A Real Durwan: Jhumpa Lahiri

SUMMARY

Boori Ma, an increasingly frail 64-year-old woman, is the durwan (live-in doorkeeper) to an apartment building of Calcutta. Each day, she trudges up the stairs, lugging her reed broom and flimsy mattress behind her. As she sweeps, her raspy voice details the losses she has suffered because of Partition. She was separated from her husband, two daughters, and home. Tied to the end of her sari is a set of skeleton keys belonging to coffer boxes that housed her valuables. She chronicles the easier times in her life, the feasts and servants and marble floor of her home. Each litany ends with the same phrase, “Believe me, don’t believe me.”

The details of her journey across the border shift in each retelling. But her tales were so impassioned that no one could dismiss her outright. Each resident of the building had a different interpretation of her tales. Mr. Dalal of the third floor can’t fathom how a landowner ends up sweeping stairs, wives think she is the victim of changing times, Mr. Chatterjee believes she simply mourns her family and wraps herself in illusion. Nevertheless, her tales harmed no one and she was entertaining. Best of all, she kept the stairs spotlessly clean and the outside world at bay. She routed away any suspicious person with a few slaps of her broom. Though there was nothing to steal from the apartments, the residents were comforted by her presence.

Boori Ma suffers from sleepless nights. Mrs. Dalal, who has a soft spot for Boori Ma, comes to the roof to dry lemon peels. Boori Ma asks her to inspect her back for the mites she assumes torment her in her sleep. Mrs. Dalal finds nothing. Boori Ma talks again about her lost comforts – such comforts Mrs. Dalal can’t dream of. The women commiserate and Mrs. Dalal offers to buy the woman new bedding. Later rains turn Boori Ma’s mattress into yogurt, so she focuses on the offer of new bedding.

Boori Ma is allowed to wander in and out of the apartments, offered tea and crackers for help with cleaning of children’s activities. She knows better than to sit on the furniture, so she crouches in doorways and takes in life from a distance. She visits The Dalals. Mr. Dalal asks her to help tote basins to his apartment. Mrs. Dalal is not pleased. A basin does not make up for not having a phone or a fridge, or other amenities promised but not delivered. The argument rings through the building and Boori Ma does not ask about bedding. She sleeps on newspaper that night.

Mr. Dalal installs one basin – the first of the building – in his home and another in the foyer for all of his neighbors to use. Instead of being moved by the gesture, the residents of the building are awash in resentment. Why did they have to share, why were the Dalals the only ones who could improve the building, why couldn’t they buy their own basins? To appease his wife after their argument, it is rumored that Mr. Dalal purchased lavish shawls and soaps. He takes her away for ten days and Mrs. Dalal assures Boori Ma that she has not forgotten her promise of renewed bedding.

While the Dalals are away, the other wives plan renovations and the stairs become choked by workmen. Unable to sweep, Boori Ma keeps to her roof, keeping an eye on her dwindling set of newspapers and wondering when she had her last glass of tea. When she grows restless of the roof, she wanders around the town spending her life’s savings on treats. She feels a tug at the end of her sari and finds her purse and skeleton keys gone. When she returns to the building, she finds the basin has been torn out of the wall.

The residents carry her up to the roof and accuse her of telling robbers about the new basin. She tries to convince them, but after all of her lies, they say, how can they believe her now? The residents seek the advice of Mr. Chatterjee. He comes to the conclusion that the building needs a real durwan to keep their valuables safe. They toss Boori Ma out of on the street muttering, as her figure recedes, “believe me, believe me.”

ANALYSIS

A Real Durwan is primarily a story about class and the resentment it can inspire. Boori Ma, a poor woman forced to sweep stairwells in her old age, comforts herself with tales of her previous riches. Whether or not these anecdotes are true, they have the same effect. They are an oasis for her, a way to escape the reality of her life for just a moment. When the Dalals install the basins in the building, their neighbors react with jealousy instead of gratitude. They rail against the Dalals for trying to show up the rest of the building. Mrs. Dalal, it is rumored, doesn’t think the basin is classy enough. At the end, Boori Ma is cast out of the building, blamed for the theft. Mr. Chatterjee says that they need a real durwan for their building; his desire to promote the illusion of the building's upward mobility is a fatal punishment for Boori Ma. She is a reminder of their true place in the social structure, and she is a reminder that her fate can await any of them. Casting her out is casting out the truth of their meager lives. Dismissing her means they can never be her.

Partition again is a theme here. In the exile of Hindus from Muslim lands and vice versa, millions of people were left homeless. Boori Ma, though she may be lying about her previous wealth, is proven to be a refugee by her accent. As in When Mr. Pirzada Came to Dine, Partition feels arbitrary. By focusing in on the life of one person affected by the treaty, the reader can glean the human toll. Though the caste system – the stratification of Indians into ethnic or class categorizations – and its notion of untouchables was banned in 1950, class and race made Boori Ma untouchable.

The structure of this story is built upon irony. Almost as if in an O. Henry story, Boori Ma is promised new bedding on the precise day that Mr. Dalal brings home the basin, and the precise day that her old bedding is ruined. The basin and the ensuing fight between Mr. and Mrs. Dalal pushes Boori Ma’s needs to the side. Mrs. Dalal says that she has not forgotten about her bedding before she leaves for her vacation but she does not arrive home in time to save Boori Ma, let alone to provide new bedding. Yes, Mrs. Dalal is considered flaky, but Boori Ma is cast out when she is out of town and unable to protect her. The irony here less a dramatic device than a comment on the fickle nature of life.

Rumor and gossip also shape the story. Boori Ma’s insistence that she is telling the truth, despite the details she changes at will, is at first a source of comedy for the residents. They think that she is entertaining even though the tales are sorrowful. When the Dalals buy the basin, their neighbors gossip about the fights that take place behind closed doors. Rumor becomes fact when the Dalals leave for vacation. This blurring of lines between truth and gossip can be blamed for Boori Ma’s punishment at the end. Since the wisest man in the building, Mr. Chatterjee, has not picked up a newspaper in decades, word of mouth and hearsay are taken as gospel. In a way, this is a reflection of society as the truth is often elusive.

Objects take on important meaning in A Real Durwan. The basin becomes a symbol of both wealth and resentment. The skeleton keys tied to the end of Boori Ma’s sari are both remembrances of her past life and a totem of her strength. They reassure her. When they are stolen, she is thrown out shortly thereafter. Boori Ma’s bedding, she believes, is full of mites that keep her up at night. Though the mites are a figment of her imagination and a manifestation of her worries, the bedding can be read as her livelihood. Once destroyed, her life slips away.

A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings: G.G. Marquez

Summary

One day, while killing crabs during a rainstorm that has lasted for several days, Pelayo discovers a homeless, disoriented old man in his courtyard who happens to have very large wings. The old man is filthy and apparently senile, and speaks an unintelligible language. After consulting a neighbor woman, Pelayo and his wife, Elisenda, conclude that the old man must be an angel who had tried to come and take their sick child to heaven. The neighbor woman tells Pelayo that he should club the angel to death, but Pelayo and Elisenda take pity on their visitor, especially after their child recovers.

Pelayo and Elisenda keep the old man in their chicken coop, and he soon begins to attract crowds of curious visitors. Father Gonzaga, the local priest, tells the people that the old man is probably not an angel because he’s shabby and doesn’t speak Latin. Father Gonzaga decides to ask his bishop for guidance.

Despite Father Gonzaga’s efforts, word of the old man’s existence soon spreads, and pilgrims come from all over to seek advice and healing from him. One woman comes because she’d been counting her heartbeats since childhood and couldn’t continue counting. An insomniac visits because he claims that the stars in the night sky are too noisy. The crowd eventually grows so large and disorderly with the sick and curious that Elisenda begins to charge admission. For the most part, the old man ignores the people, even when they pluck his feathers and throw stones at him to make him stand up. He becomes enraged, however, when the visitors sear him with a branding iron to see whether he’s still alive.

Father Gonzaga does his best to restrain the crowd, even as he waits for the Church’s opinion on the old man. The crowd starts to disperse when a traveling freak show arrives in the village. People flock to hear the story of the so-called spider woman, a woman who’d been transformed into a giant tarantula with the head of a woman after she’d disobeyed her parents. The sad tale of the spider woman is so popular that people quickly forget the old man, who’d performed only a few pointless semimiracles for his pilgrims.

Pelayo and Elisenda have nevertheless grown quite wealthy from the admission fees Elisenda had charged. Pelayo quits his job and builds a new, larger house. The old man continues to stay with them, still in the chicken coop, for several years, as the little boy grows older. When the chicken coop eventually collapses, the old man moves into the adjacent shed, but he often wanders from room to room inside the house, much to Elisenda’s annoyance.

Just when Pelayo and Elisenda are convinced that the old man will soon die, he begins to regain his strength. His feathers grow back and he begins to sing sea chanteys (sailors’ songs) to himself at night. One day the old man stretches his wings and takes off into the air, and Elisenda watches him disappear over the horizon.

Old Love: Jeffrey Archer

The "Old Love" of Jeffrey Archer is a unique amorous tale between two brilliant students of English literature from Oxford. Archer makes an exploration of the theme of love from a completely unusual standpoint. The rendition is fiercely honest while he portrays a chronic sense of envy and rivalry between two sworn arch-rivals in the Oxford University: William Hatchard and Philippa Jameson. Initially, their aggressive competition unsettles their tutor Simon Jakes. In their constant intellectual debates, Philippa confronted the deep, confident voice of William with her high-heeled boldness. The mutual hatred was absolute. Their sharply perceptive and analytical mind refused to be submissive to each other. Indeed, this fierce sense of competition enabled them to outshine everyone else in the field. Given the background of 1930's she, to him, was "that silly woman" and he "that arrogant man". Yet strange is the way of destiny that an unusual love story should blossom between the bitterest of academic rivals!

This rivalry assumed an unpalatable intensity when both excelled as toppers in their final degree exam. The Charles Oldham Shakespeare's essay writing competition fed fat to this fire of passionate jealousy and became a life and death question for each to defeat the other.There were liberal exchanges of scornful remarks between the two to play each other down. However, things took a dramatic turn when William unwittingly discovered about the death of Philippa's father (who was a Vicar) from cancer, and also, his secret dream to let his daughter study in Oxford and win the Charles Oldham award. The sight of silent sobbing of his proud and powerful adversary stirred up a sudden feelings of empathy in his guts. He got over his tentative doubts and offered to accompany her to her village for the burial ceremony. They held hand for the first time and discovered the new bond of friendship as they started their journey to her village. They communicated with each other spontaneously while returning to Oxford which bounces Philippa back to her normal competitive spirit. She slowly discovers the growth of her new found intense attraction for William. The latter secretly enjoys this interesting conversion in the Vicar's daughter.

The transformation of hatred into love has always been a captivating subject in itself, and Archer makes the situation entertaining with the employment of sparkling wit in their conversation. They make a visit to Stratford and have meals together. But their first date was far from usual: it is a unique blend of warmth and intellectual antagonism! If this instinctive antagonism triggered a strong sense of hatred before, now it drew them closer. In fact, this killer instinct became a delirious source of entertainment for both. Archer makes the reader question if intense hatred could indeed be an expression of hidden attraction?

Anyway, the situation takes a quirky turn while returning from Stratford. On their way back to Oxford, Phillipa and William had to spend the night in a car as the petrol gauge showed empty. The former obviously did not miss the chance of expressing her doubt about the cerebral power of a person who couldn't even read a petrol gauge! The day next William gave her the reason why he let the car run out of petrol: He said with a rare sense of humor: "My father told me if I spent the night with a barmaid then I should simply order an extra pint of beer, but if I spent the night with the vicar's daughter, I would have to marry her." He came down on his knees and said," Will you marry me if I win the Charles Oldham?" Philippa answered that "as there is absolutely no fear of that happening I can safely say, yes... " When William declared his love for her she told him not to show his face in Somerville again if he failed to win Charles Oldham. The readers wonder if the writer reveals Philippa's secret wish that she could marry himeven at the cost of losing Charles Oldham! Otherwise why would tears come to Philippa's eyes when a girl informed her that she had won? It was a moment of crisis for her because between the conflicting emotion of ambition and love in her heart, the latter had won and for once the proud girl confessed, "I do love nothing in the world so well as you; is that not strange?"

However, when she discovered that William was a joint winner, her puckish spirit returned as she said " I take thee for pity" to which William replied " I yield upon great persuasion... " They were locked in a passionate embrace, and after that, they were never apart for more than a few hours. Strangely, their honeymoon in Athens ended up in a heated argument over the relative significance of Doric and Ionic architecture!

Later in life, this constant battle of wit prevented their romance from dwindling into boredom and banality. Their serious research works and creative activities, though on different fields, kept them deeply connected. After three years, "with well-received D. Phils", they moved on, in tandem, to college teaching. But their fierce encounters continued and their sharp wit at each other's expense would flash across the dinner tables at Oxford. However, those who understood their love felt envious of their unique relationship! They were childless yet their life was not tasteless.

Returning home after the celebration dinner (being declared the Joint Professor), their heated argument over Proust's monumental work took such an intimidating turn, that a policeman, nearby, asked Philippa "Is everything all right madam?" "No, it is not", William declared "this woman has been attacking me for over 30 years, and to date the police have done deplorably little to protect me". Yet, beneath this apparent antagonism, their bond continued to grow stronger with each passing year. Interestingly, their intense love was inseparable from their zealous intellectual antagonism which lent a peculiar aura to their relationship. When Philippa was made the Dame of the British Empire, William referred to her as an "Old Dame" he had to live with now. It is this bitter-sweet flavor of their love which defines their marriage.

The most irritable habit of Philippa to William was her determination each morning to complete "The Times" crossword before he arrived at the breakfast table. One fine morning in June, William, studying the clue, filled in the eight boxes left incomplete by Philippa. Philippa's instantly retorted that there was no such word. To the delight of Philippa the word "Whym Wham"could not be found in the shorter Oxford Dictionary. William assured her that the word could be found in OED on his desk, made for scholars like him. William left the breakfast table with sharp comments on Philippa's limited command of English language and that she will have to eat a humble pie at Somerville's Gaudy Feast as she reads the collected works of John Skelton...

William left with a sigh, kissing his wife on her cheek, wishing he had lost Charles Oldham. Philippa replied that he did indeed because it was highly inappropriate during those days to declare a woman as the sole winner! Having closed the front door, as she entered the kitchen, Dame Philippa suddenly suffered her lone heart attack. She called out to William hoarsely but in vain. The news of her death was conveyed and the story ends with a note of dark humor in the suicidal note of Sir William (who shot himself with his pistol): "Forgive me, but I had to let her know". There was the volume of the work of John Skelton held open in one of his hand with the word "Whym Wham" underlined neatly, his fingers stiff and cold around it. Such weird ending, subtly hints at the essence of special relationship this couple shared so that they rise above the great marriage vow "TILL DEATH DO US PART." Archer's love story excels because death could not part Sir William and Dame Philippa! Even while following his wife to her grave, William felt the need to camouflage the inseparable bond they shared, and the insufferable loneliness he would feel without her... he does it with a wry sense of humor!   

This story of Archer challenges the conventional ideas about relationship between man and woman! So, while teaching it in the class-room to my undergraduate Indian students, I was led through a unique emotional experience. The modern Indian girls, who are becoming more conscious of their identity, enjoyed the bitter-sweet experiences of love between Philippa and William. Yet I was amused to observe the general reaction of the Indian boys who failed to appreciate the finer nuances of love between William and Philippa! Barring a few exceptions, most of them were shocked to find the former falling for an unpleasant and unwomanly individualist as latter! Perhaps the men in our society need to evolve in order to understand the intellectual charm that she exudes and get rid of their cliched notion of a "Perfect Woman".

The Stolen Bacillus: H.G. Wells

Summary

The Bacteriologist has a visitor to his laboratory, a pale stranger who arrives with a letter of introduction from a good friend of the scientist. The scientist shows his visitor the cholera bacillus under a microscope and they talk about the disease. The visitor is particularly interested in a vial containing living bacteria, and the scientist describes the power of cholera, saying what a terrible epidemic could be caused if a tube such as the one he holds were to be opened into the water supply.

The scientist's wife calls him away for a moment; when the scientist returns, the visitor is ready to leave. As soon as the visitor has gone, however, the scientist realizes the vial of bacteria is missing, that the visitor must have stolen it. He runs out in a panic, sees the visitor's cab leaving, and hails another cab to give chase. The scientist's wife, horrified by his inappropriate dress and hurry, follows in a third cab, with her husband's shoes and coat and hat.

We shift to the point of view of the visitor in his cab. He has indeed stolen the vial. He is an Anarchist who plans to release the bacteria into London's water supply. His motivation is fame: he feels he has been neglected by the world, and now he will reveal his power and importance. In the speeding cab, however, he accidentally breaks the glass vial.

He decides to become a human vector. He swallows what is left in the vial, and stops the cab, realizing that he no longer needs to flee. When the scientist catches up and confronts him, the Anarchist gleefully announces what he has done. The scientist allows him to walk away, and tells his wife that the man has ingested the stolen bacteria.

There is a twist: the vial, it turns out, did not contain cholera, but a strange new microbe the Bacteriologist had been studying, the only known effect of which is to make the skin of the animals exposed to it turn bright blue. The Bacteriologist reluctantly puts on his coat and returns home with his wife, complaining that he will now have to culture the bacillus all over again.

The Drover’s Wife: Henry Lawson

The story opens with the drover’ s wife and her children alone in the house in the bush. One of the children discovers a snake and calls for the mother. The bush-woman reaches for her stick and rushes to her children but meanwhile the snake hides in the wood-heap. As the snake disappears the woman puts the children to sleep and waits up with her dog for the reptile to come out. As she waits, she starts to recall several dangerous situations she had to face throughout the years, when her husband was away with the sheep. She had to fight bushfire, flood, or even pleuropneumonia that spread among the cattle.

By the morning she runs out of candle and gets up to go get more wood to keep the fire burning. She seizes a stick, pulls it out and the whole pile collapses. The bush-woman gets hurt and starts to cry. She takes out a handkerchief to wipe her tears away but she pokes her eyes instead as the handkerchief is full of holes. This ridiculous situation makes her laugh.

It is near the daylight, but the bush-woman and her dog are still on the watch for the snake. Suddenly, the snake comes out of a large crack in the partition slabs. The dog starts to chase the snaked and eventually kills it. The woman lifts the reptile on the point of her stick and throws it into the fire. The eldest boy wakes up and notices the tears in the eyes of his mother. He promises not to ever go droving.