B - A - English 102

ENG DSC 102/
ENG HONS GE 101

DSC-IA English Literature-5 (Essays, Stories and Poems)
(Core Course for students who choose English as Discipline and Generic Elective (Interdisciplinary)
for Honours Students of other subjects)
Detailed Study:
UNIT-I
i. “Deliverance” by Premchand
ii. “Joothan” by Omprakash Valmiki
iii. “Kallu” by Ismat Chughtai
iv. “Bosom Friend” by Hira Bansode
UNIT-II
i. “Girl” by Jamaica Kincaid
ii. “A Prayer for my Daughter” by W. B. Yeats
iii. “Yellow Fish” by Ambai
iv. “Reincarnation of Captain Cook” by Margaret Atwood
UNIT-III
i. “Blackout” by Roger Mais
ii. “Telephone Conversation” by Wole Soyinka
iii. “Harlem” by Langston Hughes
iv. “Still I Rise” by Maya Angelou
Non-Detailed Study:
UNIT-IV
i. “Conscientious Objector” by Edna St. Vincent Millay
ii. “General, Your Tank is a Powerful Vehicle” by Bertolt Brecht
iii. “The Dog of Tetwal” by Sa’adat Hasan Manto
iv “A Chronicle of the Peacocks” by Imtiar Husain
UNIT-V
i. “Toys” by Roland Barthes
ii. “Indian Movie, New Jersey” by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
iii. “At the Lahore Karhai” by Imtiaz Dharker
iv. “The Brand Expands” by Naomi Klein
Selections from Vinod Sood, et al, eds. The Individual and Society: Essays, Stories and Poems. Delhi;
Pearson, 2005.
*****
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UNIT-I
Lesson-1
Deliverance’ - Premchand
STRUCTURE
1.0 OBJECTIVE
1.1 INTRODUCTION
1.2 ABOUT THE AUTHOR
1.3 SUMMARY OF THE STORY
1.3.1 SELF CHECK QUESTIONS
1.4 SUMMING UP
1.5 GLOSSARY
1.6 ANSWERS TO SELF-CHECK QUESTIONS
1.7 TERMINAL QUESTIONS
1.8 SUGGESTED READING
1.0 OBJECTIVE
The purpose of this lesson to tell you about Premchand and briefly give summary of the story.
1.1 INTRODUCTION
This lesson is on short story titled ‘Deliverance’ by Munshi Premchand. It will acquaint you with the writer
and his writings. This will help you in understanding the story and issues related to it.
Munshi Premchand (1880- 1936) whose real name was Dhanpat Rai was born at Lamhi , a village near
Banaras in Uttar Pradesh. His initial education was in a madrasa wherein he learnt Urdu. He wrote both in Hindi and
Urdu. Soze-e –Watan( The Lament of the Country) published in 1908 was his first collection of short stories
written in Urdu. It was declared to be provocative and all seven hundred copies were burnt. Hence, he no longer could
write under the name the pen name Nawab Rai and changed his name to Premchand.
Premchand wrote more than three hundred short stories, around twelve novels and two plays. He also wrote
essays, comments and reviews. He changed the form of short story and brought realism into his writings. Some of his
well known works are Sevasadan, Gaban, Nirmala and Godan . These are his very popular novels. Some of his well
known short stories are ‘Panch Parmeshwar’, ‘Namak ka Daroga’, ‘Idgah’, ‘Sadgati’ and ‘Kafan’.His earlier work were
optimism but later the social changes around him present his works which present a bleak picture of humanity. These
later works show how the communities have degenerated into caste and class associations and also suffer its bitter
consequences.
Premchand was also a translator. He translated fiction from Urdu and English into Hindi . He also edited the
magazines – Madhuri and Hans which he handed over to Bhartiya Sahitya Parishad in 1935 as an encouragement of
Hindi/Hindustani as the national language. He, however, was never disturbed by the controversy over the usage of
Hindi or Urdu and continued to write in both the languages. The Indian Progressive Writers’ Association asked him to
chair their first convention in 1936 wherein his Presidential address titled ‘The Purpose of Writing’ stressed on the
role played by a writer towards society. All his works reflect this commitment towards societal issues. Many of his
works have been made into movies also like Mazdoor, Seva sadan, Godaan, Gaban, Shatranj Ke Khiladi and
Sadgati.
Premchand remains a name to reckon with in Indian literature.
Dukhi was a tanner of animal skin. one day he was sweeping the floor in front of his door and his wife Jhuriya
was spreading cow dung on the floor. Stopping her work, Jhuriya asked her husband to go and call the Brahmin. If he
didn’t the Brahmin would go to some other house. Dukhi was, however, worried where the Brahmin would sit. Jhuriya
asked him to borrow a cot from the village headman’s wife for the Brahmin to sit on.
This provoked Dukhi. He knew that the people in the headman’s house won’t give him a cot, they won’t even
give him a coal of out of their house to light fire in Dukhi’s house. He was not allowed to enter their house. Even in a
public place where the lower castes were permitted to go, they won’t give him a pot of water. A cot was out of the
question. It was something the lower castes where not given, like they had access to cowdung full of chaff or wood
which anybody would pick up and take away. He told his wife to clean and wash their cot and keep it out to dry by the
time the Brahmin came.
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But Jhuriya said that the Brahmin won’t sit on their cot as he was very bussy about his religion and did thing
according to the rules laid down. Dukhi agree with her. He told her he would break of some mohowa leaves and make
a mat for him; that would be proper as all big people ate off mahowa leaves which were holy. But his wife offered to
make the mat as he was off to call the Brahmin.
Jhuriya’s next worry was the offering of foodthat the Brahmin would take home and cook. Where would she
put the uncooked food to offer to him? Dukhi asked her not to put the food in her own dish as it would he broken and
the food wasted. The Brahmin would refuse to accept the offering and throw away the dish. He is short tempered and
when he is angry, he doesn’t spare even his wife. Once beat up his son so badly that the son still goes around the village
with a broken arm. They would just put the offering on a leaf without touching it. Jhuriya should take Jhuri, a tribal
(Ghond) to the village grocer and bring back all they required,i.e, a full to pounds of flour, an eight of ghee(clarified
Butter) salt, turmeric, and four annas placed on the edge of a leaf. If the Gond girl was not available, Jhuria should
request the women who runs the parching over in the village to accompany her to the grocer. She should be careful not
to touch anything herself because that would be sacrilege. After issuing these instructions to wife, Dukhi picked up
his stick, took up a big bundle of grass and went to request the pundit to come to his home. He carried the bundle of
grass as a present with him as he could not go just to the pandit to make a request. If the pundit saw him comping
empty handed to his house he would start abusing him and won’t come with him.
Pandit ghasiram was a priest by profession. He started observing the religious rituals as soon as he got up in
the morning. After washing his hands and feet at eight o’clock he would start the ceremony of worship, the first part
of which was preparing the bhang (a narcotic drink). After that he would grind sandalwood paste for half an hour and
apply it to his forehead before the mirror, between the two lines of the sandalwood paste he would draw a red dot.
Then he would draw design of perfect circles on his chest and arms. After this he would take out the image of the
Lord, Father it and ring a little bell. But ten o’clock he would finish his rituals of worship, have bhang and go outside
where his clients had gathered. He than reaped the crop out of the seeds of piety that he sowed everyday.
That morning he saw Dhukhi, the untouchable tanner, sitting outside his house with a bundle of grass. On
seeing him, Dhukhi got up, prostreated himself on the ground, stood up again and folded his hands. The pundit’s bright
presence filled him with respect. It was such a divine sight a short statured bold and pump figure, chubby cheeks and
eyes shining with Brahmanical light. He looked like a god with sandalwood markings on his body. Pandit Ghasiram
asked the untouchable Dhukhi what brought him there.
Bowing his head Dukhi told him that he was arranging the marriage of his daughter. He wanted the pandit’s
help in fixing up an auspicious date. When would he be free? The pandit told him that he had no time but still he would
visit his house some time that evening. Dhukhi pleaded with him to come soon as he had arranged everything for the
punditji, where could he keep the grass that he had brought with him as a gift?
Pandit asked Dhukhi to keep the grass in front of the cow, pick up the broom and clean the front of the door.
The floor of his sitting room hadn’t been cleaned and plastered for many days. Dhukhi should therefore plaster it with
cowdung. Meanwhile, the pundit would have his lunch, rest a bit and then accompany him to his house. Dhukhi should
also split the wood take out a bundle hay and put it in the fodder basket.
Dhukhi started carrying out the pundit’s orders without any loss of time. He swept the door step and plastered
the floor this went on till noon. Panditji went off to have his lunch. Dhukhi had not eaten anything since morning. He
was terribly hungry. He could not eat in the pandit’s house and his own house was a miles away. But he suppressed his
hunger and began to split the wood from a thick tree trunk. Panditji other followers had dried to split it earlier, but had
failed. And Dhukhi who was only used to cutting grass and selling it in the market was no match for the difficult taste.
The axe would just touch wood but won’t split it. Dhukhi was tired and frustreated; all his effort to split the wood
failed. He was perspring profusely and he felt dizzy. Birthe still kept on trying. He could hardly lift his hands and
found it difficult to stand erect. If he could smoke a tobacco pipe he would be refreshed. But he was in a brahmin’s
village and the Brahmins did not smoke tobacco like all the low castes and the untouchable.
Suddenly Dhukhi remembered that there was a Gond living in that village and he would ask him for a tobacco
pipe. He ran to the men’s house. But gond had a pipe and tobacco but no fire to light it with. Dhukhi thought that he
would go to the punditji’s house and request for some fire to light his pipe.
Dhukhi returned to the priest’s house with the tobacco pipe and asked for some light. Panditji asked his wife
to give some light to Dhukhi the tanner who was working for them. But his wife, the panditayan refused to do so. She
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told her husband to ask the good for nothing tanner to get out of their house, otherwise she would burn his face.
Panditji tried to calm his wife and told her of all the work Dhukhi had done. She should let him have his light. If they
hired a labourer to split the wood, they would have to pay him at least four annas. The panditayan in lost her temper at
Dhukhi entring their house. She reluctantly agreed to give him some fire to Dhukhi to light his pipe but warned that
the next time he come inside the house, she would burn the face by throwing the coals in his face.
Dukhi could hear parts of the conversation between the pandit and his wife. He felt that he should not have
come there, he had made a mistake. The panditayain was only speaking the truth how could a tanner enter a Brahmin’s
house? These people were clean and holy. That is why everyone in the world respected and worshiped them. Before
them he was a mere tanner an untouchable. He had lived all his life in the village without understanding such distinctions
before.
Therefore when the pandit’s wife came out and brought him some coal to light his tobacco pipe Dhukhi felt
that it was nothing short of a miracle from heaven. Dhukhi apologised her with folded hands for having entered her
house. Tanners didnot have much sense. Otherwise how could be so insulted and humiliated?
The panditayan had brought coals in a pait of tongs and her face was covered with a veil. She threw the coals
towards Dhukhi. They fell on his head. He drew back quickly and shook then out of his hair. He said to himself that this
was the result of polluting a Brahmins house and making it dirty. He had been punished by God for this sacrilege. That
is why everyone was afraid of the pundits. Everyone parted with his money for something or the other but no one ever
got money out of a Brahmin. Anyone who tried to do so his entire family was destroyed and he would become a leper.
He then lighted his pipe went out smoked his pipe and started splitting wood.
The pandit’s wife naw started pitying Dhukhi as some sparks from burning coals had fallen on his head. When
the pandit has finished his meal she asked him to give some food to the poor untouchable as he must be hungry; he had
been working for such a long time. The pandit found it unusual for a Brahmin to give some food to low caste tanner.
He asked his wife whether there was some bread in the house. Some little food was left but would it suffice for a
tunner? Such people needed a lot of food to quench their hunger. His wife then asked him to forget it. She wouldn’t
effort to give an untouchable so much food. The pundit asked her to put some bran and husks, mix them in floor and
make a couple of pancakes. That animal food should be enough to fit Dhukhi’s stomach. Such low caste people did not
deserve good wholesome bread. The panditayain however was not willing to do it in such hot weather and kill herself
in the process.
When Dhukhi picked up his axe after smoking his tobacco pipe, he found some strengthens his body. He
worked for about half an hour and then sat down tired, with his head in his hands. Chikhuri the gond had come in the
meanwhile. He told Dhukhi that he was wasting his time and strength in splitting up the thick trunk of wood he was
killing himself for nothing. Did he had anything to eat? Or was he being made to work without to being given any
food?
Dhukhi replied that he couldn’t digest food in a Brahmin’s house Chikhuri said that digesting food was
another problem, but he should get it in the first place. He added that these people were worse than the government
officials, who at least paid the labourers something for the work they were made to do and the Pandit called himself
a man of god. Dhukhi however asked him to hush up. If they heard this he would be in trouble.
Dukhi went bach to his work. Chikhuri felt so sorry for him that he came and took the axe out of Dhukhi’s
hands and worked for a good half hour. But there was not even a crack in the wood; it wouldn’t simply split. He then
left after telling that wood wouldn’t split even if he killed himself doing it.
Dhukhi wondered where the pandit had got that tree trunk from. How long he could he keep trying to split it?
He had several things to attend to at home; there was no end of the work. But the pandit did not think about that. He
decided to tell the pundit that he would finish the work the next day. He then set out for bringing from the storeroom,
but the fodder bin was no less than a quarter mile away. He found it difficult to lift the basket full of hay on his head.
It was four o clock in the after noon now pandit Ghasiram came out of the house, after washing his hands and face and
chewing some betel leaf. He was shocked to see Dhukhiya sleeping. The wood hadn’t been split yet. He ordered
Dhukhi to pic up the axe and start splitting wood. If he didn’t find any auspicious day for his daughter’s marriage, he
shouldn’t blame panditji for it. That was why they said that as soon as an untouchable got some food in his house, he
became careless and negligent of his duties and responsibilities.
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Dhukhi picked up the axe again. He was feeling extremely hungry. It seemed that his stomach was touching
his back now. He hadn’t eaten since the morning and he bound it impossible to stand. But if the pandit didn’t marriage
it would be total failure. That was why everybody respected the panditis everything depended on the right day fixed.
The pandit could ruin anybody if they wanted.
Dhukhi started working with renewed energy. At last he hit the axe on the tunk with all his strength and there
was crack in it. There was a strange power in his hands now. Dhukhi was started working like a mad man. It was as tough
fatigue hunger and weakness had all left him. He was surprised at his own strength. He went on working till the log
split in the middle. Then exhausted hungry and dizzy, Dhukhi gave up. He fell down.
But the punditji kept on encouraging him in his efforts. He wanted Dhukhi to strike the log a few more times
so that there would be small pieces of wood. Dhukhi however couldn’t get up. The pandit went inside the house, drank
some bhang and came out dressed in his priestly robes. He was now ready to accompany Dhukhi to his house. But
Dhukhi simply won’t get up; he was absolutely stiff. The pandit was shocked. He ran inside to inform his wife that “the
little Dhukhi”had died whole splitting wood. The panditayan was however calm and composed. She asked her husband
to send a message to the tanners settlement informing them that Dhukhi was dead and they should thake the dead body
away.
The entire village come to know about Dhukhi’s death immediately. Except for the gond, chikhuri’s house,
everyone in that village was a Brahmin. People didnot travel on that road. The only path to the well passed that may-
how were they to get there? Who would come to draw water with a tanner’s corpse lying neareby? An old women
suggested to punditji that lie should have Dhukhi’s body thrown away to enable people to draw water from the well.
The gond went to the tanner’s settlement to inform them of Dhukhi’s death and bring Dhukhis body from the panditi’s
village. The pandit had killed poor Dhukhi and there would be a police investigation. The pundit would have to pay for
it. If the tanners went there to get Dhukhi’s body would also be arrested.
Pandit Ghasiram then arrived to ask the tanners to take away but nobody was ready to do it. To make sure of
Dhukhi’s death his wife and daughter went to panditji’s door and wailed. They were accompainied by a dozen women
and a crowd of untouchables to take away Dhukhi’s body. Panditji tried to threaten and placate the tanners by turns but
they were affaried of the police. No one moved finaly panditji went home disappointed.
The crying and wailing continued till midnight. The Brahmins could not sleep that might. If no tanner came to
take away Dhukhi’s body how could a Brahmin lift up an untouchables body? The panditaiyan was mad. The tanners
women were disturbing her sleep. They wouldn’t give up crying and wailing. The pandit was worried that the village
was making such a fuss about a mere untouchable death. But the panditayin said the constant wailing would bring them
bad luck.
Dhukhi’s body had begun to stink already. The untouchable were all polluted because they would do anything that was
available.
They spent the night somehow, but no one come to claim Dhukhi’s body even in the morning. They could
still hear the wailing of women meanwhile, the foul smell from Dhukhi’s body started spreading. Panditji got out a
rape made a noose and managed to get it over the dead Dhukhi’s feet and drew it tight. The morning was still misty. He
held the rope tight and began to drag it. He dragged it out of the village. When he returned home and sprinkles ganges
water around the house outside the village, the jackals, kites, dogs and crows were picking at Dhukhi’s body in a field.
This was the reward of a whole life of devotion service and faith that the untouchable tanner Dhukhi had got for his
devotion to and blind faith in the Brahmins, especially Pandit Ghasiram.
(i) What was Munshi Premchand’s real name?
(ii) In the given story who is Ghasiram?
(iii) What happens to Dukhi in the end?
1.4 SUMMING UP
This story ‘Deliverance’ has told us about the the condition of untouchables. They are treated even lesser than
animals. Their situation is pathetic and miserable. Through this story Premchand has asked human beings to be
compassionate and kind towards fellow beings.
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1.5 GLOSSARY
Deliverance – salvation
Bleak – desolate, not clear, bad in taste
Provocative – irritating, provoking, rousing
Profusely – in large amount
Dizzy – giddy, faint
(i) Dhanpat Rai
(ii) Priest
(iii) He dies of exhaustion and hunger
i. Give a brief account of Munshi Premchand’s life.
ii. Give the short summary of the story ‘Deliverance’.
1. Amrit Rai; Harish Trivedi (1991). Premchand: his life and times. Oxford University Press.
2. Francesca Orsini (2004). The Oxford India Premchand. Oxford University Press.
*****
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Lesson-2
Deliverance’- Premchand
STRUCTURE
2.0 OBJECTIVE
2.1 INTRODUCTION
2.2 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE FIRST SCENE
2.3 UNTOUCHABLES AND THE BRAHMINS
2.3.1 SELF-CHECK QUESTIONS
2.4 CHARACTERIZATION
2.5 IRONY AND SATIRE IN THE STORY
2.6 ENDING OF THE STORY
2.7 GLOSSARY
2.0 OBJECTIVE
This lesson is an extension of the earlier lesson on 'Deliverance'. It will familiarize you with more critical
aspects of the story. Many aspects would make you understand the story deeply and comprehend its social significance.
2.1 INTRODUCTION
Since this chapter deals with some literary concepts, these are defined briefly for your understanding.
Characterization is the act of creating and describing characters in literature. Characterization includes both descriptions
of a character's physical attributes as well as the character's personality. The way that characters act, think, and speak
also adds to their characterization. Irony in its broadest sense is a rhetorical device, literary technique, or event in
which what appears, on the surface, to be the case, differs radically from what is actually the case. Satire implies state
of affairs or an event that makes use of humour, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people's
stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of politics and other topical issues.
2.1 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE FIRST SCENE
The very first scene describe the preparation being made by Dukhi and his wife Jhuriya to entertain the
Pandit who is going to fix an auspicious date for the marriage of their daughter. Dukhi sweeps the front of his house
while Jhuriya plasters the floor with the cowdung. They wish to have a cot on which they would make the pandit sit.
However, this is not possible as nobody in the village would lend a cot to untouchables like them .Hence, they decide
to make a mat of ‘mahowa’ leaves for the Pandit to sit on when he would visit the house. They have to offer him
uncooked food since nothing cooked by untouchables is acceptable to a Brahmin.further, the offering has to be
complete- a full two pounds of flour, a half of rice, a quarter of gram, an eight of ghee, salt, turmeric and four annas
at the edge of the leaf.Dukhi suggests Jhuriya to take a Gond girl along to the village grocer to fetch these things. If
the girl is unable to come then the woman who runs the parching over should be requested to accompany as being an
untouchable Jhuriya is not to touch anything. Dukhi then goes to Pandit’s house, carrying a bundle of hay on his head
as a gift.
The whole scene demonstrates what is the position of untouchables in the eyes of Brahmins. This sets the
tone of the story to depict how the untouchables are ill-treated and disgraced by the higher castes especially in the
rural areas of our country.
2.2 UNTOUCHABLES AND THE BRAHMINS
The story significantly bring out the uneven relationship between the lower caste and the Brahmins. It brings
to the fore that Brahmins have subjugated the lower caste for ages and have enslaved them mentally as well. Because
of a very long period of repression, domination and exploitation, these people have hardly raised voice against this
injustice rather they have accepted their low place in the caste hierarchy and have resigned to fate like Dukhi this has
also happened because it is taken as granted/accepted code of conduct in the society as well as also because of lack of
education.
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This is particularly evident with the disposition of Dukhi. Dukhi is highly impressed with the physical
appearance of the pandit when the pandit comes out of his house after completing the rituals of worship. Pandit
actually drinks ‘bhang’ before coming out whereas for Dukhi it was divine radiance. Premchand tells the readers the
reality – pandit is short, plump and bald with chubby cheeks. Pandit is extremely short-tempered who does not spare
even his wife. The beat his son so brutally that the son roams in the village with a broken arm. He humiliates Dukhi
who comes to seek guidance for his daughter’s marriage. The reader is shown that pandit has nothing devout about him
rather he is drenched in exploitation and corruption.
(i) From which material did Dukhi and Jhuriya make the mat?
(ii) What does Pandit drink usually?
(iii) Why did Dukhi go to the Pandit?
(iv) To which tribe does Chukhri belong?
PANDIT AND PANDITAYIN
Premchand as a short story writer presents his characters majorly through dialogue.He describes pandit ,
“…he flies off the handle very fast , and when he is in a rage he doesn’t even spare his wife…”. Pandit’s condescending
attitude towards Dukhi as well as Dukhi’s exploitation , “Put it down in front of the cow and if you’ll just pick up that
broom sweep it clean in front of the door. Then the floor of the sitting room hasn’t been plastered for several days so
plaster it with cowdung. While you’re doing that I’ll be having lunch, then I’ll rest a bit and after that I’ll come. Oh yes,
you can split that wood too, and in the storeroom there’s a little pile of hay – just take it out and put it into the fodder
bin.” He looks down upon Dukhi when tells his wife about tobacco, “It’s only that damned little Dukhi the tanner.” His
cunning and greed is revealed when he tells his wife how he has made Dukhi work for free, “You’d have to pay at least
four annas if you hired some labourer to split it”.Dukhi on the other hand is respectful towards the Pandit, “ I ‘m
arranging Bitiya’s betrothal. Will your worship help us to fix an auspicious date?” Panditayin too is biased, “Tell that
good for nothing to get out or I’ll scorch his face with a five brand.”
DUKHI AND CHIKHURI
Dukhi is an untouchable- a chamar by caste who belongs to the lowest strata of the caste hierarchy.He is an
uneducated person ignorant and superstitious. Centuries long oppression makes him accept his own exploitation as
taken by none other than deceitful pandit Ghasiram. He even loses life while splitting the log of wood for the Pandit.
Chikhuri on the other hand is a tribal belonging to the Gond tribe. They enjoy a little better status in society
than the chamars. They too are illiterate but are helpful in nature.He is distressed to see Dukhi working himself to
death in splitting the log of wood for the pandit. He says, “The government officials may force you to work for them
but they pay you something for it, no matter how little. This fellow’s gone one better, calling himself a holy man.”
When Dukhi dies and the Pandit sends word to the tanner’s settlement to come and collect the body, Chikhuri
apprises everbody with reality. He warns all, “Careful now!Don’t go to get the body. There’ll be a police investigation
yet. It’s no joke that somebody killed this poor fellow. The somebody may be a pandit, but just in his own house. If you
move the body you’ll get arrested too.”. chikhuri , thus, emerges as more courageous than Dukhi. He is bold, ready to
question and challenge the wrong done.
2.5 IRONY AND SATIRE IN THE STORY
Premchand uses irony and satire to comment upon as well as to rectify the ills prevalent in society. Whether
it is untouchability or hypocrisy in human nature he attacks them competently.
Both the Pandit and his wife are far from being devout but pose themselves as being holy.They are quick-
tempered, mean and oppressive. They look down upon untouchables and fully exploit them as they make Dukhi work
for free at their home. They are cruel and inhumane too- they do not give any food to Dukhi though he has been
working for them throughout the day. Pandit’s wife goes to the extent of throwing burning coals at him after pandit
asks her to lend some light to Dukhi for his tobacco pipe.She is not prepared to cook for an untouchable though he is
a human being like her.
However, both pandit and his wife get scared when Dukhi dies in their courtyard. Their efforts to tell the
tanners to claim the body fail miserably. Being superstitious by nature, both of them consider the wailing of women
in their courtyard as inauspicious. So the Pandit ties a rope to the feet of the corpse and drags the body out of the
Brahmin village. Afterwards he bathes himself to purify himself and is at peace with himself. His own cruelty towards
a fellow human being does evoke any guilt and exposes his indifferent nature.
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There are certain other episodes as well which exhibit the irony in the text.though Dukhi is a tall and well –
built man , Pandit always addresses him as ‘little’.When Dukhi rqests him to come home to fix an auspicious date for
his daughter’s marriage , the Pandit curtly snubs him, “I have no time today. But still, I’ll manage to come toward
evening.” Though he is free yet he pretends to be occupied so as to show Dukhi down and ascertain his superior
Brahmin caste. He goes to rest while making Dukhi work, however, when he finally comes out to go with Dukhi , its
rather late as Dukhi has died of sheer hunger and exhaustion while splitting the wood.
Premchand establishes through these episodes how situation of untouchables is miserable as they are treated
even less than animals.
The title of the story ‘Deliverance’ is ironic because it means salvation in English and ‘sadgati’ in Hindi title
and ending are interrelated. Title comments upon the ending wherein Dukhi dies but this is a disgraceful death and
even his dead body is disrespected. He certainly does not achieve salvation but definitely is relieved of his miserable
living. His death evokes compassion in reader and also asks to come out of the stupor and challenge the wrongs
prevalent in society.
(i) What is the temperament of the Pandit and his wife?
(ii) Why does Pandit pretends to be occupied?
(iii) How is the ending of the story?
2.7 GLOSSARY
Quarter - divide into four equal or corresponding parts.
Repression - the action of subduing someone or something by force.
Scorch - burn the surface of (something) with flame or heat.
Tanner - a person who is employed to tan animal hides.
2.3.1 (i) Mahowa leaves
(ii) Bhang
(iii) To ask for an auspicious date for his daughter's betrothal
(iv) Gond
2.6.1 (i) Quick -tempered, mean and oppressive
(ii) To ascertain his superior Brahmin caste
(iii) It is very sad.
(i) Describe the condition of untouchables as depicted in the given story.
(ii) Comment on the relationship of Dukhia and Jhuriya.
1. Amrit Rai; Harish Trivedi (1991). Premchand: his life and times. Oxford University Press.
2. Francesca Orsini (2004). The Oxford India Premchand. Oxford University Press.
*****
9
Lesson-3
General Introduction to Dalit Literature
STRUCTURE
3.0 OBJECTIVE
3.1 INTRODUCTION
3.2 ABOUT THE TERM 'DALIT' AND "DALIT LITERATURE'
3.2.1 HISTORY OF THE TERM
3.2.2 CONCEPT OF DALIT LITERATURE
3.2.3 FORM OF DALIT LITERATUE
3.3 DR. AMBEDKAR AND PAN-INDIAN DALIT UPRISING
3.3.1 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE YEAR 1991
3.3.2 DR. AMBEDKAR'S ' CASTES IN INDIA'
3.4 DIFFERENCE BETWEEN GANDHI AND AMBEDKAR
3.4.1 REMOVAL OF UNTOUCHABILITY
3.4.2 UNTOUCHABILITY AND CASTE
3.5 REGIONAL VOICES IN DALIT LITERATURE
3.5.1 SELF- CHECK QUESTIONS
3.6 SUM UP
3.7 GLOSSARY
3.8 ANSWERS TO SELF CHECK QUESTIONS
3.0. OBJECTIVES
This lesson attempts to explain the context of Dalit uprising as well as Dalit literature. It places ‘Dalit
literature’ as a new mode of writing inspired by the birth centenary celebrations of Dr.B.R.Ambedkar. The difference
between Gandhi’s and Ambedkar’s view of caste and Hinduism is very important to understand the nature of Dalit
literature. In addition, this lesson also tries to highlight the history of Dalit movement at the regional level.
3.1 INTRODUCTION
The erstwhile ‘untouchables’ have recorded their voice in Indian cultural history in different times. Their
voices of protest could be found 1) in the writings and activities of Adi-Hindu, Adi-Dravida, Adi-Andra and several
Hindu social reformist movements, 2) in the songs of the Bakhti poets of marginalized castes, and 3) in the activities
of the depressed classes during the colonial period. However, ‘Dalit literature’ as a mode of writing that upheld the
identity of Dalits could be found only with the emergence of Dalit movement in Maharashtra in the 1970s inspired by
Dr. B.R. Ambedkar’s works and activities.
3.2. THE TERM ‘DALIT’ AND ‘DALIT LITERATURE’
Though the term ‘Dalit’ has been used synonymously with the terms, ‘oppressed’, ‘subjugated’, ‘deprived’,
the exact meaning of the term is ‘broken people’. It refers to those who were broken away (or displaced) by the
strategies of the mainstream Hindu religious sects. Since the term ‘Dalit Literature’ remains part of the ‘identity
claims’ of those who were kept outside the four-fold Hindu social order, it includes only the writings of the erstwhile
untouchables. It does not include the writings of non-Dalits about the Dalit issue. Unlike the early literature (of the
‘untouchables’ of medieval and the 19th century) the body of Dalit literature aims at establishing a Dalit identity,
questioning the assumptions of the dominant caste groups in different regions across the nation. The modern reader
(of Dalit literature) may well understand that Dalit literature aims at disclosing such an oppressive practice found in
this mainstream culture. This mainstream may sometime assume a political nationalism or celebrate the regionalism.
Both the voices share Gandhian idea of the nationhood. Dalit literature thus seeks to disclose the problems involved
in Gandhi’s political nationalism and his celebration of Indian village life.
3.2.1: HISTORY OF THE TERM
In the cultural history of India, several terms have been used to refer to the Dalits. During the medieval times
the prefix ‘adi’ or ‘ati’ was used suggesting the idea that untouchables were ‘adi-Hindus’, ‘adi-Dravidars’, ‘adi-Andras’.
10
The colonial government used the term ‘Depressed class’ to group the untouchable castes for the purpose of governance.
Mr.Gandhi used the term ‘Harijan’, meaning ‘children of God’, but Dr.Ambedkar opposed the condescending tone of
the term and introduced the term, ‘Dalit’ as a term of self-assertion. In the Indian Constitution, the term ‘Scheduled
castes’ has been used for identifying and listing the untouchable castes and for the purpose of awarding safeguards for
their welfare.
3.2.2. CONTENT OF DALIT LITERATURE
Dalit writing thus may be regarded as self-narratives, of the ‘Other’ of the Hindu four-fold social order (of
Brahmins, Kshtriyas, Vaishiyas and Shudras in the hierarchical order). Since the birth of Dalit writing is closely
linked with the writings/activities of Dr.Ambedkar, it is necessary to have an acquaintance with his views on caste
system and Indian culture on the one hand and the difference between Gandhi’s and Ambedkar’s vision of Indian
culture and caste system. They recount the various practices of untouchability and the trauma experienced by the
victims. So, Dalit writing is mostly autobiographical in nature. In this sense it maintains certain resemblance with the
marginal literature (also called as ‘Fourth world’ literature) of other cultures.
3.2.3. FORM OF DALIT LITERATURE
The form(s) of Dalit literature is equally important like its radical content. The personal narratives of Dalit
writing may generally be understood as autobiographical. Scholars have written a lot about the challenges of
autobiographical form. However, Dalit writing also maintains a significant difference with the confessional nature of
the canonical autobiographies. Since the non-Christian cultures do not provide any space to confess, the speaking
subject chooses to confess only in disguise. In this context, ‘to confess’ means to borrow someone’s voice. In those
cultures, in which explicit articulation of a community is restricted, the ‘I’ comes to represent only a voice of the
oppressed (protesting) community. Here the ‘I’ is located only as an ‘Other’. Speech in these non-Christian, marginal
narratives remains only as “indirect speech”. In this sense, Dalit autobiographical voice goes beyond the personal
voice of autobiography and represents a collective voice of the community.
3.3. DR.AMBEDKAR AND DALIT UPRISING
The idea of a pan-Indian Dalit identity emerged after the celebration of Dr.Ambedkar’s birth centenary
celebrations in 1991. The government conducted nation-wide celebrations of his birthday and published his writings.
His writings were then translated into regional languages, enabling the small level Dalit movements to gain strength
and mobilize as a pan-Indian phenomenon.
3.3.1. SIGNIFICANCE OF THE YEAR 1991
Dalit literature gained national and international academic recognition only after the rise of pan-Indian Dalit
identity following the centenary celebrations of Dr.Ambedkar in 1991. The introduction of economic reforms, the
spread of globalization indirectly helped the rise of a pan-Dalit identity. In addition, the turn towards ‘nativism’ and
the stress on ‘regionalism’ opened space for articulating Dalit voices at the regional level in vernacular languages.
Translation of Indian regional writings focusing on caste naturally turned towards these Dalit voices. Ambedkar’s
essay, “Castes in India” and his unpublished speech “Annihilation of Caste” played a significant role in the shaping the
ideology of the Dalit movements in India.
3.3.2. AMBEDKAR ON ‘CASTES IN INDIA’
Ambedkar’s works, besides being scholarly treatises, offer a history of Hindu caste culture from a marginal
point of view. In other words, they represent the history of oppression of Dalits, who were regarded as outcastes by
the Hindu chaturvarna social order. Ambedkar’s essay “Castes in India” (presented at a conference in Columbia
University in 1916) does not merely remain a scholarly treatise on caste but it presents the life history of a culture
which maintains its ‘Otherness’ by its obsession towards caste: “Unfortunately it (caste) remains in the domain of the
‘unexplained’, not to say of the ‘un-understood’ “ (Ambedkar :5). This essay can be divided into three parts. In the first
part, he tries to investigate the nature of the problem, which obscured the Oriental(ist) scholars. In the second part,
Ambedkar tries to identify the function of caste in different times. He describes the way caste structure becomes an
imaginary, but unbreakable legal system in Indian (Hindu) culture. The origin of caste is traced back to several sources
such as, (i) the transformation of class into caste category by means of cultural (civilisational) superiority assumed
by brahmins; (ii) the closed-door policy adopted by brahmins, which forced other social groups to embrace caste
system; (iii) the philosophical basis propounded by Manu Smirti (the law-giver of Hindu social order) defending
caste system; (iv) the attitude of the minorities and marginals to imitate the dominant culture groups, and (iv) the
patronage of kings. In the third section, Ambedkar points out that the will to oppose caste system has lead only to the
formation of new castes. Because, ‘selfhood’ in India, he says, is possible only within the social body of the varna
system. It is this caste construction characterised by the chaturvarna order that excludes Dalits as the ultimate ‘Other’.
11
Ambedkar presents the problem of caste by recounting the life history of the Hindu culture at the spatial
level. It helps him to highlight the ways in which caste survives change across times. From the point of view of Dalits,
the history of our Hindu India remains only a history of exclusion of Dalits in terms of caste.
Ambedkar regards the desire of the mass to ‘imitate’ the culture of the dominant groups as one among the
various reasons by which caste survives change. His focus on the ‘desire’ of the mass questions the role of leaders and
intellectuals in social change in the Indian context. This is very clear when he says, “preaching did not make the caste
system, neither will it unmake it. My aim is to show the falsity of the attitude that has exalted religious sanction to the
position of a scientific explanation” (16-17). He felt that since caste has multiple origins, the attempts to annihiliate
caste must also be multi-dimensional.
Dr.Ambedkar’s fight is not simply against Hinduism and Brahmins but against the narrow, scripture-centred
ethics which becomes legality in Hindu culture. This results in different levels of punishments for the same crime
committed by different castes as we could see in Manusmirthi. This is not to say that he is taking a position against
legality, being himself the Minister for Law for four years. Instead, he is concerned with the function of law (the caste
norms) in the (Hindu) culture and the impossibility of breaking such laws which get religious sanction in Indian
culture. It is here that Dr.Ambedkar’s understanding of caste radically differs from Gandhi’s idea of caste and varna.
(i) What terms are synonyms with Dalits?
(ii) What term did Gandhi use for untouchables?
(iii)Who introduced the term Dalit?
3.4. DIFFERENCE BETWEEN AMBEDKAR AND GANDHI ON CASTE
Gandhi regarded untouchability as a sin and an evil social practice. Ambedkar said if, as Gandhi said, people
know that untouchability is a sin, they will not practice it. He clarified that Hindus practice untouchability not because
they are bad and evil-minded but because they are good and religious-minded. Since caste functions as a sacred
institution, Hindus are compelled to see the violation of caste norms as sacrilegious. It is here that he differs from
the Gandhi’s understanding of caste as merely a social stratification and clarifies that “caste is not a division of
labour. But it is a division of labourers”. This helps us understand ‘caste’ as a cultural formation and a unit different
from ‘class’ in addition to occupational and economical division.
3.4.1 REMOVAL OF UNTOUCHABILITY
In the Indian history, reformists and radicals work only on the removal of ‘untouchability’ and do not think
about the divisive function of caste system. This could be seen in Arya Samajists, the Nationalists and Gandhi also
follows the same line of thought. With this belief, Gandhi presented himself as the sole representative of all Indians
at the Second Round Table Conference in 1931. Dr.Ambedkar opposed this claim of Gandhi. Since Ambedkar believed
that the Dalit issue must be understood within the larger socio-cultural framework, he insisted that the Harijana Seva
Sangh (which Gandhi started after his return from the Round Table conference) must work with the touchable Hindus
instead of claiming to ameliorate the condition of untouchables.
3.4.2 UNTOUCHABILITY AND CASTE
Those interested in studying the Dalit question may greatly be benefitted through an acquaintance with
Dr.Ambedkar’s views on caste for two reasons. They may help us understand that the problem of the so-called
‘untouchables’ is in fact 1) a problem of the mainstream culture (of the touchable Hindus) and 2) part of our engagement
with modernity in the post-independent India. These two ideas of Dr.Ambedkar will help us understand the difference
between the categories of ‘class’ and ‘caste’ on the one hand and between Gandhi and Ambedkar’s position vis-à-vis
caste on the other. The fact that an untouchable can occupy an official position with his/her educational background,
but cannot enter into a temple in a village shows that ‘caste’ is more than economical category.
Dr.Ambedkar also views caste as the basis of patriarchy in Indian culture. He argued that the privilege given
for endogamy over exogamy led to the caste system. He cited the practice of sati, child-marriage and forced widowhood
as strategies of maintaining male-female sex ratio, which indirectly endorsed caste system. He thus could connect
the oppression of women with the practice of caste and provides a nuanced vision of the political function of caste.
He said that the brahmins rigidified the caste system by their strict adherence of ritual purity. This practice of ritual
purity of Brahmins functioned as a ‘closed-door policy’. Other caste groups imitated this and helped in the perpetuation
of the caste system, Ambedkar said. He addressed these complex issues in his Hindu Code Bill when he was the Law
Minister. While the issues of widow remarriage, property and adoption rights for women insisted in the Hindu Code
Bill were discussed and debated in the Constituent Assembly, the Bill was not allowed to pass in the Parliament. So,
he resigned from the Cabinet. Having lost all hopes to reform Hinduism, to change the mindset of the touchable
Hindus, he converted into Buddhism along with a huge mass of Dalits one year before his death.
12
Viewing the Dalit question as the general problem of caste system in the lines of Ambedkar may help us
perceive the function of the inhuman practices within culture. Such a broad understanding will resist our reading of
Dalits and Dalit literature as mere ‘objects’ of study. But it enables us see how caste as a practice causes damage to
the spirit of the Indian nation and harmony of Indian culture.
3.5. REGIONAL VOICES IN DALIT LITERATURE
Dalit intellectuals/writers from different regions reflect upon the local, regional issues, inspired by such
views of Dr.Ambedkar and established a pan-Dalit identity. While the reception of Ambedkar’s thoughts led to the
birth of a pan-Indian Dalit identity in the 1990s, the regional variations of the Dalit question cannot be ignored. In the
Tamil context, the canon of Dalit literature was established with the publication of Bama’s Karukku in 1994. Joothan
which was published in 1997 occupied a significant place in the history of Hindi Dalit literature.
3.5.1 SELF- CHECK QUESTIONS
(i) Who represented India in 2nd Round Table Conference in 1931?
(ii) When was Bama's Karruku published?
3.6. SUMMING UP
Dalit literature needs to be studied on the following levels: 1. As a pan-Indian phenomenon on the late 20th
century, especially after 1991, i.e., after the celebration of Dr.Ambedkar’s birth centenary celebrations; 2. As a self-
narrative, celebrating identity which maintains some resemblance with marginal literatures across cultures; 3. As a
critique of Gandhian idea of nation and Indian culture; 4. As a literature rooted in Regional culture with its own
regional dalit history.
3.7 GLOSSARY
Inspire - fill (someone) with the urge or ability to do or feel something
Mainstream - the ideas, attitudes, or activities that are shared by most people and regarded as normal
or conventional.
Governance - the action or manner of governing a state, organization, etc.
Explicit - stated clearly and in detail
3.8 ANSWERS TO SELF CHECK QUESTIONS
3.3.3 (i) oppressed, subjugated, deprived
(ii) Harijans
(iii) Dr. Ambedkar
3.5.1 (i) Mahatama Gandhi
(ii) 1994
1. List the various terms used in the history of Indian culture to refer to the ‘untouchables’.
2. Comment on the word ‘Dalit’ and explain how it differs from the word ‘harijan’.
3. Why does Ambedkar think that the problem of untouchability is the problem of the mainstream society?
4. How does Ambedkar trace of origin of patriarchy in caste system?
5. Discuss the difference in the perception of caste between Gandhi and Ambedkar.
1. Ambedkar, B.R. “Annihilation of Caste”. New Delhi: Arnold publishers, 1990. ——, “Castes in India”, Dr.
Babasaheb Ambedkar:Writings and Speeches. Education Department, Government of Maharashtra
Government, 1989, Vol.1
2. Gopal Guru, “The Category called ‘Dalit”, Atropy in Dalit Politics: Intervention 1,. Ed Gopal Guru, New
Delhi: Vikas Adhyayan Kendra, 2005
3. Gail Omvedt, Dalit Visions, 1995. New Delhi: Orient Longman, revised edition, 2006.
*****
13
Lesson-4
Omprakash Valmiki’s Joothan
STRUCTURE
4.0 OBJECTIVES
4.1 INTRO DUCTION
4.2.1 OMPRAKASH VALMIKI (1950-2013): LIFE AND WORK
4.2.2 ENGLISH TRANSLATION OF JOOTHAN AND AFTER
4.3 OMPRAKASH VALMIKI AS A HINDI DALIT WRITER
4.3.1 HINDI DALIT LITERATURE - A PRE-HISTORY
4.3.2 CONTEXT OF HINDI DALIT LITERATURE
4.4 JOOTHAN
4.4.1 JOOTHAN : A SUMMARY
4.4.2 JOOTHAN : DALIT AUTOBIOGRAPHY OR TESTIMONIAL WRITING?
4.4.3 CHALLENGES OF JOOTHAN AND DALIT TESTIMONIAL WRITING
4.5 SUMMING UP
4.6 GLOSSARY
4.9 SUGGESTED READINGS
4.0 OBJECTIVES
This lesson attempts to highlight the significant place occupied by Omprakash Valmiki’s Joothan in the
history of Hindi Dalit literature. It also tries to show how the publication of Joothan marks a unique history of Hindi
Dalit literature and its difference from the Marathi Dalit literature. In addition, it highlights the nature of Valmiki’s
narrative with a view to highlighting the formation of testimonial writing as different from autobiography.
4.1 INTRODUCTION
Omprakash Valmiki’s Joothan occupies a significant place in the history of Hindi Dalit literature. In fact it
formed a separate tradition of Hindi Dalit literature as different from the Dalit canon which is centred around the
Marathi writing. Joothan invokes the nature of Dalit experience in the Hindi-speaking central India. It thus remains
part of the untold history of a Dalit literature of the erstwhile ‘untouchables’ of that region. The English translation of
Joothan established a close connection between testimonial writing in general and the testimonial self-narratives of
the marginal communities across the world.
4.2.1 OMPRAKASH VALMIKI (1950-2013): LIFE AND WORK
Valmiki was born in 1950 at Barale district, Muzaffarnagar, Utter Pradesh. He had a traumatic experience in
school education with his casteist teachers and could not continue his education. He left his village and came to
Dehradun. He spent five years of training in Mumbai and worked as an appointee at Ordinance factory, Chandrapur. In
his free hostel life in Maharashtra he came in close contact with the Dalit Panthers. Inspired by the movement, he
started writing poems and became a theatre activist. He did M.A in Hindi when he came back to Dehradun to work on
a new project. Joothan was first published in 1997. It created mixed responses among the readers and critics of both
Dalits and non-Dalits. Valmiki (or Balmiki) is the name given to the Chuhras of Punjab and Western Utter Pradesh by
the Hindu reformists of Arya Samaj movement in North India. Religion plays a major role in Joothan, in which
Valmiki narrates his father’s critical attitude towards Dalits converting to Christianity. The name ‘Valmiki’ functions
as a caste marker and it resists them from getting recognition among Sikhs and also by the Buddhists. This shows that
the very name (that constitutes his identity) has larger implications within and outside Hinduism. Om Prakash Valmiki
also maintains a complex relationship with Marxism and with the Hindi literary modernism. He shared common
interests with the well-known Hindi Dalit writer, Mohandas Naimishray in his literary and social activism. Valmiki
died on November 17, 2013.
14
4.2.2. ENGLISH TRANSLATION OF JOOTHAN AND AFTER
Joothan was translated and introduced to the English world by the Canada based Indian, Arun Prabha Mukerjee.
Her introduction located Omprakash Valmiki’s Joothan within a broader context of Indian Dalit literature. It also
located him within a larger sphere of marginal literature across cultures. In the Preface to Joothan, Valmiki says that
from the time he planned to write his painful life, his friends asked him to write it in the form of a novel. But he
wanted to write it as an autobiography. Because he thought it would help him assert his identity. This dilemma to write
or not to write about one’s humiliating life experience is typical of early Dalit autobiographies. The English translation
of Joothan secured a unique place in the Hindi Dalit literature. It thus breaks away from the canonical Marathi-
centred Indian Dalit literature.
(i) Where was Omprakash Valmiki born?
(ii) Who translated Joothan into English?
(iii) What were Balmikis earlier called?
4.3 OMPRAKASH VALMIKI AS A HINDI DALIT WRITER
4.3.1 HINDI DALIT LITERATURE- A PRE-HISTORY
In the history of Dalit literature, Hindi Dalit literature gains significance as it accommodates Dalit voices of
several Hindi-speaking regions in North India and responds to leaders and movements of the various regions in Hindi
language. A few writers write both in Hindi as well as in one other regional language – either Punjabi, Gujarathi or
Marathi. This makes the categorization ‘Hindi Dalit literature’ difficult to fix within a region or language. However
one can roughly understand it as referring to the literature written by the writers from Punjab, Hariyana, Utter Pradesh,
Madiya Pradesh. Hence the context of Hindi Dalit literature is so broad as to accommodate the activities and writings
of more than one language and one region. Such a broad scope of the Hindi Dalit literature offers the possibility of
evolving a pan-Indian Dalit identity.
Utter Pradesh has a long history of Dalit movement which represented the cause of the Depressed Class to
the British colonial government. The All-India Adi-Hindu conference held in 1927 was attended by nearly 25000
untouchables. The participants in the conference carried slogans thanking the British for liberating them from the
uppercastes. During the visit of Simon Commission, they demanded proportional representation in legislative
assemblies and change in the tenancy Acts. The All-India Scheduled Caste Federation (SCF) later continued this
tradition. The 1928 conference of SCF (which had N.Sivaraj of Tamil Nadu as its general secretary) demanded the
British to take up welfare measures for the upliftment of the Depressed Classes. The history of Dalit movement in
this region goes back to the time of Swami Achhutanand ‘Harihar’ (1879- 1933) of Kanpur. He led the famous Adi-
Dharma movement in 1925 and represented the cause of ‘untouchables’ to the British government. He was the founder
of the Adi Hindu Mahasabha (an organisation of the Depressed Classes) and of the newspaper Adi Hindu. His activities
are similar to the activities of Pundit Iyothee Thass, who founded the Dravida Maha Jana Sabha in Tamil Nadu in 1891.
Dalit History in several regions in India develops such parallels in their ‘positive’ attitude towards colonial government
and in their critique of nationalist movement. The Dalit Panthers of India which emerged in Maharashtra in 1970s
created enormous impact in the Hindi speaking regions. This has paved way to the revival of Dalit movement in
Northern India. Inspired by this wider impact, Kanshiram started the Bahujan Samaj Party, which gained visibility in
the mainstream electoral politics with the able leadership of Mayawathi in the post-90s.
4.3.2. CONTEXT OF HINDI DALIT LITERATURE
The history of Hindi Dalit literature is normally traced back to the writings of Swami Achhutanand who had
used the terms ‘outcaste’ and ‘Dalit’ current in Hindi vocabulary. The most famous poem “Have You Really Slept Off
On Us, O Swami?” by Durgawati, the wife of Swami Achhutanand records his contribution to the history of Hindi
Dalit literature. Hindi Dalit writers, who were instrumental in the birth of a visible Dalit movement in the 1960s, led
to the formation of the Republican Party of India.
The famous Hindi Dalit writer and critic, Sheroj Singh Beichain, found the publication of book of poems,
Bharat Ke Achhut (India’s Untouchables) in 1946 by Mahatma Gyandas ‘Vivek Bhusan’, as a significant moment in
the history of Hindi Dalit literature. According to him, “Dalit interventions in the debates on social equality in India
in the context of India’s approaching political independence came from intellectuals such as Devidas Jatav, Chandrika
Prasad ‘Jigyasu’, Swami Bodhanand, Swami Sudhanand and Hari Prasad Tamta, the editor of the newspaper Samta.
They all raised their voices in support of the struggle for social equality. On Swami Achhutanand’s death, the poet
Jagat Ram Jatiya wrote the poem “Char Aansu” (“Four Drops of Tears”), which marks a significant moment in the
history of Hindi Dalit literature. Among the works of Dalit women writers writing in Hindi, after Rajat Rani Meenu’s
15
short story “Sunita” and Uth Chal Mere Saath, as part-autobiography, the novels of Kaveri (Miss Ramia), Sushila
Takbhore, Raj Bharati and Tara Parmar show significant literary promise.” The book of poems by Bihari Lal ‘Harit’,
Azadi Ki Larai (The War of Independence), was published in 1947.
Hazari’s Ek Harijan Ki Ram Kahani (The Grand Narrative of a Harijan’s Life), appeared in English translation
as An Outcaste Indian (1954). This could be regarded as the earliest Hindi Dalit autobiographical writing. During the
1980s a new generation of Hindi Dalit writers emerged with the inspiration they received from the writers of Dalit
Panthers from Maharashtra. The nation-wide Dr.Ambedkar’s centenary celebrations in the early 1990s created a
climate for the rise of pan-Indian Dalit identity politics. Publication of Dalit journals in Hindi, writings on dalit
issues both in Hindi and English in the mainstream media and Translation of Dalit literature of other regions into
Hindi sharpened the debates of Dalit identity politics and the Hindi Dalit literature in the post-90s. This has paved way
for the emergence of Dalit Autobiographical writings in Hindi by the urban dwelling middle-class Dalits. They either
lived in Maharashtra during this literary movement of the 1970s and 1980s (for example, Omprakash Valmiki), or
writers like Mohandas Naimishray lived outside. But all these writers were in contact with the Dalit Panthers. Some
of the famous Hindi Dalit autobiographies are, Joothan (1997) by Omprakash Valmiki and Tiraskrit (2002) by Surajpal
Chauhan and recently Beichain’s autobiography Mere Bachpan Mere Kandhon Par (My Childhood On My Shoulders).
4.4 JOOTHAN
4.4.1 JOOTHAN : A SUMMARY
Joothan opens with the description of a locality in which he lived: “The pigs wandering in narrow lanes,
naked children, dogs, daily fights, this was the environment of my childhood” (1). The struggles of his father to run
the family, his deep interest in his son’s education are contrasted with the incessant fights among the community. It
serves to establish the uniqueness of his illiterate father, who begged Master Har Phool Singh: “Masterji, I will be
forever in your debt if you teach this child of mine a letter or two” (2). While his relatives are against his education,
his father struggles hard for his son’s education. This unique nature of his father became a source of inspiration for
Valmiki throughout his life. Then he describes the abject poverty of his Chuhra community and their exploitation at
the hands of the merciless uppercaste Tyagis, who do not pay even for their livelihood. In addition to their work in the
fields, Chuhras are also involved in the work of skinning dead animals, cleaning and other menial jobs. The tireless
work of his mother is presented along with his mother’s sense of self-respect. She overturns basket full of joothan
when she was insulted. This incident, he says, had a great impact on him and taught him the importance of self-respect.
Such a difficult entry into school after enduring all such hardships does not give him any enthusiasm. He was given
separate treatment in schools. He was asked to sit in a corner in the classroom and was not allowed to mix with
classmates. His Headmaster asked him to sweep the school premises. Once in response to the discussion of
Dronacharya’s poverty in Mahabharatha, he casually remarked that Dalit poverty is much severe than this. The enraged
teacher abused him by calling his caste and had beaten him. He says: “That epic is etched on my back even today” (35).
In his school final, his Chemistry teacher deliberately prevented him to do his practical in the lab and failed him. Later
when a newly appointed mathematics teacher asked for water he revealed his caste. On hearing his caste, he didn’t
want to take risk and avoided water. Throughout his educational period, he had lived with two kinds of teachers – one
sexist, pervert and casteist and the other is rare- concerned and encouraging teachers. And he concluded by saying,
friends are better than teachers. His friendship with Sukhkar Singh, Ram Singh taught him so much than his teachers.
For him, they represent Dalit solidarity even at that young age. His first act of protest to earn self-respect for his
community could be seen in his response to a marriage ritual, salaam. According to the ritual, the newly married
bridegroom and the bride should beg and get gifts from the upper caste. Valmiki was already uneasy getting food from
them. So he strongly protested against this ritual saying that this would affect the self-esteem of the newly married
Dalit couple. He could not continue his higher studies because of his family condition and moved to Dehradun,
where he spent crucial part of his life with his cousin, Surjan. The urban atmosphere helped him overcome the caste
climate prevailed in his village. He got new friends. A friend Hemlal introduced him to a biography of Dr.Ambedkar.
This ignited in him a passion for identity and then he started exploring the works of Ambedkar in the library. Later on
when he read the Hindi master story tellers like Premchand he was greatly moved but was wondering at the absence of
the voice of Dalits in the mainstream. His work in the Ordinance factory gave him a new identity, added to his self-
confidence. With the first publication on caste practice that appeared in Nava Bharat Times, he had to face criticism
for being so open in his discussion of caste. He received criticisms among family, friends, and academics. A girl
from Kulkarni family, Savita, who had loved him, had withdrawn from him when she came to know about his caste.
Once when a co-passenger who was closely conversing with his family asked his caste, his wife was trying to suppress
it. But he openly confessed his caste and the conversation came to a halt abruptly. Joothan closes with an account of
16
the responses he received on the initial draft of the work. Those who read the draft of Joothan advised him to be soft
and asked him to remove parts of the narration. Even a Dalit writer, Mohandas Nemishrai asked him not to mention his
caste name in public places. But he was firm in his conviction as the narration of his personal humiliation serves as
part of his assertion of Dalit identity.
4.4.2. JOOTHAN: DALIT AUTOBIOGRAPHY OR TESTIMONIAL WRITING?
OmPrakash Valmiki’s autobiography Joothan may either be read as a memoir of a Dalit belonging to Bhangi
about the struggles faced by him in gaining education and attaining a life of a teacher or as a testimony that records the
pains and sufferings of the community in the independent India. Joothan thus foregrounds the voice of the individual
as well the collective. However this autobiographical writing is also located in a specific context of the political
history of the Dalit movement in the Hindi speaking Utter Pradesh.
The difference between the autobiography and testimony could be identified on three grounds: First, unlike
the image of the ‘Self’ constructed in autobiography, the testimonial narratives invoke the image of the ‘Other’ of the
culture. Second, unlike the narration of the life of the individual, the testimonial narrative juxtaposes the life of the
individual as an ‘Other’ with the life of the community he/she belongs. Thirdly, while autobiography has claims to
national and literary merits, the testimonial narratives have legal implications. They carry the voice of an accused
(which includes both the individual as well as the community) seeking justice. These elements of testimonial narrative
could be found in Joothan in its title, narrative, and narrative voice.
Joothan literally means the food left on the plate. In this text/context, it does not refer to the food, but it
refers to the person who is destined to eat that food. Hence the English expression ‘left-over’ does not carry the
cultural resonance. The word, ‘Joothan’ also carries the connotations of ritual purity as ‘jootha’ refers to a polluted
being. Valmiki says that it was the editor Rajendra Yadav who helped him to choose the title for this autobiographical
work. The title, ‘Joothan’, as a collective noun refers to the writer as well as the Chuhras or Bhangis. It invokes the
voice of a joothan in the courtroom of the mainstream society and nation. The narrative testifies to the deplorable
condition of the Chuhras.
According to Sarah Beth, this personal account is part of the Dalit history of this region. Because this
personal narrative is placed in the backdrop of the Ganwai Brother’s incident in Poona and the activities of the Dalit
Panthers in response, the 1978 assertion movement for the renaming of Marathwada University after Dr. Ambedkar,
the anti-reservation protests in Gujarat and elsewhere, and the 1984 incident in Malkapur in Amravati district in which
an upper-caste teacher forced his students to rip out the lesson on Ambedkar from their textbooks.
While Joothan helps readers establish Valmiki’s struggle against the stigma of untouchability and his bold
assertion of his Dalit identity, the text also helps to recover several other histories – the history of education in India,
the history of literary establishment in the Hindi region, the history of feudal practice in post-independent India -
from a dalit point of view. It is in this light that Joothan becomes a testimonial writing. It testifies to the life of a dalit,
his community as well as testifies to the dubious nature of the mainstream society in which caste practices are the
‘normal’ course of life. As a testimonial writing, Joothan presents the autobiographical account of the struggles of a
dalit in the court of Hindu social order which sanctions the caste practices as normal order of life.
Talking about Joothan, Omprakash Valmiki said that while a few Dalit brothern from far-flung rural areas
identified themselves in these pages, many friends asked why I was writing an autobiography so early in my life. And
my answer to them was “Don’t compare this narrative of pain with the achievements of others”. This statement
develops a parallel with other dalit autobiographies like Bama’s Karukku and testifies to the unique nature of Dalit
autobiography. Since these narratives do not try to describe an individual’s achievement, as Valmiki said, but testifies
to how an individual managed to survive in such horrifying moments. Hence what we get here is the ‘Other’ side of the
mainstream society and nation. Such an alternative history found in these autobiographical writings adds to the generic
significance of these narratives of pain, making them self-writing or testimonial writing.
4.4.3. CHALLENGES OF JOOTHAN AND DALIT TESTIMONIAL WRITING
The double voiced nature of this narrative is very obvious even in the first page of the autobiography. The
description of his locality where Chuhras live is a good proof for this kind of writing. The description is placed
alongside the speaker’s comment with the mainstream vision of society: “If the people who call the caste system an
ideal social arrangement had to live in this environment for a day or two, they would change their mind” (1) This
serves as a powerful critique of the mainstream and in particular, Gandhi’s vision and defense of caste system. It was
this locale that appears in Namadeo Dasal’s poetry. It was this kind of locale that was referred to as basti by Vasant
Moon, meaning a Dalit neighbourhood.
17
While looking at the similarities among the Dalit autobiographical narratives, it is also important to see the
differences among them. Responding to the question regarding the formation and identity of Dalit literature, Valmiki
said: “There can be sameness and similarity in background, atmosphere, conditions and emotions, but there is difference
and variation in all Dalit writers. Is Joothan like Apne Apne Pinjare or Tiraskrit and Abishap like Dohra? The
manner of expression of every dalit writer is quite different. The method of saying things is different. Therefore there
is variety in dalit writing. Two books have come bearing the title, Dalit Sahitya Ka Saundaryashastra; one by Sharan
Kumar Limbale and another by me. But both the books are different in their content and presentation”(68).
4.4.4 SELF -CHECK QUESTIONS
(i) Who formed Adi Hindu Mahasabha?
(ii) What is the name of Sheroj Singh Beichan's autobiography called?
(iii) Name the uppercastes of Joothan.
(iv) What does the word Joothan mean?
4.5. SUMMING UP
Om Prakash Valmiki’s Joothan is significant for its ability to record the dehumanized life of Chuhra people,
who otherwise go unrecorded in history. It establishes a tradition of separate Hindi Dalit literature making room for
a whole range of new writings to come from that Hindi-speaking topography. The testimonial nature of Joothan
raises questions about the other India and it remains the unique voice of that other uncared India.
4.6 GLOSSARY
Invoke - appeal to (someone or something) as an authority for an action or in support of an argument.
Autobiography - an account of a person's life written by that person.
Testimonial - a formal statement testifying to someone's character and qualifications.
Dilemma - a situation in which a difficult choice has to be made between two or more alternatives,
especially ones that are equally undesirable.
Marginal - at the edge or margin.
Ignite - catch fire or cause to catch fire.
Dubious - hesitating or doubting.
4.2.3 (i) Muzaffarnagar, Utter Pradesh
(ii) Arun Prabha Mukherjee
(iii) Chuhras
4.4.4 (i) Swami Achhutanand 'Harihar'.
(ii) Mera Bachpan Mere Kandhon Par ( My Childhood on My Shoulders)
(iii) Tyagis
(iv) Literally it means the food left on the plate.In this novel it refers to the person who is destined to eat
that food.
1. What is the meaning of the word ‘joothan’? Explain how the Valmiki extends the word as a metaphor
referring to the life of his people.
2. Elaborate the significance of Valmiki’s Joothan in the history of Hindi Dalit Literature.
3. Discuss Valmiki’s Joothan as a perfect example of testimonial narrative.
4. Explain how Valmiki’s Joothan challenges the mainstream vision of society and offers an alternative
history of our nation.
5. Comment on the dilemma between assertion and negation of Dalit identity in Joothan.
1. Bechain, Sheoraj Singh, “Voices of awakening”, http://www.hindu.com/lr/2008/08/03/stories/
2008080350220500.htm
2. Valmiki, Om Prakash., Joothan, Translated by Arun Prabha Mukerjee, New Delhi: Orient Longman, 2003.
3. Beth, Sarah, “Dalit Autobiographies In Hindi: The Transformation of Pain into Resistance”, www.sasnet.lu.se
4. Pramod K. Nair, “Dalit Writing, Cultural Trauma and Pedagogy: The Testimony of Omprakash Valmiki’s
Joothan”, www.academia.edu.
*****
18
Lesson-5
Kallu – Ismat Chugtai
STRUCTURE
5.0 OBJECTIVES
5.1 INTRODUCTION
5.4 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE MARRIAGE
5.7 GLOSSARY
5.0 OBJECTIVES
The purpose of this lesson to tell you about Ismat Chugtai and briefly give summary of the story. This chapter will
also bring out the hidden message given by the writer and show how literature is not only about imagination but also
about social realities.
5.1 INTRODUCTION
This lesson is on short story titled 'Kallu ' by Ismat Chugtai . It will acquaint you with the writer and his writings.
This will help you in understanding the story and issues related to it. This great writer who challenged age old norms
would become a part of you.Her characterization is so realistic that you all would empathize and would be able to
relate to them.
Ismat Chugtai(1915-91), a prominent Urdu novelist and short story writer, was a rebel who went against the
established social norms. She was way ahead of the times she was born in. She went in for a higher education, took up
a job, married a man she wanted to and as she wanted she was cremated instead of being buried.
Ismat Chugtai was the second Muslim writer after Rasheed Jahan to write short stories and novels in Urdu.
Chugtai was encouraged by All India Progressive Writers’ Association which was launched in 1936 under the
Presidentship of Hindi- Urdu writer Premchand.Chugtai was first published in 1939 though she had been writing
stories for long.Her focus had been the lives of middle class Muslim women of the sub urban towns of Uttar Pradesh.
Her portrayals reflect her insightful intellect and an intense eye for details.Her stories had majorly been controversial.
‘Lihaaf’(The Quilt, 1942) is one such prominent example which looks into the issue a woman’s sexual desire. This
story was charged with obscenity and led to a trial for four years of which she was finally acquitted. 1940s was the
decade in which Chugtai got noticed and applauded as awriter.
Ismat Chugtai also wrote for films and even acted as grandmother in Junoon(1972). She was involved in
many films of her husband Shaheed Latif. To name a few – Arzoo(1950), Darwaza(1954), Society(1955)and Sone
Ke Chidiya(1958).Several of her short stories have also been made into films of which Garam Hawa (1973) won
was highly acclaimed.Chugtai belongs to the league of progressive writers like Manto, Sardar Jafri, Kaifi Azmi, Sahir
Ludhianvi and Majrooh Sultanpuri.She received Padma Shri in 1975 for her contribution to Urdu literature.
Kallu was not even seven years’ old. Yet he did the work of a grown-up man in the household. He was made to
get up quite early in the morning. Dressed in a turn, oversized shirt, with his woollen cap pulled over his ears, he
looked like a dwarf. With his running nose he started work immediately. He was scared of cold water and did not like
to wash his face. Sometimes he rubbed the tips of his yellow teeth, which had were permanently discoloured and
covered with fungi.
He would light the stove as his first job every morning. Then he would put water for tea and set the table for
breakfast. Then he would running to the door and back carrying butter bread, milk and eggs. All this while his big
19
slippers would make a flapping sound on the floor as he went to the kitchen innumerable times. After the cook had
prepared breakfast Kallu would make more trips carrying hot toast and parathas. The children in the family, who
were about the same ages as Kallu were bed porridge, milk,eggs,toast and jam to ensure their good health while poor
Kallu just looked on. When breakfast was over he sat alone in the kitchen and ate left- over burnt ends of toast and
paratha, hurriedly forcing them down his throat with some tea.
After that he was busy doing old jobs around the house, polishing Maliha bi’s shoes looking for Hamida bi’s
ribbons and Akhtar Bhai’ s socks, recovering salima bi’s book-bag, getting Mumani Jan’s katha from the almirah’,
and bringing Abu’s cigarette case from beside his pillow. He moved like a spinning top till everyone had left for office
or school. Later,he washed Nanhi’s diapers and sat down to play with Safia bi. In between he ran to the door fetch the
mail. From the postman or ask the name of the person visting the house.
Around midday Kallu would shell the peas or wash spinach. At lunch he repeatedly ran to the dining table with
hot rotis, giving the baby’s cradle a little push every now and then on the way. What more can I say about him? Kallu
had come to the family at a very young age. He did the work of a bearer and sweeper for just two rupees a month and
some throw-away clothes to wear. His mother lived in the village and had entrusted him to our care. She thought he
would at least get enough to eat in our house. She herself worked as a cook for the village zamindar . She also made
poor Kallu work for her,asking him to scratch her backm, bring her water, get rotis and dal from the kitchen, rub down
her back and shoulders, and massage her head.
Kallu’s small hands were adept and massaging the feet and once started doing it, he would keep doing it all
afternoon. Sometimes he felt sleepy and fell at our feet. We would then wake him up by kicking him.
Kallu had no time to play. He did not find any time to rest while running around doing add jobs for everyone.
Sometimes he would just looking like an idiot. Seeing him like this someone would quietly put a straw into his ears.
Kallu would he startled and apologetically start working agains.
Preparations for Maliha bi’s marriage were going on. The family kept talking of forthcoming marriage, who
should marry whom. Mumani one asked Nanhi intent who she was going to marry. Everyone laughed Amma then asked
kallu who he was going to marry. Kallu smiled showing his yellow teeth. When asked further, he whispered that he was
going to marry Salima bi. At this Mumani burst into a bit of anger and started cursing kallu. She then boxed his ears.
Then one day , which he and Salima were playing ,kallu asked her,”Salima bi will you marry me? Salima
shook her head readily agreed. Sitting in the sun in the courtyard, Mumani overheard this., Full of anger, she took out
her sandal and hit kallu over his head with it. But she hit him in the wrong place and kallu started bleeding from the
nose. Blood was flowing down the side of his face. Kallu’s mother, who was visiting us at that time, saw the blood and
cried out aloud that her son had been murdered.
Mumani then asked both the mother and son to get out of the house. Kallu’s mother wept and begged
forgiveness, but Mumani did not relent.
Yeras passed quickly. A mere servent like kallu was forgotten . Maliha was now a mother while Hamida bi
never married. Half the family had migrated to Pakistan; the other half remained in India. Nanhi, Safia and Salima had
completed their education and were now waiting to get married. But it was note easy to find husbands for them. Our
uncle, Chacha Mian , was always in search of eligible young men for them. He moved in official circules and had
arranged a match for Maliha , but he was helpless now. These were had arranged a match for impossible to find nice
young men. Some of them demanded a car and a trip to England as part of their dowary. One would consider these
demands if there was only one girl in the family to be married off. Our family had fallen on bad days after we lost our
land. We had to live on lower income, and there were no parties any more where young girls could meet eligible,
young bachelors. However, if a rare party was hosted somewhere, Chacha Mian made the girls attend it. And so when
a dinner was held in the honour of Mr. Din, the new Deputy Collector, we started preparing to attend it days in
advance.
Mr . Din was a bachelor and the mothers of all eligible daughters considered him to be a good match. We
were taken aback when we saw him. He was over six feet tall, had a wheatish complexion, very attractive features, and
teeth silent at the mention of Salima,s name and then quickly moved away from our group to talk to other guests at the
party.
Chacha Mian was puzzled . He came to us when mR. Din was leaving and agked us who he was. Mumani
harshly replied that he was the Deputy Collector. Chacha Mian asked her if she had recognised him. He was their
kallu, the boy- servant. Mumani turned up her nose and asked whether it was their kallu, the boy who had served at their
house. Chacha Mian said that there was Kalimuddin who was frequently beaten up by Mumani. She said that there was
something wrong with the government for anybody could get a job these days. Amma (our mother) assumed her that
20
Kalimuddin was a Qureshi, a good caste; he was the same boy who had submitted to Mumani’s beatings as a child
because of his adverse circumstances. Mumani then asked Amma an why she didn’t marry off his own daughter to
kallu if he was so good. Amma said that she would be too glad to do so but she was not so fortunate.
In any case, would Kallu be interested in marrying into a family that had so it treated him. Ayesha, his mother,
had left him with the family to be taken care of, but all they had done was to turn him into a servant.
Chacha Mian added how hard Kallu’s mother worked to educate her son so that he could reach his present
position. Now people were competing with one another in offering their daughters to him in marriage. But Mumani
was adamant; she did not went him into a servant.
One day Chacha Mian came home in a disturbed frame of mind. He said that, as he was coming out of the
club, Kalimuddin had come with him. We should make some tea and entertain him. Amma ran towards the kitchen, but
Mumani made a wry face and would not move. The girls turned pale, especially Salima. We wondered whether ‘Kalim
Saheb ’ should be asked to come into the house or the ladies be sent to the lawn to meet him or Chacha Mian be
allowed to handle everything all by himself. Malima said that Kalimuddin had come to their house to take revenge for
his earlier humiliation. Salima’s face lost its entire colour.
Amma said she was not worried as Kalimuddin appeared to be a decent person and we should be generous and
hospitable because he had come visiting us. But Mumani was angry. She said that he had come there to show them how
superior he had become to them now. None of her daughters would be allowed to go and greet him. Finally,all the girls
went to see him. They were accompanied by Mumani’s married daughter. Maliha Chacha Mian was upset. He was
worried what Kalimuddin would think of them.
When we went to the Lawn, we found Kalimuddin talking to be the old gardener about the past. The Gardener
was obviously embarrassed and a little uncomfortable talking to such a big man. He reminded the gardener how he
should shout for water and how Kalimuddin would pull a sheet as purdah for Mumani. He then asked the gardener
whether he had ever stolen a look at the Bride of the House (Mumani). He Stared laughing and turned to the ladies
when he saw them.
While having tea, Kalimuddin reminded Maliha how she used to his ears for not brushing his teeth regularly.
His Childhood was a wonderful dream. Maybe all of us had forgotten him, but he hadn’t forgotten us at all. He laughed
at our jokes and soon all of us became informal. He asked Maliha to convey his regards to Dulhan bi, but she told a lie
saying that her mother was not feeling well. He laughed at this and remembered that whenever Dulhan bi was angry
with someone, she too ill. He then took leave of us saying thathe had a dinner engagement, but he would come again
another time.
We kept talking about ‘Kalim Saheb’ till late at night. Chacha Mian wondered whether he would propose to
any of the girls in the family. But Mumani rudely said that Kalimuddin should keep away from her daughter. She was
adamant. She was only pretending. Only God knew what was going on in her heart. Salima was in tears as everyone was
now teasing her.
A month passed. We had ahoust forgotten about. ‘Kalim Saheb’ when he suddenly arrived at house one day
with Chacha Mian.
He was in the lawn and he wanted to talk to the ill-tempered Dulhan bi. We agreed that Mumani would never
willingly agree to meet him. So, we though of brining him inside the house and surprise her. Chacha Mian was worried.
Where would he hide his face if Mumani insulted ‘Kalim Saheb’ Amma volunteesed to arrange the meeting.
Our hearts beat uncontrollably. What if Mumani started abusing and insulting the guest .Only Maliha and I
remained while all the girls disappeared from the scene.
Kalimuddin was ushered in Mamani’s presence as she was cleaning her Paan dan . She asked Maliha to
fetch the bowl of katha from the kitchen and give it to her. But Kalimuddin took it from Maliha and handed it over to
Mumani, who now asked for some water also. As Mumani looked up, Kalimuddin greeted her respectfully with his
eyes fixed to the floor. She blessed him in a dull manner. She then asked him to sit down. As Kalimuddin sat at the far
end of the string cot, Mumani cried out that he would break the strings there. He jumped up hastily.
But she did not agree when Kalimuddin sent a formal proposal of marriage to Salima she had decided against
it and no one could make her change her mind. But Kalimuddin wouldn’t take no for an answer one day he wouldn’t
take no for an answer.one day he sat determinedly on a chair next to Mumani’s bed. It was like a match between two
equally determined wresters and all of us watched with intrest as to who would win. Kalimuddin was firm in his
proposal said it was Mumani appeared to be angry. Chacha Main admonished Mumani. He said it was not fair on
Mumani’s part to hold a grudge against her old servant who had come up in life against all adds.
21
‘Kalim Saheb’ asked Mumani what his crime was. He called her Dulhan bi, to which she vehemently objected.
Then, he called her Amma bi (Mother) in a tearful voice. Mumani’s eyes were also filled with tears and she began
scolding us. She asked us whether we were watching a circus and why were we all standing around her like idiots. She
would have to make preparations for the forthcoming marriage all by herself as were all good- for-nothing. Her
scolding sounded like wedding trumpets on our ears.
(i) In which year did Ismat Chugtai receive Padam Shri?
(ii) What does Kallu become when he grows up?
(iii) How is Kallu addressed when he becomes a high government official?
5.4 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE MARRIAGE
Marriage is a sacred bond in Indian society. Still, it’s not love which governs it. There are other social
realities which contribute towards arranging the matrimonial alliance. The story ‘Kallu’ proves that one such factor is
material need. The people’s attitudes in life are governed by money. Kallu, the protagonist, was the son of a poor
mother who had entrusted him to the care of this Muslim family. They, however, did not treat him as a child but turned
him into a servant and ill-treated him. He was immediately forgotten, once he was asked to leave the house along with
his mother.
The family later fell into bad days. Their opulence started vanishing. Their declining social and economic
status made it difficult to get the bridegrooms for the girls of the house. The eligible young men expected huge dowry
which was beyond their means as several of the daughters had to be married. Meanwhile, Kallu had risen in life.
People were after him as he returned as Deputy Collector. Mothers of all the daughters in the marriageable age
wanted him as their son-in-law.This becomes evident when Amma says, “ I wish my daughters were so fortunate, I’d
be only too happy to have him for a son-in-law.”Chacha Mian affirms this , “People are willing to present him their
daughters on a silver platter”.
There was a strong affectionate bond between Salima and Kallu in childhood which still persist in adulthood
. Salima bursts into tears whenever she is teased about Kallu, who had once innocently expressed his desire to marry
her when they were small children. There is also a sense of guilt at their earlier treatment of Kallu in Amma and
Chacha Mian who keep persuading Mumani Jan to accept Kallu’s proposal to marry Salima. Eventually Mumani Jan
relents and this is largely due to the fact that Kallu is now on a high position – Deputy Collector and is above them in
social and economic position. Hence, it’s the wealth and social status which have played a significant role in this
marital alliance.
KALLU
Kallu whose full name was Kalumdin was left by his mother with this family as she was poor. As a seven year
old boy Kallu was turned into a servant in Mumani’s household who was made to slog day and night and ill- treated.
Kallu’s mother worked as a cook in the village zamindar’s house and felt that her son would get at least two square
meals a day in this house. But he was denied even that. Mumani even hit him with her sandal, when playing with her
daughter Salima, Kallu expressed as an innocent childhood desire to marry her. When Kallu started bleeding from the
nose and his mother protested, both were ordered to leave the house.
Years later, Kallu appears as the tall and handsome ‘Kalim Saheb’ the Deputy Collector. Parties are heed in
his honour and mothers of all daughters in the marriageable age compete with each other to have him as a son-in-
law.However, this view is not held by Mumani Jan who thinks that he has come to “show off his superiority” and
humiliate them.it is Amma who points out how they have been insensitive and cruel towards them, “ Ayesha, his
mother, left him with us so he could become somebody. But you turned him into a servant”. Chacha Mian sheds light
on the contribution of Kallu’s mother in his making, “ And the poor woman worked hard, sewed clothes, washed
people’s dirty dishes and finally succeeded in raising him to such heights. People are willing to present him their
daughters on a silver platter.”
Though nothing specific has been mentioned about Kallu, still, we are able to place him as a sensitive, hard
–working and an honest man.
MUMANI JAN
Mumani Jan is presented as irritable, argumentative and ill-tempered. She thinks very highly of herself and
the social position of her family. She has little compassion and maltreats seven years old boy Kallu. She is cruel as
she hits him with her sandal when he innocently utters a desire to marry her daughter Salima. She goes vindictive and
spiteful when Kallu’s mother protests on Kallu being hit. Leaving aside all her humanity she impolitely orders both
Kallu and his mother to leave the house even when Kallu’s nose is bleeding.
22
Later when Kallu becomes Deputy Collector and expresses his childhood wish to marry Salima , Mumani
Jan does not give in as she still holds the view that Kalimuddin(Kallu) is below them in social rank and position. When
she meets him in a party held in honour of him, she is teken aback at his rise in social ladder, “You mean the little
midget who was our houseboy? My God! What’s wrong with the government ? It seems just about anyone can land a
job with the it these days!” She is full of sarcasm when Chacha Mian apprises her that he is a Qureshi – a good caste.
She taunts, “Well, in that case why don’t you give him your daughter in marriage?”. She is upset with allthe mothers
who want Kalimuddin as their son- in –law. She shows her annoyance and irritability, “ May they perish who do – I
don’t need him.”
Mumani Jan remains complexed and even doubts the reason for Kalimuddin’s visit to their house. She says,
“ He’s here for revenge …. I don’t want to be humiliated… He’s just here to show of his superiority….Come hell or
high water , I won’t give him Salima”. Even when he is determined to marry Salima , she does not relent. Only after he
calls her Amma bi instead of usual Dulhan bi that she agrees for the alliance. She exhibits her sensitive side as goes
teary and her way of accepting the proposal comes out in the form of scolding the girls - “Is this a circus ? Why are
you standing around watching like idiots? I know these girls won’t be any help with the wedding arrangements. I’ll
have to take care of everything myself, as usual.”
AMMA
Amma is shown to be a realist. She is mature, sensible and accommodating lady. Though she has seen affluent
days, yet she easily reconciles to their lean times and fall in social status. When Mumani Jan mocks, “Well in that
case why don’t you give him your daughters in marriage?” Amma gives a very practical answer, “ I wish my daughters
were so fortunate. I’d be only too happy to have him as a son-in –law. But why would he want to have anything to do
with a familyat whose hands he suffered so much humiliation?”
Amma is a pleasant person who knows how to give respect to people. When Kalimuddin comes to visit them
, she rushes to the kitchen to prepare tea. She believes that Kalimuddin is a decent person. This opinion is reflected
when she states, “I don’t care what happens. He’s here which means he’s a decent person, and we should respond with
the same sort of generosity.” She does not get complexed as Mumani Jan. Hence, she emerges as a kind and affectionate
person.
The conclusion of the story becomes noteworthy because it portrays the changing equations in life. Kallu’s
calling Mumani Jan ‘Amma Bi’ rather than ‘Dulhan Bi’ brings him closer to family. ‘Dulhan Bi’ is formal and shows as
if Kallu is still a servant in the family, lower in social status thogh he is a Deputy Collector now and not a part of the
family. On the other hand, ‘Amma bi’ places him on a equal pedestal wherein he can ask for Salima’s hand in marriage
with dignity and fulfill his childhood dream of marrying her. this shows his confidence in his present social status and
also exhibit his capability to look after Salima.
(i) What was Kallu's full name?
(ii) Describe Mumani Jan in few adjectives.
(iii) How does Kallu address Mumani Jan in the end?
5.7 GLOSSARY
Urban - characteristic of a town or city.
Prominent - important; famous.
Fetch - go for and then bring back (someone or something) for someone.
Forthcoming - about to happen or appear.
Trumpet - a brass musical instrument with a flared bell and a bright, penetrating tone
Protagonist - the leading character or one of the major characters
Opulence - great wealth or luxuriousness.
Vanishing - disappear suddenly and completely.
Midget - a very small person or thing.
5.3.1
(i) 1975
(ii) Deputy Collector
(iii) Kalim Saheb
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5.6.1
(i) Kalimuddin
(ii) Irritable, argumentative and ill-tempered.
(iii) Amma bi
i. What is the significance of marriage in the story 'Kallu'?
ii. Draw a brief character sketch of Kallu.
iii. Compare and contrast the characters of Mumani Jan and Amma.
1. Ismat: Her Life, Her Times. Sukrita Paul Kumar, Katha, New Delhi,2000. .
2. Ismat Chughtai, A Fearless Voice. Manjulaa Negi, Rupa and Co, 2003.
3. "Torchbearer of a literary revolution". The Hindu, Sunday, 21 May 2000.
4. Kashmir Uzma Urdu weekly, Srinagar, 27 December 2004, 2 January 2005.
5. "Ismat Chughtai - Pakistan-India (1915-1991)", World People, 5 May 2006.
*****
24
Lesson-6
Bosom Friend - Hira Bandose
STRUCTURE
6.0 OBJECTIVE
6.1 INTRODUCTION
6.3 SUMMARY OF THE POEM
6.4 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE OPENING LINES
6.5 CONFLICT BETWEEN EXPECTATION AND REALITY
6.6 OPPRESSION AND ITS PRESENTATION
6.7 GLOSSARY
6.10 SUGGESTED READING/SOURCES.
6.0 OBJECTIVE
The purpose of this lesson to briefly give summary of the story.It will also discuss the various issues raised
in the poem. This poem comes from the collection Phiyad (1984) and reflects on the experience of educated Dalit
women. It brings out the hypocritical stance of the society where these Dalit women are still looked down upon while
pretending to treat these women as equals.
6.1 INTRODUCTION
This lesson is on the poem titled ‘Bosom Friend’ composed by Hira Bandose. It will acquaint you with the
writer and her writings. This will help you in understanding the poem and issues related to it.
Hira Bhandose( 1939- )was born into a mahar family(Dalit), a Kamble, in a village of Pune district. She
shifted to Bombay when her father became a Municipal worker. She studied in Bombay till class nine after which she
was married off at the age of 14-15.With the encouragement from her husband and father-in-law she completed SSC
and took up a job as a railway clerk which she holds even now.Then she did her B.A and M.A in Marathi. Her writings
brought a feminist perspective to Dalit poetry, especially Marathi poetry.
Hira Bhandose had great love for songs since childhood which found expression in the form of poetry.Soon
social reality moved her and love songs gave way to the poetry about the caste disparity.Her poems give voice to the
dreams , hopes and anguish of the Dalit women who are doubly marginalised – being a woman and being a Dalit. As a
public speaker she can be fierce and funny but her poetry is gentle. She has been influenced by Daya Pawar, Kusumagraj,
Janabai and Dhyaneshwar. Her three poetry collections – Pournima, Phiyad(1984) and Phonenix(2001) have been
highly acclaimed. Hira Bhandose runs Samvadini,an organisation which works for empowering the Dalit women.
6.4 SUMMARY OF THE POEM
The poet invited a close childhood friend to dinner. She was a glad that her friend had forgotten the rigid high
and low caste distinctions them as women do not usually ignore the caste disparities. But she proved be broadminded
as she agreed to come to the poet’s small house, forgetting the age old divide between the high and the low castes in
society. The poet was very happy that her friend had accepted her invitation.
Like the simple and innocent Shabari of the Ramayana the poet tasted every dish before serving it to her
friend. But the friend made a face and told her that the dhania chutney was not served in a proper way and the poet had
still not learned how to serve food. The low castes would never rise above their customs and manners.
The poet was ashamed to hear this, and her world came crumbling down before her. She became quiet.At the
end of the meal, the friend was shocked to learn that no buttermilk or yoghurt was served with the last course of rice.
And for the high castes it was a must. The poet was now disheartened. She lost all sensation but recovered soon like
the ripples created in a pool of stagnant water when a stone is thrown it. Memories of her past came flooding to her
when her friend asked for butter milk and yoghurt at the end of the meal. What should she tell her friend?
25
In her childhood the poet didn’t get milk even for her tea, leave alone yoghurt to buttermilk. Her mother
cooked on saw dust she had brought from the timber factory. As she cooked, smoke would get into her eyes. Once in
a while the children got only garlic chunty on coarse bread; otherwise they would break the pieces of bread and soak
them in water. They did not know what a sweet like Shrikhand was. The poet did not know even the aroma of ghee. She
had never tasted halva or basundi.
The poet feels sorry that her friend has still given up her old ways and thinking because they are deep rooted.
Lifelong prejudices and feeling do not disappear overnight.
She would serve her friend yoghurt with the last course of rice. She expresses regrets that she had not
arranged the meal served to her close friend in a proper order. She should tell the poetess the mistakes made in her
serving her the meal so that she is more careful the next time. She insists on that.
(i) In which family is Hia Bandose born?
(ii) Name three poetry collections of Hira Bandose.
(iii) Whom does the poet invite for dinner?
6.4 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE OPENING LINES
The opening lines are full of happiness, joy and hope. The poet is extremely delighted as her friend is coming
to her home. This friend has forgotten her high caste and inequality which is prevalent in the society and particularly
remembered by the women. This friend is coming to a small house for dinner. Poet is glad that this has happened and
her friend has forgotten age old prejudices. Poet says,
“Today you came over to dinner for the first time
You not only came, you forgot your caste and came
Usually women don’t forget that tradition of inequality
But you came with a mind large as the sky to me pocket size house
I thought you had ripped out all those caste things
You came bridging that chasm that divides us....”
6.5 CONFLICT BETWEEN EXPECTATION AND REALITY
The very title of the poem ‘Bosom Friend’ implies the closeness and informal relationship between the poet
and her friend. The poet is happy that her friend from high caste community is coming home for dinner forgetting her
rigid caste distinctions and long prevailing biases. However, she is in for a shock as she discovers that her friend has
not been able to shed prejudice completely and is still in the grip of her own high caste practices and beliefs. The
friend curtly points out about the food not being laid properly like serving dhania chutney with the meal and curd or
milk with the last course of the meal. The poet is upset with her friend’s critical attitude. Her happiness at the arrival
of her friend turns into humiliation. She suddenly remembers with sadness how she did not get even two suare meals
a day and food items such as milk, curd and buttermilk were unknown to her. Her friend somehow has not understood
this reality. Instead of appreciating the love of the poet , the friend is only bothered about the exterior- the layout of
the food. Hence, this conflict brings forth the heartbreak of the poet and still the biased disposition of her friend.
Even the image of the sky in the poem suggests that the poet’s expectations were raised sky high when her
friend agreed to visit her. She thought that all the barriers of caste had now broken and they wre equals. However, the
friend’s attitude came as a shock and “the sky was knocked down”. Poet became numb on learning about sill the
persistent discriminatory temperament of her firend towards the low caste. Further, when her friend uses the word
‘you folk’ it is quite disparaging. It refers to all the low casts who have not learnt the table manners. The high caste
remains critical of all the practices which deviate from their laid down norms.
6.6 OPPRESSION OF THE LOW CASTE AND ITS PRESENTATION
The four writers in this unit Omprakash Valmiki , Hira Bandose, Premchand and Ismat Chugtai belong to
twocategories of writers. The first two have experienced oppression and humiliation from the upper caste people
themselves, hence, their writings are almost autobiographical. On the other hand, the other two are sympathetic
towards the downtrodden.
Omprakash Valmiki paints a realistic and objective pcture of the plights of the sweeper community in his
autobiographical account ‘Joothan’.He himself has been a victim of caste inequalityin his his village in hildhood and
has adopted the name Valmiki to identify with the community. Hira Bandose champions the cause of Dalit women in
‘Bosom Friend’. She regrets that rigid caste distinctions have not disappeared from society as yet. Her friend agrees
to come home but is unable to accept the living way of the poet. Friend’s critical manner dashes down the poet’s
enthusiastic welcome and she is forced to be reminded of her deprived childhood.
26
Premchand’s tone is ironical when he brings out the caste distinctions in Dukhi’s village. Dukhi works himself
to death in carrying out the wishes of Pandit Ghasiram as he wants Pandit to fix the date for his daughter’s marriage.
Coming from chamar community Dukhi’s task is to work with skins and hides and to remove dead animals. Ironically
, his dead corpse too is dragged out by the Pandit from Brahmins’village bringing firth the caste discrimination
prevalent in society. Chugtai’s account of Kallu and his rise to the position of Deputy Commissioner is romantic and
sentimental. It also is about how money makes the social equations change.
The writers discussed have dealt with the problem of caste inequality in their different individualistic manners.
(i) Why is the poet delighted in the beginning of the poem?
(ii) Which words of friend exhibit her discriminatory stance?
6.7 GLOSSARY
Hypocritical - behaving in a way that suggests one has higher standards
Anguish - severe mental or physical pain or suffering.
Stagnant - having no current or flow and often having an unpleasant smell as a consequence, immobile
Prejudice - preconceived opinion that is not based on reason or actual experience.
Chasm - a deep fissure in the earth's surface.
Disposition - a person's inherent qualities of mind and character.
Disparaging - expressing the opinion that something is of little worth; derogatory.
6.3.1 (i) A mahar family(dalit)
(ii) Pournima, Phiyaad and Phonenix
(iii) Her closest friend
6.6.1 (i) Her closest friend is coming over to her house for a meal.
(ii) 'you folk'
i. Summarize the poem 'My Bosom Friend'
ii.Comment on the relationship between the poet and her friend.
6.10 SUGGESTED READING/SOURCES.
1. Deo, veena and Eleanor Zelliot. Dalit Literature - Twenty-Five Years of Protest? of Progress?. Journal of
South Asian Literature, Vol. 29, No. 2, Miscellany (Summer, Fall 1994),
2. Department of English, University of Delhi. The Individual and Society. Delhi: Pearson, 2005.
3. Dharwadker, Vinay. 'Dalit Poetry In Marathi'. World Literature Today 68.2 (1994)
4. Novetzke Christain. Twice Dalit: The poetry of Hira Bansode Journal of South Asian Literature, Vol. 28 No.
½, Miscellany (Spring, Fall 1993)
5. Rajkumar, Peniel. Dalit Theology and Dalit Liberation. Farnham, England.
*****
27
UNIT-II
LESSON-1
"GIRL" Jamaica Kincaid
STRUCTURE
1.0 LEARNING OBJECTIVES
1.1 INTRODUCTION
1.2.1 SELF ASSESSMENT QUESTION
1.3 TEXT
1.4 EXPLANATION OF THE STORY
1.4.1 SYMBOLIC MEANING
1.4.1.1 SELF ASSESSMENT QUESTION
1.4.2 DRAMATIC CONCERN
1.4.3 MOTHER'S CONCERN
1.4.4 GIRL
1.5 FORM OF POETRY
1.6 SUMMARY
1.7 GLOSSARY
1.8 SELF ASSESSMENT QUESTIONS' ANSWERS
1.9 QUESTIONS
The objective of this poem is to make you understand the relationship between mother and the daughter and
also the concern of mother towards her daughter.
Jamaica Kincaid born in 1949 is a writer from Antigua in the West Indies. Later she settled in America. Like
much of Kincaid’s early fiction, “Girl recreates the world of a young girl, focusing on the nuances and rhythms of
Caribbean English. This evocation of the speech of the islands is reminiscent of other Caribbean writers such as
Derek Walcott and Edward Kaman Brathwaite, whose stories have also been compared to prose poems. Kincaid’s
treatment of the lingering effects of slavery and colonialism on the minds of those descended from slaves and from
the once colonized Caribbean “natives” also places her in the company of Trinidadian novelist V.S. Naipaul. Kincaid’s
stories, novels and essays have been important to post-colonial theory, a branch of literary studies that is concerned
with understanding how colonized people both internalize and resist the colonizing culture.
The write had come to New York at age seventeen, taking a job as a nanny for a rich family and met New
Yorkercolunnist George S. Trow, who eventually helped her publish in the magazine. She wrote for the New Yorker
for years and moved to Vermont in 1985. She has written 10 books, including Annie John (1986), A Small Place
(1988), Lucy (1990), My Brother (1997), Talk Stories (2001), Mr. Potter (2003).
Q.1. When did Jamaica Kincaid born?
A. 1942 C. 1947
B. 1949 D. 1950
1.3 TEXT
Wash the white clothes on Monday and put them on the stone heap; wash the color clothes on Tuesday and
put them on the clothesline to dry; don’t walk bare head in the hot sun; cook pumpkin fritters in very hot sweet oil;
soak your little cloths right after you take them off; when buying cotton to make yourself a nice blouse, be sure that
it doesn’t have gum on it, because that way it won’t hold up well after a wash; soak salt fish overnight before you cook
it; is true that you sing benna in Sunday school?; always eat your food in such a way that it won’t turn someone else’s
stomach; on Sundays try to walk like a lady and not like the slut you are so bent on becoming; don’t sing benna in
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Sunday school; you mustn’t speak to wharf-rat boys, not even to give directions; don’t eat fruits on the street – flies
will follow you; but I don’t sing benna on Sunday at all and never in Sunday School; this is how to sew on a button;
this is how to make a buttonhole for the button you have just sewed on; this is how to hem a dress when you see the
hem coming down and so to prevent yourself from looking like the slut I know you are so bent on becoming; this is
how you iron your father’s Khaki shirt so that it doesn’thave a crease; this is how you iron your Khaki pant so that it
don’t have a crease; this is how you grow okra – far from the house, because okra tree harbors red ants; when you are
growing dasheen make sure it gets plenty of water or else it makes your throat itch when you are eating it; this is how
sweep a corner; this is how you sweep a whole house; this is how you sweep a yard; this is how you smile to someone
you don’t like too much; this is how you smile at someone you like completely; this is how you set a table for tea; this
is how you set a table for dinner; this is how you set a table for dinner with an important guest; this is how you set a
table for lunch; this is how you set a table for breakfast; this is how to behave in the presence of men who don’t know
you very well, and this way they won’t recognize immediately the slut I have warned you against becoming; be sure to
wash every day, even if it is with your own spit; don’t squat down to play marbles – you are not a boy, you know; don’t
pick people’s flowers – you might catch something; don’t throw stones at blackbirds, because it might not be a
blackbird at all; this is how to make a bread pudding; this is how to make doukona; this is how to make pepperpot;
this is how to make a good medicine for a cold; this is how to make a good medicine to throw away a child before it
even becomes a child; this is how to bully a man; this is how a man bullies you; this is how to love a man, and if this
doesn’t work there are other ways, and if they don’t work don’t feel too bad about giving up; this is how to spit up in the
air if you feel like it, this is how to make ends meet; always squeeze bread to make sure it’s fresh; but what if the bake
won’t let me feel the bread?; you mean to say that after all you are really going to be the kind of woman who the baker
won’t let near the bread?
Notes
Benna:Also known as ‘calypso’, it is a type of popular song that originated in Trinidad, West Indies.
Wharf-rat:Literally, a large brown rat that is commonly found on wharves. Idiomatically, a person who lives
or loiters near wharves, often existing by stealing from ships or warehouses.
Dasheen: A tropical plant, cultivated for its tuberous, starchy, edible root.
Doukona: A kind of pudding.
Pepper pot: A West Indian stew.
The rhythm of the Caribbean Island of Antigua emanates in the poetic prose of this unique short story “Girl”
by Jamaica Kincaid. The author’s tone and mood for the story demonstrates the residual effects of the slavery and
colonial takeover of her land. A mother’s advice for a life time springs out of the memory of the daughter. The story
is one long sentence with the author using semi-colons to separate the different bits of information. Believing
that her daughter is on the cusp of womanhood, the mother feels that her daughter is already making poor decisions.
The motherly advice excludes bitterness and anger. She believes that her daughter is destined to a life of promiscuity
if she does not change and follow her mother’s instructions.
Essentially the story is a list of rules for the daughter to place insider her value-system. The author was
stream of consciousness in giving the advice which is defined as a literary style that presents a character’s continuous
random flow of thoughts as they arise.
1.4.1 SYMBOLIC MEANING
Symbolically, the mother believes that happiness for a woman is found in domesticity. In between her
guiding statement, she reprimands the behavior of her daughter that she had already observed. Her advice can be
placed in four categories – cloth, food, feminine behavior and men. Here is one example from each area:
(i) Cloth – how to iron clothes and wash them.
(ii) Food – Preparation and cooking of food.
(iii) Behaviour – not to act like a boy and always wash the body every day.
(iv) Men – how to bully and love a man.
Q.2. What is the setting of the story?
A. Antigua C. ST. Lucia
B. Grenada D. Barbados
29
Continuing on that theme, the girl is taught that the length of time she spends with men and how she behaves
around men will affect how others perceive her. For example the girl is instructed:
“You mustn’t speak to wharf-rat boys, not even to give directions” and “don’t squat down to play marbles –
you are not a boy”.
Repeatedly, the mother implies that the girl has already become promiscuous; however, the girl in one of her
two statements in the story denies that she has done anything wrong.
“This is how to hem a dress when you see the hem coming down and so to prevent yourself from looking like
the slut I know you are so bent on becoming this is how you iron your father’s khaki shirt…”
In this final line of the story, the mother interprets the baker’s potential refusal to touch the bread as a sign
that the daughter maybe perceived as a slut. Kincaid uses the words “feel” and “squeeze” to turn the act of buying
bread into a metaphor for sexuality, and the baker’s refusal to sell the bread is a sign of disgust of the girl’s behaviour.
The daughter’s innocent question about the bread turns into an aggressive ugly reaction by the mother. The mother has
taken a tough love approach toward the daughter and her future. She possibly sees herself as a teenager in the behaviour
of the daughter. Certainly, the relationship at this point is more frustration than love.
1.4.2 DRAMATIC CONCERN
Like Kincaid’s other short stories, “Girl” is extremely brief and can hardly be said to have a plot, although
the reader can easily imagine a dramatic context in which this monologue might be spoken. The central voice is that
of the unnamed mother; the reader must assume that the “girl” of the title is her daughter; although the relationship is
never stated.
The New Yorker published Kincaid’s short story “Girl” in 1978, her first piece of fiction. It is so popular
because it speaks to so many audiences, including young people, African Americans and women.
This story deals with her experience of being young and female in a poor country. Kincaid’s complicated
relationship with her mother as a literate woman who struggled against her poor circumstances, eventually because of
all her problems. Kincaid has also written a book Autobiography of My Mother (1996), which explores the life of a
woman stuck in poverty and resentful of her children. She has also said that her mother’s anger towards her seemed to
get worse when Kincaid became a teenager. Just as the voice of the mother in “Girl” resents and worries about her
daughter becoming a woman, Kincaid’s mother seemed to become more oppressive and bitter toward Kincaid as she
grew older.
1.4.3 MOTHER'S CONCERN
The Mother sees herself as the only person who can save her daughter from living a life of disrespect and
promiscuity. She believes that the girl has already started following her path because of the way she walks, sits and
sings benna (Antiguan folksongs) during Sunday School, and she imparts her domestic knowledge to keep the girl
respectable. In some ways the mother is wise: not only does she also has a keen sense of social etiquette and decorum,
knowing how to act around different types of people. For her, domestic knowledge and knowing how to interact with
people bring happiness along with respect from family and the larger community. Her instructions suggest that
community plays a larger role in Antiguans’ lives and that social standing within the community bears a great deal of
weight. Yet at the same time there is bitterness in the mother’s voice and she takes her anger and frustration out on her
daughter. She seems to think that none of her wisdom will make any difference and that the girl is already destined for
a life of ill repute. She even repeatedly hints that the girl wants to live promiscuously and be a “slut”. Her fears for the
girl actually belie deeper fears of the precarious state of womanhood in traditional Antiguan society. Despite the
mother’s caustic remarks and accusations, the fact that she knows how to make abortion – inducing elixirs implies
that she has had some illicit relations with man or atleast understands that such encounters sometimes occur.
Q.3. To whom girl's mother wanted her daughter not to speak to?
A. Old Ladies C. Wharf-rat boys
B. Her Father D. Her School Teacher
1.4.4 GIRL
The Daughter: Even though the girl says very little in the story, the fact that readers perceive the mother’s
words through her ears makes her silent narrator and protagonist. The daughter narrates “Girl” as if recalling the
memory of her mother from a distant future place. “Girl” is not a word-for-word transcript of an actual conversation
between the mother and daughter but a compilation of advice the daughter remembers her mother saying. She
remembers, for example, how her mother constantly accused her of promiscuity and impropriety, an accusation that
has apparently haunted her through the years. The inclusion of such remarks in the story illustrates how deeply they
affected her while growing up and just how powerful a mother’s influence and opinions can be on her children.
30
1.5 FORM OF THE POETRY
Kincaid’s use of semicolons to separate the mother’s advice and commands crates a prose poem that vividly
captures the daughter’s conflicting feelings for her mother. A Prose Poem is one that lacks rhyme, lines and the
traditional form of poetry as well as the narrative structure of conventional fiction. The layers of advice and commands
spoken in one long unending breath crate a smothering sense of duty and even oppression that stifles real, two way
communications. The daughter uses the few opportunities she has to speak to protest her mother’s believe that she’ll
grow older to become a “slut”, suggesting that the daughter has already begun to resent her mother. At the same time,
however, Kincaid uses the run-on-sentence structure almost as a list to display the mother’s domestic accomplishments
to highlight her wisdom and power.
1.6 SUMMARY
"GIRL" consists of a single sentence of advice a mother imparts to her daughter, only twice interrupted by
the girl to ask a question or defend herself. She intends the advice to both her daughter and scolds her at the same
time. Kincaid uses semicolons to separate the admonishments and words of wisdom but often repeats herself, especially
to warn her daughter against becoming a "slut". Besides these repetitions, "girl" doesn't move forward chronologically:
there is no beginning, middle, or end to the stream.
1.7 GLQSSARY
Benna : Also known as "calypso", it is a type of popular song that originated in Trinidad, west
indies
Wharf-rat : Literally, a large brown rat that is commonly found on wharves. Idiomatically, a person
who lives or loiters near wharves, often existing by stealing from ships or warehouses.
Dasheen : A tropical plant, cultivated for its tuberous, starchy, edible root.
Doukona : A kind of pudding.
1(B), 2(A), 3(C).
1.9 QUESTIONS
1. Summarize the poem
2. Explain the concern of a Mother
l. Girl: Structure and the Prose Poem- Sparknotes
2. "Girl" by Jamaica Kincaid from Charters, Ann, Ed. The Story and its writer: An Introduction
*****
31
Lesson-2
“A PRAYER FOR MY DAUGHTER”: W.B Yeats
STRUCTURE
2.1 INTRODUCTION
2.2 TEXT OF THE POEM
2.3 ABOUT THE POET
2.3.1 TWO BASIC IMAGES OF THE POEM
2.3.2 TWO STORMS
2.4 EXPLANATION
2.5 SUMMARY
2.6 GLOSSARY
2.7 SELF ASSESSMENT QUESTIONS’ ANSWERS
2.8 QUESTION
The objective of this poem is to tell you about the relation that father shares with his daughter.
2.1 INTRODUCTION
A Prayer for My Daughter by William Butler Yeats opens with an image of the newborn child sleeping in a
cradle. A storm is raging with great fury outside his residence. A great gloom is on Yeats’ mind and is consumed with
anxiety as to how to protect his child from the tide of hard times ahead. The poet keeps walking and praying for the
young child and as he does so he is in a state of reverie. He feels a kind of gloom and worry about the future of his
daughter.
2.2 TEXT
Once more the storm is howling, and half hid
Under this cradle-hood and coverlid
My child sleeps on. There is no obstacle
But Gregory’s wood and one bare hill
Whereby the haystack-and roof-levelling wind,
Bred on the Atlantic, can be stayed;
And for an hour I have walked and prayed
Because of the great gloom that is in my mind.
I have walked and prayed for this young child an hour
And heard the sea-wind scream upon the tower,
And under the arches of the bridge, and scream
In the elms above he flooded stream;
Imagining in excited reverie
That the future years had come,
Dancing to a frenzied drum,
Out of the murderous innocence of the sea.
May she be granted beauty and yet not

Beauty to make a stranger’s eye distraught,
Or hers before a looking-glass, for such,
Being made beautiful overmuch,
Consider beauty a sufficient end,
32
Lose natural kindness and maybe
The heart-revealing intimacy
That chooses right, and never finds a friend.
Helen being chose found life flat and dull

And later had much trouble from a fool,
While that great Queen, that rose out of the spray,
Being fatherless could have her way
Yet chose a bandy-legged smith for man.
It’s certain that fine women eat
A crazy salad with their meat
Whereby the Horn of Plenty is undone.
In courtesy I’d have her chiefly learned;

Hearts are not had as a gift but hearts are earned
By those that are not entirely beautiful;
Yet many, that have played the fool
For beauty’s very self, ahs charm made wise,
And many a poor man that had roved
Loved and thought himself beloved,
From a glad kindness cannot take his eyes.
May she become a flourishing hidden tree

That all her thoughts may like the linnet be,
And have no business but dispensing round
Their magnanimities of sound,
Nor but in merriment begin a chase,
Nor but in merriment a quarrel.
O may she live some green laurel
Rooted in one dear perpetual place.
My mind, because the mind that I have loved,

The sort of beauty that I have approved,
Prosper but little, has dried up of late,
Yet knows that to be choked with hate
May well be off all evil chance chief.
If there’s no hatred in a mind
Assault and battery of the wind
Can never tear the linnet from the leaf.
An intellectual hatred is the worst,

So let her think opinion are accrued.
Have I not seen the loveliest women born
Out of the mouth of Plenty’s horn,
Because of her opinionated mind
Barter that horn and every good
By quiet natures understood
For an old bellows full of angry wind?
33
Considering that, all hatred driven hence,
The soul recovers radical innocence
And learns at last that it is self-delighting,
Self-appeasing, self-affrighting,
And that its own sweet will is Heaven’s will;
She can, though every face should scowl
And every windy quarter howl
Or every bellows burst, he happy still.
And may her bridegroom bring her to a house

Where all’s accustomed, ceremonious;
For arrogance and hatred are the wares
Peddled in the thoroughfares.
How but in custom and in ceremony
Are innocence and beauty born?
Ceremony’s a name for the rich horn,
And custom for the spreading laurel tree.
Notes
Gregory’s wood: A part of the Gregory Estate. Lady Gregory, Irish writer and promoter of Irish literature
was an associate of Yeat’s.
Helen: In Greek legend, the daughter of Zeus, the supreme god, famed for her extraordinary beauty. She
married Menelaus, King of Sparta, but later fled to Troy with Paris. The ‘fool’ is Menelaus, who then fought
the Trojan War and finally retrieved Helen.
The Great Queen: Aphrodite, the goddess of love in Greek mythology (Venus in Roman mythology),
supposed to have arisen from the sea. She married the lame Vulcan, god of fire and patron of smiths.
Horn of Plenty: In Greek mythology, the horn of a goat on whose milk Zeus was fed as a child, thereafter
becoming a source and emblem of abundance and plenty.
The loveliest woman born: Maud Gonne.
2.3 ABOUT THE POET
William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) is a celebrated Irish poet who can be called a dreamer and a visionary who
was fascinated by folk-lore, ballad and superstitions of Irish peasantry. He was also interested in magic, occultism,
theosophy and the complex symbolism which keeps changing meaning from poem to poem. His poetic career spans
over fifty years. T.S. Eliot pays a great tribute to Yeats, “Mr. Yeats has been and is the greatest poet of his time. I can
think of no poet, not even among the greatest, who has shown a longer period of development than him.” The
contradiction of the human and the non-human, of the spiritual and the physical, the sensuous and the artistic, physical
decay and intellectual maturity, the past and the present, the personal and the impersonal power and helplessness are
always present in his poetry. Arthur Symons considers Yeats to be the Chief exponent of the Symbolist Movement in
England. An eminent critic B. Rajan feels that “instead of life disdained, we have life raged against, but also eagerly
accepted. Yeats is a supreme poet of what an earlier century would have called the passions; it is through these
passions, worked upon by the organizing power of poetic language that Yeats is able to enter the centre of conflict
within a man, and to re-create the conflict as the substance of poetry.”
To Yeats, the modern civilization tended to blunt our fundamental consciousness of ourselves. The rise of
democracy and mob violence which he witnessed in Ireland and Europe did not appeal to him. He felt that these events
reflected a brutalization of humanity. In the present poem ‘A Prayer for My Daughter’ he wishes that his daughter
should remain free of “intellectual hatred” which has corrupted beauty and innocence. The poem was written in 1919,
a significant date, for it was son after the First World War.
Naturally enough, the poet was troubled and gloomy about the situation in the Western World in the post-war
period. The sensitive poet visualize the world as a harsh and coarse place to live in and the society was full of turbulence.
At this time when the poet got blessed with a daughter, it was natural that he would pray and bless her to develop
qualities which would help her to face the rampant violence, upheaval and bloodshed all around in the surrounding
areas. And Years, like T.S. Eliot felt that the need of the day was peace and order and grace and reverence. The images
in the poem that serve to express the poets’ wishes for the future, “Flourishing tree, song birds, sweet music, green
34
laurel tree, the horn of plenty” – all emphasize the need for restoration of grace, joy and order in a battered civilization.
Many critics have commented on Yeats’s love of tradition and custom. He has not prayed for any specific
Christian virtues for his daughter. He has only wished for certain abstract qualities like innocence, freedom, kindness
and gladness. He has not mentioned how these qualities can be built-up. At times, the ideas he has offered, seem
theoretical. How such ideas can be realized in an age of democracy and competition, is a question which he does not
give any solution to. He has only formulated what Wilson calls, “an essentially non-Christian order whose key-note is
a man’s sense of his own nobility and self-sufficiency”.
2.3.1 TWO BASIC IMAGES OF THE POEM
There are two basic images in this poem:
(i) the rich ‘Horn of Plenty’ which he associates with courtesy, aristocracy and ceremony.
(ii) the hidden laurel tree which “rooted in one perpetual place an provide through custom a radical innocence”,
for the soul.
2.3.2 TWO STORMS
He has also referred to two storms in this poem:
(i) one striking against the tower
(ii) the second is the future storm of ‘The Second coming’.
Yeats is convinced that in “custom and ceremony” are innocence and beauty born. The storm will not destroy
the custom of the spreading laurel tree.
2.4 EXPLANATION
‘A Prayer for My Daughter’ a tenderly written lyrical poem was composed after the much quoted and famous
poem ‘The Second Coming’. Yeats’s daughter Ann Butler Yeats was born on February 24, 1919, a month after he had
composed ‘The Second Coming’. The poet is full of gloom. The opening stanza depicts a storm. His innocent child
sleeps. The outbreak of the storm signalized through the over-flooded stream beneath the tower and violent wind,
representing the violence of the future time. The poet is anxious about the child’s safety from the terror and destruction
of the future. The poet says that his daughter be granted ‘beauty and yet not beauty to make a strange eye distraught’.
He wishes her to attain beauty but without vanity. She must cultivate courtesy. He does not want that she should be like
Helen representing Mand Gonne who had trouble from a fool. He does not show his approbation for the intellection
hatred. Another quality that he wishes his daughter to have is natural gladness which means the scattering of happiness
and peace around. One thing which he wants her to avoid is hatred – which he considers the worst of evils. The mind
which is free from hatred can face the storms and misfortunes of the world. If hatred is replaced by innocence and
purity, it can bring joy and great consolation to the individual.
The poet wishes that his daughter should get married in an aristocratic family which follows traditional
elegance and manners with courtesies. He feels the common masses today are full of arrogance and hatred. ‘Ceremony
is like the horn of plenty and custom is like the growing laurel-tree providing shade and comfort to all.’
Stanza I and II depict the terrible storm raging outside the home of the poet, while his infant daughter sleeps
blissfully in her cradle. The poet seems to be disturbed as he has a storm raging within his soul as well. His mind is
haunted with fear, full of foreboding for the future of humanity.
In Stanza III and IV he prays for his daughter that she may be “granted beauty” but not so much that is disturbs
and distracts others. Too beautiful women forget their “natural kindness” and ultimately fail to find a suitable life
partner. He mentions three women Helen, Aphrodite (Venus) and Mand Gonne who were proud, foolish and miserable
as they could not respond to their true lovers.
Stanza V and VI show that the poet dwells on virtues like grace, courtesy, bliss and joy which should be a part
of the persona of his daughter as she grows-up. Like the linnets, happy and cheerful thoughts should cluster around
her inner life so that she remains joyful and should be able to spread joy all around her.
In Stanza VII and VIII the poet stresses that the mind must be free from an evil called “hatred”. He would like
his daughter to shun strong and stubborn opinions on any subject as they only invite misfortunes.
The last two stanzas (IX and X) the prayer of the poet for his sweet daughter seem to find fulfillment. He
wishes that his daughter be married in a family which upholds customs, traditions and values culture and spiritual
values. When his daughter gets married in such a family, she will be free from arrogance and hatred and will enjoy
inner peace and fulfillment.
35
Q.1. Poet wishes her daughter to attain beauty, but without?
A. Cleverness C. Ego
B. Vanity D. Mind
Q.2. To whom Poet wishes her daughter to get married to?
A. Poor C. Bourgeois
B. Aristocrats D. Capitalists
Q.3. Who is the poet of the poem?
A. John Donne C. Keats
B. WB Yeats D. Wordsworth
2.5 SUMMARY
William Butler Yeats wrote the poem “A Prayer for my Daughter”, dedicated to his daughter Anne, and
concerning her future wellbeing and prospects, shortly after her birth in 1919. Yeats had complex views on early
twentieth-century issues including sexism, feminism and Irish Nationalism; these views are reflected in the poem.
2.6 GLOSSARY
1(B), 2(B), 3(B).
2.8 QUESTIONS
1. Summarize the poem.
2. What are the Father’s wishes for his daughter?
1. A Prayer for My Daughter by William Butler Yeats: Summary.
2. A Prayer for my Daughter by W. B. Yeats - Poems | poets.org.
*****
36
LESSON-3
“YELLOW FISH”: Ambai
STRUCTURE
3.1 INTRODUCTION
3.2 TEXT OF THE STORY
3.4 EXPLANATION OF THE STORY.
3.4.1 SYMBOLIC INTERPRETATION
3.5 SUMMARY
3.6 GLOSSARY
3.8 QUESTIONS
The objective of the poem is to show you the emotions of the girl ‘ANU’ for the Yellow Fish. Also it portrays
the psychology of a mother who has recently lost her daughter.
3.1 INTRODUCTION
Ambai’s “Yellow Fish” is a short story about a woman’s leisure on the beach and her discovery of a fish. She
watches the fisherman return to shore with their catches and sort through them, she spots an unwanted, helpless,
yellow fish thrown away on the sand. The author characterizes the narrator’s compassion as she attempts to help
return the fish to the sea, restoring its life. In doing so, we discover the narrator’s underlying reason in assisting the
fish.
3.2 TEXT
High Summer. Already the sand feels hot. It will not hold its wetness. Away, to the left of the shrunken sea and
spent waves, the sand spreads like a desert. Yet the eye is compelled by the sea alone. Now the white boat has arrived.
This is the forerunner. Its appearance is the signal that the fishing boats are returning. It floats ashore like a sawn,
swaying from side to side. Far from the shore, bright spots being to move. The fisherwomen make ready to welcome
the boats ashore. Bright colours: blinding indigo, demonic red, profound green, assaulting blue. They stand vibrant
against the white boat upon a faded blue and ash-grey sea.
Now it is possible to see the other boats. Walking further, quite close to the boats you may see the fish
filling the nets. Bodies and hands darkened by the salt wind, the men will spread their nets and start sorting the fish the
minute the boats come in. Now the fish splash into plastic troughs, round eyes wide open. The unwanted ones are
thrown away. There is a general murmur of tired voices, rising for asplit second, then falling.
Black hands.Brown wood of the boats.Between the meshes of the nets, white-bellied fish. Crowding near,
the colours of the saris press upon the eyes gently but firmly. Painted troughs.Dry sand.An extraordinary collage of
colours, on the shores of the wind-spread sea.A composition that imprints itself on the mind and memory.
A yellow fish is thrown away on the sand.
Of that palest yellow that comes before the withering and falling of leaves. It has black spots. As I stoop to
watch, it begins to shudders and leap. The mouth gasps; gasps and closes. It shudders and tosses on the hot sand.
That mouth closes; closes and opens, desperate for water. Like Jalaja’s mouth. Too hasty infant Jalaja’s
mouth. She pushed and bumped her way out into the world. Her name had already been decided. She who rises from
the waters.Lotus.Jalaja. They had to put her in an incubator. I stood outside that room constantly, watching her. Her
pale red mouth.Her round eyes. Sometimes she would open and close her mouth, as if sucking.
The ashes which Arun brought back from the electric crematorium were in a small urn, a miniature of those
huge earthen-ware jars of Mohaenjodaro and Harappa. Its narrow month was tied with a piece of cloth.
‘Why is the mouth closed?’
‘What mouth?’
37
‘The mouth of the urn. Open it.’
‘Anu. It contains only ashes.’
‘I want to see. Open it.’
‘Anu. It contains only ashes.’
‘I want to see. Open it.’
‘Anu’.
‘Open its mouth. That mouth…’
Loud racking sobs. The cloth was removed to reveal the urn’s tiny mouth.
The ashes were in this very sea.
The sea is at some distance. The yellow fish leaps hopelessly towards it.Its mouth falls open, skyward. Lifted
from the hot sand, it falls away from the fingers, heaving and tossing. It falls away again from a leaf with which I try to
hold it.
A fisher boy is on his way back from splashing in the waves. He comes when I summon him in Marathi,
‘Ikkade e, come here.’
‘Will you throw this yellow fish back into the sea?’
A quick snort of laughter. He grabs the fish firmly by its tail and starts running towards the sea. I run after
him. He places it on the crest of an incoming wave. For a moment it splutters, helpless, like a drunk who cannot find
the way home. Again it opens its mouth to the water, taking it in. Then a swish of the tail fin.An arrogant leap. Once
again it swishes its tail and swims forward. You can see its clear yellow for a very long time. Then it merges into the
blue-grey-white of the sea.
Q.1. Of which season poet is talking about?
A. winter C. Spring
B. Summer D. Autumn
Q.2. Who caught the fish after it slipped out of the net?
A. Radha C. Anu
B. Christina D. Madhu
Tamil writer C.S. Lakhsmi (1944), a Doctorate from Jawaharlal Nehru University has adopted Ambai as a
pen-name when she writes in Tamil and for her non-fiction writings in English she writes as C.S. Lakshmi. She is a
renowned Tamil writer whose works have been translated into English and won-acclaim. She has been awarded the
NarayanswamiAiyer award. Presently she is the Director of Sound and Picture Archive on Research on Women
(SPARROW). She is an accomplished dancer and has keen interest in music. She was initiated into Tamil Literature,
dance and music by her maternal grandmother and mother.
Translations ofAmbai’s stories of Lakshmi Holmstorm are collected in two volumes called ‘The Purple Sea’
and ‘In the Forest, a Deer’. Her stories deal with the themes of relationships, sexuality and love. She is one woman
writer who accepts the tag of being a Feminist writer. She believes in equality between the sexes and does not blame
the male sex for women’s woes. Her feminism permeates but does not restrict the subject matter of her work, which
investigates the ways gender is constructed in society, explores communication between human beings and celebrates
ordinary women’s courage and resourcefulness. When asked about the role of colours in her stories she said, “They
are not symbolic. I don’t use symbols in my stories. Indian life is full of colours, you know. Like for any auspicious
funiction we use haldi, then we usekumkum, and the kind of South Indian silk, too, radiates gleaming colours.”
Q.3. What is the full name of the poet?
A. C.S Lakshmi C. Kavita Kane
B. R.K Subhramanyam D. Anuradha Pondal
It is the height of summer. The sand on the seashore is extremely hot and dry. The narrator looks at the
shrunken sea and its receding waves. It was time for the boats to return back to the shore. Different coloured boats
were looking bright and vibrant with red, blue, green colours. Juxtaposed to brilliantly coloured boats there was a
white boat also. Fishermen and fisherwomen started sorting out the fish.
38
A yellow fish (with black dots) slips off the net (we don’t know if the yellow fish was male or female!) and
Anu, a young woman gets the fish. Anu feels sorry for the fish. The fish’s opening its mouth for water and gasping for
breath reminds Anu of Jalaja, her daughter who had died recently. It has not been mentioned anywhere as to how
Jalaja had died but one can assume that she might have been drowned in the sea. One day she had walked out of her
home and the sea had swallowed her. There is no surprise that her dead body was taken out of the water and her name
‘Jalaja’ implied that she was taken out of water. Anu remembers how they had cremated Jalaja’s bodyand how mad she
had gone when her husband Arun brought her ashes in an urn. Now Anu turns to a boy who was passing by her and asks
him to throw the yellow fish back into the sea. The boy laughs at Anu.
There is very little story element in this short story as it portrays the psychology of a mother who has
recently lost her new-born daughter. The first person narration begins with the description of the grey sea and goes on
to depict the array of colours of boats and fisher women’s sarees. The return of the white boat, like a majestic swan,
indicating the return of fishing boats with their nets filled with fish are all very realistically portrayed. The modern
style of narration by the lady writer is evident in the arresting manner the story starts.
Even the black hands sorting out fish is so life-like and specially the description of yellow fish gasping in the
hot sand, closing and opening its little mouth for water, transports the narrator Anu to her own life. It brings to her
mind the loss of her daughter, whose ashes were submerged in the sea. Anu could not save her daughter but she wants
to save the yellow fish. She first herself attempts to save her but the fish slips out of her hands. Later she seeks help
of a young boy to put the fish back to water. This attempt of Anu is an effort to put her mind at ease that now her child
is at peace in the sea, as the dead child’s ashes were submerged in the sea and so even the yellow fish which belongs
to the sea should be submerged to the sea and not left to die without water.
3.4.1 SYMBOLIC INTERPRETATION
There is hardly any movement of time or action in the story yet the story en-grips the reader and conveys a
depth of meaning through the images employed and through the play of brilliant and vibrant colours. The greay sea
conveys the sad state of the mind of the bereaved mother and fisher women’s colourfulsarees contrast the lack of
colour in women’s lives. Ambai depicts women’s lack of freedom through the image of fish caught in the net, from
which there is no escape. Similarly women in their lives are caught in patriarchal institutions from where they cannot
escape. Fishermen sorting the fish and discarding the unwanted ones reflect the control and power men have over
women’s lives.
Anu’s silent suffering depicts her loneliness in life and the pain of unfulfilled motherhood. The description
of hot sand and shrinking sea-water suggest Anu’s discomfort and withdrawal from life because it is beyond her
control. She could not throw the yellow fish back in the sea as she could not save her child, Jalaja, but kept watching
her mouth gasp for proper breathing. The repeated use of the image of mouth ‘gasping’ brings to mind the reality that
women’s mouths are always shut. They murmur but are not able to voice their thoughts. The message Ambai wants to
convey is that women must open their months to express their concerns to the patriarchal world.
3.5 SUMMARY
“Yellow Fish” is a simple, very moving story about fisherman and their wives and a woman whose baby died
long ago. Lakshmi does a very good job of letting us feel the heat of the tropical seashore. The wives of the fisherman
are all gathered at the shore as the boats are coming in and their help will be needed to get the nets in, the boats on
shore, and the fish sorted out into those that can be sold or used and those with no value. The ones with no value are
just thrown on the shore to die. The woman sees a yellow fish in the sand, gasping for water. It is told in the first
person by the woman and she begins to see in the dying fish her daughter that died so many years ago. Right after she
was born. The woman told fisher boy to throw fish back in the sea. The last lines of the story were very moving. “You
can see its clear yellow for a very long time. Then it merges into the blue- grey-white of the sea”.
3.5 GLOSSARY
Demonic : Pertaining to demons or evil spirits.
Profound : Descending far below the surface; opening or reaching to great depth; deep
Assaulting : A violent onset or attack with physical means, for example blows, weapons, etc.
Shudder : A shivering tremor, often from fear or horror.
39
1. (B), 2. (A), 3. (A).
3.8 QUESTIONS
A. Explain Symbolic Interpretation of the “yellow fish”.
B. Explain Gist of the poem.
“Yellow Fish” by C. S. Lakshmi (aka Amb - The Reading Life)
Yellow Fish - Ambai (CS Lakshmi) - kiddingtown.com
*****
40
LESSON-4
“REICARNATION OF CAPTAIN COOK”: Margaret Atwood
STRUCTURE
4.1 INTRODUCTION
4.2 TEXT OF THE POEM
4.4 THE TEXT
4.4.1 THE THEME
4.4.2 THE STRUCTURE OF THE POEM
4.5 SUMMARY
4.6 GLOSSARY
4.8 QUESTIONS
The objective of this poem is to tell you about the past experiences of the poet and her concern about the
gender inequality.
4.1 INTRODUCTION
In its short summary we can say that the poet loved to travel like explorers of the past. She had learnt about
the Continents and Islands of the earth and she had made a long preparation for her voyage and pleaded to the Kings to
let her make her voyage round the globe but the kings told her that there was not even an inch of the earth that has not
been explored.
4.2 TEXT
Earlier than I could learn
The maps had been coloured in.
When I pleaded, the kings told me
Nothing was left to explore.
I set out anyway, but

everywhere I went
there were historians, wearing
wreaths and fake teeth
belts; or in the deserts, cairns
and tourists. Even the caves had

candle stubs, inscriptions quickly
scribbled in darkness. I could
never arrive. Always
the names got there before.
Now I am old I know my

Mistake was my acknowledging
Of maps. The eyes raise
Tired monuments.
41
Burn down
The atlases, I shout
To the park benches; and go
Past the cenotaph
Waving a blank banner
Across the street, beyond
The corner
Into a land cleaned of geographies,

Its beach gleaming with arrows.
Note
Captain Cook: Captain James Cook (1728-79) was a British navigator and cartographer. He joined the
Royal Navy and served in the Seven Year’s War (1756-63). During this time, he surveyed the St. Lawrence River in
North America. He had the command of an expedition to Tahiti to observe the transit of the planet Venus across the
sun and to discover Terra Australis, a presumed southern continent. The expedition set sail in the Endeavour in 1768
and, after completing the observation of Venus, Cook went on to discover and chart New Zealand and the east coast of
Australia.
Margaret Atwood is considered Canada’s finest poet, novelist, literary critic, essayist and environmental
activist. Margaret has recently won PEN Pinter Prize in 2016. Born in 1939 at Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, she completed
her education at Victoria College, Toronto and later joined Harvard University with a prestigious Woodrow Wilson
Fellowship. She is a winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award and Prince of Asturias Award for Literature and has been
shortlisted for the Booker Prize five times, winning once and has been a finalist for the Governor General’s Award
several times, winning twice.
While she is best known for her work as a novelist she has also published fifteen books of poetry. Many of
her poems have been inspired by myths and fairy tales in which she has been interested from an early age. She has
published four collections of stories and three collections of unclassifiable short prose works. Her famous novels
are The Edible Woman (1969), Surfacing (1972), Life Before Man (1979), Cat’s Eye (1988), The Blind Assassin
(200), The Year of the Flood (2009),MaddAddam (2013).
Her famous quotes are:
(i) “I hope that people will finally come to realize that there is only one race – the human race and that we are all
members of it.”
(ii) “Men are afraid that women will laugh at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them.”
(iii) “You may not be able to alter reality, but you can alter your attitude towards it, and thus, paradoxically, alter
reality. Try it and see.”
(iv) “The answers you get from literature depend on the questions you pose.”
Q.1. Margaret Atwood belongs to which country?
A. India B. Australia
C. Canada D Japan
Q.2. Margaret Atwood has recently won Pen Prize in?
A. 2018 B. 2016
C. 2017 D. 2009
4.4 THE TEXT
The present poem is included in her poetry book ‘Selected Poems’ which was published in 1976.
The poet loved to travel like explorers of the past. She made a long preparation for her voyage and pleaded
that she would love to explore but found really nothing substantial. She “could never arrive”. There was nothing new
that she would give to the world because wherever she went, those places and those countries had already been visited
and written about by earlier travellers.
42
In its short summary we can say that the poet loved to travel like explorers of the past. She had learnt about
the Continents and islands of the earth and she had made a long preparation for her voyage and pleaded to the kings to
let her make her voyages round the globe but the kings told her that there was not even an inch of the earth that has not
been explored.
4.4.1 THE THEME
The theme of this poem would be that male domination was too rampant in every field of human activity –
from writing to fighting; from waging to voyaging. The poet represents women in general who were equally challenging
but denied opportunities.
The poem looks for a “new land cleaned of geographies.” We learn that “the eyes raise / tired monuments”.
Whehter we scrutinize a photograph or “my country under glass”, a disquieting question remains to be answered or
asked:
Do you seen nothing
Watching you from under the water?
In the poem ‘Reincarnation of Captain Cook’, the poet regrets that before she could learn about various
historical places and monuments in the world, all the boundaries on the global map had been marked and demarcated.
She was told by the explorers and voyagers that there was nothing new that could discover in the present world.
However the poet was firm to set out on her journey – on an expedition of her own. Wherever she went, she came
across historians landing themselves and telling her authoritatively that there was nothing left for her to find anything
new. She saw lots of tourists in deserts and caves. People had studied the writings of ancient caves by candle-light.
Some tourists had scratched their names on the walls of the caves and disfigured those heritage cites. She “could
never arrive” at her own conclusions about the particular places she visited. Historians had drawn their own inferences
and publicized their findings of research work they had undertaken and now they were no more in this world.
The poet suggests that we must destroy all the old almanacs and Atlases defining the boundaries of this
world. The speaker is convinced that the work of cartographers and historians is outdated now and the world needs to
be explored afresh. The existing lines on the Atlases of the world demarcating its boundaries must be erased and fresh
discoveries should be made. This is what the poet has set out to do. The poet implies that the navigator and cartographer
Captain James Cook must be reincarnated as a woman to explore the world afresh. It is indeed a model removed in
time as all the historians and explorers have been men in the past. Therefore all the existing boundaries on the maps
of the world must be erased so that it can be viewed from the perspective of a woman poet with a new view-point.
Two words in the title ‘reincarnation’ and ‘Captain Cook’ by implication hint at the possibility that the poem
is concerned with an exploration of some kind. Just as Captain Cook had explored and found new lands, so also,
someone in the poem is probably going to undertake a similar exploration. However, Captain Cook’s expedition has
resulted in the colonization and thereby subjugation of indigenous people. It remains to be seen whether Atwood’s
poem is a celebration or critique of Cook’s enterprise. It is a well-known fact that Atwood was extremely critical of
the English and American influences that were submerging the Canadian Identity. Being a Canadian she was keenly
conscious of the effects of colonialism on the colonized state and subject. In all probability, therefore, Atwood’s
poem may be a critique rather than an endorsement of ideas contained in the image of Captain Coo.
Q.3. This poem tells expeditions of?
A. Captain Cook B. Captain Hook
C. Captain Cyrus D. Captain Albert
4.4.2 THE STRUCTURE OF THE POEM
The poem is distinctly divided into two sections. In the first section the presumption is that the speaker is
young and raring to learn and do something new. In the second section, however, the perspective is set straight with
the stanza beginning, “Now I am old…” The speaker rightly says that her mistake was in acknowledging the maps. In
other words, acknowledging and accepting gendered formulations of the stereotypical woman. “The eyes raise tired
monuments” again suggest age old conventions and expectations since monuments are a testimonial to the past. The
eyes here are in search of something new and refreshing. They are tired of seeing the same old things day in and day
out. What is needed is change.
The concluding section provides an answer to the dilemma of the first person speaker. The answer lies in
revolt, in rejecting the determined roles, in refusing to accept the traditional, in going to land cleaned of geographies.
Thus the speaker shouts “burn down the atlases” and lodges a protest by waving a black banner. We need to change the
way we think about certain things. We need to develop a fresh perspective. The mind must be free of all prejudices.
One also must remember that even in the changed landscape and mindscape, the path will not be smooth.
43
4.5 SUMMARY
“The reincarnation of Captain cook,” which looks for a “new land cleaned of geographies,” we learn that “the
eyes raise/ tired monuments. In the poem speaker longs to clear away all the old maps, charts and guidepost. Heightened
awareness revivifies the look, sound taste, feel, smell, the essence of one’s life situation.
4.6 GLOSSARY
Demarcated : To mark the limits or boundaries of something; to delimit.
Voyage : A long journey especially by ship.
Cartographer : One who makes maps or charts.
Scrutinize : To examine something with great care.
1.(C), 2.(B), 3.(A)
4.8 QUESTIONS
A. Whom did the poet meet on her way?
B. Summarize the poem.
Reincarnation of Captain Cook - Margaret Atwood - Questions and answers- Kiddingtown.com
Reincarnation of Captain Cook - The Individual and Society[Book]-oreilly.com
*****
44
UNIT-III
Lesson-1
“Blackout” by Roger Mais
Dear students,
This lecture will focus on the following topics:
STRUCTURE
1.1. AN INTRODUCTION TO THE WRITER: LIFE AND WORKS
1.1.2 EARLY YEARS
1.1.3. POLITICAL INVOLVEMENT
1.1.4. LAST YEARS
2.1. WORKS
2.1.2. SHORT STORIES
2.1.3. NOVELS
2.1.4. PLAYS
2.1.5. AWARDS
3.1. OBJECTIVES
4.1. WHAT THE CRITICS SAY
5.1. LET US SUM UP
6.1. KNOW YOUR PROGRESS
1.1. AN INTRODUCTION TO THE WRITER (1905-1955)
1.1.2. Early Years
Roger Mais, the Jamaican novelist, poet, playwright, photographer, painter and a journalist was born on 11
August, 1905 in Kingston, Jamaica in an educated middle-class family. It is a tropical island in West Indies. Trinidad
and Barbados are some other Caribbean islands. Despite his better social status, Mais was always sympathetic to his
fellow Black brethren and later took up their cause in his writings. He spent his boyhood in the Blue Mountains region
where his father took up farming. He received his early education at home and was later sent to Calabar High School,
Kingston for further education. In his early days he tried his hand at various jobs, as an Office worker, an insurance
salesman and as an overseer at a banana plantation. He worked as a journalist for the newspapers Focus and The
Jamaica Gleaner. He also contributed a number of articles mainly on the issues of inequality and social injustice to
the journal Public Opinion. He also wrote a number of plays, short stories and reviews. Mais has written more than
thirty stage and radio plays and published more than one hundred short stories. As a painter he held art exhibition in
Paris and his artwork appeared on the covers of his novels.
He left Jamaica for the UK in 1952. During his stay abroad, he lived in London, Paris and the southern part
of France. In 1954, he discovered that he had terminal cancer and returned back to Jamaica. He died on 21 June 1955
at the age of 50.
1.1.3. POLITICAL INVOLVEMENT
Most of the works of Mais have political undertone to a fairly large extent. His major concerns in his
writings were inequality, social injustice and colonialism. His works have often been described by his critics as
‘propaganda’. His works are better known for stark realism than propaganda. He denounced England for exploitation
and slavery and he criticized the British Prime Minister Winston Churchill for ‘hypocrisy’ and ‘deception.’ In 1944,
he wrote the anti-British satirical tirade “Now We Know”, criticizing the British colonial rule, for which he was
sentenced to six months’ imprisonment for sedition.
In 1938, major riots broke out throughout the Caribbean islands. Mais volunteered himself to help to quell
the riots at Kingston where there was a change of his heart. He appeared with totally changed mindset and took the
side of the workers who were rioting. Henceforth he became a wholly committed supporter and activist involved with
the People’s National Party and Jamaican nationalism. He supported the emergent Rastafarian movement in Jamaica
which was a cultural movement. He decided to direct and work for the political and social change. In 1939 he started
his journalistic career as a contributor with the left-wing political weekly newspaper Public Opinion and worked for
it up to 1952 before he left for England. The paper was associated with ‘People’s National Party’. He also wrote
45
another article, “Why I Love and Leave Jamaica,” in 1950, which stirred patriotic emotions of the people. The younger
writers of pre-independence generation in Jamaica were greatly influenced by Roger mais and treated him as a national
hero. John Herne, another famous Jamaican writer was an ardent admirer of Mais.
Mais worked to build a ‘national identity’ and focused on local language and culture. He is one of the prominent
African writers who have promoted ‘political and cultural nationalism’ in their works. The white races not only enslaved
the Blacks but in the process of slavery they developed an inferiority complex among the blacks about their colour,
race and culture. Cultural nationalism aimed towards the assertion of African identity, race and culture. His fictional
characters spoke in local West Indian dialect which helped him to connect with the local audience. He was awarded
the high honour of the ‘Order of Jamaica’ posthumously in 1978 for his integral role in promoting ‘political and
cultural nationalism’.
2.1. WORKS
Roger Mais has written three novels, several plays, more than hundred short stories and articles. His novels
have been republished posthumously several times which reflects his importance in the Caribbean literary history.
Many of his manuscripts have been deposited in the library of University of West Indies, Jamaica. His works include
novels, plays, short stories and articles.
2.1.2. SHORT STORIES
Mais published more than one hundred short stories. Most of them were published in two journalistic
publications, Public Opinion and Focus. He also published two collections of stories, — Face and Other Stories,
and And Most of All Man. His short stories were collected in a volume entitled “Listen, The Wind” thirty-two years
after his death.
2.1.3. NOVELS
Roger Mais wrote the following three novels. Of these three novels, Brother Man (1954) is considered to
be his best work. This novel is a sympathetic exploration of the contemporary Rastafarian movement in Jamaica
which was a national cultural movement.
The Hills Were Joyful Together (1953)
Brother Man (1954)
Black Lightning (1955)
2.1.4. PLAYS
More than thirty stage and radio plays. Prior to 1930, in West Indies plays were based on Europe with
European actors. The stage shows consisted of Shakespearean plays. Rober Mais introduced local language plays that
depicted the Caribbean life and history. The audience could connect with the plays of Mais because the characters
spoke the local language. One contributing factor to the popularity of Mais’ plays is that he nativized the subjects and
concerns in his plays.
George William Gordon (1940) is a famous play of Mais. This play represents not only the people but also
shows their cries. The unfair court system, the low wages and their repercussions are stated in the play. The unfair
court system, the low wages and their repercussions are stated in the play.
Some of the famous plays are as follows:
Masks and Paper Hats (1943)
Hurricane (1950)
The Potter’s Field (1950)
The First Sacrifice (1956)
2.1.5. AWARDS
Mais has been awarded many awards. Some of them are as follows:
Musgrave Gold Medal in 1968.
The Order of Jamaica in 1978.
Ten first prizes in West Indian literary competitions.
3.1. OBJECTIVES
Roger Mais was born and brought up in Jamaica which is a tropical island in West Indies also known as
Caribbean islands. He was a dynamic and inspirational writer fwho is known for his anti-colonial writing. The Nobel
laureate V.S. Naipaul of Trinidad, George Lammings of Barbados and Jamaica Kincaid also belong to the West Indies.
In the nineteenth and early twentieth century, the Blacks were treated as inferior to Whites. They were imported as
slaves from Africa and other countries and denied freedom and equality by the Whites. Over the years the Blacks
gradually developed an inferiority complex regarding their skin colour, race and culture.
46
Mais wrote articles, poems, plays and short stories on the issues of inequality and social injustice to uphold
political and national culturalism among the black people. As a writer and political activist he worked towards the
assertion of African identity, race and culture better known as Afrocentricism.
Rober Mais is remembered as an icon of Jamaican literature. He is a dynamic and inspirational writer known
for his anticolonial writings. In his short stories, novels, stage and radio plays and numerous articles he fearlessly
wrote against social injustice and inequality in the pre-independence era.. Though born in a well to do middle class
family and equipped with western education, Mais sympathized with the poor and the downtrodden. He is considered
to be one of the representative writers from the Caribbean islands in general and Jamaica, his native country in
particular who played a pivotal role in the promotion of Afrocentricism and cultural nationalism. Hawthorne has
rightly remarked that Mais, “….gave authority to the island’s language and voice.”
The non-African critics often tend to dismiss African writings as mere ‘propaganda.’ This is true in the case
of Roger Mais too. It would be far more appropriate to describe Roger Mais as a writer of ‘Protest’ because he
protested against inequality, injustice and racial discrimination in his works. Jean D’ Costa who is a major critic of
Caribbean literature is of the view that Roger Mais’ works are not mere propaganda or protest. She considers him
among the foremost Black writers from the West Indies who have raised their voice against racial discrimination in a
most powerful manner.
For a comprehensive study of the works of Roger Mais, the following critical books would be useful:
1. Hawthorne, Evelyn J. “The Writer and the National Model”, Roger Mais and the Decolonization of
Caribbean Culture, 1989.
2. Ramchand, Kenneth. “The Achievement of Roger Mais”, The West Indian Novel and its Background , 1983.
5.1. LET US SUM UP
Now let us sum up what we have discussed in this chapter. We began with an introduction to the life and
works of Roger Mais (1905-1955). He was born in Jamaica in the West Indies also known as the Caribbean Islands in
an educated middle class family. He received his early education at home and was later sent to Calabar High School,
Kingston for further education. He left Jamaica for the United Kingdom in 1952. During his stay abroad, he lived in
London, Paris and the southern part of France. In 1954, he discovered that he had terminal cancer and returned back
to Jamaica. He died on 21 June 1955 at the age of 50 of cancer.
Roger Mais is a versatile genius and a prolific writer. He was a novelist, poet, painter, playwright, photographer,
and a journalist. Mais has written three novels, several plays for the stage and radio, more than hundred short stories
and numerous articles in newspapers and journals. His novels have been republished posthumously several times that
reflects his importance in the Caribbean literary history. Many of his manuscripts have been deposited in the library
of University of West Indies, Jamaica. He was awarded the high honour of the ‘Order of Jamaica’ posthumously in
1978 for his integral role in promoting ‘political and cultural nationalism.’ George Lammings, Jamaica Kincaid and
the Nobel laureate V.S. Naipaul are some other famous writers from the Caribbean Islands. The writings of Mais
impacted the younger generation of Jamaican writers greatly and he was treated as a national hero. The Jamaican
writer John Hearne was one such writer to be influenced by Mais.
Roger Mais though died at the age of 50 only but he had been very actively engaged with the uplift of the
Black people throughout his life as a novelist, poet, playwright, photographer, and journalist. Despite being born in an
educated middle class family he sympathized with and worked for the cause of the poor and downtrodden black
community and tried to work for their uplift as a writer and political activist. His writings deal most poignantly with
the issues of inequality and injustice and he makes a case against racial discrimination in his writings. He was a
dynamic writer who wrote fearlessly against the oppressive classes. Because of the political undertone in his writings
his work is often labeled as ‘propaganda’. He is also known as a writer for ‘protest’. As a matter of fact the stark
realism of his works is often misconstrued as propaganda. His works are considered to be an ideal national model for
political and national culturalism.
For his untiring zeal he was awarded posthumously ‘The Order of Jamaica’ in 1978. His works are preserved
in the library of University of West Indies, Jamaica.
1. Where was Roger Mais born?
2. To which country does Roger Mais belong to? When and at what age did he die?
3. Name any two newspapers for which Mais worked as a journalist.
47
4. Name any two other writers from the West Indies apart from Roger Mais.
5. What is the other name of West Indies? Name any two Caribbean islands.
6. Why was Roger Mais sent to prison?
7. What award was Roger Mais awarded posthumously?
8. Name any two collections of short stories by Roger Mais.
9. Explain the terms ‘propaganda’ and ‘protest’.
10. Name the three novels of Roger Mais. Which is his most famous novel?
11. What do you mean by cultural nationalism? Comment on it.
12. Name any play of Roger Mais. What accounted for the popularity of his plays among the audience?
13. What was Rastafarian movement? Name the novel that explores this movement.
14. How would you describe the writings of Mais?
(i) As propaganda
(ii) As Protest
(iii) As Realistic
*****
48
Lesson-2
“Blackout” by Roger Mais
STRUCTURE
1.1. SUMMARY OF THE STORY “BLACKOUT”
2.1. OBJECTIVES
3.1. ANALYSIS OF THE STORY “BLACKOUT”
3.1.2. SOCIAL INJUSTICE AND INEQUALITY
3.1.3. RACISM
5.1. LET US SUM UP
1.1. SUMMARY OF THE STORY “BLACKOUT” BY ROGER MAIS
‘Blackout’ is a short story by Roger Mais. Set in wartime Jamaica It describes an incident during blackout.
There is a conversation between an American woman and a Black man. At a deeper level this is a story about racism
and the contrast of two different races, sexes and cultures.
The story starts off explaining the blackout in the city and the general atmosphere of unease and tension in
the city. A young American woman was waiting at the bus stop during blackout in the city. The street lights had not
been turned on and the houses in the locality were hidden behind their ‘Aurelia’ hedges. There were rumours that
hooligans had been moving about in the streets after darkness, attacking and molesting unprotected women. Surprisingly,
the American woman was not scared in the least.
She was smoking a cigarette. Suddenly she saw the slinking black shadow of a Black young man who was
slowly moving towards her. She was smoking the cigarette with evident enjoyment but there was a curious look of
hunger and unrest in the eyes of the man. She was not scared. She knew that in her country i. e. America, a Black man
cannot approach a White woman so casually. The man was very tall, dressed in conventional shirt and pants and was
wearing a pair of canvas shoes. She was not concerned about his appearance but noticed only that he was a Black man.
She was curious to find out what this man wanted from her as it would be a new experience for her to narrate when she
returned back to America.
The young man approached her and politely asked for a light. He wanted to light his cigarette. She was
smoking but she did not have the matches. She had lit her cigarette from the stub of the cigarette she had thrown away.
She wondered whether this man would believe her when she told him that she did not have the matches. The man was
surprised at her answer and kept on staring at her face. His look expressed a feeling of pride and challenge. He asked
her that she was smoking herself.
Apparently, the woman was not willing to give her cigarette to light to a Black man. That would imply a
certain degree of closeness which she avoided. Hesitantly, she held out her cigarette towards him between her two
fingers. She thought that he would take it from her hand, light his cigarette and return her back. Instead of taking the
cigarette from her hand, he simply bent over her hand to light his cigarette. In the process, he came quite close to her.
She noticed that the man was smoking the half of a cigarette, holding tight in his hand and thus saving the other half to
be smoked later. He straightened up, inhaled a deep lungful of cigarette and exhaled again with satisfaction. He
thanked the lady politely. When he turned to move off, to his surprise the woman had thrown away her cigarette into
a nearby gutter. He stood there, looking at her, trying to guess her motive.
It unnerved the young lady. It was not that she was frightened but his contemptuous look made her feel
uncomfortable. In order to ease the tension, she asked him what he was waiting for. The man regretted that she had to
waste the whole cigarette because of him. She answered that she had plenty of them where that came from. In fact she
did not want to get into free talk with a Black man and that too at a public street. She found it indecent. She wondered
why he didn’t move on. He could read her thoughts and said, “It’s a public street.”
The lady did not think it proper to answer. The man uttered, “It’s a good thing you’re a woman.” The lady
asked, “If I were a man?”
The man cleverly replied that in such a case he would have treated her differently and told her about her racial
behaviour in a manner she would understand easily. She was thinking that in America this man would have been
lynched for this kind of behaviour with a white woman.
49
The man could read her thoughts and told her that it wasn’t America where a Black person would be hanged to
death for a minor offence. She could do nothing except listen to him but his attitude was baffling.
In the meantime the bus arrived. He thanked the lady for the light. She replied not to mention with a nervous
laugh. As the American woman boarded the bus and the bus moved off, the Black young man bent down and took out
the half-smoked cigarette the woman had thrown away from the gutter.
The Black man stood there conscious of his male strength and pride. The American woman was conscious of
the quiet scrutiny of his eyes. There was something in him which was challenging and disturbing. He had shaken her
superiority complex. She was curious to take a last look at him but she decided against it. Perhaps, she did not want
the fellow passengers to notice her looking back at a Black man. She did not see him retrieving the half smoked
cigarette which she had thrown away from the gutter.
Let us understand the meaning of the following phrases:
Wave of panic: A feeling of fear and anxiety.
Sweeping the city: Spreading all over the city.
Bands of hooligans: Groups of anti-social elements.
Score of respectable suburban householders: A number of residents, residing in nearby houses.
Slinking black shadow: The shadow formed by the movement of a Black man
Seemed to be materializing: Appearing
Mere suggestion of a stoop: Seemed as the man was bent forward
Dispassionate appraisement: objective assessment
2.1. OBJECTIVES
The objective of the author in the story “Blackout” is to highlight the racial segregation of the Black people
in general, specifically in the American society. Through the conversation between a Black man and a white American
woman, Mais reflects the racist attitude the Americans. As compared to the Americans the Blacks encountered lesser
degree of racial discrimination in the West Indian island of Jamaica. The author aims to sensitize the American
woman on the issue of racial discrimination. The polite and gentle behaviour of the Black finally shakes the supreme
confidence of the American woman related to her racial supremacy. By the end of the story the Black protagonist is
able to put forth his point of view regarding equality of race and gender. He stands there at the bus stop conscious of
his pride and male strength and not as an inferior Black man. That there are only two races in the World that God
originally created – men and women is the pivotal message of the story.
3.1. ANALYSIS OF THE STORY “BLACKOUT”
“Blackout” is a short story written by Roger Mais. To begin with the title of the story, the title ‘Blackout’ is
apt and suitable. The story starts off explaining the partial blackout in the city. The darkness and loneliness describe
not only the uncomfortable and tense atmosphere in the city but symbolizes the darkness in the mind of the American
lady as well.
Cigarette is the pivot on which the whole story revolves. The occasional references to cigarette help a lot to
the structure the story. The story begins with the Black man requesting the American woman for a light. He wanted to
light his cigarette. He had assumed that she would have a match-stick with her as she was smoking the cigarette. But
she had no light. She had lit her cigarette from the stub of the cigarette she had been smoking earlier. She didn’t want
to offer her own cigarette to light his cigarette to avoid closeness with the Black young man. With slight hesitation,
she held out her cigarette towards him between her two fingers. Instead of taking the cigarette from her hand, the
Black man bends down and lights his own cigarette from hers. But the woman throws away her cigarette which she had
been enjoying a moment earlier because a Black man had touched the cigarette. This indicates the racist attitude of
the woman. Smoking of cigarettes by the American lady proves that the American society is quite liberal as far as both
the sexes are concerned. It appears that she was smoking a high quality cigarette which reflects her class. On the
contrary, the Black man was smoking the half of a cigarette saving the other half for future. It reflects that the man
belonged to a poor class.
3.1.2. SOCIAL INJUSTICE AND INEQUALITY
The story focuses on social injustice and inequality in the context of the white and the black people. It aims
to highlight the differences between two races, genders and cultures. The location is Jamaica, one of the tropical
islands of the West Indies during the Second World War (1939-1945). The story describes an encounter between a
Black West Indian man and an American girl. The conversation between the two and the behaviour of the American
woman exposes the superiority complex of the Americans vis-à-vis the Blacks. The American woman’s act of throwing
away the cigarette touched by a Black man reflects her racist bias.
50
The phrases such as, wave of panic, bands of hooligans roaming the streets after dark and assaulting unprotected
women, slinking black shadow etc. create a feeling of menace and threat. The darkness prevails not only over the city
but also in the mind of the lady. She thinks that the Whites are superior to Blacks. She hates the Blacks. As the author
describes the houses were wrapped in an atmosphere of exclusive respectability in the darkness, behind their discreet
Aurelia hedges, it reflects the implicit respectability of the Blacks generally overlooked by the white people.
Most significantly, the story ends on a note of victory for the Black man who was standing with pride and
confidence at the bus stop. Finally, he could shake off the supreme confidence of the American lady.
3.1.3. RACISM
Race is a significant social issue because people use racial differences as the basis for discrimination.
Racism exists when one ethnic group dominates the other mainly on the basis of the colour of skin. Racism is the
systematic marginalization of some people in terms of liberty, rights and representation. It is a particular form of
oppression. Much of today’s racism can be traced to the era of colonialism that began in the 1400s when the Europeans
began to colonize Africa and parts of America, the white settlers started to consider themselves superior to other
races. It resulted in White supremacy. Blacks were the worst sufferers as they had to suffer violence, mistreatment
and degradation at the hands of Whites. They worked all day and night, cleaning and taking on commands of their
masters. If they disobeyed the commands or did something wrong, they were beaten and whipped mercilessly by their
masters. Blacks were treated as second class citizens.
The Black community gradually came to resist racism. Harlem renaissance in America was a movement for
the assertion of Black identity and dignity. The story “Blackout” captures that mood of resistance. The Black man
though poor is dignified and he conveys his point to the American lady in a poised manner.
Rober Mais, one of the most prominent Caribbean writers is remembered as an icon of Jamaican literature.
He is a dynamic and fearless writer well known for his anti colonial writings. In his short stories, novels, stage and
radio plays and numerous articles he assiduously wrote against social injustice and inequality during the colonial
regime. Though born in a well- to- do middle class family and western educated he sympathized with the poor and the
downtrodden. He belongs to the generation of African writers Chinua Achebe, Ngugi Wa Thion”go, Frantz Fanon, for
instance who promoted cultural nationalism.
The non-African critics often tend to dismiss African writings as mere ‘propaganda.’ This is true in the case
of Roger Mais also. It would be far more appropriate to describe Roger Mais as a writer of ‘Protest’ because he
protested against inequality, injustice and racial discrimination in his works. Jean D’ Costa who is a major critic of
Caribbean literature is of the view that Roger Mais’ works are not mere propaganda or protest. She considers him
among the foremost Black writers from the West Indies who have raised their voice against racial discrimination in a
most powerful manner.
For a comprehensive study of the works of Roger Mais, the following books would be useful:
1. Hawthorne, Evelyn J. “The Writer and the National Model”, Roger Mais and the Decolonization of
Caribbean Culture, 1989.
2. Ramchand, Kenneth. “The Achievement of Roger Mais”, The West Indian Novel and its Background , 1983.
5.1. LET US SUM UP
Roger Mais is a versatile genius and a prolific writer from Jamaica, one of the Caribbean Islands. He is a
prominent Caribbean writer who offered a fearless depiction of the inequality and social injustice during the colonial
period in the African and Caribbean countries. “Blackout” is one of his representative story that contrasts the mindset
of two races, sexes, classes and cultures.
The story” Blackout” is set in Jamaica in the West Indies or the Caribbean Island. The main theme of the
story is racism. It contrasts the two races, sexes, classes and cultures. There are two characters in the story- a female
American and a Black Jamaican man. The conversation between the two showcases the difference between two races,
genders and cultures in terms of their attitude towards race and gender.
The American woman’s racial bias is evidenced in her action. When the Black man lights his cigarette from
her cigarette, instead of smoking again, she flicks it away. Implicit in her action is her superiority complex and her
repulsion for the Black man. When the man refers to her action, she does not wish to prolong the conversation with
a Black man.
The conversation gradually focuses on gender and race which highlights the racist mindset of the American
woman. She is proud of her class and race. The American woman is rich whereas the Black man is poor. The man was
smoking half of the cigarette and the other half was preserved for future consumption. When the man regrets for
making her waste the whole cigarette, she answers proudly that she has plenty more where that came from, which
shows her social status as well as superiority complex.
51
In terms of gender, one is a man the other a woman. Both are proud of their gender. The woman was proud of
her being an American woman whereas the man was proud of his male strength and black lineage. What is important
by the end of the story that both of them start reacting to each other as ‘any man any woman’. The story also denotes
the difference between the two cultures. In America, a Black person cannot approach a white woman and if he does so
he could be lynched. But in the West Indies, as the man tells her, ‘there are only men and women in this country’.
Unlike America, there was no segregation and all were treated equally in Jamaica.
1. What is the main theme of the story “Blackout’?
2. Why was the city in partial blackout? What was the young American woman doing at the bus stop?
3. What was the slinking black shadow? Why did the slinking black shadow not disconcert the young woman?
4. In spite of the wave of panic, why was the young woman not in the least nervous?
5. Describe the Black man.
6. What was the difference between the position of the Blacks in America and the West Indian island?
7. What did the man ask the white lady? What was the lady’s reply?
8. Why was the lady not willing to give a light to the man?
9. Why did the American lady throw the cigarette away?
10. How do the references to cigarettes function to structure the story?
11. What was the impact of the Black man’s behaviour on the lady?
12. The American woman had a typical racist attitude in the story. Do you agree?
13. What does the man mean by “In this country there are only men and women”?
14. What had been the basis of the American lady’s ‘supreme confidence’? How was the man able to shake it?
15. Describe the following phrases:
(i) Wave of panic
(ii) Bands of hooligans roaming the streets after dark and assaulting unprotected women
(iii) Slinking black shadow
16. What do you understand by racism? Describe it briefly.
*****
52
Lesson-3
“Telephone Conversation”
Dear students,
STRUCTURE
1.1. AN INTRODUCTION TO THE POET
1.1.2. THE EARLY YEARS: LIFE AND EDUCATION
1.1.3. GROWING-UP YEARS
1.1.4. LAST YEARS
2.1. WORKS
2.1.2. PLAYS
2.1.3. NOVELS
2.1.4. ESSAYS
2.1.5. POEMS
2.1.6. MEMOIRS/AUTOBIOGRAPHY
3.1. (I) TEXT OF THE POEM “TELEPHONE CONVERSATION”
(II) SUMMARY OF THE POEM
4.1. OBJECTIVES
5.1. ANALYSIS OF THE POEM “TELEPHONE CONVERSATION”
7.1. LET US SUM UP
Wole Soyinka is a Nigerian playwright, poet, author, teacher and political activist who received the Nobel
Prize for Literature in 1986. He was the first African writer to receive Nobel Prize for literature. He dedicated his
Nobel acceptance speech to Nelson Mandela.
1.1.2. THE EARLY YEARS: LIFE AND EDUCATION
Wole Soyinka was born Akinwande Oluwole “Wole” Babatunde Soyinka on July 13, 1934, in Abeokuta, near
Ibadan in western Nigeria. His father, Samuel Ayodele Soyinka was a prominent Anglican minister and headmaster.
His mother, Grace Eniola Soyinka who was called “Wild Christian” was a shopkeeper and local activist. As a child,
Soyinka was a precocious and inquisitive child. He lived in an Anglican mission compound learning the Christian
teachings of his parents as well as the Yoruba spiritualism and tribal customs of his grandfather.
1.1.3. GROWN UP YEARS: POLITICAL ACTIVISM
After finishing preparatory university studies in 1954 at Government College in Ibadan, Nigeria Soyinka
moved to England and continued his education at the University of Leeds, London where he served as the editor of the
school’s magazine, The Eagle. He graduated with a bachelor’s degree in English literature in 1958. In 1972 the
university awarded him an honorary doctorate.
In the late 1950s Soyinka wrote his first important play A Dance of the Forests which satirized the Nigerian
political elite. From 1958 to 1959 Soyinka was a dramaturgist at the Royal Court Theatre in London. In 1960 he was
awarded a Rockefeller fellowship and returned to Nigeria to study African drama. In 1960, he founded the theater
group, The 1960 Masks and in 1964, the Orisun Theatre Company wherein he produced his own plays and performed
as an actor. He has periodically been a visiting professor at the universities of Cambridge, Sheffield, and Yale.
1.1.4. LATER YEARS
In 1986, Soyinka was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in the genre of drama, the first African writer to
receive this prestigious award. In its citation the Nobel prize committee said the playwright “in a wide cultural
perspective and with poetic overtones fashions the drama of existence.” Soyinka sometimes writes of modern West
Africa in a satirical style but his serious intent and his belief in the evils inherent in the exercise of power are usually
present in his work. A prolific writer, Soyinka has published hundreds of works till date.
Now considered Nigeria’s foremost man of letters, Soyinka is still politically active. During the civil war in
Nigeria he appealed in an article for a cease-fire. He was arrested for this in 1967, and held as a political prisoner for
22 months until 1969.
53
After the election on March 28, 2015, Soyinka said that Nigerians must show a Nelson Mandela like ability
to forgive president-elect Muhammadu Buhari’s who had earlier been an unpopular military ruler. Critical of African
authoritarian leadership, Soyinka is the proponent of Nigerian democracy and has been actively associated with
National Democratic Organization, National Liberation Council of Nigeria and Pro-National Conference Organization.
In 2010 he founded the Democratic Front for a People’s Federation and served as Chairman of the party.
In 2014 Soyinka was diagnosed with prostate cancer and was cured 10 months after treatment.
2.1. WORKS
Soyinka is primarily a dramatist and his plays have been widely performed. He received Nobel prize in the
genre of drama only. In addition to drama and poetry, Soyinka has written two novels, The Interpreters(1965) and Season
of Anomy (1973) as well as autobiographical works including The Man Died: Prison Notes (1972), a gripping account
of his prison experience, and Ake: The Years of Childhood (1981), a memoir about his childhood. Myth, Literature
and the African World (1975) is a collection of Soyinka’s literary essays.
Soyinka’s verse is characterized by a precise command of language and a mastery of lyric, dramatic and
meditative poetic forms. He wrote poems from prison while he was imprisoned in 1967-69 for speaking out against
the civil war in Nigeria also known as Biafra war. One finds in his works, plays specially a fine mix of western
elements of drama with Yoruba ( a tribe of Nigeria to which Soyinka belongs) folklore and religion.
Some of his notable works are as follows:
2.1.2. PLAYS
A Dance of the Forests (1950)
The Lion and the Jewel (1963)
Trials of Brother Jero (1963)
The Strong Breed (1963)
The Road (1965)
Kongi’s Harvest (1967)
Jero’s Metamorphosis (1973)
From Zia, With Love (1992)
King Baabu (2002)
Death of the King’s Horseman (1975)
2.1.3. NOVELS
The Interpreters (1965)
Season of Anomy (1973)
2.1.4. ESSAYS
Myth, Literature and the African World (1975)
2.1.5. POEMS
Idanre and Other Poems (1967)
Poems from Prison (1969). Republished as A Shuttle in the Crypt (1972)
Mandela’s Earth and Other Poems (1969)
Samarkand and other Markets I Have Known (2002)
2.1.6. MEMOIRS/AUTOBIOGRAPHY
Ake: The Years of Childhood (1981)
The Man Died: Prison Notes (1972),
3.1. (I) TEXT OF THE POEM “TELEPHONE CONVERSATION” BY WOLE SOYINKA
Telephone Conversation
The price seemed reasonable, location
Indifferent. The landlady swore she lived
Off premises. Nothing remained
But self-confession. “Madam , I warned,
“I hate a wasted journey - I am African.”
Silence. Silenced transmission of pressurized good-breeding. Voice, when it came,
Lipstick coated, long gold-rolled
Cigarette-holder pipped. Caught I was, foully.
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“HOW DARK?”...I had not misheard....”ARE YOU LIGHT OR VERY DARK?” Button B. Button A. Stench
Of rancid breath of public hide-and-speak.
Red booth. Red pillar-box. Red double-tiered
Omnibus squelching tar.
It was real! Shamed
By ill-mannered silence, surrender
Pushed dumbfoundment to beg simplification.
Considerate she was, varying the emphasis-
“ARE YOU DARK? OR VERY LIGHT” Revelation came
“You mean- like plain or milk chocolate?”
Her accent was clinical, crushing in its light
Impersonality. Rapidly, wave-length adjusted
I chose. “West African sepia”_ and as afterthought.
“Down in my passport.” Silence for spectroscopic
Flight of fancy, till truthfulness chaged her accent
Hard on the mouthpiece “WHAT’S THAT?” conceding “DON’T KNOW WHAT THAT IS.” “Like brunette.”
“THAT’S DARK, ISN’T IT?”
“Not altogether.
Facially, I am brunette, but madam you should see the rest of me. Palm of my hand, soles of my feet.
Are a peroxide blonde. Friction, caused-
Foolishly madam- by sitting down, has turned
My bottom raven black- One moment madam! - sensing
Her receiver rearing on the thunderclap
About my ears- “Madam,” I pleaded, “wouldn’t you rather
See for yourself?”
3.1.(II) SUMMARY OF THE POEM “TELEPHONE CONVERSATION” BY WOLE
Soyinka.
Soyinka’s “Telephone Conversation” depicts a conversation between a white lady and an Afro American man
which reflects the dark face of racism and racial prejudice of the mainstream white society. The poem deals with the
sensitive subject of racism and racial prejudice in a lighthearted, almost comical manner.
The title of the poem “Telephone Conversation” reveals the fact that two people are talking on the phone. The
poem thus begins on a positive note. The man is searching for a house and the landlady has quoted a considerable price
and the area where the house is located is an impartial area meaning thereby that it is not racially prejudiced. The man
could enjoy his privacy as the landlady does not live under the same roof. The Afro American man is ready to accept
the offer, but presumably there has been a similar incident in his past, therefore he admits to her at the outset that he
is black, saying he prefers not to waste the time travelling there if she’s going to refuse him on that account. “Madam,
I warned/I hate a wasted journey-I am African.”
There is silence at the other end, silence which the black man construes as an awkward silence. However, he
is proved wrong because when the landlady speaks again, she disregards all formalities and asks him without hesitation
to explain how dark he is. The man first thinks he has misheard but then realizes that that is not true as she repeats her
question with a varying emphasis. Feeling as if he has just been reduced to the status of a machine, just like the
telephone in front of him, and asked to choose which button he is, the man is so disgusted that he can literally smell
the stench coming from her deceptive words and see red everywhere around him. Ironically, he is the one who is
ashamed by the tense and awkward silence which follows and asks for clarification thinking sarcastically that the lady
was really helpful by giving him options to choose from.
He suddenly understands what she is trying to ask, and repeats her question to her stating if she would like
him to compare himself with chocolate, dark or light? She dispassionately answers and his thoughts change as he
describes himself as a West African Sepia as it says in his passport. The lady remains quiet for a while, not wanting to
admit her ignorance, but then she curiously asks what that is. He replies that it is similar to brunette and she immediately
clarifies that that is dark.
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Now the man has had enough of her insensitiveness. He disregards all constraints of formality and mocks
her outright, saying that he isn’t all black, the soles of his feet and the palms of his hands are completely white, but he
is foolish enough to sit on his bottom so it has been rubbed black due to friction. But as he senses that she is about to
slam the receiver on him, he struggles one last time to make her reconsider pleading her to at least see for herself
only to have the phone slammed on him.
4.1. OBJECTIVES
“Telephone Conversation” by Wole Soyinka demonstrates the injustice faced by a man who is judged on the
basis of his skin colour. However, in this poem the problem of racism is not expressed in an explicitly angry tone.
Soyinka outlines the conversation between the black man and the white landlady with humorous undertones to reflect
in a nuanced manner the unfairness of her treatment. The poem could be compared with Roger Mais’ poem “Blackout”
in its balanced treatment of race. The main objective of the poet in this poem is to expose the insensitivity of a racist
woman.
5.1. ANALYSIS OF THE POEM “TELEPHONE CONVERSATION”
The poem centres on the conversation between an Afro American man calling a white landlady about rental
accommodation. The man correctly assesses that the woman will have reservations about renting to him because of
his skin colour. What surprises him is her question, “HOW DARK?” He tries to answer “West African sepia” and
“brunette,” but goes on to explain that this is not an easy-to-categorize colour. The poem ends with his question,
“Wouldn’t you rather / See for yourself?” This implicitly invites her to evaluate him as a person instead of on the basis
of his colour which does not define his identity.
Soyinka writes the poem in free verse i.e. it has no metre or rhyme. It is written in the form of a dialogue.
Soyinka also includes creative and offbeat elements to the speaker’s thoughts and speech, for example, the speaker
describes his bottom as “raven black,” humorously. All this serves to strengthen the speaker’s concealed frustration.
Soyinka uses two main literary devices to impart the message of the poem. Right at the beginning the imagery
used to describe the mental image the man has of the woman is interesting: “lipstick coated, gold rolled cigarette
holder piped”. Listening to her voice on the phone, the listener can make out that the landlady belongs to a higher
social class. When he hears her question regarding how dark he is, he is so humiliated and angry that he sees red
everywhere. The imagery of the huge bus squelching the black tar is symbolic of how the dominant white community
treats the minority black community as tar.
The next most evident use is that of irony. In the beginning of the poem, the African says that he has to “self-
confess” when he reveals his skin colour to the lady. The colour of his skin is something that he has no control over
and even if he did, it is not a sin to be dark skinned, so the fact that the man feels ashamed and sorry for this is ironical
and casts light on how ridiculous racism is that the victimized one should be the one to apologize and should be so
submissive when he has actually committed no mistakes.
On the other hand, the lady is continuously described in positive terms, suggesting that she is of a good
breeding and upper class. Even when the reader finds out that she is a shallow and racist person who exhibits extreme
insensitivity by asking crude questions. The repeated and exaggerated assertions of the woman’s good manners and
sophistication are contradicted by her speech. The poem contains quite a few such ironical references.
A most important device used by Soyinka to highlight this sense of racism is that of the telephone. Had the
person been speaking face to face with the lady, this whole conversation would never have taken place. She would have
either refused outright or would have found a more subtle way of doing so. The whole conversation about ‘how dark’
the man is wouldn’t have occurred. Thus the telephone is used to make the issue of racism clear and prove how
nonsensical it really is.
Written in an independent style and delivered in a passively sarcastic tone, this poem is a potent comment on
the mainstream racist society. Soyinka might be speaking through personal experience. The emotions of anger, rage,
shame, humility and an acute sense of disgust at the apathy and inhumanity of humans are beautifully expressed in the
poem. In the modern world, racism might be on the decline but that does not mean that discrimination against other
minorities has been completely eradicated. Thus this poem remains a universal message for all of us, as Soyinka
manages to convey just how absurd all prejudices are by highlighting the woman’s poor choice of rejecting the man
just because he does not share the same skin color.
‘Telephone Conversation’ is a favourite poem both for its excellent use of rich language and the timeless
message it conveys.
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Wole Soyinka is a widely acclaimed African writer and critic. In the Nobel prize citation he was described as
one “who in a wide cultural perspective and with poetic overtones fashions the drama of existence.” As a postcolonial
critic his views on culture, folklore and myth are very significant. For a detailed study of Soyinka the following books
are recommended:
James Gibbs (1980). Critical Perspective on Wole Soyinka (Critical Perspectives).
Eldred Jones (1987) The Writing of Wole Soyinka. Heinemann.
7.1. LET US SUM UP
The poem deals with the sensitive subject of racism and racial prejudice in a lighthearted, almost comical
manner. The black man handles the situation as gracefully and humorously as he can which makes his situation appear
to the reader as all the more undeserved and unjust. The basis of the woman rejecting to rent out her house to the man
is because of her racial prejudice against the black people who were downgraded as savages. On the contrary, the
black man retains better manners and vocabulary than the woman. He is using words such as “spectroscopic” and
“rancid”, whereas the white lady does not know what West African Sepia is and is inconsiderate in her inquiries.
Soyinka proves how absurd it is to judge the intellect or character of a man depending on the colour of his skin only.
Written in an independent style and a passively sarcastic tone, this poem is a potent comment on society.
Soyinka might be speaking through personal experience. Implicit in this are the emotions of anger, rage, shame,
humility and an acute sense of disgust at the apathy and inhumanity of humans who judge a man by the colour of his
skin and not the qualities of head and heart. In contemporary time racism might be on the decline but it is still a reality.
Since discrimination against the minorities and many ethnic groups still persists, this poem is relevant in the present
times. This poem imbibes a universal message for all and Soyinka manages to convey just how absurd all prejudices
are by highlighting the woman’s poor choice of rejecting the man just because he does not share the same skin colour.
1. Explain the title of the poem “Telephone Conversation” by Wole Soyinka.
2. What is a dialogue poem?
3. Summarise briefly the poem “Telephone Conversation” by Wole Soyinka.
4. In which year was Wole Soyinka awarded the Nobel Prize? To which country does Soyinka belong?
5. Name any three plays of Wole Soyinka.
6. Describe Soyinka as a political activist.
7. What image do you get of the landlady in the poem?
8. Comment on the ending of the poem “Telephone Conversation”.
9. What is the message of the poem “Telephone Conversation”?
10. Name any two collections of Soyinka’s poems.
*****
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Lesson-4
“Harlem”
Langston Hughes
Dear students,
STRUCTURE
1.1.2. THE EARLY YEARS OF LANGSTON’S LIFE AND EDUCATION
1.1.4. LAST YEARS
2.1. WORKS
2.1.2. POEMS
2.1.3. NOVELS
3.1. INTRODUCTION – (I) TEXT OF THE POEM “HARLEM” BY LANGSTON HUGHES
(II) SUMMARY OF THE POEM
4.1. OBJECTIVES
5.1. ANALYSIS OF THE POEM “HARLEM”
5.1.2. SIGNIFICANCE OF HARLEM AS A PLACE AND MOVEMENT
6.1. WHAT CRITICS SAY
7.1. LET US SUM UP
1.1. INTRODUCTION TO THE POET
1.1.2. EARLY YEARS OF LANGSTON’S LIFE AND EDUCATION
James Mercer Langston Hughes was born on February 1, 1902, in Joplin, Missouri. His parents, James
Hughes and Carrie Langston, separated soon after his birth. Hughes was brought up mainly by his maternal grandmother
until her death. Hughes then went to live with his mother, and they moved to several cities before settling down in
Cleveland, Ohio. It was during this time that Hughes first began to write poetry and was a regular contributor to his
school’s literary magazine and frequently submitted to other poetry magazines, although they would ultimately reject
him.
1.1.3. GROWING UP YEARS
Hughes graduated from high school in 1920 and spent the following year in Mexico with his father. Around
this time, Hughes’s poem “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” was published in “The Crisis” magazine and was highly
praised. In 1921 Hughes returned to the United States and enrolled at Columbia University where he studied briefly,
and during that time he became active in Harlem renaissance. But Hughes dropped out of Columbia university in 1922
and did various odd jobs around New York for the following year. He joined as a steward on a freighter that took him
to Africa and Spain. He left the ship in 1924 and lived for a brief time in Paris, where he continued to develop and
publish his poetry.
1.1.4. LAST YEARS
Langston’s poetry was later promoted by Vachel Lindsay, and Hughes published his first book in 1926. He
went on to write countless works of poetry, prose and plays, as well as a popular column for the Chicago Defender. He
died on May 22, 1967.
2.1. WORKS
2.1.2. POEMS
Langston Hughes has been a prolific writer. he has written poems, short stories, novels and books for children.
he published a dozen collection of poems. Some of the notable ones are as follows:
The Weary Blues, 1926
Fine Clothes to the Jew, 1927
Let America be America Again, 1938
Shakespeare in Harlem,1942
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One Way Ticket, 1949
Montage of a Dream Deferred, 1951
2.1.3. NOVELS
Not Without Laughter, 1930
The Ways of White Folks, 1934
3.1. INTRODUCTION TO THE POEM “HARLEM”
(i) Text of Langston Hughes’ Poem “Harlem”
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
Like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore—
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?

Or crust and sugar over—
Like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags

Like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
Maybe it just sags

Like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
(ii) Summary of “Harlem” by Langston Hughes
The poem “Harlem” by Langston Hughes is a very short but meaningful poem of eleven lines in the form of
a series of questions. The poem written by an Afro American poet in 1951 reflects the post World War II mood of
disappointment and frustration of many Afro Americans whose dreams were delayed and deferred. The opening question
in the poem is, “What happens to a dream deferred?” Five of the six answers to the opening question are interrogative
rather than declarative sentences. The war was over, but for the Afro Americans their dream was still being deferred.
What was the dream is not clearly stated in the poem but understandably it is related to the dream of equity and
equality, justice, freedom or indiscrimination for the black people.
It is not very clear in the poem who the speaker is. It could be the poet or an undefined Afro American man or
woman. Harlem was the name of a place in the neighbourhood of New York where the impoverished Black community
lived in ghettos. The Afro Americans were promised the dreams of equity and equality but promises were not fulfilled.
They were delayed, deferred and postponed.Their dreams never came true. Despite legal, political and social consensus
to abolish apartheid, i,e. racial discrimination, the Black people could never escape discrimination in the United
States.
The first image in the poem is of “dream dries up like a raisin”. The simile likens the original dream to a
grape, which is sound, juicy, green and fresh since the dream has been neglected for too long, it has probably dried up.
When the dream is postponed or deferred or delayed, it brings frustration. It dries up like a raisin in the sun but it is
wet inside, likewise it stinks like rotten meat, it becomes fester like a sore and one day it will explode and cause
larger social damages.
The next image in the poem “fester like a sore and then run” conveys a sense of infection and pain. Comparing
the dream to a sore of a body, the poet suggests that unfulfilled dreams become part of us, like a longstanding injury
that has gathered pus. The word “fester” means something that decays and “run” literally refers to pus. This denotes
the pain that one undergoes when one’s dreams are always deferred. A postponed dream is like a painful injury that
begins to be infected.
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The next image “Does it stink like rotten meat” denotes the sense of disgust. A dream deferred may also
stink. The poet also hints at the disastrous results of ignoring or blocking people’s dreams.
Summing up, ‘Harlem’ offers revealing insight into the pitiable condition of the Afro Americans during the
post World War II which later culminated in the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s spearheaded by the Afro
Americans.
4.1. OBJECTIVES
Hughes titled this poem “Harlem” after the place in New York neighbourhood that became the centre of the
Harlem Renaissance which was a major creative explosion by the Afro Americans in music, literature, and art that
occurred during the 1910s and 1920s. Harlem Renaissance was the name given to the cultural ,social, and artistic
explosion that took place in Harlem between the end of World War I and the middle of the 1930s. During this period
Harlem was a cultural centre for Black writers, artists, musicians, photographers, poets, and scholars.
Many Afro American families saw Harlem as a sanctuary from the frequent discrimination they faced in
other parts of the country. In the early 1950s, America was still racially segregated. Afro Americans were the victims
of slavery, which turned them to second-class citizens. Unfortunately, Harlem’s glamour faded at the beginning of the
1930s when the Great Depression set in leaving many of the Afro American families who had prospered in Harlem
destitute once more. The poem describes this particular point of time when the Afro Americans encountered
disappointment and frustration as their dreams and hopes were belied.
5.1. ANALYSIS OF THE POEM “HARLEM”
This short poem consisting of eleven lines is one of Hughes’s most famous works. In this poem with eleven
short lines, except for one line, all are questions. This could be called a rhetorical poem as it is built on the structure
of a rhetoric. Hughes wrote “Harlem” in 1951 and it addresses one of his most common themes - the limitations of
the American Dream for Afro Americans. The ‘dream deferred’ is the long- postponed and frustrated dream of Afro
Americans,— a dream of freedom, equality, dignity, opportunity and success.
The speaker ponders over the fate of a “dream deferred.” The question is a powerful one, and there is a sense
of silence after it. Hughes then uses vivid analogies to evoke the image of a delayed dream. He imagines it drying up,
festering, stinking, crusting over, or, finally, exploding. All of these images, while not outright violent, have a slightly
dark tone to them. Each image is potent enough to make the reader smell, feel, and taste these discarded dreams.
According to Langston Hughes, a discarded dream does not simply vanish, on the contrary it undergoes an evolution,
approaching a physical state of decay.
Through this poem Langston Hughes examines the possible effects caused by the dream, when they are
constantly deferred. When the dreams are constantly deferred, or when dreams are constantly postponed and delayed
we are naturally cut between hope and hopelessness. The dreams remain in the mind like a heavy load. When these
loads are extended, explosions are inevitable. The conflict in the poem remains unresolved. The last line of the poem
“Or does it explode?” suggests that the dreams will explode and destroy all the limitations imposed upon them.
5.1.2. SIGNIFICANCE OF HARLEM AS A PLACE AND MOVEMENT
The Harlem Renaissance was the name given to the cultural, social, and artistic explosion that took place in
Harlem between the end of World War I and the middle of the 1930s. During this period Harlem was a cultural centre,
drawing black writers, artists, musicians, photographers, poets, and scholars. Many of these Black people had come
from the South because of the oppressive caste system. Among those artists whose works achieved recognition were
Langston Hughes and Claude McKay, Countee Cullen and Arna Bontemps, Zora Neale Hurston and Jean Toomer.
During this period Harlem was the Mecca to which black writers, artists, musicians, photographers, poets, and scholars
travelled.
Walter White and James Weldon Johnson and W.E.B. Du Bois are some well known Afro American writers
who encouraged talented Black artists to leave the South. Du Bois, then the editor of THE CRISIS magazine was at the
height of hisfame and influence in the black community. THE CRISIS published the poems, stories, and visual works
of many artists of the period including Hughes. The Renaissance involved racial pride. The “New Negro” became very
vocal and militant demanding civil and political rights for their community. The Harlem Renaissance incorporated
jazz and the blues, attracting whites to Harlem. The greatest impact of the Harlem movement was to reinforce race
pride among the Afro Americans. It was in the post Harlem renaissance period that the derogatory word ‘Negro’ was
replaced by Afro American or African American.
“Harlem” is a very significant poem in Afro American literature because it represents the hopes,
aspirations,frustrations and discontent of the Black community who lived in Harlem, ghettos in the neighbourhood of
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New York. As critic Arthur P. Davis writes, “When [Hughes] depicts the hopes, the aspirations, the frustrations, and
the deep-seated discontent of the New York ghetto, he is expressing the feelings of Negroes in black ghettos throughout
America.
As an active member of the Harlem group Hughes encouraged and helped young Afro American writers. The
famous writer Alice Walker looked upon Hughes as a hero. Maya Angelou was greatly influenced by the writings of
Hughes.
7.1 LET US SUM IT UP
Let us now briefly recapitulate the lecture. Langston Hughes is one of the pioneering Afro American writers
whose thoughts and writing have greatly impacted the younger generation of Afro American writers. As an active
member of the Harlem activists he raised his voice through his writings against the injustice meted out to the Blacks.
He waged an untiring war against the racist policies of the Whites and was highly critical of their racist policies. The
titles of his novels and collection of poems Let America be America Again, Shakespeare in Harlem, Not Without
Laughter and The ways of White Folks, to cite a few examples.
“Harlem” is a short poem of eleven lines that expresses the Afro Americans’ mood of disappointment and
frustration after World war II when they felt like betrayed. The Blacks had been fighting against racial and gender
expression and wanted equal opportunities but the promises were not realised. The poet warns of the consequences if
the dreams are deferred for long. There can be explosion. A discarded dreamsimply does not vanish,it undergoes an
evolution.
1. What do you mean by Afro American? What were they called in the pre-Harlem days?
2. What five things does Langston Hughes compare a dream deferred to?
3. What dream do you think the poet might be referring to?
4. Why has the poem been titled “Harlem” by the poet?
5. Describe briefly the Harlem Renaissance.
6. Do you feel the poem is optimistic about the future?
7. Describe briefly the early life of Langston Hughes.
8. Who is the speaker in the poem “Harlem”?
9. Name any two collection of poems by Langston Hughes
10. Explain the line, “ Or does it explode?”
*****
61
Lesson-5
“Still I Rise”
by Maya Angelou ( 1928 - 2014)
Lectures 1.
Dear students,
STRUCTURE
1.1 (I) TEXT AND (II) SUMMARY OFTHE POEM
2.1 OBJECTIVES OF THE POEM
3.1 CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF ‘STILL I RISE”
3.2 FIGURES OF SPEECH IN THE POEM
4.1 WHAT CRITICS SAY ABOUT “STILL I RISE”
5.1 LET US SUM UP
6.1 KNOW YOUR PROGRESS
1.1. (I) TEXT OF THE POEM ‘STILL I RISE’ BY MAYA ANGELOU
You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I’ll rise.
Does my sassiness upset you?

Why are you beset with gloom?
‘Cause I walk like I’ve got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.
Just like moons and like suns,

With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I’ll rise.
Did you want to see me broken?

Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.
Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don’t you take it awful hard
‘Cause I laugh like I’ve got gold mines
Diggin’ in my own back yard.
You may shoot me with your words,

You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I’ll rise.
Does my sexiness upset you?

Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I’ve got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?
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Out of the huts of history’s shame
I rise
Up from a past that’s rooted in pain
I rise
I’m a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.
1.1. (II) SUMMARY OF THE POEM ‘STILL I RISE”
Dear students,
The poem “Still I Rise” is considered to be Maya Angelou’s best-known poem expressing the protest and
defiance of the Afro-American people against years of slavery in America/United States. It is rooted in the history of
slavery in America with it’s poignant references to slavery. Written in the first person the poem speaks not only for
the poet but for every black man and woman in America. At a larger context the poem speaks of the universal notion
of the defiance of the downtrodden and the oppressed across the globe. The image of the “black ocean, leaping and
wide” is a powerful metaphor for the black power capable of overcoming oppression.
The tone of the poem is defiant and assertive. It expresses the Afro-Amerians’ defiance of slavery contesting
vehemently the lies prapogated by the whites against the Afro-Amerians specially the Afro American women. Apparently
addressed to the dominant American community Angelou begins the poem on a note of provocative defiance declaring
boldly that although she may be trod into the very dirt, she will still rise like dust. ‘But still, like dust, I’ll rise’.
In the second stanza the poet poses some soul serching questions to the oppressive white community
responsible for the slavery and subsequent exploitation of the Afro American women for centuries. Provocative
questions like “Does my sassiness upset you?” “Does my haughtiness offend you?” and “Does my sexiness offend
you?” are rooted in the history of the oppression of the Afro American women in America who were subjected not
only to sexual exploitation by the whites but were also blamed for their sexiness by their white predators. Courageous
and bold women like Maya Angelou succeeded in overcoming such humiliation and exploitation during their life
time, and the poet speaks boldly about the “meeting of my thighs” with such inspiring strength here. Angelou best
expresses the ultimate defiance of a woman, she owns and loves every part of herself, and rises up, dazzling and sexy.
This celebration of female body would situate the poem in the feminist canon.
The fourth stanza refers to the image of an Afro American enslaved woman with “Bowed head and lowered
eyes/Shoulders falling down like teardrops/Weakened by my soulful cries.” The poet refuses to subscribe to this
image of a subdued, cowed down woman shedding tears and unlike the past emerges as a woman who has overcome
sexism and oppression of the bygone days with her defiant spirit. “You may shoot me with your words,/You may cut
me with your eyes,/ You may kill me with your hatefulness,/But still, like air, I’ll rise.”
The poet’s reference to the “oil wells” and the “gold mines” in the second and fifth stanzas is strongly
evocative. She asserts that she walks “like I’ve got oil wells/ Pumping in my living room” and that she laughs “like I’ve
got gold mines/ Diggin’ in my own back yard.” Though her oppressors might think they have finished her off by
subjecting her to poverty, still, she walks like a wealthy woman in possession of all the wealth in the world. Implicitly
the poet knows the materialistic and mercenary mindset of her oppressors and therefore prefers to pose like a wealthy
woman.
The source of the poet’s sustaining strength is the ‘Black ocean’ that signifies the black human force. The
Afro Americans could overcome their history of shame, tears and pain and the nights of terror and fear of the past
firstly with the blessings of their ancestors and secondly with their collective strength and effort. This fighting spirit
is the gift of the ancestors that has enabled their race to rise against all odds.
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Note:
Afro American: The Americans of African origin. Previously called Negro, they are now called Afro American
or African American.
2.1. OBJECTIVES OF THE POEM “STILL I RISE”
Defiance of Racial and Gender Oppression by an Afro American Woman
This poem is a wonderfully defiant, human, uplifting cry from the deep heart of the oppressed Afro-Americans
specially the womenfolk and their defiance of slavery and oppression. The poem most poignantly raises its voice
against racial discrimination and gender oppression. Implicit in the provocative questions,— “Does my sassiness
upset you?” “Does my haughtiness offend you?” and “Does my sexiness offend you?” is the image of the defiant Afro
American woman.
Message of Strength and Positivity
The poem is rooted in the long history of the salvery of the Afro American people when they were brought
to America loaded like cattle in ships to work on plantation sites. It is a welcome assertion by the oppressed Afro
American woman of her victory in a way, a tale of overcoming all kinds of oppression and false propaganda. Defying
the coercive forces she rises up like “black ocean, leaping and wide.” The poem carries Maya Angelou’s message of
strength and positivity not only for the black woman but for the entire black race. The poem’s message of strength and
positivity is not limited to one person, in the larger context it is compatible with the universal notion of the defiance
of the downtrodden.
Triumphant Tone of the Poem
The concluding stanza of the poem-’I am the dream and the hope of the slave./I rise/ I rise/.I rise’ best sums
up the gist of the poem. It has been the dream and hope of every slave to overcome oppression and depression and rise
up despite the oppressive and coersive forces working against them. The repetitive rhythmic lines ‘I rise” are a
reinforcement of the poet’s defiance of slavery. These lines not only offer poetic beauty in the form of rhythm but
create a charged atmosphere of defiance. “Still I Rise” offers an intriguing mixture of tones,— playful and defiant,
comical and angry, self-assured and bitter. Ultimately, the poem’s tone, as the title of the poem suggests, is triumphant.
The poem ends on a sanguine, triumphant note.
3.1. CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF THE POEM “STILL I RISE”
Dear students,
You are now familiar with the text and summary of this powerful poem ‘Still I Rise’ by the famous Afro
American poet Maya Angelou. A poem can broadly be divided into two categories:
(i) Subjective
(ii) Objective
“Still I Rise” is written in the first person and thus this is a subjective poem expressing the personal experiences
and responses of an Afro American woman to racial and gender oppression. Most importantly, the first word of the
poem “You” is important as it is addressed to others. Thus this is not simply a private, retrospective lyric, it is marked
by a boldness and self-assertiveness. Clearly addressed to the white American oppressors of the blacks by a black
woman, the poem at the personal level speaks for the poet who shares the legacy of centuries of racial and gender
oppression but at the larger context it speaks for all Afro Americans, for other living blacks, and even for her black
ancestors. The poem is also objective because the personal in the poem becomes political.
‘Still I Rise’ consists of eight stanzas in all. The first seven stanzas are of four lines each. The concluding
stanza beginning with “Out of the huts of... “ consists of fifteen lines ending with the line “I rise” which is repeated
thrice. The repetitive device is employed by the poet as a reinforcement of her declaration.
The poem is both subjective and objective. It is personal as well as political. The speaker, an Afro American
woman is responding to centuries of oppression and mistreatment. The first kind of oppression the speaker mentions
is an oppression rooted in writing:
“You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies . . . .” (1-2)
The poem is in a way a direct response to this kind of oppressive writing. The speaker transforms writing,
one of the most important means of domination, into an instrument of liberation. First and foremost, those who
would help liberate blacks must first liberate their minds and challenge the thinking of their oppressors.
The first reference to actual physical oppression is mentioned in the third line, “You may trod me in the very
dirt.” Metaphorically, to tread another person into the dirt is to treat that person with disrespect and violence. Yet no
64
sooner does the speaker imagine being abused in this way than she immediately responds, “But still, like dust, I’ll
rise” (4). The reference to “dust” implies that something normally seen as negative can instead be seen as positive. It
means that something normally seen as bothersome can actually possess a kind of resilience and strength.
The poem can also be read as a historical document as it records the painful history of the blacks in America.
References to ‘history’s shame’, ‘a past that’s rooted in pain’ and ‘nights of terror and fear’ in the concluding stanza
of the poem sum up the painful and shameful history of the Afro Americans in America. It was the dream of every
slave— man as well as woman to be free. The poem celebrates that dream of freedom of a slave. Despite all odds the
slave rises up.The poem traces the journey of the slave from the days of slavery in the past to the days of freedom in
the present.
3.2. FIGURES OF SPEECH IN THE POEM
Simile: Angelou incorporates similes like “but still, like dust, I’ll rise” throughout the poem. This particular
simile also creates imagery, helping the reader to picture the rising cloud of dust in his or her mind. Angelou’s use of
simile deepens the meaning of the poem by giving the reader a tangible connection, like dust, to connect with the
deeper themes of the poem. Other examples of simile in the poem are—’I walk like I’ve got oil wells’, ‘Just like
moons and like suns’, ‘Just like hopes springing high’, ‘Shoulders falling down like teardrops’, ‘I laugh like I’ve got
gold mines’ and ‘like air, I’ll rise’.
Metaphor: Angelou uses metaphor as the speaker compares herself to a “black ocean, leaping and wide”.
This metaphor reinforces the vast power felt by the speaker of the poem, that she feels unrestrained like the ocean,
capable of overcoming her difficulties.
Personification: “Past rooted in pain” gives human qualities, in this case emotion to a non-human object or
idea “the past.” Angelou contrasts the difficult past with its hardships, restrictions, and disappointments to the bright
promise of the future. She also uses alliteration here in “huts of history,” which adds to the cadence of the poem.
All of these literary devices contribute to the depth of the poem by demonstrating the extent of the speaker’s
power to overcome obstacles and still rise.
Imagery: Angelou employs strong imagery throughout the poem as she creates a contrast between past and
present:
“Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.” (13-16)
In this stanza, Angelou appeals to the readers’ sensory perception, particularly of sight, by creating an image
of defeat— the slumped posture and downcast eyes suggest failure and disappointment. The “soulful cries” deepen
this image by adding an auditory layer, so the reader not only sees what defeat must feel like, but can hear it as well.
The poem “Still I Rise” is considered to be Maya Angelou’s best-known poem expressing the protest and
defiance of the Afro-American people against years of slavery in America.
What Carol Neubauer had to say about Angelou’s Yet Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water ‘fore I Diiie
(1971) sums up the gist of Angelou’s poems. “.... In other poems Angelou turns her attention to the lives of black
people in America from the time of slavery to the rebellious 1960s. Her themes deal broadly with the painful anguish
suffered by blacks forced into submission, with guilt over accepting too much, and with protest and basic survival.”
(Southern Women Writers :The New Generation,1975)
5.1. LET US SUM UP
Let us briefly recapitulate what we have discussed in this lecture. We began with the poem followed by its
summary. You will agree this is a very beautiful and powerful poem by the Afro American poet Maya Angelou. The
poem consists of eight stanzas ending with the forceful assertion of the poet, “I rise.” The poem is both personal and
political. It is subjective as well as objective. The speaker, an Afro American woman is implicitly responding to
centuries of oppression and mistreatment. The poem ends on a positive, triumphant note. Various figures of speech,-
simile, metaphor, personification and imagery etc. in the poem have been used by the poet that impart a lyrical and
rhythmic beauty to the poem. Angelou incorporates similes like “but still, like dust, I’ll rise” throughout the poem.
Similarly, the metaphor of “black ocean, leaping and wide” signifies black power. The poem can be read as a historical
document of the painful journey of the Afro Americans in America.
65
1. What do you mean by first person narrative?
2. How many stanzas are there in the poem “Still I Rise’?
3. Give a detailed analysis of Maya Angelou’s poem “Still I Rise.”
4. Explain how the main theme of “Still I Rise” could be considered a universal theme.
5. The speaker addresses “you” several times in the poem, “Still I Rise.” Who is meant by “you”?
6. What does this stanza “Out of the huts of history’s shame....” from the poem “Still I Rise” by Maya
Angelou signify?
7. Explain both the denotation and connotation of the phrase “black ocean” in the poem “Still I Rise.”
8. What do you like most about this poem?
9. What do you mean by Afro- American?
10. What is the final tone of the poem?
(i) Defeated
(ii) Angry
(iii) Triumphant
And Still I Rise, Random House (New York, NY), 1978, new version published as Still I Rise, illustrated by
Diego Rivera, edited by Linda Sunshine, Random House (New York, NY), 2001, many reprintings.
*****
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Lesson-6
‘Still I Rise’
Dear students,
STRUCTURE
1.1 AN INTRODUCTION TO THE POET
1.1.2 THE EARLY YEARS OF MAYA ANGELOU’S LIFE AND EDUCATION
1.1.4. THE LAST YEARS
1.1.5. AWARDS
2.1. WORKS
2.1.2 AUTOBIOGRAPHIES
2.1.3. POEMS
3.1. MAJOR THEMES OF POEMS
3.1.2. SIGNIFICANCE OF MAYA ANGELOU’S POETRY IN AFRO AMERICAN LITERATURE
3.1.3. SIGNIFICANCE OF THE POEM ‘STILL I RISE’ IN AFRO AMERICAN LITERATURE
5.1. LET US SUM UP
Maya Angelou ( 1928 - 2014)
In the previous lecture you have gone through the poem “Still I Rise” and the discussions on the merit of the
poem regarding the objectives and critical analysis. This must have given you an idea of the hardships and sufferings
of the Afro Americans in America during the time of slavery. Maya Angelou belongs to the modern generation of Afro
American women who bravely fought against the forces of oppression and suppression and did not cow down despite
all odds against them. Some of the famous Afro American women writers are Zora Neale Hurston, Alice Walker, Toni
Morrison, Gloria Neylor and Paul Marshall.
In this lecture you are going to be introduced to Maya Angelou’s life and her works for a better understanding
of the poet as a person and as a writer.
Maya Angelou was an acclaimed Afro American author, poet, historian, songwriter, playwright, dancer, stage
and screen producer, director, performer, singer, and civil rights activist.
1.1.2.THE EARLY YEARS OF MAYA ANGELOU’S LIFE AND EDUCATION
Maya Angelou was born Marguerite Johnson in St. Louis, Missouri. Angelou’s life is a living example of
black-on-black oppression.The black women had to suffer not only racial oppression at the hands of their white
masters but were victimized by their own men too for various reasons,—economic, social and psychological. Angelou’s
most famous autobiographical work, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969) deals with her early years in Long
Beach, St. Louis and Stamps, Arkansas, where she lived with her brother and paternal grandmother. Angelou was raped
by her mother’s boyfriend at the age of eight years when she had gone to visit her mother. When the man was murdered
by her uncles for his crime, Angelou felt responsible, and stopped talking. She remained mute for five years. When
Angelou was twelve and a half, Mrs. Flowers, an educated black woman, finally got her to speak again. Mrs. Flowers,
as Angelou recalled in her children’s book Mrs. Flowers: A Moment of Friendship (1986), emphasized the importance
of the spoken word, explained the nature of and importance of education, and instilled in Angelou a love of poetry.
Angelou attended George Washington High School in San Francisco and took lessons in dance and drama on
a scholarship at the California Labour School. At the age of 17 Angelou graduated from high school and also became
a single mother of her son.
At the initial stage of her life, Angelou tried hand at all kinds of odd jobs .She has been at various times in her
life a streetcar conductor, Creole cook, junkie, singer, actress, and civil-rights activist. She writes in her third
autobiography Singin’ and Swingin’ and Gettin’ Merry like Christmas (1976) that she also “worked as a shake
dancer in night clubs, fry cook in hamburger joints, dinner cook in a Creole restaurant and once had a job in a mechanic’s
67
shop, taking the paint off cars with my hands.” Angelou married a white ex-sailor,Tosh Angelos, in 1950. After they
separated, Angelou continued her study of dance in New York City, returning to San Francisco to sing in the Purple
Onion cabaret. From 1954 to 1955, she was a member of the cast of a touring production of Porgy and Bess. During
the late 1950s, Angelou sang in West Coast and Hawaiian night clubs before returning to New York to continue her
stage career.
1.1.4. THE LAST YEARS
Angelou joined the Harlem Writers Guild in the late 1950s and met James Baldwin and other important Afro
American writers. It was during this time that Angelou had the opportunity to hear the great civil right activist Dr.
Martin Luther King speak. Inspired by his message, she decided to become a part of the struggle for civil rights. She
was offered a position as the northern coordinator for Dr. King’s SCLC. Following her work for Dr. King, Angelou
moved to Cairo , Egypt with her son and in 1962 to Ghana in West Africa. She worked as a freelance writer and was a
feature editor at the African Review. When Angelou returned to the US in the mid-1960s she was encouraged by
author James Baldwin and Robert Loomis, an editor at Random House to write her autobiography.( Most of Angelou’s
books are published by Random House) Initially, Angelou declined the offers but eventually changed her mind and
wrote her first autobiography I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. The book records Angelou’s childhood and ends
with the birth of her son. It won immediate success and was nominated for a National Book Award.
Angelou was also an educator and served as the Reynolds professor of American Studies at Wake Forest
University. She achieved national prominence in 1993 when she read “On the Pulse of the Morning,” a poem she
had written, at Bill Clinton’s request for his presidential inauguration.
1.1.5. AWARDS
Angelou was flooded with rewards during her lifetime. She was awarded over 50 honorary degrees. In 2000,
Angelou was awarded the National Medal of Arts by President Bill Clinton. In 2010, she was awarded the Presidential
Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honour in the United States by President Barack Obama. In 2013 she received
the Literarian Award, an honorary National Book Award for contributions to the literary community.
She died in 2014 at the age of 86.
2.1. WORKS
Angelou is a prolific writer. She has written autobiographies, poems, essays, songs, screen plays and continued
her career in film and television.
2.1.2. AUTOBIOGRAPHIES
Angelou has written the following six autobiographies:
1. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969)
2. Gather Together in My Name (1974),
3. Singin’ and Swingin’ and Gettin’ Merry like Christmas (1976)
4. The Heart of a Woman (1981)
5. All God’s Children Need Traveling Shoes (1986) .
6. A Song Flung up to Heaven (2002).
2.1.3. POEMS
Yet Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water ‘fore I Diiie (1971), nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in 1972. This
volume contains 38 poems, some of which were published in The Poetry of Maya Angelou (1969).
The Complete Collected Poems of Maya Angelou (1994)
Phenomenal Woman (1995), a collection of four poems.
“A Brave Startling Truth” (1995), which commemorated the founding of the United Nations.
“Amazing Peace” (2005), a poem written for the White House Christmas tree-lighting ceremony.
‘Caged Bird’, ‘Awaking in New York’, ‘California Prodigal’, ‘Harlem Hopscotch’ and ‘Kin’ are some notable
poems of Maya Angelou.
“And Still I Rise”, Random House (New York, NY), 1978, new version published as “Still I Rise”, illustrated
by Diego Rivera, edited by Linda Sunshine, Random House (New York, NY), 2001, many reprintings.
Besides autobiographies and poems, Angelou has written screen plays, essays, songs and scripts for television
and films.
3.1. MAJOR THEMES OF POEMS
Angelou was a prolific and widely-read poet and her poetry has often been acclaimed for its depiction of
black beauty, the strength of women, and the human spirit; criticism of the Vietnam War and demand for social
justice.
68
Angelou’s themes in her poems deal mainly with the painful anguish suffered by the blacks who were forced
into submission as a result of which they suffered with a feeling of guilt and shame. Her poems voice the protest of
the Afro Americans and their struggle for survival. Angelou’s thematic concerns are related to the effects and
consequences of individual desire, experience, oppression, and loss, and the social, psychological, and spiritual
responses to racial and sexual brutality.
Her poems belong to the Afro American oral tradition. She incorporates in her poetry elements of Afro
American slave songs and work songs.
3.1.2. SIGNIFICANCE OF ANGELOU’S POETRY IN AFRO AMERICAN LITERATURE
Angelou usually recited her poems before spellbound crowds. She was an accomplished singer too. The
Afro Americans have a strong oral tradition. It was this oral tradition that kept alive the songs of the slaves and slave
narratives. Angelou’s poetry can be traced to the Afro American oral tradition in her use of personal narrative and
emphasis on individual responses to hardship, oppression and loss. Her poems often respond to matters like race and
sex on a larger social and psychological scale. Describing her work to George Plimpton, Angelou said, “Once I got
into it I realized I was following a tradition established by Frederick Douglass—the slave narrative—speaking in the
first-person singular talking about the first-person plural, always saying I meaning ‘we.’ And what a responsibility.
Trying to work with that form, the autobiographical mode, to change it, to make it bigger, richer, finer, and more
inclusive in the twentieth century has been a great challenge for me.”
3.1.3. SIGNIFICANCE OF ANGELOU’S ‘STILL I RISE” IN AFRO AMERICAN LITERATURE
“Still I Rise” is a very significant poem in Afro American literature for voicing the feelings and sentiments
of the enslaved black woman against years of oppression and suppression. Written in the form of a personal narrative
on the lines of the Afro American oral tradition the poem represents the defiant feelings and aspirations of the black
woman in particular. The personal narrative transcends to a universal narrative speaking for the downtrodden across
the globe. Rooted in the history of the blacks in America, this poem on the one hand can be read as a feminist poem
and at a larger level as a historical document of the painful journey of the Afro Americans in America followed by the
protest of the Afro Americans.
Initially the poem was titled ‘And Still I Rise’ (1978) The new version of the poem was published as ‘Still I
Rise’. Illustrated by Diego Rivera, edited by Linda Sunshine, Random House (New York, NY), 2001) the poem has
had many reprintings.
The famous critic Carol E. Neubauer has remarked that by 1975, “Angelou had become recognized not only
as a spokesperson for blacks and women, but also for all people who are committed to raising the moral standards of
living in the United States.” (Southern Women Writers: The New Generation)
Angelou rose to national fame in the early 1990s when President Bill Clinton invited her to write and read
the first presidential inaugural poem. Americans all across the country watched as she read “On the Pulse of Morning,”
which begins “A Rock, a River, a Tree” and calls for peace, racial and religious harmony, and social justice for
people of different origins, incomes, genders, and sexual orientations. It recalls the civil rights movement and Dr.
Martin Luther King, Jr.’s famous “I have a dream” speech as it urges America to “Give birth again / To the Dream” of
equality. Angelou exhorted the new administration and all Americans to work together for progress: “Here, on the
pulse of this new day, / You may have the grace to look up and out / And into your sister’s eyes, and into / Your
brother’s face, your country /And say simply / Very simply / With hope—Good morning.”
Maya Angelou is far more famous for her atobiographies than her poems. Her poems are considered by
some critics to be weak in substance, lacking in poetic invention, and lacklustre in language. However, what Lyman B.
Hagen had to say about Maya Angelou’s poems is significant. The famous critic Lyman B. Hagen has observed,
“Angelou may rank as a poet of moderate ability, but her poetry is praised for its honesty and for a moving sense of
dignity.”
5.1. LET US SUM UP
Here is a brief recap of Angelou’s illustious and eventful life and achievements. An acclaimed American
poet, storyteller, activist and autobiographer, Maya Angelou was born Marguerite Johnson in St. Louis, Missouri.
Angelou had a broad career as a singer, dancer, actress, composer, and Hollywood’s first female black director, but
she is most famous as a writer, editor, essayist, playwright, and poet. As a civil rights activist, Angelou worked for Dr.
Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. She was also an educator and served as the Reynolds professor of American
Studies at Wake Forest University. By 1975, wrote Carol E. Neubauer, “Angelou had become recognized not only as
a spokesperson for blacks and women, but also for all people who are committed to raising the moral standards of
69
living in the United States.” She served on two presidential committees, for Gerald Ford in 1975 and for Jimmy
Carter in 1977. In 2000, Angelou was awarded the National Medal of Arts by President Bill Clinton. In 2010, she was
awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honour in the U.S. by President Barack Obama.
Angelou was awarded over 50 honorary degrees. She died in 2014 at the age of 86.
Angelou is most famous for her six autobiographies. Her poems are considered by some critics to be weak
in substance, lacking in poetic invention, and lacklustre in language. Lyman B. Hagen has observed and rightly so,
Angelou may rank as a poet of moderate ability, but her poetry is praised for its honesty and for a moving sense of
dignity.
Her poems belong to the Afro American oral tradition. Her poems often respond to matters like race and sex
on a larger social and psychological scale. Her poetry has often been appreciated for its depiction of black beauty, the
strength of women, and the human spirit, criticism of the Vietnam War and demand for social justice.
1. What was Maya Angelou’s original name?
2. How many autobiographies has Maya Angelou written? Name any one of her autobiography.
3. Describe briefly the childhood of Maya Angelou.
4. Describe Maya Angelou as a civil rights activist.
5. What are the major themes of Angelou’s poems?
6. Name the poem Maya Angelou recited at Bill Clinton’s presidential inauguration. Give the gist of this
poem.
7. What is the significance of the poem ‘Still I Rise’ in Afro American literature? What was the original title
of the poem?
8. Name any four awards received by Maya Angelou.
9. Maya Angelou tried her hand at many jobs. Name any four of the jobs undertaken by her.
10. To which tradition Maya Angelou ‘s poetry subscribes to?
(i) Oral tradition
(ii) Modern tradition
(iii) Native tradition
And Still I Rise, Random House (New York, NY), 1978, new version published as Still I Rise, illustrated by
Diego Rivera, edited by Linda Sunshine, Random House (New York, NY), 2001, many reprintings.
*****
70
Unit-IV
Violence and War
Dear Students,
The texts in this unit deal with the themes of “Violence and War” and comprise of the genres of essay, short
stories, and poems. The prescribed texts are narratives located in World Wars I and II, the Indian partition and the
1984 riots in Delhi. The texts, therefore, need to be understood and studied keeping the respective situations in mind.
These notes comprise of three lessons dealing with each of these occurrences. The Polish President Lech Walesa
once said, “We have already tried and tested every form of violence, and not once in the entire course of human
history has anything good or lasting come from it” (King 397). This quote assumes significance here as the texts
under discussion also delve on a similar thought as we will see in this unit.
Objectives
The lessons are designed in a manner so as to provide you with an introduction and background to the writer,
followed by an in-depth analysis of the text under consideration. Each lesson comes with a glossary, questions for
revision, and suggested reading and references appended at the end. A thorough reading of the text is necessitated
before you begin to study these notes.
Lesson 1 is a critical study of the following poems:
1. “Conscientious Objector” by Edna St. Vincent Millay
2. “General, Your Tank is a Powerful Vehicle” by Bertolt Brecht
Lesson 2 is an analysis cum summary of the two short stories “The Dog of Tetwal” by Sa’adat Hasan Manto and “The
Chronicle of the Peacocks” by Intizar Husain.
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UNIT-IV
Lesson-1
“Conscientious Objector” by Edna St. Vincent Millay
Edna St. Vincent Millay was an American poet and playwright. She was born in Rockland, Maine, on February
22, 1892 and died on October 19, 1950. She lived in New York after her graduation and developed a considerable
reputation as a bohemian feminist. She is regarded as the most famous poet of the Jazz Age. The poetic chronicles she
wrote during this time opened a new vista of subject matter and introduced a liberated way of life for the women of
the 1920s and 1930s. Most of Millay’s work was composed at the Greenwich Village, New York, a place known for its
Bohemain culture and as an artist’s haven. Her literary oeuvre consists of poems, plays and songs. She crafted her
poems in a formal style, with strict adherence to traditional meter and rhyme schemes. Millay is most popular for the
sonnets she wrote which take precedence over other poetic forms. In recent times, we see a renewed interest in her
poetry, especially by feminist critics.
EARLY LIFE AND CAREER
She was born to Henry Tollman Millay, a school teacher, and Cora Buzzelle. Her parents were divorced in
1900, and her strong-willed mother brought up her three daughters by working as a nurse. Cora Millay encouraged her
daughters to be independent individuals like herself and supported any intellectual or artistic interest they displayed.
Her mother’s example was the most important influence in Millay’s childhood; it was largely responsible for her
uninhibited behavior and the autonomous attitude expressed in her writing.
Millay was inclined towards music from an early age. She took piano lessons for several years and planned
on a musical career, but decided in favor of becoming a writer when her poem “Renaissance” was published in Lyric
Year in 1912 for which she received enthusiastic praise. Her musical talent and musical education contributed to her
remarkable sense of harmony and rhythm, which were the features of her poetry that made her celebrated during the
1920’s and 1930’s. She was also interested in drama as a young girl; this interest continued throughout her life and led
to her writing a total of six dramatic works.
Millay studied at Vassar College, one of the leading American institutions of higher education for women.
This opportunity came as a result of the generosity of the New York head of the National Training School of the
YWCA, Miss Caroline B. Dow. She studied Latin, French, Greek, Italian, Spanish, and German while continuing to
write poetry and to act in amateur theatrical productions. When she was only twenty years old, she had already
establishing her reputation as a writer. Her first collection of poetry, Renascence and Other Poems, was published in
the fall of 1917. In 1923 she became the first woman to receive the Pulitzer Prize for her collection of poems Ballad
of the Harp Weaver. Her most famous poem is “First Fig,” a quatrain, which reads as:
“My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends—
It gives a lovely light!” She married Eugene Jan Boissevain in 1923, who was a sensitive and considerate
man. Together they bought “Steepletop,” their permanent home, near New York, where she eventually passed away in
1950, almost a year after her husband’s death.
INTRODUCTION
The outbreak of World War I saw the emergence of the concept and eventually the rise of conscientious
objectors. The progression in society from warring nations to democratic states, coupled with strong religious beliefs,
made men question themselves and the state over the necessity of war. Other war time poets like Sigfried Sassoon and
Wilfred Owen echoed similar sentiments and advocated pacifism as a better way to end conflict.
In military parlance a conscientious objector is an individual who has claimed the right to refuse to perform
military service on the grounds of freedom of thought, conscience, disability or religion. “Conscientious Objector”
by Edna St. Vincent Millay forms part of the collection Wine from These Grapes (1934). The poems in this collection
are bitter and philosophical in theme and content. “Conscientious Objector” was written during World War I, sometime
in 1917, and it strongly reflects her pacifist leanings and political activism. A careful reading of the poem suggests
that Millay is speaking from the point of view of a conscientious objector.
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STRUCTURE
The poem is in the first person narrative which is an effective mode of expression. It serves well as an
anthem for her ideas. Here, the reader is made aware of the poet’s determination to stand up for her beliefs and here
confidence in them: ‘But I will not hold the bridle…I will not tell him’. This conveys the poet’s strong convictions and
the repeated use of the pronoun ‘I’ highlights the courage and confidence. This is emphasized by the use of the modal
verb ‘will’ which stresses the poet’s determination and conviction.
The poem begins with a declaration and the use of personification, “I shall die, but that is all that I shall do for
Death.” Millay makes use of enjambment in this line for poetic effect. The first stanza is only one line: I shall die, but
that is all I shall do for death. This line shows that the conscientious objector is standing alone and is doing something
which is against the societal norms. He is expected to fight for his country. This indicates that he is determined to
follow his own conscience. This is supported by the repeated use of the pronoun ‘I’ and the alliteration of ‘d’ in the
line. Immediately a conflict between the individual and Death is apparent. The harsh sounding ‘d’ suggests the power
of Death and that the persona’s values will result in threat and danger to his life.
The other two stanzas in the poem are of varying lengths and do not have a rhyme scheme or fixed stanza
form. The use of a semi-colon in stanza 2 suggests that Death’s destruction is on-going as each conflict ends another
begins. This is linked to the idea that Death’s ‘business’ will also take him to Cuba and the Balkans. ‘Cuba’ refers to
the 1898 Spanish/USA conflict and the ‘Balkans’ to the on-going war. The use of the semi-colon in stanza 3 suggests
that the narrator will not succumb to the pressure of being conscripted into war.
The next two stanzas are longer in length which could suggest the struggle of the clash between the
conscientious objector’s values and the patriotic expectations. It indicates the power and force that the narrator
faces. This is supported by the use of alliteration and consonance ‘…promises me much, I will not map him the/route
to any man’s door.’ The softer sound conveys the consistent pressure to renounce his values and go against his
conscience but could also suggest that he is resigned to his fate.
Millay also makes use of repetition to emphasize the key ideas in the poem. For example, the repetition of
the phrase, “I will not” throughout the poem emphasizes the determination and grit of the poet not to partake in this
unethical and immoral act.
Text
I shall die, but that is all that I shall do for Death.
I hear him leading his horse out of the stall; I hear the
Clatter on the barn-floor.
He is in haste; he has business in Cuba, business in the
Balkans, many calls to make this morning.
But I will not hold he bridle while he cinches the
girth.
And he may mount by himself; I will not give him a
leg up.
Though he flick my shoulders with his whip, I will not
tell him which way the fox ran.
With his hoof on my breast, I will not-tell him where
the black boy hides in the swamp.
I shall die, but that is all that shall do for death; I
am not on his pay-roll.
I will not tell him the whereabouts of my friends nor
Of my enemies either.
Though he promise me much, I will not map him the
route to any man’s door.
Am I a spy in the land of the living, that I should
deliver men to Death?
Brother, the password and the plans of our city are
safe with me; never through me
Shall you be overcome.
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SUMMARY
The title of the poem gives us a clear indication of the theme. The Conscientious Objector is a person who
refuses to be a part of the armed forces for moral and ethical reasons.
Thus, by inference the efficacy of war is at stake here and is being seen as immoral. War is immoral because
it militates against life and facilitates death. This poem “Conscientious Objector” is, thus, a statement against the
immorality of war as well as death which follows in its wake.
The poem begins with the recognition that death is inevitable, life and death being the two sides of the same
coin. The affirmative tone of “I shall die” is followed by an equally vehement denial “But that is all I shall do for
Death”. Though she knows Death is inevitable, she refuses to aid Death in its designs. The personification of Death in
the opening line serves to heighten the sense of struggle. The resistance offered here is not against death as part of the
cosmic design, but Death as a consequence of man’s mindless actions in mindless wars.
The poet offers a passive non-cooperation as a method of resisting this pointless death.
Lines 2-5 capture the urgency inherent in the situation beautifully. Death like a hunter is preparing to set
about his business in places like Cuba and the Soviet Balkans, which are in the grip of civil war and strife certain of
finding many victims. Death is leading his horse out of the barn in a hurry – “I hear the clatter on the barn-floor. He is
in haste.”
However, the business in Cuba or the Balkans is not the handiwork of Death. The civil war and strife is
engineered by man and Death is reaping the benefits of man’s folly. The resultant suffering and death, the poet seems
to suggest is avoidable only if man refuses to invite death and chooses life instead. The poet on her part shows the way
by refusing to assist Death— “But I will not hold the bridle while he cinches the girth. And he may mount by himself;
I will not give him a leg up.”
In the next line “Though he flick my shoulders with his whip, I will not tell him which way the fox ran”, Death
is presented as a hunter who is killing not for prey but for sport.
The fox obviously stands for the people who are the innocent victims of war. The image of the hunt, once
again reinforces the idea of war as a meaningless cruel game of Death. A subtle irony in these lines alerts us to the fact
that war is a sport for people who see death only as a spectacle. Yet, at the same time, the hunt would not be possible
without the active participation of the hounds, or in other words the foot soldiers. Hence, the foot soldiers are in a
significant way responsible for this game of Death.
This theme of Death hunt is carried forward in lines 12-13, as well, but this is another kind of hunt. The poet
points out the essential inhumanity of the hunt by referring to the sordid history of slavery in America. In this Death
hunt, black men, women and children were brutally hunted down by the white masters. The brutality is captured in the
poignant image of the terrified black boy hiding in the swamps to save his life. The first part of the poem ends once
again with the resolve that, although death is inevitable, the poet will not do anything to aid Death. The poet’s passive
resistance in the face of imminent physical pain and torture, (flick my shoulders with his whip”, “hoof on my breast”)
is a measure of the poet’s pacifist beliefs.
The second part of the poem, from lines 16-24, continues the theme of resistance but this time in the face of
inducements. The poet promises to protect not just her friends but her enemies as well against Death – “I will not tell
him the whereabouts of my friends nor of my enemies either.” In this part, she presents a world view which is not only
pacifist but inclusive as well. She refuses to be “a spy in the land of the living” She refuses to “deliver men to death”
The poet in a very quiet way, through consistent denials asserts life. This quiet determination born out of the poet’s
pacifist world-view is her response to the militarist environment of World War I. The concluding lines of the poem
mark a movement outward. While re-affirming her resolve to resist death, she tries to reach out to others and instill
the same resolve in them. These lines take us back in time and remind us of all the betrayals which aided Death in its
designs. This reminder is also a warning not to fall into Death’s trap. There is also, in these lines a passionate appeal
to all those men who have become the agents of Death to affirm life. The poet assures the people that she would resist
Death at all costs. Through her own example, she is perhaps urging the people to become conscientious objectors.
IMAGERY
The key poetic device in the poem is personification, where Death is personified as a horseman, “leading his
horse out of the stall.” This is suggestive of the Book of Apocalypse in the New Testament, which points towards
death and the end of the world. The personification portrays a businessman in the initial part alluding to some business
in Cuba and the Balkans. In the latter part of the stanza death is personified as a huntsman looking for his prey. Millay
also creates a vivid image of the horseman mounting and her refusal, “to give him a leg up.” She also alludes to the
“fox” which is a reference to the military deserters and also to the “Black boy” which is a reference to racism
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prevalent at the time in the United States. In the last segment of the poem she makes use of a rhetorical question, “Am
I a Spy in the land of the living, that I should deliver men to Death?” The answer is self-explanatory and evident in the
query itself that the poet does not wish to abet death. The conscientious objector, thus, becomes a metaphor for
someone who is anti-death.
GLOSSARY
Conscientious Objector : a term that describes a person who is an individual who has claimed the
right to refuse to perform military service on the grounds of freedom of
thought, conscience, disability or religion.
Cuba….Balkans : the reference to Cuba probably is to the 1898 Spanish-American War.
Balkans could be a reference to WWI, which started in the Balkans in 1914.
Cinches : a strap that holds the saddle on a horse.
Fox : the military deserters.
Black boy : could probably be a reference to racism in the United States.
QUESTIONS FOR FURTHER STUDY
a) Explore how the writer presents her ideas about violence in “Conscientious Objector.”
b) How is death personified in the first part of the poem?
c) What is the significance of the title “Conscientious Objector”?
d) Do you feel that the poet and the ‘I’ of the poem are one and the same?
e) Comment on the use of imagery in the poem.
f) What emotions do you think are present in the poem?
REFERENCES
Brittin, Norman A. Edna St. Vincent Millay. Rev. ed. New York: Twayne, 1982. Print.
Cheney, Anne. Millay in Greenwich Village. University: University of Alabama Press, 1975.
King, Mary. Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr.: The Power of Nonviolent Action. Paris:
UNESCO, 2002. Print.
Robert L. Gale English. “Modern American Poetry.” english.illinois.edu
Thomas-hardy.net/documents/news_09/great_historians.pdf
www.enotes.com
www.museindia.com
*****
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Lesson-2
“General, Your Tank is a Powerful Vehicle” by Bertolt Brecht
INTRODUCTION
Bertolt Brecht, originally Berthold, (1898-1956) was a German political activist, playwright and poet. He is
regarded as one of the seminal influences on Western theatre since World War II. Due to the ban on his works by Nazi
Germany, namely Hitler, he was compelled to leave the country. He spent the years 1941- 47 in America and returned
to East Germany only after the war.
Bertolt Brecht is arguably the most revolutionary force in twentieth-century theatre. His most famous concept
is verfremdungseffekt (sometimes translated as the “alienation” effect), and it completely changed the way artists
thought about and created theatre. The key to this concept was that Brecht did not want audience members’ emotional
involvement to prevent them from thinking about the social and political issues presented in a play. More importantly,
he wanted thoughtfulness to incite action and participation. Through music, song, and vaudeville-style theatrics, Brecht’s
“epic theatre” becomes a world where actors acknowledge the artifices of the medium and communicate directly
with the audience. His ideas challenged the dominance of realism and forever altered traditional notions of what
theater could be. He always wrote for the cause of the humiliated and the offended and always extolling the greatness
of the ordinary man.
Early life and work
Brecht descended from a peasant family with a genealogy going back to the sixteenth century. His father,
Berthold Friedrich Brecht, was a Catholic, and his mother Sophie, a Protestant. Brecht’s boyhood and adolescence
were marked by self-confidence, quick-mindedness, cunning, and vitality—all characteristics that stood him in good
stead throughout his life. His skill in manipulating people and suppleness in pursuing his goals were also evident from
his youth.
Brecht began medical studies at the University of Munich to delay an early conscription; however, he eventually
ended up studying theatre history with a Professor Artur Kutscher. Brecht wrote his own ballads which he performed
in the coffeehouses and cabarets of Munich. Some of Brecht’s works belonging to this period are, Baal (English
translation, 1963), In der Nacht (Drums in the Night, 1961), Im Dickicht der Städte (1923; In the Jungle of Cities,
1961). His most famous plays are: Life of Galileo, Mother Courage and Her Children, Mr.Puntila and his Man
Mati, The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui, The Caucasian Chalk Circle, and The Good Person of Szechwan. These
plays are an expression of his resistance against the Nazi and Fascist movements which resulted in his exile.
Brecht’s aim as a poet was to communicate effectively with the readers. The work of contemporary poets
like Rainer Maria Rilke, Hugo von Hofmannsthal, and Stefan George was incomprehensible as per Brecht, and it
communicated ‘nothing’ to the readers. As per his views poetry serves the role of a valuable document which conditions
history and vice-versa. This led him to dispense with rhyme and rhythm in his poems and adopt a simple, direct style.
As the textual notes inform us, “To him the poet was a craftsman serving the community, a man among men, speaking
of humanity.” Brecht, therefore, resorted to the use of a direct and simple language which served as an effective
medium for the communication of his ideas.
Literary critics hail Brecht as a poet, first and foremost. He infused life into the “artificial” and “dead”
literary German language through vitality and rhythm of his poetic abilities. Rudyard Kipling is regarded as a seminal
influence in Brecht’s poetic and dramatic works. As per the German scholar Reinhold Grimm, “Kipling’s impact on
his language was perhaps decisive for the early Brecht” (Demetz 62). His poems are remarkable for their pithiness,
variety and choice of themes. Simple and direct his poems bear testimony to his genius for language. Brecht wrote his
poems in, as he called it, “a kind of Basic German.” His sensitivity for the “gestic” power of language was nurtured by
his fondness for Luther’s Bible. The term comes close to the English word gist, attitude or point. The notions of
clarity and functionality are at the root of Brecht’s poetry, as he always quoted from Hegel, “The truth is concrete.”
‘General, Your Tank’ is a part of his famous anti-war poem “From a German War Primer”.
STRUCTURE
“General Your Tank is a Powerful vehicle” makes use of short, epigrammatic statements, and is conspicuous
for its pithiness. The poem has a compact structure which consists of three stanzas of four lines each. It is written in
the second- person narrative, which Brecht has addressed to a “General” that war and not humanity is ultimately
powerless. The third line of each stanza, “But it has one defect:” acts as a refrain and also lends emphasis to the
thought. As Martin Esslin observes of his poetry, “Brecht was a poet, first and foremost. Its power to a large extent,
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lies in its directness and simplicity, in the bold use of hackneyed words in unhackneyed contexts” (171). His poetry
shuns ornamentation and ostentation and makes use of a ‘functional’ and ‘austere’ language. This poem exemplifies
his point of view aptly as its brevity and pithiness is didactic and serves to pass a social message to the community.
The first stanza deals with the powerful tank which “Smashes down forests and crushes hundred men.” Although
it can do this, it is nonetheless powerless, because it cannot propel itself; it needs a driver. The tank may be a symbol
of power and destruction but remains powerless without a driver, i.e. man.
The second stanza deals with the powerful bomber that “flies faster than a storm and carries more than an
elephant”. The bomber too, like the tank, suffers from the same defect. It needs a mechanic to fly. Note the ironic use
of the word “powerful” in both these stanzas. The very fact that Brecht emphasizes here is that man is the ultimate
power and hence the most important. This is brought in light in the lines where he says that the only defects of these
powerful weapons are that they need man to get them functioning. Hence, this highlights poet’s deep faith in mankind.
The last stanza states that man, in fact, the most powerful for he is the one who converts the otherwise
powerless tanks and bombers into powerful instruments of destruction. But even man suffers from one defect, and
that is, his ability to think. The use of “defect” in this stanza is highly ironical for this defect is not really a defect but
a crowning feature of human beings. The fact that man has the ability to think and distinguish between what is right and
wrong for him and others around him, makes him the ultimate center. For Brecht, the best soldiers were the soldiers
who could think.
TEXT
General, your tank is a powerful vehicle
It smashed down forests and crushes a hundred men
But it has one defect:
It needs a driver.
General, your bomber is powerful
It flies faster than a storm and carries more than an elephant
But it has one defect:
It needs a mechanic.
General, man is very useful
He can fly and he can kill
But he has one defect:
He can think.
SUMMARY
In this poem “General, Your Tank is a powerful Vehicle” Bertolt Brecht expresses his strong and abiding faith
in the superiority of mankind. The poem is a satire on war and military generals. The figure of speech in the poem is
irony. In every war, it is the poor soldier who fights and gets killed bringing glory and praise to the Military Generals.
The ordinary soldier is always forgotten and the General is raised to the status of a hero on winning the war. Bertolt
Brecht skilfully uses irony and satire throughout the poem and convinces the reader of the foolishness of the Military
Generals and also the futility of war. Bertolt Brecht’s poem is addressed to a Military General and tells him with
contempt that his ‘tank is a powerful vehicle because it can destroy forests and kills hundreds of men. But alas! it has
a defect. Without a man driving the vehicle, it becomes as useless as the General who is helpless without the soldiers
fighting bravely under him.
Again the poet tells the General that his bomber plane is very powerful because it flies faster than wind can
carry heavy things but it is useless without a mechanic who is an ordinary soldier in the force. Brecht uses irony to
show how dehumanized and made helpless man by machines. Man has become a slave of machines. But machines are
invented by man and machines are utterly useless without man. Yet it is a tragedy that machines use man as its slave
because all skilful, creative and useful works are being done by machines! Finally, the poet tells the General that man
is very useful for the General because the General uses soldiers and machines equally in the war and more importance
is given to the machines! The soldiers can fly and kill people. But he also has one defect. The defect is that man can
think. In Military, thinking is a defect! If the Generals have intelligence to think they will not fight and put an end to
war by discussion!
CENTRAL IDEA
The poem raises a valid and important aspect of human nature and that is the ability to think. The ‘thinking’
faculty of man elevates him and makes him all powerful. As mentioned in the textual notes, “Brecht’s concern was for
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the soldier not the generals or the nation.” The epigrammatic lines convey the idea that war is powerless if the
soldiers fighting the war questioned its efficacy. All the instruments of war, namely, the tanks and planes would be
rendered useless and powerless if the men operating them refused to do so. He once said “Nothing is more important
than learning to think crudely. Crude thinking is the thinking of great men”. Brecht, in this poem, is suggesting that if
only man begins to think, he can render all machines and weapons of destruction powerless, and put an end to war by
refusing to co-operate with the fighting forces. The poem also conveys the thought that if the Generals fighting the
wars would use their intelligence and think appropriately perhaps there would be no need for war.
FOCUS AREA
Conscription – war time issues – desertion – condition of soldiers – role of senior officers, like Generals.
QUESTIONS FOR FURTHER STUDY
1. Compare this poem with “Conscientious Objector” and state the common views in both the poems.
2. Comment on the use of irony and satire in the poem.
3. Evaluate “General, Your Tank” as an anti-war poem.
4. What, according to the poet, are the inherent weaknesses of apparently powerful machines?
REFERENCES
Brecht: A Collection of Critical Essays. Peter Demetz, ed. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1962.
Esslin, Martin. Brecht: The Man and His Work. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1960.
Hayman, Ronald. Brecht: A Biography. New York: Oxford University Press, 1983. Print.
Lyon, James K. Bertolt Brecht and Rudyard Kipling: A Marxist’s Imperial Mentor. The Hague: Mouton,
1975. Print.
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Bertolt-Brecht
*****
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Lesson-3
“The Dog of Tetwal” by Sa’adat Hasan Manto
Dear Students,
The two texts in the short story section consist of “The Dog of Tetwal” by Sa’adat Hasan Manto and “A
Chronicle of the Peacocks” by Intizar Husain which comes under the rubric of Partition literature. Both the stories
are an ironic comment on the partition but the distinction lies in the manner in which the two authors tackle the
subject. They belong to the same time in history, both wrote in Urdu, but adopted divergent styles. Manto died when
he was barely in his forties and Husain was blessed with a long life and passed away this year in February. While
studying the two stories it will be beneficial for the students to compare and contrast the use of language, and writing
style of these two men.
INTRODUCTION
Sa’adat Hasan Manto (1912-1955) was born in Samrala, Punjab and was of Kashmiri ancestry. He is regarded
as one of the best short story writers of modern times, as also the most controversial. His irreverence for authority
and rules is amply exhibited in his writings. Manto’s writings explore sexuality, exploitation, and the human condition
without regard for conventional restrictions. His essays, screenplays, and short stories received varied receptions.
Some works were received well, but others were considered obscene or sensationalist. His use of direct language
resulted in his being prosecuted for obscenity several times. As a spokesman for social reform, Manto often depicted
characters from low stations in life for which writers like Salman Rushdie have remarked that Manto was a writer of
‘low-life’ fictions (Bombay Series xxix). Critics feel that his work falls short of the ideals expected in a literary work
to which Manto would have answered with his oft-quoted statement, “If you are not familiar with the age in which we
live, read my stories. If you cannot endure my stories, it means that this age is unbearable” (Wadhwan 14). The aura
Manto created around himself is still visible in the world of art and literature. A four-day National Theatre Festival
2016 organised by the Chandigarh Sangeet Akademi opened with the staging of an Urdu play, “Badnam Manto” testifying
to the fact that the reputation still lives.
Like Intizar Husain, Manto too, was torn between two worlds, between the past and the present. As Matt
Reeck and Aftab Ahmad have observed, “He claimed allegiance not only to his native Punjab but also to his ancestors’
home in Kashmir” (vii). Jagdish Chand Wadhwan discerns that Manto’s stories are marked with sarcasm, irony,
bitterness, irritation and a grim sense of humour. These outstanding traits in Manto’s writings set him apart from the
other writers of his time. Manto was a part of the Urdu literature’s Progressive Writers Movement but this progressive
group shunned him in his hours of need and labeled him to be ‘reactionary,’ ‘retrogressive’ and ‘licentious.’ Manto’s
writings are among the few Urdu works that have caught the reader’s attention and have been translated into English.
Like Shakespeare, in a very ‘Mantoesque’ manner, he too wrote his own epitaph which proclaimed him second to
none.
A prolific writer Manto left behind him a bulk of Urdu literature most of which has been translated by writers
like Khushwant Singh and Khalid Hasan. His writings may be classified under three distinct categories; the first phase
was from 1934-1935 when he wrote radio plays in Delhi. The second phase lasted almost eleven years from 1937-
1948 the time that he spent writing plays and scripts in Bombay. After this came the final and the most significant
period in his life and lasted from 1948-1955. The story in our text “The Dog of Tetwal” and “Akhri Salute” are two
outstanding poems which belong to this period. These are two outstanding stories related to the Kashmir conflict.
The story, ‘‘The Dog of Tetwal’’ (also spelled as Tethwal) was first published in English in a collection of
Manto’s stories entitled Kingdom’s End and Other Stories, translated by Khalid Hasan. Written in a vivid, narrative
style Manto depicts the senseless animosity between the Indian and Paksitani troops in which the ‘dog’ becomes a
victim. “The Dog of Tetwal” can also be seen as a metaphor for the innocent lives lost in war then and even now,
almost seventy years after partition.
Although during his lifetime he was criticized for his undeviating portrayal of humanity’s underside, Manto
continued to write about the world around him as he saw it. After his death in 1955 at the age of forty-two, Manto
gradually became more widely accepted in literary circles so that now he is, according to Ali, ‘‘the most popular story
writer of Urdu’’ and even ‘‘something of a cult figure.’’
SUMMARY
The partition of India in 1947 served as the inspiration for Saadat Hasan Manto’s ‘‘The Dog of Tetwal.’’ It was
first published in English in a 1987 collection of Manto’s stories titled Kingdom’s End and Other Stories, translated
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by Khalid Hasan. The partition split India into Muslim Pakistan and secular (but Hindu-dominated and Hindu-ruled)
India, resulting in violent upheaval. When the national boundaries were redrawn, India cut through the center of
Pakistan, which was, therefore, itself a nation divided. In addition, Muslims and Hindus were so hostile to each other
that Muslims living in India and Hindus living in Pakistan were suddenly aliens in their own land. As one scholar has
aptly described, “At best, they were coldly tolerated. At worst, they were robbed, raped, attacked, and murdered.
Chaos erupted as sixteen million refugees literally ran for their lives to the nation where they would find safety.
Violence escalated, and more than half a million people died in 1947 alone. The governments of the newly drawn
nations, themselves in turmoil, were unable to contain the violence. In 1948, India and Pakistan went to war over
territorial boundaries, principally which nation would govern Kashmir. The war, however, spread all along the frontier.”
Writers like Manto took to writing about this sad situation and expressed their views about the dilemma of the
innocent, displaced people. They were victims of an act which not only rendered them homeless but also emotionally
and morally defunct. The partition, thus, served as an impetus for ‘‘The Dog of Tithwal,’’ which gives a microcosmic
view of the hateful struggle. Juxtaposed with the beauty of nature and the harmonious mountain setting, the Pakistani
and Indian soldiers who face each other cannot be at peace. Looking for ways to express their frustration at being
unable to kill each other, the leaders of the two groups of soldiers terrorize and kill a friendly dog that is looking for
companionship.
The story begins in a picturesque setting with Indian and Pakistani soldiers entrenched in their positions
along the nations’ border in a mountainous area. The peace of the mountains pervades in spite of the tension. Flowers
are in bloom, birds are singing, and clouds are scudding lazily through the skies. Manto compares nature to a symphony
that plays beautifully and the men with their guns to discordant notes. The peaceful setting of nature is in consonance
with the sh’ers recited by the soldiers on both sides of the border. This description of course, belies the raison d’être
of their presence, which is a senseless war, an aftermath of partition.
The story rolls into action at the Indian camp, with Jamadar Harnam Singh on night watch. At two o’clock, he
wakes Ganda Singh to take over the watch and lies down to sing a romantic song about a pair of shoes with stars on
them. Banta Singh joins in with a song about love and tragedy. The soldiers feel sadness creeping over them; perhaps
they are reminded that life should be about love rather than about war. The barking of a dog interrupts this pensive
scene. Banta Singh finds the dog in the bushes and announces that his name is Jhun Jhun. The soldiers are in a good
humor and pleased to see the dog, until Harnam Singh decides that the dog cannot eat if it is a Pakistani dog. The other
soldiers think he is joking, but he then declares that all Pakistanis will be shot, even Pakistani dogs. The dog recognizes
something in his tone and reacts with fear, which seems to please Harnam Singh. Another soldier responds by leading
the men in a declaration of ‘‘India Zindabad!’’ (an expression of nationalistic fervor). Banta Singh makes a sign with
the dog’s name on it as Chapad Jhunjhun, along with the information that it is an Indian dog, and hangs it around the
dog’s neck.
It so happens that the next morning the dog appears in the Pakistani camp where it had spent a few days with
the Pakistani soldiers before it went to the Indian side. Like the Indian soldiers, the Pakistanis are tired of the war that
has been dragging on for months. As Subedar Himmat Khan twirls his moustache and studies a map of the Tetwal
sector of India, Bashir begins to sing a song about where a lover spent the night.
When the dog appears, Subedar Himmat Khan turns the lines of the song into an accusation against Jhunjhun.
‘‘Where did you spend the night?’’ he screams. Bashir takes this as a joke and sings his song to the dog, but Subedar
Himmat Khan throws a pebble at Jhunjhun. Bashir discovers the sign around the dog’s neck. The soldiers ponder the
sign to see if it could be in code; Subedar Himmat Khan reports the incident to his platoon commander, who ignores
the report because he finds it meaningless. While the commander is correct that the report is not of tactical significance,
it is implied that his failure to investigate indicates a lack of discipline in the ranks. The soldiers are bored and seem
to feel that their presence here is meaningless.
The Pakistani soldiers change the name Chapad Jhunjhun and put a sign around his neck saying that he is
Sapar Sunsun, a Pakistani dog. Subedar Himmat Khan then sends Jhunjhun back to his ‘‘family,’’ urging him to take the
message to the enemy. The dog trots off, and Subedar Himmat Khan fires in the air. Out of sheer boredom, he decides
to fire at the Indians. For half an hour, the two sides exchange fire, after which Subedar Himmat Khan orders a halt. As
he combs his hair, he wonders where the dog has gone.
As the ill-fated dog, Chapad Jhunjhun, finds its way back to the Indian camp amidst the firing it infuriates
Jamadar Harnam Singh. He shoots at the dog, hitting some stones. Jhun Jhun continues to run toward him, and Subedar
Himmat Khan continues to shoot at the dog. Meanwhile, Harnam Singh fires. The two opposing soldiers enjoy scaring
the terrified dog until Harnam Singh wounds the dog. Still, Subedar Himmat Khan will not let Jhun Jhun return to the
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Pakistani camp. Khan tells the dog it is his duty to continue going toward the enemy camp. It is clear that, in Subedar
Himmat Khan’s mind, fanaticism has overcome any rationality. When the wounded dog drags himself toward Harnam
Singh, Jamadar Harnam Singh shoots and kills him. While the Pakistani Subedar Himmat Khan proclaims the killing
of the hapless dog to martyrdom, the Indian Harnam Singh dismisses it with the statement ‘‘He died a dog’s death.’’
The story, thus, ends abruptly exhorting the reader to question the reason for the shooting.
The story, thus, is a depiction of the frustration of the warring soldiers as well as the futility of military
action. The idyllic environment forms an ironical backdrop for the subsequent violent shooting of the dog. Set in a
historical moment in time but just as war was unacceptable then it remains just as unacceptable now also. The observation
made by Jamadar Harnam Singh, “‘Now, even dogs will have to be either Hindustani or Pakistani!’” is an important
one. The ‘martyrdom’ of the dog or the ‘dog’s death’ become potent symbols for the readers in present times as this
unnecessary killing continues to this day.
AREAS OF FOCUS
use of crude words, colloquial language – hindi words like – Sikhras, gurmukhi – sh’ers
natural setting versus the war, singing of folk/love songs, Heer- Ranjha
use of nature imagery, simile, metaphor
GLOSSARY
Sh’ers – couplets, an Urdu word
Jamadar – rank of a junior commissioned officer in the army
Lout – a stupid, rude or awkward man
Sikhras – a derogatory word for Sikhs
Heer/Ranjha – a romantic tragedy part of popular Punjabi folk culture. It is the love story of Heer
Sayal and Dhido Ranjha, a tale loved by Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs.
Gurmukhi – the language of the Sikhs
Kunj – grove, arbour or bower
Fakir – ascetic, religious mendicant
Waris Shah – a Punjabi Sufi poet of the eighteenth century. He was called Shakespeare of the Punjabi
language especially for the poetic composition “Heer Ranjha.”
QUESTIONS
1. Give a description of nature in the first section of the story.
2. Comment on the title “Dog of Tetwal.” Is it an appropriate title?
3. What is the significance of the love songs in the story?
4. Is this story relevant for the present times?
References
Black Margins: Sa’adat Hasan Manto. Ed. Muhammad Umar Memon. New Delhi: Katha, 2003. Print.
Manto: Manto Centenary (1912 - 2012). Eds. Ayesha Jalal and Nusrat Jalal. Lahore: Sang-e-Meel Publishers,
2012. Print.
Manto, Saadat Hasan. Bombay Series. Trans. Matt Reeck, Aftab Ahmad. New Delhi: Random House, 2012.
Print.
Manto, Saadat Hasan. The Armchair Revolutionary and other Sketches. Trans. Khalid Hasan, ed. Ali Mir
and Saadia Toor.
Wadhwan, Jagdish Chander. Manto Naama: The Life of Saadat Hasan Manto. Trans. Jai Ratan. New Delhi:
Roli, 1998. Print.
*****
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Lesson-4
“A Chronicle of the Peacocks” by Intizar Husain
INTRODUCTION
Intizar Husain (December 21, 1925- February 2, 2016) also fondly remembered as Intizar Sahab, is a
noted Urdu short story writer, novelist and journalist. He was born in the small town of Dibai, Uttar Pradesh
which forms the backdrop for his famous novel Basti, written in 1979. He occupies a special position in Partition
literature following close in the footsteps of Sa’adat Hasan Manto. He was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize
in 2003 which brought immense recognition to his work. He made immense contribution towards Urdu literature
and subaltern history. The canvas includes five novels, seven collections of short stories, reportage, travelogues,
prose essays and the innumerable columns he wrote during a long career as a journalist.
Unlike his counterpart and celebrated Urdu writer Saadat Hasan Manto, Intizar Husain’s writings have
distanced themselves from the brutal details of partition and have, in fact, drawn from early memories of his stay
in India. He adopts a passive style to bring to fore the futility of violence and war. His upbringing in India and
early association with it reflects in his work. Husain’s stories are widely appreciated in India and form part of the
Indian literature in translation corpus. The tragedy of partition is brought out through motifs of longing and
nostalgia where he tries to omit the gory details and excruciating pain. Instead he focuses on, “The one overriding
concern throughout his literary career seems to be his near-compulsive need to revisit the past, a past that was more
syncretic and pluralistic than his present” (Jalil n. pag.). Husain draws upon the rich cultural and religious heritage
of India and makes use of the Buddhist and Hindu mythology and Shia lore to dwell on the issues of power and
violence with respect to ancient and modern times. As the notes in the book tell us of him, “Husain has often been
quoted as saying that he wanders between Karbala and Ayodhya and the Shia in him sits beside the Hindu.”
After the partition Intizar Husain settled in Lahore.
The term chronicle is defined as, “A register of events in order of time, often exposed contemporaneously
with the events it records” (Cuddon 134). Since medieval times, chronicles were seen as important sources of history
but by the beginning of the seventeenth century this form of writing was replaced by the writing of history and
biographies. Other forms of writing like autobiographies, memories, diaries, logbooks and narratives of sea voyages
and explorations became commonplace. “A Chronicle of the Peacocks” or “Morenama” by Husain also follows this
form of registering events for a contemporary audience.
STRUCTURE
“A Chronicle of the Peacocks” or “Morenama” was written in 1999 and makes use of the concept of hijrat,
migration. In this story the author oscillates between different time zones, some familiar, and some alien. There are
many voices which intermingle with the author’s voice and present a colourful canvas of myths and parables. Husain
makes use of the literary device emboxment which is a narrative form used in the Pañcatantra tales. Emboxment
follows the pattern of larger story boxes containing smaller story boxes (Olivelle xiv). In “A Chronicle” Husain
makes use of this device to present his story where the past incidents are emboxed within the contemporary framework.
Tale after tale is dovetailed into one another in order to form a composite whole. Many rhetorical questions are
raised in the story relating to the fate of the peacocks, the existence of the ducks, the fate of Ashwatthama, and above
all Parikshit’s question about the necessity of war. The use of allusion throughout the story layers it with different
meanings as each reference made by Husain belongs to a different era, place and person. Thus, he is able to regenerate
ancient narratives from the Mahabharata, the Jataka tales, Shia lore and his own childhood for contemporary use.
In this story, Husain combines traditional knowledge with present circumstances to question the necessity
of war. He weaves narratives after narratives, some ecclesiastic some earthly to expose the horrors of war. His
illustrations are a blend of the old and the new, from Pokhran to Saddam Hussein to Hiroshima. He alludes to Manu,
Mansarovar, Allah Mian and Mahatma Buddha all in the same breath. The “Morenama” is also addressed to the plight
of the peacocks and the effect of the oil-spill on the ducks. He alludes to the sermons of Shri Krishna and the samadhi
of Meerabai and the dargah of Khwaja Moin-ud-din Chishti alike. The didactic tone adopted by Husain is not clear but
only passes a message of moral confrontation, renunciation and suffering. He has not presented a single multi-
dimensional character but collates many voices into one. The story like most of his stories is open ended. Husain
does not deliver a clear moral message but leaves his readers to form their own opinion.
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SUMMARY
One of the translators of this story, Alok Bhalla, in an interview with Intizar Husain recalls the following
words by him, “Kahani to awara hoti hai. Story is a vagabond” (Bhalla n. pag.). He also writes, “In Intizar Husain’s
fictional world, historians and dervishes, storytellers and epic poets, Bodhisattva and Sufi singers, peacocks and
ghosts wander over the sorrowing earth in search of another gate—not the gates of blood, khooni darwazas, but
gates of peace, shanti darwazas” (Bhalla n. pag.). This is true of “A Chronicle” as well. In this tale Husain tries to
seek an answer to the angst and justification of war which cripples man of his sense of reason and annihilates both bird
and man. In doing so he has created a narrative which shifts from person to person, land to land, and religion to
religion.
The nama begins with a question about an evil spirit following the author, which as is eventually revealed, is
of Ashwathhama. The narrative begins with the news of the nuclear test carried out by India (at Pokhran, 1989) which
had scared the peacocks into frenzy. The author’s journalistic imagination was stirred and he immediately wrote a
column about the incident. The incident, however, lingers on in his mind and he alludes to the story of Manu (from
Indian mythology) and the fish; and questions the limits of his duty with respect to his role as a journalist. The news
also reminds him of the peacocks he had seen on an earlier visit to Jaipur, the pink city. The “quiet dignity,” “royal
grace” and “calm elegance” of these birds of paradise had remained with him ever since.
Husain juxtaposes this serene image with the vision of a “lonely peacock” on a hill and questions the
disappearance of the bird. Simultaneously he alludes to the devastating oil-spill off the United States coast (perhaps
the 1998 incident) which had turned the “ambrosia” into “poison” especially for ducks. The image of, “a dark, oil-
soaked sea” in which a, “a forlorn duck covered with foul effluents” (Individual 183) watches the waves in disbelief.
The reference to this incident is symbolic of the U. S.-Iraq war for which the poor and weak always pay a price, in this
case the duck. The ducks and geese of the modern world have vanished and so have the lakes in which they could float
such as the Mansarovar. Husain then narrates a tale from the Shia lore which his Dadima (grandmother) told him. The
story is about the banishment of the peacock from paradise for helping Satan enter inside the wall. This story assumes
significance with respect to Husain who uses his stories to write about the haunting sense of loss for a way of life that
has irrevocably vanished mingled with a lingering regret.
Peacocks rule Husain’s world as he feels they are wiser than human beings but have to suffer because of
man’s greed and foolishness. The scene then shifts to Sravasthi, Uttar Pradesh. The seat of Buddha’s sermons, a
previous seat of peace and love is now in ruins and ironically it is the lone peacock that carries the ling forgotten
message of peace. The tomb of the Sufi saint, Nizamuddin Auliya also wears a deserted look but for the lone peacock
which transports Husain to Indraprastha (old name of Delhi) the capital city of the Pandavas. From here the narrative
moves back to Rajasthan to look for the peacocks and even though they had returned they scream at the sight of
Ashwathhama who has followed the author. Here, Husain makes a digression and the narrative shifts to the battlefield
of Kurukshetra.
The emboxment comes into effect here as Husain places the atom bomb dropped over Hiroshima within the
story of the Mahabharata. The devastation caused by the atom bomb in the Kali yuga has been ensconced within the
destruction done by Ashwathhama’s Bhramastra in the Dwapara yuga. Thus, we see that the narrative shifts backwards
and forward in this chronicle. The cries of the women due to Ashwathhama’s Bhramastra have travelled to the present
times where various forms of violence, war and devastation happen frequently. The pertinent question asked by Parikshit
to Veda Vyasa still remains unanswered and perhaps that is why, the author opines, it still hovers over India and
Pakistan like a sword. Husain ends the “morenama” on a note of despair and leaves the readers to figure for themselves
the way out of this dilemma.
GLOSSARY
Morenama – meaning chronicle, as in Babarnama, Akbarnama or Mantonama.
Subhan Allah – an Urdu expression which means, Praise be to the Lord.
Ambrosia – the food of the Greek and Roman Gods.
Saddam Hussein – (1937-2006) dictator, fifth president of Iraq.
Mansarovar – a lake in the Tibet Autonomous Region.
Sravasthi – a former capital of the King of Kosala where Gautam Buddha delivered
his famous sermons.
Vihara – a Buddhist temple or monastery.
Ashwathhama – son of guru Dronacharya
Dronacharya – teacher of the Pandavas and Kauravas
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Hiroshima – one of the largest island cities of Japan where the United States dropped
an atomic bomb in 1945.
Meerabai – also known as Meera Bai, was a 16th-century Hindu mystic poet and
devotee of Krishna
Khwaja Moin-ud-din Chishti – a Sufi scholar and saint of the twelfth century AD who came to India
from Persia and settled in Ajmer during the time of King Prthvi Raj
Chauhan.
Janardhan – a name for Lord Krishna
Manuji – In Hindu tradition, Manu is the name of accorded to a progenitor of
humanity being the first human to appear in the world in an epoch after
universal destruction. According to the Puranas, 14 Manus appear in
each kalpa (aeon). The period of each Manu is called Manvantara.
Bhramastra – a weapon of mass destruction created by Lord Bhrama.
Indraprastha – Indraprastha was the capital of the kingdom led by the Pandavas in the
Mahabharata epic. It is often thought to have been located in the region
of present-day New Delhi.
Hastinapur – Hastinapur was the capital of the Kuru dynasty of kings.
Vyasji – also known as Veda Vyasa as he is supposed to have compiled the Vedas.
Baital Pachchisee – a collection of twenty-five tales based on King Vikramaditya.
QUESTIONS FOR REVISION
1. Examine the role of peacocks in the text.
2. The story juxtaposes tradition and modernity in an interesting manner. Discuss.
3. Explain the significance of Ashwathhama in the text.
4. Make a list of the old stories and legends in this text and state their purpose.
5. Power and failure of reason are factors responsible for war. Comment.
REFERENCES
A Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory. Ed.J. A. Cuddon. Delhi: Maya Blackwell, 1998. Print.
Francisco, Jason. “Intizar Husain’s “Leaves” – A Review Essay. The Annual of Urdu Studies, ix, pp.188-
191, 1994.
Jalil, Rakshandha. “Nothing But the Sea Ahead.” Web. 3rd Feb, 2016.
Pañcatantra: The Book of India’s Folk Wisdom. Trans. Patrick Olivelle. New York: OUP, 1997. Print.
https://muse.jhu.edu/article
*****
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UNIT-V
Lesson-1
TOYS: BARTHES
STRUCTURE
1.1 INTRODUCTION
1.3 TEXT
1.4 SUMMARY
1.5 THEMES AND ISSUES
1.6 GLOSSARY
1.7 ANSWERS OF SELF ASSESSMENT QUESTIONS
1.8 QUESTIONS
1.9 SOURCES/ SUGGESTED WRITINGS
The objective of this lesson is to reveal the thought process of an adult as to what he thinks of toys?
1.1 INTRODUCTION
The essay “Toys” has been taken out of Barthes’s Mythologies which contains a total of thirty nine essays.
The work was originally written in French in 1957 and is a collection taken from Les Lettres nouvelles. This work
was subsequently translated into English by Annette Lavers. Mythologies is divided into two sections.
The first section contains 28 essays on myths and the use of the mythic language associated with a diverse
range of images in popular culture. In an introduction, the author writes that these essays were written, one a month,
over a period of approximately two years. He also writes that the essays grew out of “a feeling of impatience at the
sight of the ‘naturalness’ with which newspapers, art and common-sense constantly dress up a reality ... undoubtedly
determined by history.” This statement contains a key thematic element of both Section 1 and Section 2—the belief
that the creation and understanding of myth is a function of human experience in particular times, places, and
circumstances.
The essays in Section 1 examine a wide range of examples of such experiences, albeit a range limited to
experiences in France (the country in which the author resided) in the 1950s (the time at which the book was written).
Tourism, cooking, striptease, advertising, literature, film, many more —all, in the author’s perspective, manifest
mythic language, and all manifest the particular purpose of myth as defined by the author in the second half of the
book — to manipulate public perception and experience.
Section 2 which consist of 11 essays is subtitled Myth Today, and consists of a complex, detailed, theoretical
examination of the construction and function of myth. The author begins his essay with the statement that myth is a
form of language/speech, and goes on to de-construct mythic language into its various components. The arguments
here are densely intellectual, defining the development of myth as a rational exercise in delineating perception.
Without actually using the word, he presents the theory that myth is a kind of culturally sanctioned propaganda, using
images with universal resonances and commonly understood meanings to tell individuals what and how to feel about
being human.
Born on November 12, 1915, in Cherbourg, France, French literary philosopher Roland Barthes was educated
at the Sorbonne, and went on to help establish structuralism as one of the leading intellectual movements of the 20th
century. His work made important advances in the areas of semiotics, anthropology and post-structuralism. Barthes
died in Paris in 1980.
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Q.1. The essay “Toys” has been taken from?
a. Myths c. Mythologies
d. Death of an Author d. Black skin White Mask
Early Life
Roland Gérard Barthes was born on November 12, 1915, in Cherbourg, France. When Barthes was an infant,
his father was killed in a naval battle. Shortly thereafter, his mother, Henriette Barthes, moved the family to Bayonne,
where Roland spent most of his early childhood. In 1924, the Bartheses moved to Paris, where Roland first studied at
the Lycée Montagne. From 1930 to 1934, he was enrolled at the Lycée Louis-le-Grand.
Barthes’s prominent grandfather was a famous explorer and colonial administrator. Though his grandparents
were wealthy, food often lacked in his home; his grandparents refused to help them after Barthes’s mother bore an
illegitimate child. His mother then worked as a bookbinder to make ends meet.
In the late 1930s and early ’40s, Barthes continued his education at the Sorbonne, focusing on classical
letters, grammar, philology and Greek tragedy. During this time, he fell ill to tuberculosis, spending time in sanatoriums
during the occupation (from 1934 to 1935, and from 1942 to 1946).
Works
Following his debut, his works Mythologies (1957), Critical Essays (1964) and The Eiffel Tower and Other
Mythologies (1964), explore the meaning we have associated to various popular cultural icons, ranging from the
world of fashion to advertising to wrestling.
In his book The Fashion System, Barthes shows how various signs and symbols can be twisted and
reinterpreted in different ways. He explains how any word can be associated with glamour and idealistic meaning in
the field of fashion. People are likely to associate any piece of clothing with luxury and beauty if fashion tells them
to, according to Barthes.
Barthes’ most renowned work is an essay titled “The Death of the Author” (1967) in which he presents his
famous literary theory. He strongly opposes the incorporation of an author’s background, education, caste, ethnicity,
religion, nationality and gender while interpreting his literary works.
Barthes was of the view that a writer and his work are separate entities, and so they must not be related when
his work is critically examined. Keeping in mind the author’s biasness and religious and political leanings while
examining his texts might seem an easier way to understand his works, but in reality it is a flawed system which can
potentially limit the readers’ understanding.
In his book S/Z (1970), Barthes expresses his opinion on what constitutes an ideal text. According to Barthes,
a text is truly ideal if it not restricted in meaning, and can be interpreted in many different ways. He introduces two
literary terms: writerly text, meaning text which can be creatively understood by the readers, and readerly text, in
which readers are restricted to the meaning intended by the writer.
All in all, Barthes maintained a unique literary philosophy and a vague, eccentric writing style which was widely
copied by writers worldwide. His theories gathered equal amounts of praise and criticism by readers and critiques
alike. After the 1970s, his philosophy had spread not only in France, but also in America and Europe. He inspired
various philosophers and thinkers, among which are Michael Foucalt, Jacques Lacan and Jacques Derrida.
His last books, an autobiography titled Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes (1975) and A Lover’s Discourse
(1977) established his stature as a literary stylist and writer. Barthes passed away at the age of 64. A Barthes Reader
(1982) and Incidents (1987) were published by his friend Susan Sontag posthumously.
His critical approach to literature greatly contributed to the development of semiotics, structuralism and
post-structuralism. His philosophy is not restricted to these schools of thought; in fact, it has affected various modes
of communication, such as photography, music, and even computers. Roland Barthes work is ever-changing and ever-
adaptive, providing new insights to literary philosophers even today.
1.3 TEXT: “TOYS”
French toys: one could not find a better illustration of the fact that the adult Frenchman sees the child as
another self. All the toys one commonly sees are essentially a microcosm of the adult world; they are all reduced
copies of human objects, as if in the eyes of the public the child was, all told, nothing but a smaller man, a homunculus
to whom must be supplied objects of his own size.
Invented forms are very rare: a few sets of blocks, which appeal to the spirit of do-it-yourself, are the only
ones which offer dynamic forms. As for the others, French toys always mean something, and this something is
86
always entirely socialized, constituted by the myths or the techniques of modern adult life: the Army, Broadcasting,
the Post Office, Medicine (miniature instrument-cases, operating theatres for dolls), School, Hair-Styling (driers
for permanent-waving), the Air Force (Parachutists), Transport (trains, Citroens, Vedettes, Vespas, petrol-stations),
Science (Martian toys).
The fact that French toys literally prefigure the world of adult functions obviously cannot but prepare the
child to accept them all, by constituting for him, even before he can think about it, the alibi of a Nature which has at all
times created soldiers, postmen and Vespas. Toys here reveal the list of all the things the adult does not find unusual:
war, bureaucracy, ugliness, Martians, etc. It is not so much, in fact, the imitation which is the sign of an abdication, as
its literalness: French toys are like a Jivaro head, in which one recognizes, shrunken to the size of an apple, the
wrinkles and hair of an adult. There exist, for instance, dolls which urinate; they have an oesophagus, one gives them
a bottle, they wet their nappies; soon, no doubt, milk will turn to water in their stomachs. This is meant to prepare the
little girl for the causality of house-keeping, to ‘condition’ her to her future role as mother. However, faced with this
world of faithful and complicated objects, the child can only identify himself as owner, as user, never as creator; he
does not invent the world, he uses it: there are, prepared for him, actions without adventure, without wonder, without
joy. He is turned into a little stay-at-home householder who does not even have to invent the mainsprings of adult
causality; they are supplied to him ready-made: he has only to help himself, he is never allowed to discover anything
from start to finish. The merest set of blocks, provided it is not too refined, implies a very different learning of the
world: then, the child does not in any way create meaningful objects, it matters little to him whether they have an adult
name; the actions he performs are not those of a user but those of a demiurge. He creates forms which walk, which
roll, he creates life, not property: objects now act by themselves, they are no longer an inert and complicated material
in the palm of his hand. But such toys are rather rare: French toys are usually based on imitation, they are meant to
produce children who are users, not creators.
The bourgeois status of toys can be recognized not only in their forms, which are all functional, but also in
their substances. Current toys are made of a graceless material, the product of chemistry, not of nature. Many are now
moulded from complicated mixtures; the plastic material of which they are made bas an appearance at once gross and
hygienic, it destroys all the pleasure, the sweetness, the humanity of touch. A sign which fills one with consternation
is the gradual disappearance of wood, in spite of its being an ideal material because of its firmness and its softness,
and the natural warmth of its touch. Wood removes, from all the forms which it supports, the wounding quality of
angles which are too sharp, the chemical coldness of metal. When the child handles it and knocks it, it neither vibrates
nor grates, it has a sound at once muffled and sharp. It is a familiar and poetic substance, which does not sever the
child from close contact with the tree, the table, the floor. Wood does not wound or break down; it does not shatter,
it wears out, it can last a long time, live with the child, alter little by little the relations between the object and the
hand. If it dies, it is in dwindling, not in swelling out like those mechanical toys which disappear behind the hernia of
a broken spring. Wood makes essential objects, objects for all time. Yet there hardly remain any of these wooden toys
from the Vosges, these fretwork farms with their animals, which were only possible, it is true, in the days of the
craftsman. Henceforth, toys are chemical in substance and colour; their very material introduces one to a coenaesthesis
of use, not pleasure. These toys die in fact very quickly, and once dead, they have no posthumous life for the child.
Q.2. Of which toys Author is talking about?
a. French c. English
b. Japanese d. Korean
1.4 SUMMARY
Roland Barthes’ “Toys” is an analysis of the cultural significance of children’s playthings.
According to Barthes the adult French man sees the child as another self. All the toys are commonly seen
essentially a microcosm of the adult world. They are all reduced copies of human objects. Barthes pities that the
elders belittle the child. We create for children a small world that goes with their size, underestimating their imaginative
capabilities and power of creativity. Since the child is a minor by law, she/he does not enjoy the right to take decisions
and everything is decided for her/him. In Barthes view, French toys always mean something that is always entirely
socialized, constituted by the myths or the techniques of modern adult life. To illustrate, toys usually consist of an
assortment of the miniature items of the Army, Broadcasting, and the post office, medicine, school, hairstyling, the
Air Force Transport and science. The French toys literally represent the world of adult functions. This fact obviously
prepares the child to accept them all without any thought. The world of the adult is thrust upon the child. The child is
forced to accept the social environment silently without questioning.
87
This is what Barthes means when he refers to “the alibi of a nature which all the time created soldiers,
postman and Vespas. Toys here reveal the list of all the things the adult usually finds. Barthes says that toys are like
Jevaro head (pronounced ashee-var-o). The Jevaro are one of the most feared tribes in South America. They have the
war custom of cutting their enemies head and also shrinking this human head to the size of a ball. The toy like head
could still be recognized as that of an adult. Toys are like Jevaro head in the sense that the toys which stands for an
object, say a revolver, may still be recognized as a revolver. The toys thus initiate the child into a world of adulthood.
For example, replica of kitchen appliances and the dolls which urinate whisper to the girl that her fate is tied to the
expressive role of a house wife. In other words, the dolls given to the little girl prepares her for the casualty of
housekeeping. They condition her to future role as a mother. Barthes describes modern toys as faithful and complicated
objects. This is because the child only used the toys as an owner and not as a creator, he does not invent the world he
uses it. The toys are prepared for him. They are actions without adventure, wonder and joy. They are supplied to him
ready made and he is never allowed to discover anything. French toys are thus meant to produce children who are
users and not creators. Roland Barthes analyses toys as a text and brings out the underlying ideology and the cultural
significance of children’s playthings.
Q.3. All the toys are commonly seen essentially a microcosm of?
a. Childhood c. Old Age
b. Adult world d. Infant Stage
In the course of his observation Barthes makes a distinction between building sets which are designed as
toys and other common toys. France is the second largest toy market in the Europe but kids’ building sets enjoy only
marginal sales in France. Barthes describes modern toys as faithful and complicated objects because the child only
uses them as an owner and not as a creator, he does not invent the world, he uses it. Building sets differ from toys in
the sense that it develops the child’s creativity and allows the child to discover something and create meaningful
objects. Other toys do not allow the child this benefit. The set of blocks implies a very different learning of the world.
The actions that the child performs with such toys are not those of a user but those of a creator who fashions the
sensible world in the light of eternal ideas. From the building sets the child creates forms which walk or rolls. He
creates life itself. But Barthes laments that such toys are rather rare both in the form and in the substance toys signify
bourgeois ideology. Current toys are molded from the plastic materials. They are the product of chemistry and not of
nature. They have the appearance of hygienic but it destroys all the pleasure, the sweetness and the humanity of touch.
Wood as a material for making toy is gradually disappearing. Barthes considers wood as a familiar and poetic substances.
It does not sever the child from the close contact with the tree. Wood does not wound or breakdown. It does not
shatter. It can last a long time, it lives with the child. Wood makes objects for all time. Yet currently there hardly
remain any of these wooden toys. Toys are chemical in substance and colour. Their very material introduces one to a
feeling of use, not of pleasure. These toys die in fact very quickly and it is incapable of bringing of fond memories of
childhood.
1.6 GLOSSARY
Microcosm : a thing, place or community regarded as representing on a small scale something
very much larger.
Inert : without power to move or act.
Grates : to rub something into small pieces.
Hernia : a swelling caused by a part of the bowel being pushed through a weak point of the
wall of the abdomen.
Consternation : great surprise, anxiety or mental confusion.
Demiurge : the maker or the creator of the world.
Vibrates : Shake
Vespas : one of the most popular brands of motor scooters.
Coe aesthesis : is the body awareness of one’s own body, as a sum of all sensations, as opposed to
individual sensations. It is the feeling or sense of being alive, of feeling vital.
1.7 ANSWERS OF SELF ASSESSMENT QUESTIONS
1(c), 2(A), 3(B)
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1.8 QUESTIONS
Answer the following the questions in a two or three sentences each
a. Why does Barthes state that the adult French man sees the child as another self?
According to Barthes the adult French man sees the child as another self because all the toys are commonly
seen essentially a microcosm of the adult world. They are all reduced copies of human objects.
b. What do French toys mean, according to Barthes?
In Barthes view French toys always mean something that is always entirely socialized, constituted by the
myths or the techniques of modern adult life.
c. What does Barthes mean when he refers to “the alibi of a nature which has at all times created soldiers, postman
and Vespas?
The French toys literally represent the world of adult functions. This fact obviously prepares the child to
accept them all without any thought. The world of the adult is thrust upon the child. The child is forced to
accept the social environment silently without questioning. This is what Barthes means when he refers to
“the alibi of a nature which all the time created soldiers, postman and Vespas
d. French toys are like a Jevaro head. What is a Jevaro head? How is it similar to the toys?
Barthes says that toys are like Jevaro head. The Jevaro are one of the most feared tribes in South America.
They have the war custom of cutting their enemies head and also shrinking it to the size of a ball. The toy-
like head could still be recognized as that of an adult. Toys are like Jevaro head in the sense that the toys
which stands for an object, say a revolver, may still be recognized as a revolver.
e. “ It is not so much, in fact, the imitation which is a sign of abdication, as its literalness”. Explain this statement.
The statement means that the French toys, in fact, express love for war, bureaucracy, ugliness etc.
f. What message do dolls indirectly convey to the little girl?
The dolls given to the little girl prepares her for the casualty of housekeeping. They condition her to future
role as a mother.
g. Why does Barthes describe modern toys as faithful and complicated objects?
Barthes describes modern toys as faithful and complicated objects because the child only used the toys as an
owner and not as a creator, he does not invent the world he uses it.
h. How do building sets differ from other toys?
Building sets differ from other toys in the sense that it develops the child’s creativity and allows the child to
discover something and create meaningful objects. Other toys do not allow the child this benefit.
i. “But such toys are rare”. What is referred to here? How do they benefit the child?
The reference is to the„ building sets designed as toys for children. Such toys develop the child’s creativity
and allow the child to discover something and create meaningful objects.
j. Why does Barthes oppose plastic toys?
Current toys are molded from the plastic materials. They are the product of chemistry and not of nature.
They have the appearance of hygienic but it destroys all the pleasure, the sweetness and the humanity of
touch. That is why Barthes opposes plastic toys
k. Modern toys offer no pleasure. Why?
Modern toys are chemical in substance and colour. Their very material introduces one to a feeling of use,
not of pleasure. They are the product of chemistry and not of nature.
Answer the following the questions in a paragraph
a. What are the limitations of present-day toys?
Current toys are molded from the plastic materials. They are the product of chemistry and not of nature.
They have the appearance of hygienic but it destroys all the pleasure, the sweetness and the humanity of
touch. Wood as a material for making toy is gradually disappearing. Barthes considers wood as a familiar and
poetic substances. It does not sever the child from the close contact with the tree. Wood does not wound or
breakdown. It does not shatter. It can last a long time, it lives with the child. Wood makes objects for all time.
Yet currently there hard remain any of these wooden toys. Toys are chemical in substance and colour. Their
very material introduces one to a feeling of use, not of pleasure. These toys die in fact very quickly and it is
incapable of bringing of fond memories of childhood. Unlike building sets, other current toys neither develop
the child’s creativity nor allow the child to discover anything. They do not allow the child to create meaningful
objects.
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b. Why does Barthes favour the use of wood in the production of toys?
Wood as a material for making toy is gradually disappearing. Barthes considers wood as a familiar and poetic
substances. It does not sever the child from the close contact with the tree. Wood does not wound or
breakdown. It does not shatter. It can last a long time, it lives with the child. Wood makes objects for all time.
There hardly remain any of these wooden toys. Current toys are chemical in substance and colour. Their very
material introduces one to a feeling of use, not of pleasure. These toys die infect very quickly and it is
incapable of bringing of fond memories of childhood. That is why Barthes favors the use of wood in the
production of toys.
c. What are Barthes views on building sets as toys?
In his essay “Toys”, Roland Barthes analyses toys as a text and brings out the underlying ideology and the
cultural significance of children’s playthings. In the course of his observation Barthes makes a distinction
between buildings etc which are designed as toys and other common toys. France is the second largest toy
market in the Europe but kids building sets enjoy only marginal sales in France. Barthes describes modern
toys as faithful and complicated objects because the child only uses them as an owner and not as a creator, he
does not invent the world, he uses it.
Building sets differ from toys in the sense that it develops the child’s creativity and allows the child to
discover something and create meaningful objects. Other toys do not allow the child this benefit. The set of
blocks implies a very different learning of the world. The actions that the child performs with such toys are
not those of a user but those of a creator who fashions the sensible world in the light of eternal ideas. From
the building sets the child creates forms which walk or rolls. He creates life itself. But Barthes laments that
such toys are rather rare.
Answer in not more than 300 words.
a. “Toys” is an analysis of the cultural significance of children’s playthings. Discuss.
Roland Barthes “Toys” is an analysis of the cultural significance of children’s playthings. According to Barthes
the adult French man sees the child as another self. All the toys are commonly seen essentially a microcosm of
the adult world. They are all reduced copies of human objects. Barthes pities that the elders belittle the child. We
create for children a small world that goes with their size, underestimating their imaginative capabilities and
power of creativity. Since the child is a minor by law, she/he does not enjoy the right to take decisions and
everything is decided for her/him. In Barthes view, French toys always mean something that is always entirely
socialized in the adult point of view. Toys usually consist of an assortment of the miniature items of the Army,
Broadcasting, and the post office, medicine, school, hairstyling, the Air Force Transport and science. The French
toys literally represent the world of adult functions. This fact obviously prepares the child to accept them all
without any thought. The world of the adult is thrust upon the child. The child is forced to accept the social
environment silently without questioning. Toys reveal the list of all the things the adult usually finds. Barthes
says that toys are like Jevaro head in the sense that they could still be recognized as the object which it stands
for. The toys thus initiate the child into a world of adulthood. For example, the dolls given to the little girl
prepares her for the casualty of housekeeping. They condition her to future role as a mother. Barthes describes
modern toys as faithful and complicated objects. This is because the child only used the toys as an owner and not
as a creator, he does not invent the world he uses it. The toys are prepared for him. They are actions without
adventure, wonder and joy. They are supplied to him ready made and he is never allowed to discover anything.
French toys are thus meant to produce children who are users and not creators. In the course of his observation
Barthes makes a distinction between building sets which are designed as toys and other common toys. France is
the second largest toy market in the Europe but kids building sets enjoy only marginal sales in France. Barthes
describes modern toys as faithful and complicated objects because the child only uses them as an owner and not
as a creator, he does not invent the world, he uses it. Building sets differ from toys in the sense that it develops
the child’s creativity and allows the child to discover something and create meaningful objects. Other toys do
not allow the child this benefit. The set of blocks implies a very different learning of the world. The actions that
the child performs with such toys are not those of a user but those of a creator who fashions the sensible world
in the light of eternal ideas. From the building sets the child creates forms which walk or rolls. He creates life
itself. But Barthes laments that such toys are rather rare. According to Barthes toys signify bourgeois ideology.
Current toys are moulded from the plastic materials. They are the product of chemistry and not of nature. They
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have the appearance of hygienic but it destroys all the pleasure, the sweetness and the humanity of touch. Barthes
considers wood as a familiar and poetic substance. But wood as a material for making toy is gradually disappearing.
It does not sever the child from the close contact with the tree. Wood does not wound or breakdown. It does not
shatter. It can last a long time. It lives with the child. Wood makes objects for all time. There hardly remain any
of these wooden toys. Toys are chemical in substance and colour. Their very material introduces one to a feeling
of use, not of pleasure. These toys die in fact very quickly and it is incapable of bringing fond memories
of childhood.
1.9 SOURCES/SUGGESTED READING
“Toys” Roland Barthes - Biblioklept.com
http://undefinedstateofbliss.blogspot.in/
http://xroads.virginia.edu/
http://www.english.unt.edu/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
https://www.scribd.com/
http://www.universityofcalicut.info/
*****
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Lesson-2
Indian Movie, New Jersey: Chitra Divakaruni Banerjee
STRUCTURE
2.1 INTRODUCTION
2.3 TEXT
2.4 SUMMARY
2.6 GLOSSARY
2.8 QUESTIONS
2.9 SOURCES/ SUGGESTED READING
The objective of this poem is to explain the disillusionment that Indian immigrants experience in America.
2.1 INTRODUCTION
Movies and the magic of cinema earn their cult following by providing an escapist medium for viewers to
break free from the burden of reality. Chitra Divakaruni’s, Indian Movie, New Jersey employs the quintessential
Bollywood film as the central symbol of disillusionment that Indian immigrants experience in America. The Bollywood
movie is a manifestation of the desires the immigrants desperately yearn for, but also perplexingly display immigrant
resentment towards the submission of their native culture and values for a life in America. Ironically enough, the
endeared Indian Movie essentially becomes an absolute truth of happiness for the immigrants despite its obvious
gilded fantasies and kitschy appeal. The juxtaposition of reality and illusion are interlaced within the poem to stress
the conflict of these two human perceptions that co-exist but never overlap. The title of the poem pairs an connotatively
embellished “Indian Movie” against the lack luster monotony of “New Jersey” to emphasize the strain of alienation
these Indian immigrants harbor towards a new life in America.
In this poem you read about the Asian American immigrant experience. Within the space of a few lines
Divakaruni has managed to raise a wide array of issues related to assimilation and inclusion of the migrant within the
host society. The sense of alienation and uprootedness exists along with aspirations for a comfortable lifestyle.
Racial discrimination and xenophobic behaviour are paralleled by the migrants’ resistance to hybridization and refusal
to change their cultural norms. The movie-hall is presented as the space where the Indian community asserts its
ethnic identity and the movie becomes an extended metaphor for their memories of India.
Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni is an award-winning and bestselling author, poet, activist and teacher of writing.
Her work has been published in over 50 magazines, including the Atlantic Monthly and The New Yorker, and her
writing has been included in over 50 anthologies, including The Best American Short Stories, the O. Henry Prize
Stories and the Pushcart Prize Anthology. Her books have been translated into 29 languages, including Dutch, Hebrew,
Bengali, Russian and Japanese, and many of them have been used for campus-wide and city-wide reads. Several of her
works have been made into films and plays. She lives in Houston with her husband Murthy and has two sons, Anand and
Abhay, who are in college. She loves to connect with readers on her Facebook page.
Born in Kolkata, India, she came to the United States for her graduate studies, receiving a Master’s degree in
English from Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio, and a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley.
To earn money for her education, she held many odd jobs, including babysitting, selling merchandise in an
Indian boutique, slicing bread in a bakery, and washing instruments in a science lab. At Berkeley, she lived in the
International House and worked in the dining hall. She briefly lived in Illinois and Ohio, but has spent most of her life
in Northern California, which she often writes about. She currently lives in Houston, Texas, which has begun to appear
in her writing.
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Divakaruni teaches in the nationally ranked Creative Writing Program at the University of Houston, where
she is the Betty and Gene McDavid Professor of Creative Writing. She serves on the Advisory board of Maitri in the
San Francisco Bay Area and Daya in Houston. Both are organizations that help South Asian or South Asian American
women who find themselves in abusive or domestic violence situations. She served on the board of Pratham, an
organization that helps educate underprivileged children in India, for many years and is currently on their emeritus
board.
Divakaruni has judged several prestigious awards, such as the National Book Award and the PEN Faulkner
Award. She is, herself, the winner of a number of awards, including the American Book Award.
Two of her books, The Mistress of Spices and Sister of My Heart, have been made into movies by filmmakers
Gurinder Chadha and Paul Berges (an English film) and Suhasini Mani Ratnam (a Tamil TV serial) respectively. A
short story, “The Word Love,” from her collection Arranged Marriage, was made into a bilingual short film in
Bengali and English, titled “Ammar Ma”. All the films have won awards.
Q.1: What is the birth place of the Chitra Divakaruni Banerjee?
A. Assam C. Karnataka
B. Kolkata D. West Bengal
2.3 TEXT
“Indian Movie, New Jersey” (1990)
Not like the white filmstars, all rib
and gaunt cheekbone, the Indian sex-goddess
smiles plumply from behind a flowery
branch. Below her brief red skirt, her thighs
are satisfying-solid, redeeming
as tree trunks. She swings her hips
and the men-viewers whistle. The lover-hero
dances in to a song, his lip-sync
a little off, but no matter, we
know the words already and sing along.
It is safe here, the day
golden and cool so no one sweats,
roses on every bush and the Dal Lake
clean again.
The sex-goddess switches
to thickened English to emphasize
a joke. We laugh and clap. Here
we need not be embarrassed by words
dropping like lead pellets into foreign ears.
The flickering movie-light
wipes from our faces years of America, sons
who want mohawks and refuse to run
the family store, daughters who date
on the sly.
When at the end the hero
dies for his friend who also
loves the sex-goddess and now can marry her,
we weep, understanding. Even the men
clear their throats to say, “What qurbani!
What dosti!” After, we mill around
unwilling to leave, exchange greetings
and good news: a new gold chain, a trip
to India. We do not speak
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of motel raids, canceled permits, stones
thrown through glass windows, daughters and sons
raped by Dotbusters.
In this dim foyer
we can pull around us the faint, comforting smell
of incense and pakoras, can arrange
our children’s marriages with hometown boys and girls,
open a franchise, win a million
in the mail. We can retire
in India, a yellow two-storied house
with wrought-iron gates, our own
Ambassador car. Or at least
move to a rich white suburb, Summerfield
or Fort Lee, with neighbors that will
talk to us. Here while the film-songs still echo
in the corridors and restrooms, we can trust
in movie truths: sacrifice, success, love and luck,
the America that was supposed to be.
Q.2. Which Goddess is portrayed in the poem?
A. Wisdom Goddess B. Wealth Goddess
C. Sex Goddess D. Shakti
2.4 SUMMARY
Stanza 1
The speaker in the poem is not individualized; we don’t know his/her gender or social status though we can
guess that the speaker is a middle-aged, first generation immigrant because there is a mention of grown up, rebellious
children in the second paragraph. It is the collective identity of the Indian immigrant community that is the focus of
this poem and the speaker is both a participant and observer in this exploration.
The genre of film is used to sketch the differences in the American and Indian ideals of feminity, as embodied
by the film stars on screen. The Indian ‘sex-goddess’, as Divakaruni calls her, has more fleshy limbs than the white
film star who is ‘all rib/and gaunt cheekbone’. Her thighs are ‘satisfying-solid, redeeming’ suggesting stability and
reliability. The men gazing on her respond with appreciative whistles to her sexually suggestive movements. Don’t
miss the association with fertility and fecundity in the image of the sex-goddess ‘smiling plumply/from behind a
flowery branch.’ The abundant flesh on her body is comforting and familiar. The speaker’s preference for the
stereotypical Indian representation of womanhood, over the starved looking white film star is an indication of resistance
to acculturation or the process of assimilating features of another culture through continuous contact. The immigrant
clings to his/her notions of beauty. The coinage ‘sex-goddess’ is interesting: it combines sexuality with spirituality
and captures the influence of cinema on the Indian psyche.
It is clear that the movie is a typical masala film with a formulaic and predictable storyline. The viewers
seem to be familiar with the songs; apparently they have seen the movie before or heard the songs. The whole experience
of watching a movie is like a ritual for them, an assertion of their distinct identity. Notice how, throughout the poem,
the speaker uses the collective pronoun ‘we’ no less than ten times, ‘our’ is used thrice and ‘us’ twice. The movie-hall
becomes the site for collective participation, where the immigrant community can re-create, for a brief period, the
home that they have left behind. The hostility and alienation felt outside can be discarded: ‘It is safe here.’ The word
‘here’ highlights the movie-hall as a sanctuary. Nostalgia for their homeland makes them forget the negative aspects.
As the speaker says,
….the day
golden and cool so no one sweats,
roses on every bush, and the Dal Lake
clean again.
Distance makes them idealize their homeland, believing that the Dal Lake is not dirty or polluted.
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Stanza 2
On screen the sex-goddess speaks in English, with a heavy accent. Think for a moment about the incongruity
of the scene. An Indian movie being screened for an Indian audience in New Jersey, who have gone there with the
ostensible purpose of reasserting their cultural identity and the heroine, who is supposed to be a representation of
ideal Indian womanhood, speaks in English and wears ‘a brief red skirt’; certainly not traditional attire. The sex-
goddess is obviously a member of the English speaking, educated, upper-class; pseudo-modern and aping the outward
manifestations of a western lifestyle. But the audience does not notice the contradictions between the implications
of what is on the screen and their nostalgia.
They identify with her inarticulate and unclear accent and feel relieved to be away from the embarrassment
of mispronounced words. The poet uses a simile to reinforce the failure to communicate effectively with Americans:
Here We need not be embarrassed by words dropping like lead pellets into foreign ears.
Language is an important tool for assimilation with the culture of the host country but the immigrants have
failed to adapt their pronunciation of English to American norms.
The light from the screen is soothing as it ‘wipes from our faces years of America’. The tensions of a new
life in an alien country are temporarily forgotten. The speaker talks of generational conflicts as well; sons and daughters
who want to break the shackles of their parents’ traditions and culture. For most second generation Asian Americans,
India is no more than a holiday destination which they have visited perhaps a few times. Note how the plural ‘sons’ and
‘daughters’ forges their collective identity as an immigrant community with common problems. The younger generation
has no direct experience of or understanding of Indian society and values: subservience to elders in the family,
conservative norms for women and a general allegiance to family over self.
The American culture they have been born and brought up in nurtures and celebrates individualism and the
pursuit of personal gratification which they find more attractive. The boys do not want to follow their fathers and run
the family store. (From the 1960s to 1980s Indian immigrants were most visible as the owners of convenience
stores, motels or as cab-drivers.) The girls assert their right to sexual liberty in a clandestine manner and meet their
boyfriends without informing their parents. Independence is asserted in different ways, sometimes by sporting hairstyles
that are associated with punk sub-culture. It is not as if conflicts between parents and children are peculiar to immigrant
groups; they occur everywhere, all the time. For the immigrant in an alien land the family is her/his only emotional
support and if there are tensions within the family it leads to further psychological stress.
Stanza 3
The film has a familiar plot, repeated innumerable times in Indian movies, and ends predictably. Yet the
audience is moved to tears by the hero’s sacrifice; he gives up his life so that his friend can marry the sex-goddess.
The tale of friendship and sacrifice touches them in many ways; it is a reminder of certain values associated with
Indian culture and at the same time they realize that their lives are so far removed from their homes, both geographically
and culturally.
In India movies are synonymous with popular culture. Television and radio programmes rely heavily on
movies for their content, and style and fashion are dictated by film stars. Though frequently disparaged for their lack
of original stories or convincing characterization, the immigrants see no shortcomings. For them watching a movie is
an opportunity to rejuvenate their connections with their culture.
After the movie is over they hover in the foyer discussing their latest acquisitions. A trip to India is a perennial,
favorite topic. The reference to the ‘good news: a new gold chain’ is a gentle reminder that Indians have not been able
to give up their preoccupation with gold ornaments. The speaker comments how they consciously remain silent about
the painful reality of their lives outside where they are targets of racial hatred and discrimination.
You would be interested to know that around 60 per cent of the hotels and motels in America are owned and
run by immigrants of Indian origin, and 30 per cent of them are owned by the Patel community from Gujarat. There
were nationwide investigations into a network of hotels and motels used to harbour illegal immigrants and facilitate
human smuggling. It is apparent that there is resentment amongst members of the host community and prejudice
against the whole immigrant community after such incidents, forming obstacles on the path to social inclusion.
Stanza 4
The immigrants linger on in the secure environment of the movie-hall where the smells are also familiar.
They stand and talk with their compatriots, arranging the marriages of their children with ‘hometown boys and girls’.
No doubt they think that the boys and girls from India will be traditional and untouched by American culture. The
ambivalence of the immigrant towards her/his host country can be witnessed in this stanza. Though the community is
reluctant to change its cultural norms and practices they are not averse to realizing their material aspirations here:
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Open a franchise, win a million
in the mail.
They dream of starting a profitable business or winning huge sums in the e-mail lottery. Their aspirations are
cast in material terms, the typical middle-class dream of a house in the suburbs, whether in India or America:
Or at least move to a rich white suburb, Summerfield or Fort Lee, with neighbours that will talk to us.
There is a sad undercurrent noticeable here; the immigrant feels alienated by a lack of communication. The
poem ends with the immigrant’s realization that in the movie-hall they can believe in ‘movie-truths’: ‘sacrifice, success,
love and luck’, knowing well that these values are rarely found in real life. The fiction of the movie is like the idea of
America that pulled them here, the myth of prosperity and social prestige which remains unfulfilled.
Q.3. Which lake is mentioned in the poem “Indian Movie, New Jersey”.
A. Pichola Lake B. Dal Lake
C. Chilika Lake D. Wular Lake
In “Indian Movie, New Jersey,” Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni compares the value systems, customs and familial
expectations found in the United States to those found in India, Divakaruni’s native country.
“Indian Movie, New Jersey,” does not feel entirely “foreign”, as one is fortunate to have some very close
Indian friends. One thinks of them, naturally, while reading this poem and one feels glad for one’sunderstanding; one
could relate to this poem because of one’s connection with them. It is interesting, in a family with three grown
children, how the middle child, the only son, is completely “Americanized,” and how the youngest daughter is fully
committed to honoring her families customs – including making the decision to have her marriage arranged.
The Indian culture is a proud one. Values include family first, and secondly earning a good living. The lines
that brought this to light are “…sons/who want mohawks and refuse to run/the family store, daughters who date/on the
sly.” (Lines 21-24) These are much more serious offenses to an Indian family than to an American one, generally
speaking. The hair situation, in speaking of the son reminds me of what I know. Indians boys are supposed to grow out
their hair, long. The hair is wound around the cloth that forms the turban. This holds great religious significance. In the
poem, the depiction of how an Indian family feels when their son wants to cut his hair into a mohawk is going to mean
something different – being an individual and expressing oneself as such is not looked upon positively in that culture.
The daughter dating on the sly has much more to do with than just the concern as a parent of what trouble she might get
herself into, and for dating too young. To an Indian family, this is disrespectful because tradition says that the elders
(parents) are better suited to choose a mate for their children because of their wisdom and experience.
A Note on the Language
It is not enough to respond emotionally to a poem. An appreciation of the poet’s technique enhances our
pleasure in reading the poem. Remember that poems are not always within the form of rhyming stanzas, with fixed
line lengths and rhyming end-words as in this example,
The sun descending in the west
The evening star does shine;
The birds are silent in their nest
And I must seek for mine
The moon like a bower
In heaven’s high tower,
With silent delight
Sits and smiles on the night.
( William Blake: ”Night” )
Most modern poetry is in the form of free verse where there is no fixed pattern of stanzas or syllables. In
‘Indian Movie, New Jersey’ the poet uses run-on lines, or enjambment, where the sense of one line is carried over to
the next.
Divakaruni depends on the repetition of ‘we’, ‘us’ and ‘our’ as an organizing principle. These collective
pronouns, used a total of 15 times, resonate throughout the poem She uses figurative language sparingly, as in the
simile of the Indian film star’s thighs that are ‘ satisfying-solid/ redeeming as tree trunks’, or the metaphor of the
‘years of America’ on their faces.
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The language is simple with the inclusion of some Urdu and Hindi words: ‘dosti’, ‘quarbani’ and ‘pakoras’, to
give the language an ethnic flavour. Another interesting feature is her use of typical Indianisms in the coinage of
words like ‘men-viewers’, and ‘lover-hero’.
The extended, implicit metaphor of movies
The word metaphor comes from the Greek word ‘metaphorein’, that means to transport something from one
place to another. A metaphor is a comparison between two dissimilar objects, as in ‘fishing for information’, where
the characteristics of one domain are carried over to another. Sometimes the metaphor is not restricted to a word and
can carry over the whole poem: it is then called an extended metaphor. If the comparison is not directly stated and
implied it is an implicit metaphor. In this poem there is an unstated comparison between movies and the immigrant
community’s culture. Indian movies are a composite representation of their ideals, values, and the home they have
left behind. The metaphor of Indian movies permeates the whole poem; it is a very successful use of the technique of
an extended, implicit metaphor.
2.6 GLOSSARY
Gaunt : thin, without flesh, bony
Dal Lake : famous lake in Srinagar, in the state of Jammu and Kashmir. A popular tourist
spot, it is plagued by an alarming rise in the levels of pollution and falling water
levels.
Thickened English : inarticulate, heavy accent while speaking the language
Mohawks : a type of hairstyle where the sides of the head are shaved and a long, narrow strip
of hair left. This style was sported by the warriors of the Mohawk tribes, indigenous
people of North America and later became associated with punk sub-culture in
the U.S.
Quarbani : Urdu for sacrifice
Dosti : Hindi for friendship
Motel : a hotel with accommodation and service facilities for cars
Pakoras : fried Indian snack
“Dotbusters” : has to do with the red dot on the forehead that is called a pottu.
1. (B), 2. (C), 3. (B)
2.8 QUESTIONS
a) What is the central idea of the poem?
b) How does she compare the value systems, customs and familial expectations found in the United States to
those found in India?
c) How is the genre of film used to sketch the differences in the American and Indian ideals of feminity, as
embodied by the film stars on screen?
d) Comment on the use of language in the poem.
1. “Indian Movie, New Jersey” presents the complexities of Indi by Susana Xu on Prezi.com
2. Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni Indian Movie New Jersey Free Essays- StudyMode.com
http://instructional1.calstatela.edu/
http://biography.jrank.org/
http://www.chitradivakaruni.com/
http://sol.du.ac.in/
http://kicknode.com/
*****
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Lesson-3
At The Lahore Karhai: Imtiaz Dharker
STRUCTURE
3.1 INTRODUCTION
3.3 TEXT
3.4 SUMMARY
3.6 GLOSSARY
3.8 QUESTIONS
The objective of this poem is to portray the nostalgia experienced by Indians living outside their homeland.
3.1 INTRODUCTION
People of Asian origin have been living in Britain since the early 18th century. Indian domestic workers,
sepoys, cricketers, and sailors recruited by the British Navy were common sights. The 1950s and 1960s saw the
largest wave of migration. The Second World War had ended and the Indian subcontinent had just gone through a
painful partition and many people were displaced whereas Britain needed cheap labour to rebuild its ravaged economy.
In 2006, roughly two per cent of the population of the United Kingdom was of Indian origin, including
people from pre-partition India and Indians with British passports from Uganda, Kenya and Nigeria. Any representation
of the Indian immigrant’s experience in London has to be read in the context of 200 years of colonial rule.
The poem, like ‘Indian Movie, New Jersey’ is a representation of the immigrant’s nostalgia for home, explored
through the metaphor of food. Like most immigrant literature it is autobiographical in nature. The group has a
heterogeneous composition, comprising people of different nationalities – Indian, Pakistani and British. The poet
explores their regional immigrant identity.
Dharker was born in Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan to Pakistani parents. She was brought up in Glasgow where her
family moved when she was less than a year old. She was married to Simon Powell, the founder of the organization
Poetry Live, who died in October 2009 after surviving for eleven years with cancer. Dharker divides her time between
London, Wales, and Mumbai. She says she describes herself as a “Scottish Muslim Calvinist” adopted by India and
married into Wales. Her daughter Ayesha Dharker, (whose father is Anil Dharker), is an actress in international films,
television and stage.
Dharker has written five books of poetry Purdah (1989), Postcards from God (1997), I speak for the Devil
(2001), The Terrorist at my Table (2006), Leaving Fingerprints (2009) and Over the Moon (2014) (all self-
illustrated).
Dharker is a prescribed poet on the British AQA GCSE English syllabus. Her poems Blessing and This Room
are included in the AQA Anthology, Different Cultures, Cluster 1 and 2 respectively. Dharker was a member of the
judging panel for the 2008 Manchester Poetry Prize, with Carol Ann Duffy and Gillian Clarke. For many she is seen
as one of Britain’s most inspirational contemporary poets. She was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature
in 2011. In the same year, she was awarded the Cholmondeley Prize by the Society of Authors. In 2011 she judged the
Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award with the poet Glyn Maxwell. In 2012 she was nominated a Parnassus Poet at the
Festival of the World, hosted by the Southbank Centre as part of the Cultural Olympiad 2012, the largest poetry
festival ever staged in the UK, bringing together poets from all the competing Olympic nations. She was the poet in
residence at the Cambridge University Library in January–March 2013. In July 2015 she appeared on the popular
BBC Radio 4 programme Desert Island Discs and spoke about growing up in Glasgow and her decision to leave her
family and elope to India, as well as her second marriage to the late Simon Powell.
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Q.1. When was Imtiaz Dharker elected as a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature?
A. 2013 B. 2012
C. 2006 D. 2011
3.3 TEXT: “AT THE LAHORE KARHAI”
It’s a great day, Sunday,
when we pile into the car
and set off with a purpose –
a pilgrimage across the city,
to Wembley, the Lahore Karhai.
Lunch service has begun –
‘No beer, we’re Muslim’ –
but the morning sun
squeezed into juice,
and ‘Yaad na jaye’
on the two-in-one.
On the Grand Trunk Road
thundering across Punjab to Amritsar,
this would be a dhaba
where the truck-drivers pull in,
swearing and sweating,
full of lust for real food,
just like home.
Hauling our overloaded lives
the extra mile,
we’re truckers of another kind,
looking hopefully (years away
from Sialkot and Chandigarh)
for the taste of our mothers’
hand in the cooking.
So we’ve arrived at this table:
the Lahore runaway;
the Sindhi refugee
with his beautiful wife
who prays each day to Krishna,
keeper of her kitchen and her life;
the Englishman too young
to be flavoured by the Raj;
the girls with silky hair,
wearing the confident air
of Bombay.
This winter we have learnt
to wear our past
like summer clothes.
Yes, a great day.
A feast! We swoop
on a whole family of dishes.
The tarka dal is Auntie Hameeda
the karhai ghosht is Khala Ameena
the gajjar halva is Appa Rasheeda.
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The warm naan is you.
My hand stops half-way to my mouth.
The Sunday light has locked
on all of us:
the owner’s smiling son,
the cook at the hot kebabs,
Kartar, Rohini, Robert,
Ayesha, Sangam, I,
bound together by the bread we break,
sharing out our continent.
These
are ways of remembering.
Other days, we may prefer
Chinese.
3.4 SUMMARY
“At the Lahore Karhai” by Imtiaz Dharker portrays the nostalgia experienced by Indians living outside their
home land. The poet herself is of Indian origin but has been brought up in Wembley, a county in England with
comparatively larger population of residents from Indian origin. The poet’s cultural background helps her to do
justice to the emotions and feelings she has tried to express through her poem.
The poet narrates the old memories surfacing from within her heart as she travels down to the Lahore Karhai,
Wembley, an Indian restaurant in the area, and she feels a powerful nostalgia erupting from within her. The fact that
she calls it a pilgrimage itself expresses how meaningful this journey went down to be for her. She compares her
journey to that of truck drivers back in India, driving their trucks on The Grand Trunk road, across Punjab to Amritsar,
and then, drenched in sweat, swearing, getting down at a dhaba with an expectation to get food that tastes like home.
She is also a trucker, only of a different kind. Instead of trucks, people like her, the Non-resident Indians, years away
from their home in Sialkot and Chandigarh, bear the weight of the rush and chaos in their lives for some extra miles,
and then at moments like these, they too stop, at restaurants and places which promise them the feeling of home, with
a hope of getting a break, and giving a chance to the memories reverberating in their heart to come to life and fill their
environment with nostalgia. With such a feeling does the poet enter the doors of Lahore Karhai, expecting the taste of
her mother’s hands in the bread she is about to break.
She describes the company that she has got around her on the lunch table—a Sindhi migrant, who left her
home back in Lahore, sitting with his wife who prays to Krishna everyday, “the keeper of her kitchen and her life”; an
Englishman too young to be influenced by his domicile and instill that feeling of superiority, and two girls representing
the typical Bombay culture with their confidence. She further goes on to say that that winter taught them to wear their
past like summer clothes.
As they swoop on the divine meal on a great day, memories from past rejuvenate in the poet’s mind. Every
dish she tastes reminds her of someone back home. The tarka dal reminds her of Auntie Hameeda, ever bite of karhai
ghosht brings to life memories of Khala Ameena, and the gajjar halva synonymously reminds her of Appa Rasheeda.
The warm naan reminds her of a second person singular “You”, perhaps referring to her soulmate. As she brings
another bite near her mouth, her hand stops halfway to witness the divinity and nostalgia of the moment. The smiling
face of the owner’s son, the look of the cook preparing the kebabs, and the fact that all people on the table feasting
together—Kartar, Rohini, Robert, Ayesha, Sangam, and she herself—sharing their past, bounded together by the bread
they break—the nostalgic meal. She wraps up by saying that activities such as these, such traditional feasts, are rather
excuses for remembering our long-forgotten past. On a normal day, they would have preferred Chinese, but the
tradition and nostalgia such a feast encompasses within itself is unparalleled and is perhaps more important a reason
than the food itself why people such as her, Truckers of different kind, go for such a pilgrimage once in a while.
Q.2. What is the name of the Restaurant that poet mentions in the poem?
A. Visco C. Wembley
B. Sun Beam D. Daziel
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Q.3. The 'tarka dal' reminds poet of?
A. Mother B. Grandmother
C. Her cook D. Aunty Hameeda
The main themes of Dharker’s poetry include home, freedom, journeys, geographical and cultural displacement,
communal conflict and gender politics. This poem has leading themes like homesickness, nostalgia, Indian dishes and
psychological journey.
3.6 GLOSSARY
Karhai : a deep bottomed dish used to cook and fry
Grand Trunk Road : Asia’s oldest and longest highway that runs through 2,500 km of the Indian sub-
continent, from Sonargaon in Bangladesh, through Kolkota, Delhi and Wagah, on
the border, to Lahore and Rawalpindi in Pakistan
Raj : period of British rule over India, from 1858 to 1947
Tarka daal : lentils with a sprinkling of oil
Karhai ghosht : mutton cooked in a Karhai
Gajjar halva : a sweet-dish made of carrots and milk
Naan : a sort of Indian bread made from fermented flour
Khala : Urdu word for aunt (mother’s sister)
Appa : Urdu word for elder sister
1. (D), 2. (C), 3. (D)
3.8 QUESTIONS
1. What does the poetess feel while sitting at Wembley, a city in England?
2. What dishes remind her while having them in a restaurant in England?
3. What do you mean by Lahore Karahai?
4. What is the central idea of the poem?
1. At the Lahore Karhai- Imtiaz Dharker -Blogspot.com
2. At the Lahore Karhai (poem) - Imtiaz Dharker -Poemhunter.com
http://sol.du.ac.in/
https://en.wikipedia.org/
http://www.poetryinternationalweb.net/
http://www.imtiazdharker.com/
*****
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Lesson-4
The Brand Expands: Naomi Klein
STRUCTURE
4.0 Learning Objectives
4.3 TEXT
4.4 SUMMARY
4.6 GLOSSARY
4.8 QUESTIONS
The objective of this essay is to tell you about how a brand expands as the title itself reveals.
4.1 INTRODUCTION
No Logo is a book published in the year 2000 by Naomi Klein which consists of 18 chapters followed by
a conclusion. “The Brand Expands” is chapter three of the book consisting of about 33 pages which dwells
extensively on the branding culture. The chapter has been subtitled: “How the Logo Grabbed Centre Stage” .
Logos no longer just represent a brand; they are now a culture, a lifestyle. Brands are gradually becoming a
culture. Certain brands represent certain lifestyle. For example if you’re wearing an Etnies t-shirt you are usually
a skateboarder and embrace the skateboarding culture. When you like a brand you are going to want more and
more things by the brand.
Naomi Klein is an award-winning journalist, a columnist and an author of the international bestseller No
Logo. Translated into 28 languages and with more than a million copies in print, The New York Times called No
Logo “a movement bible.” In 2000, The Guardian Newspaper short-listed it for its First Book Award, and in
2001, No Logo won the Canadian National Business Book Award, and the French Prix Médiations. She is also
the author of Fences and Windows: Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Globalization Debate, and The Shock
Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, which is an international bestseller and was published worldwide in
September 2007. Additionally, she was a contributor to both Wrestling with Zion: Progressive Jewish-American
Responses to the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict and Going Rouge: Sarah Palin An American Nightmare. In 2004,
her reporting from Iraq for Harper’s Magazine won the James Aronson Award for Social Justice Journalism.
Naomi Klein is a contributing editor for Harper’s and reporter for Rolling Stone, and writes a regular
column for The Nation and The Guardian that is syndicated internationally by The New York Times Syndicate. A
collection of her work, Fences and Windows: Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Globalization Debate was
published in 2002. In 2004, she released The Take, a feature documentary about Argentina’s occupied factories,
co-produced with director Avi Lewis. The film was an official selection of the Venice Biennale and won the Best
Documentary Jury Prize at the American Film Institute’s Film Festival in Los Angeles.
She is a former Miliband Fellow at the London School of Economics and holds an honorary Doctor of
Civil Laws from the University of King’s College, Nova Scotia. She was voted 11th, the highest ranked woman, in
the Global Intellectuals Poll—a list of the world’s top public intellectuals compiled by Prospect Magazine, in
conjunction with Foreign Policy Magazine.
Q.1: What is the Profession of Naomi Klein?
A. Journalist B. College Professor
C. Assistant Manager D. Doctor
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4.3 TEXT
THE BRAND EXPANDS
How the Logo Grabbed Centre Stage
Since the crocodile is the symbol of Lacoste, we thought they might be interested in sponsoring our
crocodiles.
— Silvino Gomes, commercial director of the Lisbon Zoo, on the institution’s creative corporate sponsorship
program, March 1998
I was in Grade 4 when skin-tight designer jeans were the be-all and end-all, and my friends and I spent a lot of
time checking out each other’s butt for logos. “Nothing comes between me and my Calvins,” Brooke Shields assured
us, and as we lay back on our beds Ophelia-style and yanked up the zippers on our Jordache jeans with wire hangers,
we knew she was telling no word of a lie. At around the same time, Romi, our schools own pint-sized Farrah Fawcett,
used to make her rounds up and down the rows of desks turning back the collars on our sweaters and polo shirts. It
wasn’t enough for her to see an alligator or a leaping horseman —it could have been a knockoff. She wanted to see the
label behind the logo. We were only eight years old but the reign of logo terror had begun.
About nine years later, I had a job folding sweaters at an Esprit clothing store in Montreal.
Mothers would come in with their six-year-old daughters and ask to see only the shirts that said “Esprit” in
the company’s trademark bold block lettering. “She won’t wear anything without a name,” the moms would confide
apologetically as we chatted by the change rooms. It’s no secret that branding has become far more ubiquitous and
intrusive by now. Labels like Baby Gap and Gap Newborn imprint brand awareness on toddlers and turn babies into
mini-billboards. My friend Monica tells me that her seven-year-old son marks his homework not with check marks
but with little red Nike swooshes.
Until the early seventies, logos on clothes were generally hidden from view, discreetly placed on the inside
of the collar. Small designer emblems did appear on the outside of shirts in the first half of the century, but such
sporty attire was pretty much restricted to the golf courses and tennis courts of the rich. In the late seventies, when
the fashion world rebelled against Aquarian flamboyance, the country-club wear of the fifties became mass style for
newly conservative parents and their preppy kids. Ralph Lauren’s Polo horseman and Izod Lacoste’s alligator escaped
from the golf course and scurried into the streets, dragging the logo decisively onto the outside of the shirt. These
logos served the same social function as keeping the clothing’s price tag on: everyone knew precisely what premium
the wearer was willing to pay for style. By the mid-eighties, Lacoste and Ralph Lauren were joined by Calvin Klein,
Esprit and, in Canada, Roots; gradually, the logo was transformed from an ostentatious affectation to an active fashion
accessory. Most significantly, the logo itself was growing in size, ballooning from a three-quarter-inch emblem into
a chest-sized marquee. This process of logo inflation is still progressing, and none is more bloated than Tommy
Hilfiger, who has managed to pioneer a clothing style that transforms its faithful adherents into walking, talking, life-
sized Tommy dolls, mummified in fully branded Tommy worlds.
This scaling-up of the logo’s role has been so dramatic that it has become a change in substance. Over the
past decade and a half, logos have grown so dominant that they have essentially transformed the clothing on which
they appear into empty carriers for the brands they represent. The metaphorical alligator, in other words, has risen up
and swallowed the literal shirt.
This trajectory mirrors the larger transformation our culture has undergone since Marlboro Friday, sparked
by a stampede of manufacturers looking to replace their cumbersome product-production apparatus with transcendent
brand names and to infuse their brands with deep, meaningful messages. By the mid-nineties, companies like Nike,
Polo and Tommy Hilfiger were ready to take branding to the next level: no longer simply branding their own products,
but branding the outside culture as well—by sponsoring cultural events, they could go out into the world and claim
bits of it as brand-name outposts. For these companies, branding was not just a matter of adding value to a product. It
was about thirstily soaking up cultural ideas and iconography that their brands could reflect by projecting these ideas
and images back on the culture as “extensions” of their brands. Culture, in other words, would add value to their
brands. For example, Onute Miller, senior brand manager for Tequila Sauza, explains that her company sponsored a
risqué photography exhibit by George Holz because “art was a natural synergy with our product.”
Branding’s current state of cultural expansionism is about much more than traditional corporate sponsorships:
the classic arrangement in which a company donates money to an event in exchange for seeing its logo on a banner or
in a program. Rather, this is the Tommy Hilfiger approach of full-frontal branding, applied now to cityscapes, music,
art, films, community events, magazines, sports and schools. This ambitious project makes the logo the central focus
of everything it touches - not an add-on or a happy association, but the main attraction.
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Advertising and sponsorship have always been about using imagery to equate products with positive cultural
or social experiences. What makes nineties-style branding different is that it increasingly seeks to take these
associations out of the representational realm and make them a lived reality. So the goal is not merely to have child
actors drinking Coke in a TV commercial, but for students to brainstorm concepts for Coke’s next ad campaign in
English class. It transcends logo-festooned Roots clothing designed to conjure memories of summer camp and
reaches out to build an actual Roots country lodge that becomes a 3-D manifestation of the Roots brand concept.
Disney transcends its sports network ESP1M, a channel for guys who like to sit around in sports bars screaming at the
TV, and launches a line of ESPN Sports Bars, complete with giant-screen TVs. The branding process reaches beyond
heavily marketed Swatch watches and launches “Internet time,” a new venture for the Swatch Group, which divides the
day into one thousand “Swatch beats.” The Swiss company is now attempting to convince the on-line world to abandon
the traditional clock and switch to its time-zone-free, branded time.
The effect, if not always the original intent, of advanced branding is to nudge the hosting culture into the
background and make the brand the star. It is not to sponsor culture but to be the culture. And why shouldn’t it be? If
brands are not products but ideas, attitudes, values and experiences, why can’t they be culture too? As we will see later
in the chapter, this project has been so successful that the lines between corporate sponsors and sponsored culture
have entirely disappeared. But this conflation has not been a one-way process, with passive artists allowing themselves
to be shoved into the background by aggressive multinational corporations. Rather, many artists, media personalities,
film directors and sports stars have been racing to meet the corporations halfway in the branding game. Michael
Jordan, Puff Daddy, Martha Stewart, Austin Powers, Brandy and Star Wars now mirror the corporate structure of
corporations like Nike and the Gap, and they are just as captivated by the prospect of developing and leveraging their
own branding potential as the product-based manufacturers. So what was once a process of selling culture to a sponsor
for a price has been supplanted by the logic of “co-branding” a fluid partnership between celebrity people and celebrity
brands.
The project of transforming culture into little more than a collection of brand-extensions-in waiting would
not have been possible without the deregulation and privatization policies of the past three decades. In Canada under
Brian Mulroney, in the U.S. under Ronald Reagan and in Britain under Margaret Thatcher (and in many other parts of
the world as well), corporate taxes were dramatically lowered, a move that eroded the tax base and gradually starved
out the public sector. As government spending dwindled, schools, museums and broadcasters were desperate to make
up their budget shortfalls and thus ripe for partnerships with private corporations. It also didn’t hurt that the political
climate during this time ensured that there was almost no vocabulary to speak passionately about the value of a non-
commercialized public sphere. This was the time of the Big Government bogeyman and deficit hysteria, when any
political move that was not overtly designed to increase the freedom of corporations was vilified as an endorsement
of national bankruptcy. It was against this backdrop that, in rapid order, sponsorship went from being a rare occurrence
(in the 1970s) to an exploding growth industry (by the mideighties) picking up momentum in 1984 at the Los Angeles
Olympics.
At first, these arrangements seemed win-win: the cultural or educational institution in question received
much-needed funds and the sponsoring corporation was compensated with some modest form of public
acknowledgment and a tax break. And, in fact, many of these new public-private arrangements were just that simple,
successfully retaining a balance between the cultural event or institution’s independence and the sponsor’s desire for
credit, often helping to foster a revival of arts accessible to the general public. Successes like these are frequently
overlooked by critics of commercialization, among whom there is an unfortunate tendency to tar all sponsorship with
the same brush, as if any contact with a corporate logo infects the natural integrity of an otherwise pristine public
event or cause. Writing in The Commercialization of American Culture, advertisng critic Matthew McAllister labels
corporate sponsorship “control behind a philanthropic facade.” He writes:
While elevating the corporate, sponsorship simultaneously devalues what it sponsors.... The sporting
event, the play, the concert and the public television program become subordinate to promotion because,
in the sponsor’s mind and in the symbolism of the event, they exist to promote. It is not Art for Art’s
Sake as much as Art for Ad’s Sake. In the public’s eye, art is yanked from its own separate and
theoretically autonomous domain and squarely placed in the commercial.... Every time the commercial
intrudes on the cultural, the integrity of the public sphere is weakened because of the obvious
encroachment of corporate promotion.
This picture of our culture’s lost innocence is mostly romantic fiction. Though there have always been
artists who have fought fiercely to protect the integrity of their work, neither the arts, sports nor the media have ever,
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even theoretically, been the protected sovereign states that McAllister imagines. Cultural products are the all-time
favourite playthings of the powerful, tossed from wealthy statesmen such as Gaius Cilnius Maecenas, who set up the
poet Horace in a writing estate in 33 B.C., and from rulers like Francis I and the Medici family, whose love of the arts
bolstered the status of Renaissance painters in the sixteenth century. Though the degree of meddling varies, our
culture was built on compromises between notions of public good and the personal, political and financial ambitions
of the rich and powerful.
Of course there are some forms of corporate sponsorship that are inherently insidious -the tobacco industry’s
corralling of the arts springs to mind. But not all sponsorship deals should be so easily dismissed. Not only are such
broad strokes unfair to worthy projects but, perhaps more important, they can prevent us from seeing changes in the
field. If all corporate sponsorship arrangements are regarded as equally compromised, it becomes easy not to notice
when the role of the corporate sponsor begins to expand and change — which is precisely what has been happening
over the past decade as global corporate sponsorship has ballooned from a $7-billion-a-year industry in 1991 to a
$19.2 billion one in 1999.
Absolut Vodka – Keith Haring, Absolut Haring (detail), 1986
Table 2.1 Corporate Tax as a Percentage of Total Federal Revenue in the US, 1952, 1975 and 1998
Table 2.2 Increase in US Corporate Sponsorship Spending since 1985

When sponsorship took off as a stand-in for public funds in the mid-eighties, many corporations that had
been experimenting with the practice ceased to see sponsorship as a hybrid of philanthropy and image promotion and
began to treat it more purely as a marketing tool, and a highly effective one at that. As its promotional value grew —
and as dependency on sponsorship revenue increased in the cultural industries — the delicate dynamic between
sponsors and the sponsored began to shift, with many corporations becoming more ambitious in their demands for
grander acknowledgments and control, even buying events outright. Molson and Miller beer, as we will see further on
in this chapter, are no longer satisfied with having their logos on banners at rock concerts. Instead, they have pioneered
a new kind of sponsored concert in which the blue-chip stars who perform are entirely upstaged by their hosting
brand. And while corporate sponsorship has long been a mainstay in museums and galleries, when Philip Morris
owned
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Altoids mints decided in January 1999 that it wanted to get into the game, it cut out the middleman. Rather
than sponsoring an existing show, the company spent $250,000 to buy works by twenty emerging artists and launch its
own Curiously Strong Collection, a travelling art exhibition that plays on the Altoids marketing slogan, “Curiously
strong mints.” Chris Peddy, Altoids brand manager, said, “We decided to take it to the next level.”
These companies are part of a larger phenomenon explained by Lesa Ukman, executive editor of the
International Events Group Sponsorship Report, the industry’s bible: “From MasterCard and Dannon to Phoenix
Home Life and LaSalle Bank, companies are buying properties and creating their own events. This is not because they
want to get into the business. It’s because proposals sponsors receive don’t fit their requirements or because they’ve
had negative experiences buying into someone else’s gig.” There is a certain logic to this progression: first, a select
group of manufacturers transcend their connection to their earthbound products, then, with marketing elevated as the
pinnacle of their businesses, they attempt to alter marketing’s social status as a commercial interruption and replace
it with seamless integration. The most insidious effect of this shift is that after a few years of Molson concerts, Pepsi
sponsored papal visits, Izod zoos and Nike after-school basketball programs, everything from small community events
to large religious gatherings are believed to “need a sponsor” to get off the ground; August 1999, for instance, saw the
first-ever private wedding with corporate sponsorship. This is what Leslie Savan, author of The Sponsored Life,
describes as symptom number one of the sponsored mindset: we become collectively convinced not that corporations
are hitching a ride on our cultural and communal activities, but that creativity and congregation would be impossible
without their generosity.
The Branding of the Cityscape
The expansive trajectory of branding revealed itself to Londoners in a 1997 holiday season morality play. It
began when the Regent Street Association found itself without enough money to replace the dimming Christmas
lights that normally adorned the street during the season. Yves Saint Laurent stepped in and generously offered to split
the cost of new decorations in exchange for seeing its logo up in lights. But when the time came to hang the Christmas
lights, it seemed that the YSL logos were much larger than the agreed-upon size. Every few steps, shoppers were
reminded by illuminated signs 5.5 meters high just who had brought them Christmas. The logos were eventually
replaced with smaller ones, but the lesson remained: the role of the sponsor, like that of advertising in general, has a
tendency to expand.
While yesterday’s corporate sponsors may have been satisfied merely propping up community events, the
meaning-seeking brand builders will never accept this role for long. Branding is, at its core, a deeply competitive
undertaking in which brands are up against not only their immediate rivals (Nike vs. Reebok, Coke vs. Pepsi, McDonald’s
vs. Burger King, for example) but all other brands in the mediascape, including the events and people they are sponsoring.
This is perhaps branding’s crudest irony: most manufacturers and retailers begin by seeking out authentic scenes,
important causes and cherished public events so that these things will infuse their brands with meaning. Such gestures
are frequently motivated by genuine admiration and generosity. Too often, however, the expansive nature of the branding
process ends up causing the event to be usurped, creating the quintessential lose-lose situation. Mot only do fans
begin to feel a sense of alienation from (if not outright resentment toward) once-cherished cultural events, but the
sponsors lose what they need most: a feeling of authenticity with which to associate their brands.
That’s certainly what happened to Michael Chesney, the hip-hop adman who painted Canadian billboards into
the branding era. He loved Toronto’s Queen Street West —the funky clothing stores, the artists on all the patios, and,
most of all, the graffiti art that figured large on the walls in that part of town. For Chesney, it was a short step from the
public’s growing interest in the cultural value of graffiti to the commercial takeover of that pocket of marginal space
— a space used and reused by the disenfranchised for political and cultural expression in every city in the world.
From the start, Chesney considered himself a distant relative of the graffiti kids — though less a cousin than
a rich uncle. The way he saw it, as a commercial artist and billboard salesman he was also a creature of the streets,
because even if he was painting for corporate clients, he, like the graffiti artists, left his mark on walls. It was in this
context that Chesney pioneered the advertising practice of the “building takeover.” In the late eighties, Chesney’s
company Murad began painting directly onto building walls, letting the size of each structure dictate the dimensions
of the ad. The idea harked back to 1920s Coca-Cola murals on corner grocery stores and to early-industrial urban
factories and department stores that painted their names and logos in giant block lettering on their buildings’ facades.
The walls Chesney rented to Coke, Warner Brothers and Calvin Klein were a little bit bigger, however, reaching their
pinnacle at a colossal 20,000-square-foot billboard overlooking one of Toronto’s busiest intersections. Gradually,
the ads wrapped around the corners of the buildings so that they covered not just one wall, but all of them: the ad as
edifice.
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In the summer of 1996, when Levi Strauss chose Toronto to test-market its new Silver Tab jeans line, Chesney
put on his most daring show yet: he called it “The Queen Street Takeover.” Between 1996 and 1997, Levi’s increased
its spending on billboard advertisements by a startling 301 percent — and Toronto saw much of that windfall. For one
year, as the centrepiece of the most expensive outdoor ad campaign in Canadian history, Chesney painted his beloved
strip silver. He bought up the facades of almost every building on the busiest stretch of Queen and turned them into
Levi’s billboards, upping the ante of the ad extravaganza even further with 3-D extensions, mirrors and neon. It was
Murad’s greatest triumph, but the takeover presented some problems for Michael Chesney. When I spent a day with
him at the tail end of the Silver Tab bonanza, he could barely walk down Queen Street without running into somebody
who was furious about the invasion. After ducking a few bullets, he told me a story of bumping into an acquaintance:
“she said, ‘You took over Queen Street.’ She was really almost crying and I just, my heart sank, and she was really
bummed out. But, hey, what can you do? It’s the future, it’s not Queen anymore.”
Nearly every major city has seen some variation of the 3-D ad takeover, if not on entire buildings, then on
buses, streetcars or taxis. It is sometimes difficult, however, to express dissatisfaction with this brand expansion —
after all, most of these venues and vehicles have been carrying some form of advertising for decades. But somewhere
along the line, the order flipped. Now buses, streetcars and taxis, with the help of digital imaging and large pieces of
adhesive vinyl, have become ads on wheels, shepherding passengers around in giant chocolate bars and gum wrappers,
just as Hilfiger and Polo turned clothing into wearable brand billboards.
If this creeping ad expansion seems a mere matter of semantics when applied to taxis and T-shirts, its
implications are much more serious when looked at in the context of another marketing trend: the branding of entire
neighbourhoods and cities. In March 1999, Los Angeles mayor Richard Riordan unveiled a plan to revitalize poor
inner-city areas, many of them still scarred from the 1992 riots after the Rodney King verdict: corporations would
adopt a run-down part of town and brand its redevelopment. For the time being, the sponsors of Genesis LA, as the
project is called - among them Bank-America and Wells Fargo & Co. — only have the option of seeing these sites
named after them, much like a sponsored sports arena. But if the initiative follows the expansive branding trajectory
seen elsewhere, the sponsoring companies could well wield more politically powerful roles in these communities
soon.
The idea of a fully privatized, branded town or neighbourhood is not nearly as far-fetched today as it was only
a few years ago, as the inhabitants of Disney’s town Celebration, Florida, can attest —and as the citizens of Cashmere,
Washington, have quickly learned. A sleepy town of 2,500 people, Cashmere has as its major industry the Liberty
Orchard candy factory, which has been making Aplets and Collets chewy sweets since it was founded in 1918. It was
all very quaint until Liberty Orchard announced in September 1997 that it would leave for greener pastures unless the
town agreed to transform itself into a 3-D tourist attraction for the Aplets and Cotlets all-American brand, complete
with signs along the highway and a downtown turned into a corporate gift shop. The Wall Street Journal reported the
company’s ransom demands:
They want all road signs and official correspondence by the city to say “Cashmere, Home of Aplets and
Cotlets.” They have asked that one of the two main streets in town be changed to Cotlets Avenue, and the
other one be renamed Aplets Avenue. The candy maker also wants the Mayor and Council to sell City Hall
to them, build new parking lots and possibly go to the bond market to start a tourism campaign on behalf
of the worldwide headquarters of a company that says its story is “America in a nutshell.”
The Branding of Media
Although there is a clear trajectory in all of these stories, there is little point, at this stage in our sponsored
history, in pining for either a mythic brand-free past or some Utopian, commercial-free future. Branding becomes
troubling —as it did in the cases just discussed,—when the balance tips dramatically in favour of the sponsoring
brand, stripping the hosting culture of its inherent value and treating it as little more than a promotional tool. It is
possible, however, for a more balanced relationship to unfold —one in which both sponsor and sponsored hold on to
their power and in which clear boundaries are drawn and protected. As a working journalist, I know that critical,
independent — even Anti corporate — coverage does appear in corporate-owned media, sandwiched, no less, between
the car and tobacco ads. Are these articles tainted by this impure context? No doubt. But if balance (as opposed to
purity) is the goal, then maybe print media, where the first mass-market advertising campaigns began, can hold some
important lessons for how to cope with the expansionist agenda of branding.
“I appeal to every producer not to release “sponsored” moving pictures … Believe me, if you jam
advertising down their throats and pack their eyes and ears with it, you will build up a resentment
that will in time damn your business.
– Carl Laemmle of Universal Pictures, 1931
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It is common knowledge that many advertisers rail at controversial content, pull their ads when they are
criticized even slightly and perpetually angle for so-called value-addeds — plugs for their wares in shopping guides
and fashion spreads. For example, S.C. Johnson & Co. stipulates that its ads in women’s magazines “should not be
opposite extremely controversial features or material antithetical to the nature/copy of the advertised product” while
De Beers’ diamonds demands that their ads be far from any “hard news or anti/love romance themed editorial.” And up
until 1997, when Chrysler placed an ad it demanded that it be “alerted in advance of any and all editorial content that
encompasses sexual, political, social issues or any editorial that might be construed as provocative or offensive.”
But the advertisers don’t always get their way: controversial stories make it to print and to air, even ones
critical of major advertisers. At its most daring and uncompromised, the news media can provide workable models
for the protection of the public interest even under heavy corporate pressure, though these battles are often won
behind closed doors. On the other hand, at their worst, these same media show how deeply distorting the effects of
branding can be on our public discourse — particularly since journalism, like every other part of our culture, is under
constantly increasing pressure to merge with the brands.
Part of this stepped-up pressure is coming from the explosion of sponsored media projects: magazines,
Web sites and television programs that invite corporate sponsors to become involved at the development stage of a
venture. That’s the role Heineken played in the British music and youth culture show Hotel Babylon, which aired on
1TV. In an embarrassing incident in January 1996, a memo from a Heineken executive was leaked to the press that
berated the producers for insufficiently “Heineken-izing” the as-yet-unaired program. Specifically, Justus Kos objected
to male audience members drinking wine as opposed to “masculine drinks like beer, whisky,” noted that “more evidence
of beer is not just requested but needed” and complained that the show’s host “shouldn’t stand in the way of the beer
columns when introducing guests.” Most inflammatory of all was the executive’s complaint that there was “too high
a proportion of Negroes in the audience.”
After the controversy made its way into the press, Heineken CEO Karel Vuursteen issued a public apology.
Another sponsor scandal erupted during the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan, when CBS investigative journalist
Roberta Baskin saw her CBS Sports department colleagues reporting on the games in jackets adorned with bold Nike
logos. Nike was the official sponsor of the network’s Olympic coverage and it provided news and sports reporters
with the swooshed gear because, according to Nike spokesman Lee Weinstein, it “helps us build awareness about our
products.” Baskin was “dismayed and embarrassed” that CBS reporters seemed to be endorsing Nike products, not
only because it represented a further dissolution of the line between editorial and advertising, but because two years
earlier, Baskin had broken a news story about physical abuse of workers at a Nike shoe factory in Vietnam. She
accused the station of refusing to allow her to pursue a follow-up and of yanking the original story from a scheduled
rerun because of its sponsorship deal with Nike. CBS News president Andrew Heyward strenuously denied bowing to
sponsor pressure, calling Baskin’s allegations “truly preposterous.” He did pull the Nike jackets off the news reporters
midway through the games, though the sports department kept theirs on.
In some ways, these stories are simply pumped-up versions of the same old tug-of-war between editorial and
advertising that journalists have faced for a century and a quarter. Increasingly, however, corporations aren’t just
asking editors and producers to become their de facto ad agencies by dreaming up ways to plug their wares in articles
and photo shoots, they are also asking magazines to become their actual ad agencies, by helping them to create the ads
that run in their magazines. More and more magazines are turning their offices into market-research firms and their
readers into focus groups in an effort to provide the most cherished “value-added” they can offer their clients: highly
detailed demographic information about their readership, amassed through extensive surveys and questionnaires.
In many cases, the magazines then use the readership information to design closely targeted advertisements
for their clients. Details magazine, for instance, designed a twenty-four-page comic/advertisement strip in October
1997, with products like Hugo Boss cologne and Lee jeans woven into a story line about the daily adventures of a
professional in-line skater. On the page following each product’s extreme cameo, the company’s real ad appeared.
The irony of these branding experiments, of course, is that they only seem to make brands more resentful of the
media that host them. Inevitably, the lifestyle brands begin to ask why they need to attach themselves to someone
else’s media project in the first place. Why, even after proving they can integrate into the most stylish and trendiest of
magazines, should they be kept at arm’s length or, worse, branded with the word “Advertisement,” like the health
warnings on packs of cigarettes? So, with lifestyle magazines looking more and more like catalogues for designers,
designer catalogues have begun to look more and more like magazines: Abercrombie & Fitch, J. Crew, Harry Rosen
and Diesel have all shifted to a storybook format, where characters frolic along sketchily drawn plotlines.
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The merger between media and catalogue reached a new high with the launch of the teen TV drama Dawson’s
Creek in January of 1998. Not only did the characters all wear J. Crew clothes, not only did the windswept, nautical
set make them look as if they had stepped off the pages of a J. Crew catalogue, and not only did the characters spout
dialogue like “He looks like he stepped out of a J. Crew catalogue,” but the cast was also featured on the cover of the
January J. Crew catalogue. Inside the new “freestyle maga log,” the young actors are pictured in rowboats and on
docks-looking as if they just stepped off the set of a Dawson’s Creek episode.
To see the birthplace of this kind of brand ambition, you have to go online, where there was never really any
pretence of a wall existing between editorial and advertisement. On the Web, marketing language reached its nirvana:
the ad-free ad. For the most part, the on-line versions of media outlets feature straightforward banner ads similar to
their paper or broadcast versions, but many media outlets have also used the Met to blur the line between editorial and
advertising much more aggressively than they could in the non-virtual world. For instance, on the Teen People site,
readers can click and order cosmetics and clothing as they read about them. On the Entertainment Weekly site,
visitors can click and order the books and CDs being reviewed. In Canada, The Globe and Mail has attracted the ire of
independent booksellers for the on-line version of its book review section, ChaptersGLOBE.com. After reading
Globe reviews, readers can click to order books directly from the Chapters chain — a reviewer/retailer partnership
that formed “Canada’s largest online bookstore.” The New York Times’ on-line partnership with Barnes and Noble has
caused similar controversies in the U.S.
These sites are relatively tame examples of the branding-content integration taking place on the Net, however.
Sites are increasingly created by “content developers,” whose role is to produce editorial that will make an ad-cozy
home for the developers’ brand-name clients. One such on-line venture is Parent Soup, invented by content developer
“iVillage” for Fisher-Price, Starbucks, Procter and Gamble and Polaroid. It calls itself a “parents’ community” and
attempts to imitate a user-driven newsgroup, but when parents go to Parent Soup to get peer advice, they receive such
branded wisdom as: the way to improve your child’s self-esteem is by taking Polaroid’s of her. No need to bully or
buy off editors -just publish do-it-yourself content, with ads pre-integrated.
Absolut Vodka’s 1997 Absolut Kelly Internet site provided an early preview of the direction in which branded
media are headed. The distiller had long since solicited original, brand-centred creations from visual artists, fashion
designers and novelists to use in its advertisements — but this was different. On Absolut Kelly, only the name of the
site advertised the product; the rest was an illustrated excerpt from Wired magazine editor Kevin Kelly’s book Out of
Control. This, it seemed, was what the brand managers had aspired to all along: for their brands to become quietly
integrated into the heart of the culture. Sure, manufacturers will launch noisy interruptions if they are locked on the
wrong side of the commerce/culture divide, but what they really want is for their brand to earn the right to be accepted,
not just as advertising art but simply as art. Off-line, Absolut is still a major advertiser in Wired, but on-line, it is
Absolut that is the host, and a Wired editor the supporting act.
Rather than merely bankrolling someone else’s content, all over the Net, corporations are experimenting
with the much-coveted role of being “content providers”: Gap’s site offers travel tips, Volkswagen provides free
music samples, Pepsi urges visitors to download video games, and Starbucks offers an on-line version of its magazine,
Joe. Every brand with a Web site has its own virtual, branded media outlet —a beachhead from which to expand into
other non-virtual media. What has become clear is that corporations aren’t just selling their products on-line; they’re
selling a new model for the media’s relationship with corporate sponsors and backers. The Internet, because of its
anarchic nature, has created the space for this model to be realized swiftly, but the results are clearly made for off-
line export. For instance, about a year after the launch of Absolut Kelly, the company reached full editorial integration
in Saturday Night magazine when the final page of a nine page excerpt from Mordecai Richler’s novel Barney’s
Version was wrapped around the silhouette of an Absolut bottle. This was not an ad, it was part of the story, yet at the
bottom of the page were the words.
“Absolut Mordecai.”
Although magazines and individual television shows are beginning to see the branded light, it is a network,
MTV, that is the model for fully branded media integration. MTV started out sponsored, as a joint venture between
Warner Communications and American Express. From the beginning, MTV has not been just a marketing machine for
the products it advertises around the clock (whether those products are skin cleansers or the albums it moves with its
music videos); it has also been a twenty-four-hour advertisement for MTV itself: the first truly branded network.
Though there have been dozens of imitators since, the original genius of MTV, as every marketer will tell you, is that
viewers didn’t watch individual shows, they simply watched MTV. “As far as we were concerned, MTV was the star,”
says Tom Freston, network founder. And so advertisers didn’t want to just advertise on MTV, they wanted to co-brand
with the station in ways that are still unimaginable on most other networks: giveaways, contests, movies, concerts,
awards ceremonies, clothing, countdowns, listings, credit cards and more.
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The model of the medium-as-brand that MTV perfected has since been adopted by almost every other major
media outlet, whether magazines, film studios, television networks or individual shows. The hip-hop magazine Vibe
has extended into television, fashion shows and music seminars. Fox Sports has announced that it wants its new line
of men’s clothing to be on par with Nike: “We are hoping to take the attitude and lifestyle of Fox Sports off the TV and
onto men’s backs, creating a nation of walking billboards,” said David Hill, CEO of Fox Broadcasting.
The rush to branding has been most dramatic in the film industry. At the same time that brand-name product
placement in films has become an indispensable marketing vehicle for companies like Nike, Macintosh and Starbucks,
films themselves are increasingly being conceptualized as “branded media properties.” Newly merged entertainment
conglomerates are always looking for threads to sew together their disparate holdings in cross-promotional webs
and, for the most part, that thread is the celebrity generated by Hollywood blockbusters. Films create stars to cross-
promote in books, magazines and TV, and they also provide prime vehicles for sports, television and music stars to
“extend” their own brands.
I’ll explore the cultural legacy of this type of synergy-driven production in Chapter 9, but there is a more
immediate impact as well, one that has much to do with the phenomenon of disappearing unmarketed cultural “space”
with which this section is concerned. With brand managers envisioning themselves as sensitive culture makers, and
culture makers adopting the hard-nosed business tactics of brand builders, a dramatic change in mindset has occurred.
Whatever desire might exist to protect a television show from too much sponsor interference, an emerging musical
genre from crass commercialism or a magazine from overt advertiser control has been trampled by the manic branding
imperative: to disseminate one’s own brand “meaning” through whatever means necessary, often in partnership with
other powerful brands. In this context, the Dawson’s Creek brand actively benefits from its exposure in the J. Crew
catalogue, the Kelly brand grows stronger from its association with the Absolut brand, the People magazine brand
draws cachet from a close association with Tommy Hilfiger, and the Phantom Menace tieins with Pizza Hut, Kentucky
Fried Chicken and Pepsi are invaluable Star Wars brand promotion. When brand awareness is the goal shared by all,
repetition and visibility are the only true measures of success. The journey to this point of full integration between ad
and art, brand and culture, has taken most of this century to achieve, but the point of no return, when it arrived, was
unmistakable: April 1998, the launch of the Gap Khakis campaign.
The Branding of Music
In 1993, the Gap launched its “Who wore khakis?” ads, featuring old photographs of such counterculture
figures as James Dean and Jack Kerouac in beige pants. The campaign was in the cookie-cutter co-optation formula:
take a cool artist, associate that mystique with your brand, hope it wears off and makes you cool too. It sparked the
usual debates about the mass marketing of rebellion, just as William Burroughs’s presence in a Nike ad did at around
the same time. Fast forward to 1998. The Gap launches its breakthrough Khakis Swing ads: a simple, exuberant
miniature music video set to “Jump, Jive ‘n’ Wail” — and a great video at that. The question of whether these ads were
“co-opting” the artistic integrity of the music was entirely meaningless. The Gap’s commercials didn’t capitalize on
the retro swing revival — a solid argument can be made that they caused the swing revival. A few months later, when
singer-songwriter Rufus Wainwright appeared in a Christmas-themed Gap ad, his sales soared, so much so that his
record company began promoting him as “the guy in the Gap ads.” Macy Gray, the new R&B “It Girl,” also got her big
break in a Baby Gap ad. And rather than the Gap Khaki ads looking like rip-offs of MTV videos, it seemed that
overnight, every video on MTV —from Brandy to Britney Spears and the Backstreet Boys —looked like a Gap ad; the
company has pioneered its own aesthetic, which spilled out into music, other advertisements, even films like The
Matrix. After five years of intense lifestyle branding, the Gap, it has become clear, is as much in the culture-creation
business as the artists in its ads.
For their part, many artists now treat companies like the Gap less as deep-pocketed pariahs trying to feed off
their cachet than as just another medium they can exploit in order to promote their own brands, alongside radio, video
and magazines. “We have to be everywhere. We can’t afford to be too precious in our marketing,” explains Ron
Shapiro, executive vice president of Atlantic Records. Besides, a major ad campaign from Nike or the Gap penetrates
more nooks and crannies of the culture than a video in heavy rotation on MTV or a cover article in Rolling Stone.
Which is why piggybacking on these campaign blitzes-Fat Boy Slim in Nike ads, Brandy in Cover Girl commercials,
Lil’ Kim rapping for Candies —has become, Business Week announced with much glee, “today’s top 40 radio.”
Of course the branding of music is not a story of innocence lost. Musicians have been singing ad jingles and
signing sponsorship deals since radio’s early days, as well as having their songs played on commercial radio stations
and signing deals with multinational record companies. Throughout the eighties — music’s decade of the straight up
shill — rock stars like Eric Clapton sang in beer ads, and the pop stars, appropriately enough, crooned for pop:
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George Michael, Robert Plant, Whitney Houston, Run-DMC, Madonna, Robert Palmer, David Bowie, Tina Turner,
Lionel Richie and Ray Charles all did Pepsi or Coke ads, while sixties anthems like the Beatles’ “Revolution” became
background music for Nike commercials.
During this same period, the Rolling Stones made music history by ushering in the era of the sponsored rock
tour —and fittingly, sixteen years later; it is still the Stones who are leading the charge into the latest innovation in
corporate rock: the band as brand extension. In 1981, Jovan —a distinctly un-rock-and-roll perfume company —
sponsored a Rolling Stones stadium tour, the first arrangement of its kind, though tame by today’s standards. Though
the company got its logos on a few ads and banners, there was a clear distinction between the band that had chosen to
“sell out” and the corporation that had paid a huge sum to associate itself with the inherent rebelliousness of rock.
This subordinate status might have been fine for a company out merely to move products, but when designer Tommy
Hilfiger decided that the energy of rock and rap would become his “brand essence,” he was looking for an integrated
experience, one more in tune with his own transcendent identity quest. The results were evident in the Stones’ Tommy
sponsored Bridges to Babylon tour in 1997. Not only did Hilfiger have a contract to clothe Mick Jagger, he also had
the same arrangement with the Stones’ opening act, Sheryl Crow — on stage, both modelled items from Tommy’s
newly launched “Rock V Roll Collection.”
It wasn’t until January 1999, however —when Hilfiger launched the ad campaign for the Stones’ No Security
Tour - that full brand-culture integration was achieved. In the ads, young, glowing Tommy models were pictured in
full-page frame “watching” a Rolling Stones concert taking place on the opposite page. The photographs of the band
members were a quarter of the size of those of the models. In some of the ads, the Stones were nowhere to be found
and the Tommy models alone were seen posing with their own guitars. In all cases, the ads featured a hybrid logo of
the Stones’ famous red tongue over Tommy’s trademarked red-white-and-blue flag. The tagline was “Tommy Hilfiger
Presents the Rolling Stones No Security Tour”-though there were no dates or locations for any tour stops, only the
addresses of flagship Tommy stores.
In other words, this wasn’t rock sponsorship; it was “live-action advertising,” as media consultant Michael J.
Wolf describes the ads. It’s clear from the campaign’s design that Hilfiger isn’t interested in buying a piece of someone
else’s act, even if they are the Rolling Stones. The act is a background set, powerfully showcasing the true rock-and-
roll essence of the Tommy brand; just one piece of Hilfiger’s larger project of cawing out a place in the music world,
not as a sponsor but as a player — much as Nike has achieved in the sports world.
The Hilfiger/Stones branding is only the highest-profile example of the new relationship between bands and
sponsors that is sweeping the music industry. For instance, it was a short step for Volkswagen — after using cutting-
edge electronic music in its ads for the new Beetle — to launch Drivers Fest ’99, a VW branded music festival in
Long Island, New York. Drivers Fest competes for ticket sales with the Mentos Freshmaker Tour, a two-year old
travelling music festival owned and branded by a breath-mint manufacturer — on the Mentos Web site, visitors are
invited to vote for which bands they want to play the venue. As with the Absolut Kelly Web site and the Altoids’
Curiously Strong art exhibition, these are not sponsored events: the brand is the event’s infrastructure; the artists are
its filler, a reversal in the power dynamic that makes any discussion of the need to protect unmarketed artistic space
appears hopelessly naive. This merging dynamic is clearest in the branded festivals being developed by the large beer
companies. Instead of merely playing in beer ads, as they likely would have in the eighties, acts like Hole, Sound
garden, David Bowie and the Chemical Brothers now play beer-company gigs. Molson Breweries, which owns 50
percent of Canada’s only national concert promoter, Universal Concerts, already has its name promoted almost every
time a rock or pop star gets up on stage in Canada — either through its Molson Canadian Rocks promotional arm or
its myriad venues: Molson Stage, Molson Park, Molson Amphitheatre.
For the first decade or so, this was a fine arrangement, but by the mid-nineties, Molson was tired of being
upstaged. Rock stars had an annoying tendency to hog the spotlight and, worse, sometimes they even insulted their
sponsors from the stage. Clearly fed up, in 1996 Molson held its first Blind Date Concert. The concept, which has
since been exported to the U.S. by sister company Miller Beer, is simple: hold a contest in which winners get to
attend an exclusive concert staged by Molson and Miller in a small club — much smaller than the venues where one
would otherwise see these megastars. And here’s the clincher: keep the name of the band secret until it steps on stage.
Anticipation mounts about the concert (helped along by national ad campaigns building up said anticipation), but the
name on everyone’s lips isn’t David Bowie, the Rolling Stones, Sound garden, 1NXS or any of the other bands that
have played the Dates, it’s Molson and Miller. No one, after all, knows who is going to play, but they know who is
putting on the show. With Blind Date, Molson and Miller invented a way to equate their brands with extremely popular
musicians, while still maintaining their competitive edge over the stars.”In a funny way,” says Universal Concerts’
Steve Herman, “the beer is bigger than the band.”
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The rock stars, turned into high-priced hired guns at Molson’s bar mitzvah party, continued to find sad little
ways to rebel. Almost every musician who played a Blind Date acted out: Courtney Love told a reporter, “God bless
Molson.... I douche with it.” The Sex Pistols’ Johnny Lydon screamed “Thank you for the money” from the stage, and
Soundgarden’s Chris Cornell told the crowd, “Yeah, we’re here because of some fucking beer company... Labatt’s.”
But the tantrums were all incidental to the main event, in which Molson and Miller were the real rock stars and it
didn’t really matter how those petulant rent-a-bands behaved.
Jack Rooney, Miller’s vice president of marketing, explains that his $200 million promotion budget goes
toward devising creative new ways to distinguish the Miller brand from the plethora of other brands in the marketplace.
“We’re competing not just against Coors and Corona,” he says, “but Coke, Nike and Microsoft.” Only he isn’t telling
the whole story. In Advertising Age’s annual “Top Marketing 100” list of 1997’s best brands there was a new arrival:
the Spice Girls (fittingly enough, since Posh Spice did once tell a reporter, “We wanted to be a ‘household name’.
Like Ajax.”) And the Spice Girls ranked number six in Forbes magazine’s inaugural “Celebrity Power 100,” in May
1999, a new ranking based not on fame or fortune but on stars’ brand “franchise.” The list was a watershed moment
incorporate history, marking the fact that, as Michael J. Wolf says, “Brands and stars have become the same thing.”
But when brands and stars are the same thing, they are also, at times, competitors in the high-stakes tussle for brand
awareness, a fact more consumer companies have become ready to admit. Canadian clothing company Club Monaco,
for instance, has never used celebrities in its campaigns. “We’ve thought about it,” says vice president Christine
Ralphs, “but whenever we go there, it always becomes more about the personality than the brand, and for us, we’re just
not willing to share that.”
There is good reason to be protective: though more and more clothing and candy companies seem intent on
turning musicians into their opening acts, bands and their record labels are launching their own challenges to this
demoted status. After seeing the enormous profits that the Gap and Tommy Hilfiger have made through their association
with the music world, record labels are barrelling into the branding business themselves.
Not only are they placing highly sophisticated cross-branding apparatus behind working musicians, but bands
are increasingly being conceived — and test-marketed — as brands first: the Spice Girls, the Backstreet Boys, 1M’
Sync, All Saints and so on. Prefab bands aren’t new to the music industry, and neither are bands with their own
merchandising lines, but the phenomenon has never dominated pop culture as it has at the end of the nineties, and
musicians have never before competed so aggressively with consumer brands. Sean “Puffy” Combs has leveraged his
celebrity as a rapper and record producer into a magazine, several restaurants, a clothing label and a line of frozen
foods. And Raekwon, of the rap group Wu-Tang Clan, explains that “the music, movies, the clothing, it is all part of the
pie we’re making. In the year 2005 we might have Wu-Tang furniture for sale at Nordstrom.” Whether it’s the Gap or
Wu-Tang Clan, the only remaining relevant question in the sponsorship debate seems to be, where do you have the
guts to draw the borders around your brand?
Nike and the Branding of Sports
Inevitably, any discussion about branded celebrity leads to the same place: Michael Jordan, the man who
occupies the number-one spot on all of those ranking lists, who has incorporated himself into the JORDAN brand,
whose agent coined the term “superbrand” to describe him. But no discussion of Michael Jordan’s brand potential can
begin without the brand that branded him: Nike. Nike has successfully upstaged sports on a scale that makes the
breweries’ rock-star aspirations look like amateur night. Now of course pro sports, like big-label music, is in essence
a profit-driven enterprise, which is why the Nike story has less to teach us about the loss of unmarketed space —
space that, arguably, never even existed in this context —than it does about the mechanics of branding and its powers
of eclipse. A company that swallows cultural space in giant gulps, Nike is the definitive story of the transcendent
nineties superbrand, and more than any other single company, its actions demonstrate how branding seeks to erase all
boundaries between the sponsor and the sponsored. This is a shoe company that is determined to unseat pro sports,
the Olympics and even star athletes, to become the very definition of sports itself. Nike CEO Phil Knight started
selling running shoes in the sixties, but he didn’t strike it rich until high-tech sneakers became the must-have accessory
of America’s jogging craze. But when jogging subsided in the mid-eighties and Reebok cornered the market on trendy
aerobics shoes, Nike was left with a product destined for the great dustbin of yuppie fads. Rather than simply switching
to a different kind of sneaker, Knight decided that running shoes should become peripheral in a reincarnated Nike.
Leave sneakers to Reebok and Adidas-Nike would transform itself into what Knight calls “the world’s best sports and
Fitness Company.”
The corporate mythology has it that Nike is a sports and fitness company because it was built by a bunch of
jocks who loved sports and were fanatically devoted to the worship of superior athletes. In reality, Nike’s project was
a little more complicated and can be separated into three guiding principles. First, turn a select group of athletes into
Hollywood-style superstars who are associated not with their teams or even, at times, with their sport, but instead
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with certain pure ideas about athleticism as transcendence and perseverance — embodiments of the Greco-Roman
ideal of the perfect male form. Second, pit Nike’s “Pure Sports” and its team of athletic superstars against the rule
obsessed established sporting world. Third, and most important, brand like mad.
Step 1: Create Sport Celebrities
I wake up every morning, jump in the shower, look down at the symbol, and that pumps me up for the
day. It’s to remind me every day what I have to do, which is, “Just Do It.”
--Twenty-four-year-old Internet entrepreneur Carmine Collettion on his decision to get a Nike swoosh
tattooed on his navel, December 1997
It was Michael Jordan’s extraordinary basketball skill that catapulted Nike to branded heaven, but it was
Nike’s commercials that made Jordan a global superstar. It’s true that gifted athletes like Babe Ruth and Muhammad
Ali were celebrities before Nike’s time, but they never reached Jordan’s otherworldly level of fame. That stratum was
reserved for movie and pop stars, which had been transformed by the special effects, art direction and careful
cinematography of films and music videos. Sport stars pre-Nike, no matter how talented or worshiped, were still
stuck on the ground. Football, hockey and baseball may have been ubiquitous on television, but televised sports were
just real-time play-by-plays, which were often tedious, sometimes exciting and high tech only in the slow-mo replay.
As for athletes endorsing products, their advertisements and commercials couldn’t quite be described as cutting-
edge star creation — whether it was Wilt Chamberlain goofily grinning from a box of Wheaties or Rocket Richard
being sentenced to “two minutes forlooking so good” in Grecian Formula commercials.
Nike’s 1985 TV spots for Michael Jordan brought sports into the entertainment world: the freeze frame, the
close-up and the quick cuts that allowed Jordan to appear to be suspended in mid-jump, providing the stunning illusion
that he could actually take flight. The idea of harnessing sport-shoe technology to create a superior being — of
Michael Jordan flying through the air in suspended animation — was Nike myth making at work. These commercials
were the first rock videos about sports and they created something entirely new. As Michael Jordan says, “What Phil
[Knight] and Nike have done is turn me into a dream.”
Many of Nike’s most famous TV commercials have used Nike superstars to convey the idea of sports, as
opposed to simply representing the best of the athlete’s own team sport. Spots often feature famous athletes playing
a game other than the one they play professionally, such as tennis pro Andre Agassi showing off his version of “rock-
and-roll golf.” And then there was the breakthrough “Bo Knows” campaign, which lifted baseball and football player
Bo Jackson out of his two professional sports and presented him instead as the perfect all-around cross-trainer. A
series of quick-cut interviews with Nike stars —McEnroe, Jordan, Gretzky — ironically suggested that Jackson
knew their sports better than they did. “Bo knows tennis,” “Bo knows basketball” and so on.
At the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Nike took this strategy out of the controlled environment of its TV
commercials and applied it to a real sports competition. The experiment started in 1995 when Nike’s marketing
department dreamed up the idea of turning a couple of Kenyan runners into Africa’s first Olympic ski team. As Mark
Bossardet, Nike’s director of global athletics, explained, “We were sitting around the office one day and we said,
‘What if we took Kenyan runners and transferred their skills to cross country skiing?’” Kenyan runners, who have
dominated cross-country track-and-field competitions at the Olympics since 1968, have always represented the
“idea of sports” at Nike headquarters. (“Where’s the Kenyans running?” Phil Knight has been heard to demand after
viewing a Nike ad deemed insufficiently inspiring and heroic. In Nike shorthand it means, “Where’s the Spirit of
Sports?”). So according to Nike marketing logic, if two Kenyan runners -living specimens of sports incarnate —were
plucked out of their own sport and out of their country and their native climate, and dumped on a frozen Mountain top,
and if they were then able to transfer their agility, strength and endurance to cross-country skiing, their success would
represent a moment of pure sporting transcendence. It would be a spiritual transformation of Man over nature, birthright,
nation and petty sports bureaucrats — brought to the world by Nike, of course. “Nike always felt sports shouldn’t have
boundaries,” the swooshed press release announced. Finally there would be proof.
And if nothing else, Nike would get its name in lots of quirky human-interest sidebar stories—just like the
wacky Jamaican bobsled team that hogged the headlines at the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary. What sports reporter
could resist the heart-warmer of Africa’s first ski team? Nike found its test-tube subjects in two mid-level runners,
Philip Boit and Henry Bitok. Since Kenya has no snow, no ski federation and no training facilities, Nike financed the
entire extravagant affair, dishing out $250,000 for training in Finland and custom-designed uniforms, and paying the
runners a salary to live away from their families. When Nagano rolled around, Bitok didn’t qualify and Boit finished
last-a full twenty minutes after the gold medal winner, Bjorn Daehlie of Norway. It turns out that cross-country
running and cross country skiing — despite the similarity of their names — require entirely different sets of skills
and use different muscles.
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But that was beside the point. Before the race began, Nike held a press conference at its Olympic headquarters,
catered the event with Kenyan food and beer and showed reporters a video of the Kenyans encountering snow for the
first time, skiing into bushes and falling on their butts. The journalists also heard accounts of how the climate change
was so dramatic that the Kenyans’ skin cracked and their fingernails and toenails fell off, but “now,” as Boit said, “I
love snow. Without snow, I could not do my sport.” As the Tampa Tribune of February 12, 1998, put it, “They’re just
two kooky Kenyans trying to make it in the frozen tundra.”
It was quintessential Nike branding: by equating the company with athletes and athleticism at such a primal
level, Nike ceased merely to clothe the game and started to play it. And once Nike was in the game with its athletes,
it could have fanatical sports fans instead of customers.
Step 2: Destroy the Competition
Like any competitive sports player, Nike has its work cut out for it: winning. But winning for Nike is about
much more than sneaker wars. Of course Nike can’t stand Adidas, Fila and Reebok, but more important, Phil Knight
has sparred with sports agents, whose individual greed, he claims, puts them “inherently in conflict with the interests
of athletes at every turn”; the NBA, which he feels has unfairly piggybacked on Nike’s star-creation machinery; and
the International Olympic Committee, whose elitism and corruption Knight derided long before the organization’s
1999 bribery scandals. In Nike’s world, all of the official sports clubs, associations and committees are actually
trampling the spirit of sports — a spirit Nike alone truly embodies and appreciates.
So at the same time as Nike’s myth machine was fabricating the idea of Team Nike, Nike’s corporate team
was dreaming up ways to play a more central role in pro sports. First Nike tried to unseat the sports agents by starting
an agency of its own, not only to represent athletes in contract negotiation but also to develop integrated marketing
strategies for its clients that are sure to complement —not dilute —Nike’s own branding strategy, often by pushing
its own ad concepts on other companies.
Then there was a failed attempt to create — and own — a college football version of the Super Bowl (the
Nike Bowl), and in 1992, Nike did buy the Ben Hogan golf tour and rename it the Nike Tour. “We do these things to
be in the sport. We’re in sports — that’s what we do,” Knight told reporters at the time. That is certainly what they did
when Nike and rival Adidas made up their own sporting event to settle a grudge match over who could claim the title
“fastest man alive” in their ads: Nike’s Michael Johnson or Adidas’s Donovan Bailey. Because the two compete in
different categories (Bailey in the 100- meter, Johnson in the 200), the sneaker brands agreed to split the difference
and had the men compete in a made-up 150-meter race. Adidas won.
When Phil Knight faces the inevitable criticism from sports purists that he is having an undue influence on
the games he sponsors, his stock response is that “the athlete remains our reason for being.” But as the company’s
encounter with star basketball player Shaquille O’Neal shows, Nike is only devoted to a certain kind of athlete.
Company biographer Donald Katz describes the tense meeting between O’Neals manager, Leonard Armato, and Nike’s
marketing team:
Shaq had observed the explosion of the sports-marketing scene (“He took sports-marketing courses,”
Armato says) and the rise of Michael Jordan, and he’d decided that rather than becoming a part of
several varied corporate marketing strategies, an array of companies might be assembled as part
of a brand presence that was he. Consumer products companies would become part of Team Shaq,
rather than the other way around. “We’re looking for consistency of image,” Armato would say as
he began collecting the team on Shaq’s behalf. “Like Mickey Mouse.”
The only problem was that at Nike headquarters, there is no Team Shaq, only Team Nike.Nike took a pass and
handed over the player many thought would be the next Michael Jordan to Reebok —not “Nike material,” they said.
According to Katz, Knight’s mission “from the beginning had been to build a pedestal for sports such as the world had
never seen.” But at Nike Town in Manhattan, the pedestal is not holding up Michael Jordan, or the sport of basketball,
but a rotating Nike sneaker. Like a prima Donna, it sits in the spotlight, the first celebrity shoe.
Step 3: Sell Pieces of the Brand as If It Was the Berlin Wall
Nothing embodies the era of the brand like Nike Town, the company’s chain of flagship retail outlets. Each
one is a shrine, a place set apart for the faithful, a mausoleum. The Manhattan Nike Town on East Fifty-seventh Street
is more than a fancy store fitted with the requisite brushed chrome and blond wood, it is a temple, where the swoosh
is worshiped as both art and heroic symbol. The swoosh is equated with Sports at every turn: in reverent glass display
cases depicting “The definition of an athlete”; in the inspirational quotes about “Courage,” “Honour,” “Victory” and
“Teamwork” inlaid in the floorboards; and in the building’s dedication “to all athletes and their dreams.”
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I asked a salesperson if there was anything amid the thousands of T-shirts, bathing suits, sports bras or socks
that did not have a Nike logo on the outside of the garment. He racked his brain. T-shirts, no. Shoes, no. Track suits?
No. “Why?” he finally asked, sounding a bit hurt. “Is somebody allergic to the swoosh?” Nike, king of the super
brands, is like an inflated Pac-Man, so driven to consume it does so not out of malice but out of jaw-clenching reflex.
It is ravenous by nature. It seems fitting that Nike’s branding strategy involves an icon that looks like a check mark.
Nike is checking off the spaces as it swallows them: superstores? Check. Hockey? Baseball? Soccer? Check. Check.
Check. T-shirts? Check. Hats? Check. Underwear? Check.
Schools? Bathrooms? Shaved into brush cuts? Check. Check. Check. Since Nike has been the leader in
branding clothing, it’s not surprising that it has also led the way to the brand’s final frontier: the branding of flesh. Not
only do dozens of Nike employees have a swoosh tattooed on their calves, but tattoo parlours all over North America
report that the swoosh has become their most popular item. Human branding? Check.
The Branded Star
There is another reason behind Nike’s stunning success at disseminating its brand. The superstar athletes
who form the building blocks of its image — those creatures invented by Nike and cloned by Adidas and Fila — have
proved uniquely positioned to soar in the era of synergy: they are made to be cross-promoted. The Spice Girls can
make movies, and film stars can walk the runways but neither can quite win an Olympic medal. It’s more practical for
Dennis Rodman to write two books, star in two movies and have his own television show than it is for Martin Amis or
Seinfeld to play defence for the Bulls, just as it is easier for Shaquille O’Neal to put out a rap album than it is for
Sporty Spice to make the NBA draft. Only animated characters — another synergy favourite — are more versatile
than sports stars in the synergy game.
But for Nike, there is a downside to the power of its own celebrity endorsers. Though Phil Knight will never
admit it, Nike is no longer just competing with Reebok, Adidas and the NBA; it has also begun to compete with
another brand: its name is Michael Jordan. In the three years before he retired, Jordan was easing away from his
persona as Nike incarnate and turning himself into what his agent, David Falk, calls a “superbrand.” He refused to go
along when Nike entered the sports-agent business, telling the company that it would have to compensate him for
millions of dollars in lost revenue. Instead of letting Nike manage his endorsement portfolio, he tried to build synergy
deals between his various sponsors, including a bizarre attempt to persuade Nike to switch phone companies when he
became a celebrity spokesperson for WorldCom. Other highlights of what Falk terms “Michael Jordan’s Corporate
Partnership Program” include a WorldCom commercial in which the actors are decked out in Oakley sunglasses and
Wilson sports gear, both Jordan-endorsed products. And, of course, the movie Space Jam — in which the basketball
player starred and which Falk executive-produced — was Jordan’s comingout party as his own brand. The movie
incorporated plugs for each of Jordan’s sponsors (choice dialogue includes “Michael, it’s show time. Get your Hanes
on, lace up your Nikes, grab your Wheaties and Gatorade and we’ll pick up a Big Mac on the way!”), and McDonald’s
promoted the event with Space Jam toys and Happy Meals.
Nike had been playing up Jordan’s business ambitions in its “CEO Jordan” commercials, which show him
changing into a suit and racing to his office at halftime. But behind the scenes, the company has always resented
Jordan’s extra-Nike activities. Donald Katz writes that as early as 1992, “Knight believed that Michael Jordan was no
longer, in sports-marketing nomenclature, ‘clean.’” Significantly, Nike boycotted the co-branding bonanza that
surrounded Space Jam. Unlike McDonald’s, it didn’t use the movie in tie-in commercials, despite the fact that Space
Jam is based on a series of Nike commercials featuring Jordan and Bugs Bunny. When Falk told Advertising Age that
“Nike had some reservations about the implementation of the movie,” he was exercising considerable restraint. Jim
Riswold, the long-time Nike adman who first conceived of pairing Jordan with Bugs Bunny in the shoe commercials,
complained to The Wall Street Journal that Space Jam “is a merchandising bonanza first and a movie second. The idea
is to sell lots of product.” It was a historic moment in the branding of culture, completely inverting the traditionally
fraught relationship between art and commerce: a shoe company and an ad agency huffing and puffing that a Hollywood
movie would sully the purity of their commercials.
For the time being at least, a peace has descended between the warring super brands. Nike has given Jordan
more leeway to develop his own apparel brand, still within the Nike Empire but with greater independence. In the
same week that he retired from basketball, Jordan announced that he would be extending the JORDAN clothing line
from basketball gear into lifestyle wear, competing directly with Polo, Hilfiger and Nautica. Settling into his role as
CEO — as opposed to celebrity endorser — he signed up other pro athletes to endorse the JORDAN brand: Derek
Jeter, a shortstop for the Mew York Yankees and boxer Roy Jones Jr. And, as of May 1999, the full JORDAN brand is
showcased in its own “retail concept shops” — two in New York and one in Chicago, with plans for up to fifty outlets
by the end of the year 2000. Jordan finally had his wish: to be his own freestanding brand, complete with celebrity
endorsers.
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The Age of the Brandasaurus
On the surface, the power plays between millionaire athletes and billion-dollar companies would seem to
have little to do with the loss of unmarketed space that is the subject of this section. Jordan and Nike, however, are
only the most broad strokes, manifestations of the way in which the branding imperative changes the way we imagine
both sponsor and sponsored to the extent that the idea of unbranded space — music that is distinct from khakis,
festivals that are not extensions of beer brands, athletic achievement that is celebrated in and of itself—becomes
almost unthinkable. Jordan and Nike are emblematic of a new paradigm that eliminates all barriers between branding
and culture, leaving no room whatsoever for unmarketed space.
An understanding is beginning to emerge that fashion designers, running-shoe companies, media outlets,
cartoon characters and celebrities of all kinds are all more or less in the same business: the business of marketing
their brands. That’s why in the early nineties, Creative Artists Agency, the most powerful celebrity agency in Hollywood,
began to represent not just celebrity people, but celebrity brands: Coke, Apple and even an alliance with Nike. That’s
why Benetton, Microsoft and Starbucks have leapfrogged over the “magalog” trend and have gone full force into the
magazine publishing business: Benetton with Colours, Microsoft with the on-line zine Slate and Starbucks with Joe,
a joint venture with Time Inc. That’s why teen sensation Britney Spears and sitcom character Ally McBeal each have
their own line of designer clothing; why Tommy Hilfiger has helped launch a record label; and rapper Master P has his
own sports agency business. It’s also why Ralph Lauren has a line of designer household paints, Brooks Brothers has
a line of wines, Nike is set to launch a swooshed cruise ship, and auto-parts giant Magna is opening up an amusement
park. It is also why market consultant Faith Popcorn has launched her own brand of leather Cocooning armchairs,
named after the trend she coined of the same name, and Fashion Licensing of America Inc. is marketing a line of
Ernest Hemingway furniture, designed to capture the “brand personality” of the late writer.
As manufacturers and entertainers swap roles and move together toward the creation of branded lifestyle
bubbles, Nike executives predict that their “competition in the future [will] be Disney, not Reebok.” And it seems
only fitting that just as Nike enters the entertainment business, the entertainment giants have decided to try their hand
at the sneaker industry. In October 1997, Warner Brothers launched a low-end basketball shoe, endorsed by Shaquille
O’Neal. “It’s an extension of what we do at retail,” explained Dan Romanelli of Warner Consumer products.
It seems that wherever individual brands began — in shoes, sports, retail, food, music or cartoons — the
most successful among them have all landed in the same place: the stratosphere of the superbrand. That is where Mick
Jagger struts in Tommy Hilfiger, Steven Spielberg and Coke have the same agent, Shaq wants to be “like Mickey
Mouse,” and everyone has his or her own branded restaurant — from Jordan to Disney to Demi Moore to Puffy
Combs and the supermodels.
It was Michael Ovitz, of course, who came up with the blueprint for the highest temple of branding so far,
one that would do for music, sports and fashion what Walt Disney long ago did for kids’ cartoons: turn the slick world
of television into a real-world branded environment. After leaving Creative Artists Agency in August 1995 and being
driven out as president of Disney shortly after, Ovitz took his unprecedented $87 million golden handshake and
launched a new venture: entertainment- and sports-themed mega malls, a synthesis of pro sports, Hollywood celebrity
and shopping. His vision is of an unholy mixture of Nike Town, Planet Hollywood and the NBA’s marketing wing —
all leading straight to the cash register. The first venture, a 1.5-million-square-foot theme mall in Columbus, Ohio, is
scheduled to open in the year 2000. If Ovitz gets his way, another mall, planned for the Los Angeles area, will include
an NFL football stadium.
As these edifices of the future suggest, corporate sponsors and the culture they brand have fused together to
create a third culture: a self-enclosed universe of brand-name people, brand-name products and brand-name media.
Interestingly, a 1995 study conducted by University of Missouri professor Roy F. Fox shows that many kids grasp the
unique ambiguities of this sphere intuitively. The study found that a majority of Missoui high-school students who
watched Channel One’s mix of news and ads in their classrooms thought that sports stars paid shoe companies to be
in their commercials. “I don’t know why athletes do that —pay all that money for all them ignorant commercials for
themselves. Guess it makes everyone like ‘em more and like their teams more.” So opined Debbie, a ninth-grader and
one of the two hundred students who participated in the study. For Fox, the comment demonstrates a disturbing lack
of media literacy, proof positive that kids can’t critically evaluate the advertising they see on television. But perhaps
these findings show that kids understand something most of us still refuse to grasp. Maybe they know that sponsorship
is a far more complicated process than the buyer/ seller dichotomy that existed in previous decades and that to talk of
who sold out or bought in has become impossibly anachronistic. In an era in which people are brands and brands are
culture, what Nike and Michael Jordan do is more akin to co-branding than straight-up shilling, and while the Spice
Girls may be doing Pepsi today, they could easily launch their own Spice Cola tomorrow.
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It makes a good deal of sense that high-school kids would have a more realistic grasp of the absurdities of
branded life. They, after all, are the ones who grew up sold.
Top: Virgin’s Richard Branson, the rock-and-roll CEO. Bottom: Revolution Soda Co.’s consumable Che.
Q.2: What is the name of the shirt with the logo alligator on it?
A. Nike B. Lacoste
C. Puma D. Versace
Q.3: What was the punch line of the brand “GAP”?
A. “Who wore Khakis?” B “Brand of Youngsters”
C. “Just Do It” D. “Nothing is Impossible”
4.4 SUMMARY
When Naomi Klein was in Grade 4 skintight designer jeans were extremely popular and everyone spent a lot
of time checking out each other’s bottoms for logos. One person in her class would wander from student to student
turning back the collars on sweaters and polo shirts. It wasn’t enough that there was an alligator or leaping horseman
on the shirt – it could be a knockoff. She wanted to see the label behind the logo. They were only eight years old, but
the reign of logo terror had begun. Nine years later, when Naomi was working at an Esprit clothing store in Montreal,
mothers would come in with their six-year-old daughters and ask to see only the shirts that said “Esprit” in the
company’s trademark bold block lettering. “She won’t wear anything without a name,” the moms confided
apologetically. It’s no secret that branding has become far more widespread and intrusive by now. Labels like Baby
Gap and Gap Newborn imprint brand awareness on toddlers and turn babies into mini-billboards. This is the age where
a seven-year-old marks his homework not with checkmarks, but with little red Nike swooshes. Until the early seventies,
logos on clothes were generally hidden from view, discreetly placed on the inside of the collar. Small designer
emblems did appear on the outside of shirts in the first half of the century, but such sporty attire was pretty much
restricted to the golf courses and tennis courts of the rich.
In the late seventies, when the fashion world rebelled against Aquarian flamboyance, the country-club wear
of the fifties became mass style for the newly conservative parents and their preppy kids. Ralph Lauren’s Polo horseman
and Izod Lacoste’s alligator escaped from the golf course and scurried into the streets, dragging the logo decisively
onto the outside of the shirt. These logos served the same social function as keeping the clothing’s price tag on:
everyone knew precisely what premium the wearer was willing to pay for style. By the mid-eighties, Lacoste and
Ralph Lauren were joined by Calvin Klein, Esprit and, in Canada, Roots; gradually, the logo was transformed from an
ostentatious affectation to an active fashion accessory. Most significantly, the logo itself was growing in size,
ballooning from a three quarter-inch eblem into a chest-sized marquee. This process of logo inflation is still
progressing, and none is more bloated than Tommy Hilfiger, who has managed to pioneer a clothing style that
transforms its faithful adherents into walking, talking, life-sized Tommy dolls, mummified in fully branded Tommy
worlds. This scaling-up of the logo’s role has been so dramatic that it has become a change in substance. Over the past
decade and a half, logos have grown so dominant that they have essentially transformed the clothing on which they
appear into empty carriers for the brands they represent. The metaphorical alligator, in other words, has risen up and
swallowed the literal shirt. This trajectory mirrors the larger transformation our culture has undergone since Marlboro
Friday, sparked by a stampede of manufacturers looking to replace their cumbersome product-production apparatus
with transcendent brand names and to infuse their brands with deep, meaningful messages.
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By the mid-nineties, companies like Nike, Polo and Tommy Hilfiger were ready to take branding to the next
level: no longer simply branding their own products, but branding the outside culture as well – by sponsoring cultural
events, they could go out into the world and claim bits of it as brand-name outposts. For these companies, branding
was not just a matter of adding value to a product. It was about thirstily soaking up cultural ideas and iconography that
their brands could reflect by projecting these ideas and images back on the culture as “extensions” of their brands.
Culture, in other words, would add value to their brands. For example, Onute Miller, senior brand manager for Tequila
Sauza, explains that her company sponsored a risqué photo exhibit by George Holz because “art was a natural synergy
with our product.” Branding’s current state of cultural expansionism is about much more than traditional corporate
sponsorships: the classic arrangement in which a company donates money to an event in exchange for seeing its logo
on a banner or in a program. Rather, this is the Tommy Hilfiger approach of full-frontal branding, applied now to
cityscapes, music, art, films, community events, magazines, sports and schools. This ambitious project makes the
logo the central focus of everything it touches- not an add-on or a happy association, but the main attraction.
Advertising and sponsorship have always been about using imagery to equate products with positive cultural
or social experiences. What makes current branding different is that it increasingly seeks to take these associations
out of the representational realm and make them a lived reality. So the goal is not merely to have child actors drinking
Coke in a TV commercial, but for students to brainstorm concepts for Coke’s next ad campaign in English class. It
transcends logo-festooned Roots clothing designed to conjure memories of summer camp and reaches out to build
an actual Roots country lodge that becomes a 3D manifestation of the Roots brand concept. Disney transcends its
sports network ESPN, a channel for guys who like to sit around in sports bars screaming at the TV, and launches a line
of ESPN Sports Bars, complete with giant-screen TVs.
The branding process reaches beyond heavily marketed Swatch watches and launches “Internet time,” a new
venture for the Swatch Group, which divides the day into one thousand “Swatch beats.” The Swiss company is now
attempting to convince the on-line world to abandon the traditional clock and switch to its time-zone-free, branded
time. The effect, if not always the original intent, of advance branding is to nudge the hosting culture into the background
and make the brand the star. It is not to sponsor culture but to be the culture. And why shouldn’t it be? If brands are not
products but ideas, attitudes, values and experiences, why can’t they be culture too? As we will see later in this article,
this project has been so successful that the lines between corporate sponsors and sponsored culture have entirely
disappeared. But this conflation has not been a one way process, with passive artists allowing themselves to be shoved
into the background by aggressive multinational corporations.
Rather, many artists, media personalities, film directors and sports stars have been racing to meet the
corporations halfway in the branding game. Michael Jordan, Puff Daddy, Martha Stewart, Austin Powers, Brandy and
Star Wars now mirror the corporate structure of corporations like Nike and the Gap, and they are just as captivated by
the prospect of developing and leveraging their own branding potential as the product-based manufacturers. So what
was once a process of selling culture to a sponsor for a price has been supplanted by the logic of “co-branding” – a
fluid partnership between celebrity people and celebrity brands. The project of transforming culture into little more
than a collections of brand extensions-in-waiting would not have been possible without the deregulation and privatization
policies of the past three decades. In Canada under Brian Mulroney, in the U.S. under Ronald Reagan and in Britain
under Margaret Thatcher (and in many other parts of the world as well), corporate taxes were dramatically lowered, a
move that eroded the tax base and gradually starved out the public sector. As government spending dwindled, schools,
museums and broadcasters were desperate to make up their budget shortfalls and thus ripe for partnerships with
private corporations. It also didn’t hurt that the political climate during this time ensured that there was almost no
vocabulary to speak passionately about the value of a non-commercialized public sphere. This was the time of the Big
Government bogeyman and deficit hysteria, when any political move that was not overtly designed to increase the
freedom of corporations was vilified as an endorsement of national bankruptcy. It was against this backdrop that, in
rapid order, sponsorship went from being a rare occurrence (in the 1970s) to an exploding growth industry (by the
mid-eighties), picking up momentum in 1984 at the Los Angeles Olympics.
At first, these arrangements seemed win-win: the cultural or educational institution in question received
much-needed funds and the sponsoring corporation was compensated with some modest form of public
acknowledgement and a tax break. And, in fact, many of these new public-private arrangements were just that simple,
successfully retaining a balance between the cultural event or institution’s independence and the sponsor’s desire for
credit, often helping to foster a revival of arts accessible to the general public. Successes like these are frequently
overlooked by critics of commercialization, among whom there is an unfortunate tendency to tar all sponsorship with
the same brush, as if any contact with a corporate logo infects the natural integrity of an otherwise pristine public
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event or cause. Writing in The Commercialization of American Culture, advertising critic Matthew McAllister labels
corporate sponsorship “control behind a philanthropic façade.” He states that the corporation is elevated with
sponsorship and the sponsor is devalued in the long run because, in the sponsor’s mind and in the symbolism of the
event, the events exist to promote the corporation. “It is not Art for Art’s Sake as much as Art for Ad’s Sake.” The art
is taken over by the commercial. “Every time the commercial intrudes on the culture, the integrity of the public
sphere is weakened because of the obvious encroachment of corporate promotion.”
Culture hasn’t always been the pure public symbol of integrity as McAllister seems to suggest. Powerful
people and organizations for thousands of years have hired creative people to create what we now consider culture.
Of course there are some forms of corporate sponsorship that are inherently insidious – the tobacco industry’s
corralling of the arts springs to mind. But not all sponsorship deals should be so easily dismissed. Not only are such
broad strokes unfair to worthy projects but, perhaps more important, they can prevent us from seeing changes in the
field. If all corporate sponsorship arrangements are regarded as equally compromised, it becomes easy not to notice
when the role of the corporate sponsor begins to expand and change – which is precisely what happened in the
nineties as global corporate sponsorship ballooned from a $7 billion-a-year industry in 1991 to a $19.2 billion one in
1999. When sponsorship took off as a stand-in for public funds in the mid-eighties, many corporation that had been
experimenting with the practice ceased to see sponsorship as a hybrid of philanthropy and image promotion and
began to treat it more purely as a marketing tool, and a highly effective one at that. As its promotional value grew – and
as dependency on sponsorship revenue increased in the cultural industries – the delicate dynamic between sponsors
The separation of brand and product
Klein explores the ideal that a brand is not created in the factory anymore; it’s created in the office. The
brand is not a reflection of quality but a reflection of what the marketing department wants it to stand for. We’re not
producing things, but images of things. The inconvenience of production is contracted out. Klein uses Nike as an
example of this. Nike uses third world labour to produce its products. They have used abusive sweatshops in Vietnam
perhaps more interested in how much they can spend on branding than they need to on production. John Ermatinger,
from Livi Struass, referred to this as greater flexibility to allocate resources and capital to its brands.
It does seem odd that so many have favoured a specific brand but for reasons that couldn’t be further removed
from manufacturer quality. More alarmingly though is the conditions that a significant number of these contractors
maintain in their factories.
To illustrate this point Klein provides an example of a factory in China called the Liang Shi Handbag Factory
which produces Kathie Lee handbags for Wal-Mart. Wages per hour are $0.13-$0.23, 60-70 hours a week, 6 days a
week with 10 hour shifts. Workers have no legal contract and the dorms are dirty and 10 per room.
The marketing of cool to the young
The source of marketing to youth, Klein reports is the identity crises brands suffered when the baby boomers
fell off the consumer spectrum. As the baby boomers moved into old age and many passed away, brands had to find
new markets. Brill Cream took years to recover from this.
In the 1990’s brands that thrived included “beers, soft drinks, fast food, chewing gum and sneakers”.
“Kids would still pay up to fit in”. “Peer pressure became a powerful marketing tool”. Clothing retailing Elsie
Decoteau said of teenagers: “they shop in packs… if you sell to one you sell to everyone in their school” Klein
likens this to extreme keeping-up-with-the-Joneses. Klein astutely points out that cool is “riddled with self doubt”
therefore the brand has a stake in self doubt of teenagers.
The purpose of Marketing Cool, or Marketing cool to young adults is to perpetuate this ideal that through the right
purchasing one can reach that just out of reach untapped well of cool. Klein discusses the morality of this type of
marketing to insecure teenagers. Marketing is articulating what the ideal of beauty is with the motivation of profit;
and this to a demographic which needs no encouragement to be insecure.
Perhaps related to this is the “peculiar cachet of working class kids acquiring status by adopting the gear
of prohibitively costly leisure activities such as skiing, golf or sailing”.
4.6 GLOSSARY
Hybrid : offspring resulting from cross-breeding different entities
Corporate : unified into one body
Revenue : the income returned by an investment
Brand : a name, symbol, logo or other item used to distinguish a product or service, or its
provider.
119
Manifestation : apparent, clear, and obvious
Attire : dress
Swooshed : move with a rushing sound
Philanthropy : the desire to promote the welfare of others, expressed especially by the generous
donation of money to good causes.
Alienation : the state of being withdrawn, or isolated from the objective world, as through
indifference or disaffection
Mummified : preserve (a body) by embalming and wrapping it in cloth
Conglomerates : a thing consisting of a number of different and distinct parts or items that are
grouped together
Imitators : to copy the mannerisms or speech of
Bonanza : a situation which creates a sudden increase in wealth, good fortune, or profits
Catchet : the state of being respected or admired; prestige
Pariah : an outcast
Sponsorship : financial support received from a sponsor
Transcend : be or go beyond the range or limits of
Disseminating : spread (something, especially information) widely
Resentful : feeling or expressing bitterness or indignation at having been treated unfairly
Renaissance : rebirth. The revival of European art and literature under the influence of classical
models in the 14th–16th centuries.
Sparred : make the motions of boxing without landing heavy blows, as a form of training
Illusion : an instance of a wrong or misinterpreted perception of a sensory experience
1. (A), 2. (B), 3. (A)
4.8 QUESTIONS
1. What are a couple of examples of “branding” of children that Naomi Klein points out early in her article?
2. Before the Early seventies, how were logos on clothing displayed?
3. What functions did logos play on clothing after the late seventies?
4. Physically, what was happening to logos on clothing?
5. What major problem does Klein see with corporations (such as Tommy Hilfiger) sponsoring events?
6. Please explain how Coke, Roots, Disney and Swatch have moved their marketing from the world of media into
the “real world”?
7. What did Mulroney and Reagan and Thatcher do that has allowed corporations to sponsor schools, museums
and broadcasters as never before?
8. What is a historical example Klein uses when discussing sponsorship of cultural products?
9. Instead of simply sponsoring cultural events corporations are running their own cultural events like Molson
and Miller rock concerts or Altoids art displays. Klein has a difficult time explaining clearly why this is a
problem. In your own words, based on the information in the article, explain why this trend threatens our
cultural events.
4.9 SOURCES/ SUGGESTED READINGS
1. https://lewmass.blogspot.com/2010/10/brand-expands.html
2. https://brainly.in/question/8679544
http://ems3oi.weebly.com/
https://archive.org/
http://dannyreviews.com/
https://en.wikipedia.org/
*****
120
ASSIGNMENT
Paper Code: ENG DSC 102/ ENG HONS. GE 101

DSC-IA English Literature-1
(Essays, Stories and Poems)
Note:
1. A student has to attempt any five assignment questions out of each course.
2. Each assignment questions carries six marks.
1. Write the critical and brief analysis on “A Prayer for my Daughter.”

2. Discuss briefly the plight of Omprakash Valmiki as a Dalit.
3. What is the central idea in the poem “Still I Rise” by Maya Angelou?
4. Discuss the status of women as described in prose poem “The Girl.”
5. Discuss how the logic of national boundaries seems to extend to the animal kingdom in the story. How
does Manto use this idea to show the senselessness of violence and its effect on its victim?
6. Explore how Edna St. Vincent Millay presents her ideas about violence in “Conscientious Objector.”
*****
121
CONTENTS
SR.NO. TOPIC PAGE NO.
UNIT-I
Syllabus 1
Lesson-1 Deliverance’ - Premchand 2
Lesson-2 Deliverance’- Premchand 7
Lesson-3 General Introduction to Dalit Literature 10
Lesson-4 Omprakash Valmiki’s Joothan 14
Lesson-5 Kallu – Ismat Chugtai 19
Lesson-6 Bosom Friend - Hira Bandose 25
UNIT-II
Lesson-1 "GIRL" Jamaica Kincaid 28
Lesson-2 “A PRAYER FOR MY DAUGHTER”: W.B Yeats 32
Lesson-3 “YELLOW FISH”: Ambai 37
Lesson-4 “REICARNATION OF CAPTAIN COOK”: Margaret Atwood 41
UNIT-III
Lesson-1 “Blackout” by Roger Mais 45
Lesson-2 “Blackout” by Roger Mais. 49
Lesson-3 “Telephone Conversation” 53
Lesson-4 “Harlem” 58
Lesson-5 “Still I Rise” 62
Lesson-6 ‘Still I Rise’ 67
UNIT-IV
Lesson-1 “Conscientious Objector” by Edna St. Vincent Millay 72
Lesson-2 “General, Your Tank is a Powerful Vehicle” by Bertolt Brecht 76
Lesson-3 “The Dog of Tetwal” by Sa’adat Hasan Manto 79
Lesson-4 “A Chronicle of the Peacocks” by Intizar Husain 82
UNIT-V
Lesson-1 TOYS: BARTHES 85
Lesson-2 Indian Movie, New Jersey: Chitra Divakaruni Banerjee 92
Lesson-3 At The Lahore Karhai: Imtiaz Dharker 98
Lesson-4 The Brand Expands: Naomi Klein 102
ASSIGNMENT 121
B.A. Ist Year English Course Code: ENG DSC-102
ENGLISH LITERATURE-1
ESSAY, STORIES & POEMS
UNIT - I to V
Prof. Neelima Kanwar
Prof. Meeta Biswas (Retd.)
Prof. Jaiwanti Dimri
Dr. Deepali Dhaul
Dr. Ashwani Rana
International Centre for Distance Education & Open Learning

Himachal Pradesh University, Gyan Path
Summer Hill, Shimla - 171005

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ENG DSC 102/

ENG HONS GE 101

May she be granted beauty and yet not

Helen being chose found life flat and dull

In courtesy I’d have her chiefly learned;

May she become a flourishing hidden tree

My mind, because the mind that I have loved,

An intellectual hatred is the worst,

And may her bridegroom bring her to a house

I set out anyway, but

and tourists. Even the caves had

Now I am old I know my

Into a land cleaned of geographies,

Does it stink like rotten meat?

Maybe it just sags

Maybe it just sags

Does my sassiness upset you?

Just like moons and like suns,

Did you want to see me broken?

You may shoot me with your words,

Does my sexiness upset you?

Absolut Vodka – Keith Haring, Absolut Haring (detail), 1986

Table 2.2 Increase in US Corporate Sponsorship Spending since 1985

Paper Code: ENG DSC 102/ ENG HONS. GE 101

1. Write the critical and brief analysis on “A Prayer for my Daughter.”

International Centre for Distance Education & Open Learning

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