Studies in English Language and Literature

In Rajmohan's Wife , a novel by Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay, we come across the character of Suki’s mother in the twelfth chapter of the work. Portrayed as a bucolic character, she is a middle-aged woman. She had dark complexion with partial hair growth and a creased visage. Clad in abrasive clothes, she had a very simple appearance. She had a couple of friends named Kanak and Matangini. Apart from being sympathetic to Matangini, she was full of duty, responsibility and awareness of her household chores. Besides being helpful and supportive, Suki’s mother, by and large, loved and advised Matangini a lot. She was suffused with receptivity, compassion and affection. Moreover, she fostered a mind that was practical. Suki’s mother, with a heart full of mercy, with strong resolution, worked as a maidservant in Mathur Ghose’s residence. She was very much loyal too. However, nothing or nobody can be bereft of any ill act. Who can be perfect completely? Suki’s mother was not an except...

At the outset of our discussion, let us all have an idea of the term ‘cuckold’. ‘Cuckold’ refers to the husband of an unfaithful or adulterous wife. The chief purpose of cuckoldry, a crucial feature of the Restoration Comedy of Manners, is to ridicule the society by means of satire. Rajmohan’s Wife records the story of Matangini who is a pure and untainted girl. The novel also gives an account of her ill and unhappy wedlock with Rajmohan. In course of the novel, we come to find that Rajmohan is actually brutal and cruel by nature through and through. Matangini was in love with Madhav before her marriage with Rajmohan. Madhav has been portrayed to be an English-educated man. However, she had to get married to Rajmohan due to her father’s pressure. Matangini, the female protagonist in Bankim Chandra’s novel, is found to be oscillating between the social norms and her scruples. After leaving the house with Kanak for fetching water, she asserts her own identity against the norms of the pa...

  Harold Pinter’s “The Birthday Party”: Actwise Summary/ Detailed Summary of the Play/ Thorough Summary/ Actwise Synopsis/ Plotline of the Play/ Outline of the Play/ Story Outline   Act I The opening scene of Harold Pinter’s play named The Birthday Party is discerned in the scruffy room of a household in a tiny town, by the sea, with a door. When we come to see the curtain rising, we get to know Petey who enters with a newspaper and then takes a seat near the table. We can hear Meg’s voice through the hatch of the kitchen. Now let us get introduced to the characters of the play: Petey, Meg, Stanley, Lulu, Goldberg and McCann. All through the play, random references to food are provided, even though, sometimes they are not understood properly. Here we come to find Meg serving breakfast to Petey, her husband. Again, on the contrary, we come to notice the lack of proper understanding in this regard. For instance, when Stanley is asked about the fried bread, he thinks and t...

  Character portrait/Character/Character sketch of Sridhar in Bravely Fought the Queen by Mahesh Dattani In the drama named Bravely Fought the Queen by Mahesh Dattani, Sridhar is depicted as Lalitha’s responsible husband. He, a worker of the Trivedi brothers, remains busy at taking care of advertising for the Re Va Tee product. He is a sincere and hardworking person. Also, he is very efficient. In this play, Jiten Trivedi stays obstinate and does not pay any attention to the intellect of Sridhar. In this play, we come to know Jiten’s character pretty well, especially when he argues that their aim is to attract men but not women, since it is the men who have the purchasing power. In this context, we can discern and find the male domination in the advertising world. However, Sridhar cautions them of the possible hostile consequences of the existing advertisement, since he is a very liable employee. Again, as and when Sridhar utters, “This is professional suicide”, Jiten, in utmo...

Western Marxism: A Brief Note The term ‘Western Marxism’ covers the works of the German, the French, the British and the Italian leftist intellectuals belonging to the twentieth century. Gramsci is one of the major figures or practitioners of this idea. One of the most enduring concerns of these theorists is the reason why the intellectual revolution foretold by Marx did not happen in western Europe. The conventional reading of Marx was disseminated and obligatory by the Russian Bolsheviks. Again, such reading claimed political activities as well as rational beliefs amassing from commercial interests. As capitalism never does care for the financial interests of the workers, as the employees form a considerable section of the population and their number are a few, a grassroots-level revolution is to be introduced, be it sooner or be it later. Yes, the workers are subjugated and live in hopeless destitution. Still, the Marxists of the West take in for questioning that most of the workf...

Stanza 1 Just as an enormous python meandering itself round its victim and kills it, a creeper twists round the rough trunk of the casuarina tree up to the treetop. There are deep scars on the rugged trunk of the tree left by the creeper. Anyway, the creeper cannot kill the casuarina tree. Making a fun of the creeper, the vast tree wears it like a scarf, as if it is its embellishment. The scarlet flowers bloom among the long branches of the tree hanging in clusters. The birds and bees gather there when it is daytime, and at night, now and then, the garden, where the casuarina tree stands straight, is flooded with a unique melodious song of the bird, when people sleep in their houses.   Stanza 2 At daybreak, the poet-cum-speaker opens her window open. She becomes engrossed with the loveliness and magnificence of the tree. It is mostly in winter when a baboon sits still like a statue on the tree. It stays busy staring sullenly at the sunrise. The young baboons jump and play b...

  There are a preface and an epilogue of the main story of Santiago’s memorable fishing. As the novel opens, we get acquainted with an aged man named Santiago who has failed to catch, for about 84 days, a fish of noteworthiness. Manolin’s parents ordered him to work with a lucky fisherman. Nevertheless, Manolin, the boy, unhappy with his new master, returns to Santiago and offers to give his company to Santiago for the next day’s fishing. The old man somehow dissuades telling him to work with Martin, who was the owner of the terrace. Anyway, both Santiago and Manolin, in spite of the difference of their age, are fond of baseball games. Both support the Americans in this regard. Their hero is DiMaggio. Thereafter, we see that the boy brings some food and two beers to the old man’s poor hovel. Apart from that, he thinks how to obtain clothes, blanket, soap and towel for his dear master. While taking food, they talk of baseball, of the players and managers. They gossip that the manage...