5.

TAKE PITY
By ( Bernard Malamud )

Story Outline

Take Pity is a pathetic account of a kind hearted man's futile efforts to rescue a poor
family from abject poverty and death. The man, Rosen, is a coffee salesman. The
poor family is a widow, Eva, and her two daughters. Eva fails to make a living from
her husband's shop. She and her two daughters are starving. Rosen tries to help
them in many ways. But Eva refuses to live on charity. Rosen asks her to marry
him. But she rejects the offer. Then he sends her some money. He sends the
money through a friend who says it was repayment of a loan given by her husband.
Eva refuses to take the money. She is determined to live an independent life. She is
very willful. But Rosen knows that she will lose her foolish war against Fate. He
becomes desperate. He tries to kill himself, leaving all his property to her. But he
fails even in this last attempt. Eva is moved. She comes to him to accept his offer of
marriage. But Rosen has had enough. He refuses to do anything for her, although it
goes against his nature to reject a request.

The story reveals some surprising secrets of human nature. It gives us a better
understanding of human psychology and emotions.
Rosen‟s unusual
his sincere softness
attempts to helpisher
contrasted
out of herwith Eva’s
misery unusual
makes stiffness. His
him desperate. frustration
It moves in
Eva at
last, and she consents to marry him. But now it is too late. Rosen is no longer the
generous self-sacrificing man he always had been. His character is changed. This
change is more painful than Eva’s sufferings.

EVA'S CHARACTER

Eva is a young widow with two daughters. She is determined to make her own
living. So she rejects every offer of help from the kind-hearted coffee salesman,
Rosen. She counts on her courage. But she fails to realize that courage alone
cannot overcome fate. The truth dawns on her too late. She feels very sorry for her
refusal to accept Rosen‟s sincere offers of help. She regrets her harsh attitude
towards the kind-hearted man. So she tries to make it up with him. But now he is
sick of her. He has already gone too far in his sincere efforts to help her. He is
frustrated. So he refuses to forgive her.
Eva‟s courage is heartless courage. She is too willful to realize the sufferings of her
poor daughters. Why should she subject them to starvation, when she knows that
she cannot make even a bare living? Her courage is rather pride that nobody can
admire. It breaks Rosen‟s heart and changes his whole character. In the end Eva
repents. She feels sorry for her stiffness towards the sincere and kind-hearted man.
Her character too is entirely changed. Her resolution to live her own independent
life breaks down. She is moved to pity for the brokenhearted man. She decides to
accept his offer of marriage although it is against her nature. But she repents too
late. It is too late to make amends for the harm she has done to Rosen.

A COMMENT ON ROSEN'S BEHAVIOUR

Rosen is a coffee salesman. He is a very kind-hearted man. He does his best to

save the poor family of Axel Kalish. But Axel's widow Eva is too willful. She is
determined to make her own living. Rosen knows that it is impossible. So he offers
to help her. But she rejects every offer. He even offers to marry her. But she
refuses. Rosen cannot see her and her two daughters starving to death. He
becomes desperate. He tries to kill himself, leaving all his property to the poor
family. But this last effort also fails. He is a lovable character. He goes far out of his
way to help the starving family. He is selfless and sincere. His role is a noble role.
Human society has never been devoid of such people, but they are rare, too rare
these days.

Rosen uses every trick to save the unfortunate family from starvation. Being a
businessman he knows that the shop set up by Eva‟s deceased husband will fail.
The locality does not need that shop. He advises Eva to move away to a better
location. But the headstrong girl refuses to take his advice. He tries to help her with
food and money. But she heartlessly refuses to accept his sincere offers. He even
offers to marry her. And finally he even tries to kill himself, leaving all his property to
Eva and her daughters. He fails even in this last desperate attempt. It breaks his
heart. Now at last Eva realizes her fault. She feels sorry for the pains that she has
caused Rosen. She tries to make amends but now it is too late. Rosen is truly a
great man although he is neither rich nor famous. His role in the story inspires love
and respect.

What does Rosen advises Eva; why does she not act upon it?

Why does Eva refuse offers of help from Rosen?

Rosen is an ex-coffee salesman and has a good deal of experience about business.
From his experience, he knows that Eva’s business would not flourish there.

He advises Eva to take the money and her children and run away from there.
However, Eva refuses to act upon his advice because she thinks that with the
insurance money she can establish her business. She says that with the insurance
money she will stock up and fix the store. She believes that she will be able to
attract the customers by decorating the store. Therefore, she rejects this advice
because of her optimistic approach.

Secondly, he advises to marry someone, but she again refuses. She believes that
nobody will marry her because she is a widow with two daughters. She believes
that she cannot have happiness because all her life she has been suffering. Here
she refuses because of her pessimistic point of view.

Why does Rosen want to help Eva?

Rosen wants to help Eva out of pity. The title of the story also suggests that.

After her husband’s death, Eva gets insurance money. She decides to invest the
money in her husband’s failing business. The business fails and things worsen. She
and her daughters starve. Out of pity, Rosen bear their sufferings. That is why he
tries to give something to eat to Eva’s daughters. He is even ready to marry her out
of pity. He tells her that he wants to marry her because he wants to take care of her
daughters. It is because of this pity that Eva rejects the offer. She wants love not
pity.

When we read the story carefully, we find that he wants to help them because he
cannot stand their misery. His heart bleeds for them. Moreover, he is sick and
knows that he will not live long. That is why he wants to help Eva even with his
whole money and with his life.

Eva was responsible for her tragic failure. Elaborate

Eva was a self-esteemed and optimist woman. She believed that after investing the
insurance money her business will flourish. So, she was not ready to listen to any
advice from Rosen. But she was unable to see the things from rational angle.
When her husband died, Rosen advised her to take the money and the children and
run away from there. Eva said that she had no place to go. At this, he offered her to
shift in his two-family house. She was too foolish to accept this handsome offer.

Eva also rejected Rose’s proposal for marriage. Rosen had promised her that after
the marriage he would take care of her and her daughters. It was a good chance
but she refuses it too. It was a great mistake.

Therefore, we can conclude that Eva was responsible for her suffering after the
death of her husband. She should have realized that she could not live on her own
with her two starving daughters. She was too optimistic and too obstinate.

Why does Eva come to Rosen with haunted, beseeching eyes, and raised
arms at the end of the story?

Why does Rosen refuse to help Eva in the end of the story?

Eva is a young widow with two daughters. She is determined to make her own
living. So she rejects every offer of help from the kind-hearted coffee salesman,
Rosen. She counts on her courage. Her courage is rather pride that nobody can
admire. It breaks Rosen’s heart and changes his whole character.

In the end, she repents. She feels sorry for her stiffness towards the sincere and
kind-hearted man. Her character too is entirely changed. Her resolution to live her
own independent life breaks down. She is moved to pity for the brokenhearted man.
She decides to accept his offer of marriage although it is against her nature. But
she repents too late. It is too late to make amends for the harm she has done to
Rosen.

She comes to him with hunted, beseeching eyes, and raised arms and expresses
her feelings. But now he is sick of her. He has already gone too far in his sincere
efforts to help her. He is frustrated. So he refuses to forgive her.

Describe Eva’s life before her husband’s death.

Eva led a very hard life even before the death of her husband. Her native country
was Poland and she belonged to Jewish family. However, she had to leave Poland
because of Hitler’s invasion of Poland. Therefore, to save the lives of his family and
for better career, her husband took her and their two daughters to America.
However, the condition of her life did not get better.
Her husband worked very hard and started a grocery store with his savings, but the
store did not flourish and their condition became worse. Now they did not have
anything to eat. After two months, he tried to sell the store but nobody bought. Now
they were starving. They did not have anything to spend. They got poorer. Because
of hunger and starvation, they became so weak that no one could look at their
faces. He decided to go in auction but because of continuous worries, tension and
failures he died of heart attack.

Discuss Eva’s life after the death of her husband.

After the death of her husband, Eva took over the charge of everything. Although
Rosen advised her not to invest the money in the store, yet she did that. She
invested the insurance money in the store. She bought all kinds of goods on cash. It
took her a week to arrange things in the store. She worked very hard. She packed
things on the shelves. She mopped the floors. She mad decorations with tissue
paper. In short, she arranged and decorated the store very well.

However no customer came. They used to come only when the main shops were
close. They used to buy only minor things. Therefore, her store failed miserably.
She did not make any profit. She had no money. She and her daughters at up the
food present in the store. After that, they were starving again. Once more, they had
become so weak that no one could look at their faces.