrieves thepaw. And the reanimated corpse of Herbert knocks three timesbefore his mother hears him. In addition to permeating the plot,the number three gives “The Monkey’s Paw” its structure. Thestory is broken up into three parts, which take place at threetimes of day, during three types of weather. Part I occurs in theevening during a rainstorm. Part II takes place during themorning of a bright winter day. Part III is set in the middle of achilly, windy night.

By stressing threes, Jacobs taps into a number of associationsthat are common in Western culture. Most relevant to the story isthe saying “bad luck comes in threes.” One well-known trinity,or three, is from Christian theology, in which God is composedof the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Disregard for threes hasbeen superstitiously equated with disregard for the trinity. In the



case of Jacobs’s characters, faith in a non-Christian totem (thepaw) may be interpreted as disrespect for Christianity. Finally,because twos commonly occur in nature (we have two legs, twoeyes, two hands, and so on), threes are often used in literature toproduce a perverse or unnatural effect.

GLOSSARY

Placidly : in a quiet and tranquil manner

Rubicund : having a healthy reddish colour

Proffer : present for acceptance or rejection

Fakir : a Muslim or Hindu mendicantmonk regarded as a holy man

Presumptuous : going beyond what is appropriate,permitted, or courteous

Doggedly : with obstinate determination

Talisman : a trinket thought to be a magicalprotection against evil

Antimacassar : a piece of ornamented cloth thatprotects the back of a chair fromhair oils

Avaricious : immediately desirous of acquiringsomething

Scurrying : moving with great haste



Bibulous : given to or marked by theconsumption of alcohol

Fusillade : rapid simultaneous discharge offirearms

QUESTIONS

1. Who is Mr. White?

2. What happened to their son, Mr. Herbert?

3. What was the power of the Monkey’s Paw?

4. How did the Whites get the Monkey’s Paw?

5. What were the three wishes made by Mr. White in the story?

6. What was the final wish?

7. Comment on the ending of the story The Monkey’s Paw?

8. Describe the weather and its influence on the theme of thestory

9. Does fate rule our lives or do we have some control overwhat happens to us? Explain your viewpoint based on thestory The Monkey’s Paw



REFERENCES:

https://www.kyrene.org/cms/lib/AZ01001083/Centricity/Domain/2259/The%20Monkeys%20Paw%20-%20text.pdf

http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/books/2014/10/illustrated_edition_of_the_monkey_s_paw_by_w_w_jacobs.html

https://englishsummary.com/the-monkeys-paw-summary-by-w-w-jacobs/

https://www.coursehero.com/lit/The-Monkeys-Paw/character-analysis/

https://www.owleyes.org/text/monkeys-paw/analysis/character-analysis

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