1 MODULE 1/2

HONEWCOMB

The Ashes That

Made Trees Bloom
2 The Essence….

The story “The Ashes That Made The Trees

Bloom’ drives home the need to adopt and
cultivate the virtues like honesty, compassion
and truth by human beings. This is exquisitely
depicted with the help of magical realism,
karma and kindness.

The story is a touching tale of an honest

,hardworking farmer and his dog.
3 Role Players

The good old rice farmer

The pet dog – Muko and his Spirit
The jealous old couple
The Diamio of Japan
4 Bond Of Love

In the very opening of the story we see lovely

bond between human being and animal
i.e.Muko.
Muko receives love and care by the farmer as his
own child. It is well expressed in the lines - “The
old dame made it a cushion of blue scrape, and
at mealtime Muko - for that was its name –
would sit on it as snug as any cat.
 Rural Setting

The setting of the story is shown in rural area.The

rice farmer , goes to his farm from morning to untill O
Tento Sama (the sun) goes down behind the hills.
Every day the dog follows the farmer to his work at
rice farm. The scene becomes picturesque when heron
walks in the footsteps of the farmer.
5
 Agricultural Tools.
6 .

7
Kindness

The farmer was a After getting

kind of spiritual treasure ,he made
fellow. While feast for their
walking he friends and gave
purposefully dug plentiful to the
the ground so that neighbours. That
insects would come was an act of
out for herons. He charity.
respected every
form of life.
 Kindness
8
 Treasure
9 The dog was instrumental in finding out the treasure
for the farmer. The farmer paid attention to dogs
whining and scratching and ultimately struck his hoe
in the earth. For his great surprise ….Lo ! a pile of
gold gleamed before him.
 Vocabulary
 Gleamed – glittered
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 Lo – look (archaic word)
 Snug – comfortable
 Dainties – tasty food
 Mortar – bowl
 Smothered (here, fondled)
 Sod – grass covered ground
 Mill – grinding apparatus
 Turned up – dug up
 Covetous – greedy
 Carcass – dead body
 Pounding - crushing
11 Muko
 The old neighbour dragged Muko to scratch the ground to get
treasure. Muko is brutally chopped off by the wife of jealous old
couple when they did not get any treasure through Muko. Greed
made them insensitive and extremely cruel. This is gothic element
in the story.
 Dream
12 The dog appeared in the dream of the farmer and said ,
“Cut down the tree over my grave, and make from it a
mortar for your rice pastry and mill for your bean
sauce”. The Spirit of dog protected the farmer from
cunningness of envious neighbour.
13
Thanks.

 Pramod Bhivsan Nikalje

 AECS- 2, Tarapur