Love

=What do I need to know about ... Love?=

Brief Description
Love is one of the main themes within “The English Teacher”, and it develops within the novel as Krishna’s character develops or perhaps it develops Krishna’s character as he becomes more open to the love of his family.

Love takes many forms in Narayan’s “The English Teacher”: As the novel progresses Krishna’s character becomes more and more susceptible to different aspects of love. His experience of love and the many forms it takes develops greatly throughout the book from hating his job and living as a bachelor in a hostel to, taking up a new job and contacting the spirit of his dead love.
 * Marital love**: The love between Krishna and his wife. Also the love that is lacking between the Headmaster and his wife.
 * Parental love**: The love between Krishna/Susila/Krishna’s mother and Leela. Lack of this love between the Headmaster and his children. The love between Krishna's mother and Krishna.
 * Love of work/learning**: The love between the Headmaster and his school. The love that Krishna does not feel for his work at the college in the beginning of the book but begins to develop as he discovers the Headmaster’s school and decides to work there. The lack of love and passion for work of the proffessors in the college. The love and passion for learning of the Headmaster's students, and lack of the love and passion for learning of the college students.
 * Spiritual love:** Krishna attempting to contact his dead wife and her spirit. Susila's mother's love for the Eastern remedies and Gods.

Key Quotations
However after his first meeting with his child all of these feelings are cast aside with the statement that **//“I found [Leela] enchanting”//** – Pg 16 and even possibly before that when Krishna frets that the **//“child must not be hurt”//** when alighting the train. Eventually, the love develops into a classic father daughter relationship when he attempts to spoil Leela and states that **//“Just a little won’t do her harm”//** – Pg 32. His love for his wife is apparent from the moment he received his wife’s letter as **//“[he] smelt [his] wife’s letter before opening it”//** – Pg 16. His relationship grows deeper as he begins to indulge in flirtation such as **//“I will call you Jasmine hereafter”//** – Pg 48. This love is then seemingly destroyed when Susila dies and “**// a curiously dull pain at heart” //** – Pg 91, lies where his love for Susila and her love for him once was. Her absence and the absence of love also affects him physically as **//“the days had acquired a peculiar blankness and emptiness”//** – Pg 92. All is not lost however, following the loss of his wife //** “nothing else will worry or interest me in life hereafter” **// – Pg 91, this is Krishna stating that Leela will be the only worry within his life for the moment of his wife’s death. Krishna's strong marital love he still feels for Susila is further revealed as he continues to attempt contacting her spirit even after her death, comparing himself to ** //"a three-quarter deaf man catching the rustle of the dress of someone he loves"// ** - Pg. 163 This illustrates the love he is feeling and how he can not bear to part from her, even if physically she is dead to the senses. The lack of passion in Krishna's life is evident, especially percieved between his life and his work, ** //"I did not do it out of love for them or for Shakespeare but only out of love for myself"// ** - Page 8. This shows that Krishna has no passion and love for his work, and he is doing the work for money and the love for himself.
 * //“God, what am I to do with a little child of seven months?”//** – Pg 15. This is Krishna’s initial reaction when he finds out that his wife and child would be living with him. This quotation shows no real love for his daughter at the beginning of the book, almost as though his child were simply an unwanted object that he could cast aside. This is accentuated by his constant reference to Leela as **//“the baby”//**, **//“the child”//**, **//“the girl”//** or **//“it”//**, instead of using her name.

Role in the novel
Love is what compels Krishna to make life changing choices; it is for the love of his family he makes these choices. Some of these choices are: It is this development in love which allows him to contact his dead wife’s spirit by himself at the end of the novel, although it may be said that this love, or rather loss of love, may have been blinding Krishna to the possibility that the medium was tricking him into believing that he could contact his wife and by the end of the novel he’s so infatuated in his love for his wife that he dismisses all possibility that the meeting may simply be a dream and not a spiritual connection?
 * · Choosing to rent a house of his own and move out of the hostel
 * · Choosing to buy a house of his own
 * · Choosing to make Susila his single and largest responsibility when she is sick
 * · Choosing to take care of Leela by himself upon Susila’s death
 * · Choosing to attempt to contact Susila’s spirit
 * · Choosing to continuously deny the fact that the medium may be tricking him and trying harder and harder to contact her
 * · Choosing to allow Leela to join the Headmaster’s school
 * · Choosing to resign and take up the Headmaster’s job at the children’s school