Preface

THE PORJECT IS ABOUT THE LESSON “THE PORTAIT OF THE

LADY”WHICH WAS WRITTEN BY KHUSHWANT SINGH. I HAVE
CHOSEN THIS LESSON FOR MY PROJECT AS I LIKED THE BOND
BETWEEN THE AUTHOR AND HIS GRANDMOTHER.ALSO I LOVED
THE WAY IN WHICH THE AUTHOR EXPRESSED THE CHANGES THAT
HE HAD EXPERIENCED IN THE BOND BETWWEN HIM AND HIS
GRANDMOTHER. I WAS AMAZED BY THE WAY BY WHICH THE
AUTHOR’S GRANDMOTHER ADAPTED TO HER NEW ENVIRONMENT
IN THE CITY.THIS LESSON HAS TAUGHT ME MANY LIFE LESSONS.

“ONCE A BOND IS FORMED BETWEEN TWO SOULS IT CAN BE

NEVER BROKEN UNLESS OR UNITL BOTH THE SOULS BREAK IT “.
THIS PROJECT IS MADE IN SUCH A WAY THAT THE READERS CAN
UNDERSTAND THE BOND WHICH HAD FORMED BETWEEN THE
AUTHOR OF THIS LESSON AND HIS GRANDMOTHER ALSO THE
READERS WILL BE ABLE TO DESCRIBE HOW THE BOND BETWEEN
THE AUTHOR AND HIS GRANDMOTHER CHANGED AS TIME PASSED
AWAY.
Index
1. Introduction
2. About the author
3. Theme of the lesson
4. Characters in the lesson
5. Character sketch of the characters-Grandmother and
Grandson
6. Summary of the lesson
7. Conclusion of the summary
8. Values learnt from this lesson
9. Moral of this lesson
10. Meaning of some of the lines from the lesson
11. What I have learnt from this project
The Portrait of a Lady Introduction
By- Khushwant Singh
The portrait of A Lady gives us a picture of a human relationship in a joint
family. It is a factual description, a realistic account of how the
grandparents give all their time, attention and love to the grandchildren.
The description of the author’s grandmother is deeply moving with a
touch of humour and poetry in it. She was so old that she could not be
older. It was difficult to believe that she once used to play games as a
child, and was even young and married. She seems to have stopped
growing older. In the village, she was left alone with her little grandson.
She was religious-minded. She was all the time telling the beads of the
rosary. She took the child to temple-school. Inside she read holy books.
While returning home she fed the village dogs. In the city, she began to
feed the sparrows because she got a separate room to live and there were
no dogs. In the last phase, she received the author warmly when he
returned home from abroad. She sang his home-coming and beat the
drum; she was taken ill and she died. Even the sparrows went into
mourning and crowded around the dead body. Such was that lady with a
noble soul!
KHUSHWANT SINGH

KHUSHWANT SINGH

KHUSHWANT SINGH AT A READING IN NEW DELHI

BORN KHUSHAL SINGH

2 FEBRUARY 1915
HADALI, PUNJAB PROVINCE, BRITISH
INDIA
(NOW IN PUNJAB, PAKISTAN)

DIED 20 MARCH 2014 (AGED 99)

NEW DELHI, INDIA

OCCUPATION LAWYER, JOURNALIST, DIPLOMAT,

WRITER, POLITICIAN

NATIONALITY INDIAN

ALMA MATER GOVERNMENT COLLEGE, LAHORE (B.A.)

UNIVERSITY OF LONDON (LL.B.)
 RELATIVES SIR SOBHA SINGH (FATHER)

Characters in this story

Grandson

Grandmother

The Theme of the Poem

The themes can be interpreted as spanning many stages of the author’s

life. During childhood, the key themes were seen to be innocence,
admiration, and love between a grandmother and her grandson. During
the author’s stay in the city, however, the two were linked by themes
of separation and unfamiliarity. Finally, following his return from
abroad, the dominant subject appears to be a sense of reunion as well
as a bittersweet ending.

A CHARACTER SKETCH OF GRANDMOTHER

”Grandmother” was a wrinkled old lady who couldn’t have been much older. She was little,
chubby, and a tad bent. The narrator portrays her as a ”winter landscape in the mountains”
since she constantly wore a white saari with silver hair hiding her face. Her face is serene,
pleasant, and comforting.
She is also unable to assist the narrator with her academics due to her lack of knowledge in
science and English. She was disappointed to learn that the narrator’s school did not teach
about God or the holy scriptures. She also believes that music was not created with gentle
folk in mind.
When the narrator arrived from another country. She was overjoyed, so she gathered all the
women in her community and began singing about the return of the soldiers. She acquired a
fever as a result of her overwork. She informed her family that she was nearing the end of her
life. However, the doctor predicted that she would recover quickly.

Character sketch of the grandson

Khushwant Singh, the narrator in the story 'The Portrait of a Lady' was a
sensitive and observant person. He cherished the memories of his
association with his grandmother. He has beautifully described the details
about many episodes from his past life that were related to his
grandmother. His description of his grandmother's old age, her movements,
her religious beliefs, her association with sparrows reflect his ability to
describe the common things with sensitive delicacy. He was a great author,
grandson, and human being.
The Portrait of a Lady Summary in English

The writer recalls his Grandmother as short, healthy and slightly bent.
Her hairs were silver in colour and were scattered messily on her
wrinkled face. She used to walk around the whole house in white
clothes. She kept her one hand resting on her waist and the other hand
was telling the beads of her rosary.

The writer thinks of her as not very pretty but constantly beautiful all
the time. He compares her calm face with the winter landscape.
 During their lengthy stay in the village, Grandmother woke him up from the bed in the early
morning, plastered his wooden slate, organized his breakfast, and sent him to the school. The
temple was connected to the school. She sat inside and studied the sacred texts while the
children learned the alphabet.

On their way back to the home she used to give the stale chapattis to
the street dogs.

A turning point in their beautiful relationship arrived when they went to live in a city.
Despite the fact that they shared a room, their relationship started to grow apart. Now, the
writer used to go to the city school on a school bus and studied subjects like English, Physics,
mathematics
and many more subjects that his grandmother could not understand at all.

His grandmother could no longer go to school with him to send him.

She felt upset that there was no teaching about God and scriptures at
the city school. Instead, he was given music lessons, but she said
nothing. She thought music was dreadful.

It was just good for prostitutes and beggars, according to her. It was not intended for
gentlemen.

When the writer went to a university, he got a separate room in his

house. The common link of the relationship between the grandson and
the grandmother was broken now. Grandmother rarely talked to
anyone in the house now. The writer’s grandmother quietly accepted
her loneliness. She was constantly occupied with her spinning wheel
and reciting prayers and she hardly ever spoke to anyone. She took a
break in the afternoon. Her daily routine consisted of breaking bread
into pieces and giving it to the birds. The birds would perch on her
legs, head, and even her shoulders.

When the writer was leaving on a trip abroad for his further studies,
his grandmother did not get disturbed at all. Rather she went to the
train station to say goodbye, but she didn’t say anything and merely
kissed his forehead

. Her lips were moving in prayer, her thoughts were consumed by prayer and her fingers were
busy reciting the storey of the beads on her rosary. Seeing her grandmother at this old age,
the writer was thinking that it might be his last meeting with his grandmother. But when he
came back home after a duration of 5 years, his grandmother was there to welcome him back
and he saw her celebrate his return.
The next morning after the return of his grandson she got ill. Although
the doctor told them that it was a slight fever and would go away very
soon, still she could foresee that her time to leave this world was near.
She did not want to waste her time talking to someone. Her fingers
were busy reciting the storey of the beads on her rosary.

She went to her bed praying and telling the beads till her lips stopped
moving and the rosary fell down from her lifeless hand. Her body was
discovered on the floor, wrapped in a red shawl

after she died. To grieve her death, thousands of sparrows flew in and sat dispersed around
her body. All the sparrows flew away without making any noise when the dead body of the
old lady was carried away for the last rites.

Conclusion of The Portrait of a Lady

To sum up, in the portrait of a lady summary, the writer and his
grandmother had a beautiful bond between them and loved each other
a lot. The story tells us how beautiful a relationship can become
between a grandson and his grandmother.
Values learnt from this lesson

Moral of the lesson

THE MORAL OF THE LESSON IS WE SHOULD HAVE DEEP, LOVING

BOND WITH OUR GRANDPARENTS WHO LOVE US SO MUCH.

MEANING OF SOME OF THE LINES FROM THE LESSON

1. THE THOUGHT WAS ALMOST REVOLTING.- THE THOUGHT WAS

VERY UNPLEASANT.
2. AN EXPANSE OF PURE WHITE SERENITY- IT IS A SIMILE WHICH
SYMBOLISE PURENESS OF CHARACTER AND
TRANQUILLITY/CALMNESS OF MIND. BY THE USE OF THIS
SIMILE THE WRITER SYMBOLISE THE THE PURITY IN THE
CHARACTER OF HIS GRANDMOTHER AND THE THE CALMNESS OF
MIND THE GRANDMOTHER HAVE.
3. A TURNING-POINT- THE TIME WHEN A SITUATION STARTS TO
CHANGE IN AN IMPORTANT, ESP. POSITIVE, WAY
4. ACCEPTED HER SECLUSION WITH RESIGNATION- THE PHRASE
'ACCEPTED HER SECLUSION WITH RESIGNATION' MEANS
THAT THE GRANDMOTHER TOOK HER LONELINESS CALMLY
AND ACCEPTED HER FATE WITHOUT BEING SENTIMENTAL AT
ALL
 5. A VERITABLE BEDLAM OF CHIRRUPINGS- A VERITABLE BEDLAM OF
CHIRRUPING – IT REFERS TO THE NOISE, CONFUSION, AND
CHAOS CAUSED BY THE CHIRRUPING OF THE SPARROWS THAT
SCATTERED AND PERCHED AROUND THE AUTHOR’S
GRANDMOTHER.
6. FRIVOLOUS REBUKES – IT REFERS TO THE CASUAL AND LIGHT-
HEARTED REBUKES OF THE GRANDMOTHER TO THE SPARROWS.
7. THE SAGGING SKINS OF THE DILAPIDATED DRUM- REFERS TO THE
DETERIORATED CONDITION OF THE DRUM THAT THE
GRANDMOTHER PLAYED, EVEN WHEN THE DRUM WAS CLEARLY
IN A STATE OF DISREPAIR.

What I have learnt from this project

THE TWO MAJOR VALUES THAT ONE OUGHT TO TAKE AWAY FROM
THE STORY ARE AS FOLLOWS. FIRSTLY, WE SHOULD SPEND MORE
TIME WITH OUR GRANDPARENTS, KEEP IN TOUCH WITH THEM, MAKE
THEM FEEL LOVED AND WANTED, ESPECIALLY IN THEIR OLD AGE
WHEN THEY CEASE TO BE LESS ACTIVE. SECONDLY, A LIFE OF
DEDICATION AND INTEGRITY CAN BE LIVED EVEN WITHOUT COLLEGE
OR UNIVERSITY LEVEL EDUCATION AS THE GRANDMOTHER
DEMONSTRATES