MOTIFS: The English Teacher
1.Jasmine: a.Symbolises happiness at parts and foreshadows some bad endings. b.Links to Susila c.Represents love and family life d.Repeated throughout the last chapter as if to foreshadow his successful link to his wife Quotes:
48
Krishna nicknames Susila Jasmine
55
Krishna names the house ‘The Jasmine Home’
178
Krishna receives a Jasmine garland when he retires and hangs it in his bedroom before he sleeps. He says ‘Their essences came forth into the dark night as I lay in bed, bringing a new vigour with them.’ This is the first time that he actually sees Susila’s spirit.
2.Alarm clock: a. Peculiarly, Krishna personifies his alarm clock b. The alarm clock provides Krishna with an aspect of chaos in his routine life c.Even though the clock does not alarm regularly and is not entirely dependable, Krishna continues to rely on it, and somehow it does manage to function adequately when called upon most times. d. Krishna treats the clock as if it is human, he doesn’t have friends at the hostel so he talks to his clock. e. The clock starts his new routines e.g. first swim in the river f. Krishna used Taine’s book to stop it from ringing=English taking over India. Another motif introduced here is the Taine’s History of Literature Quotes: P.5 In order to get up early to go for a swim in Chapter 1, Krishna sets the alarm and tells it ‘Much depends on you.’ P.5 If I placed a heavy book, like Taine’s History of Literature…it stopped shrieking.
3.River: a.A place for calming, relaxation of the soul b.Krishna goes to relief his stress, to take a walk or to write poems. c.River=optimism and happiness d.Hinduism=rivers wash you clean of sins P.6 After swimming Krishna has ‘a new lease of life.’ P.137 The municipal government use the beauty of the river Sarayu to make up for the town’s poor services
4.Praying: a.Connects life and death (when he tried to communicate with Susila, had to sit at near a shrine or a temple) b.Believes praying can save them from death c.Indian’s religion over English d.A way to express their opinions on the English colonial rule (when headmaster decided to pray before his meal).
5.The veranda: a.A place for communication b.A place for reunion c.Good memories from the house are made here “My wife liked the veranda”. d.It’s a place for “business” discussions and family time
6.Krishna’s poetry: a.Krishna’s clichéd and pathetic attempts to write poetry reinforce his arrogant and pretentious nature b.Krishna seems to view poetry as something romantic, a way to demonstrate that he has hidden emotional depths, when, in reality, his inability to find a subject to write about shows that he has only the most shallow understanding of what it is to write poetry. c.Loses his pretentiousness, and his desire to write poetry as the novel progresses and as he gains emotional depth through his various experiences. Examples: i.The poem about hostel toilets being hell and God using them as a form of punishment which ‘promises to be a very good poem’ ii.The ice pack poem‘ iii.The handsomely bound notebooks’ contain Krishna’s ‘most cherished thoughts on life and nature and humanity’
7.Indigo Saree: a.Krishna’s appreciation of his wife in this dress b.Symbolizes his affection towards his wife portraying his true inner love for her, “I looked at her indigo saree and smiled to myself” c.Symbolizes wife. –it was on her when she lived and when she died it went with her d.Shows that Krishna couldn’t bear to see it lying around the house unless it was on his wife
8. Light:
a. The first poem Krishna wrote about Susila was based around themes of light. Light can be associated with heaven, or the afterlife, and therefore the use
of light to describe Susila may have been a foreshadowing of her death.
Quote - "She was a phantom of delight
When she first gleamed upon my sight:
A lovely apparition, sent
To be a moment's ornament
...
And yet a spirit still, and bright
With something of an angel-light"
(page 41 - 42)
b. Krishna, after Susila's death, regretted the fact that he had never been able to take a walk with Susila along the river by the moonlight, as they had planned to do together before she died.
Quotes
Susila: "Even when you just think of me anywhere and everywhere, on the road, at home,
or on the river bank when a streak of moonlight lights the water surface, and
you think of me, I feel it and know your thoughts."
Krishna: " Suddenly there dawned on me the meaning of her statement: ' When you see the
moonlight lighting up the water surface.' Weeks ago, in my period of desolation, as I sat on the sands of Sarayu, a late moon rose in the east, and the flowing water shimmered with it. It only added to my desolation. Again, it reminded me of my wife. How often had she expressed a wish to walk along the river in moonlight, and for all the years of married life I had not been able to give her that fulfilment even once; some pointless thing postponed it every time; we never went out in the moonlight at all. And this regret tormented me when I saw moonlight on water, that night..."
c. When Krishna describes Susila's beauty, he usually associates her with having a glow, or having light.
1. Jasmine:
a. Symbolises happiness at parts and foreshadows some bad endings.
b. Links to Susila
c. Represents love and family life
d. Repeated throughout the last chapter as if to foreshadow his successful link to his wife
Quotes:
2. Alarm clock:
a. Peculiarly, Krishna personifies his alarm clock
b. The alarm clock provides Krishna with an aspect of chaos in his routine life
c. Even though the clock does not alarm regularly and is not entirely dependable, Krishna continues to rely on it, and somehow it does manage to function adequately when called upon most times.
d. Krishna treats the clock as if it is human, he doesn’t have friends at the hostel so he talks to his clock.
e. The clock starts his new routines e.g. first swim in the river
f. Krishna used Taine’s book to stop it from ringing=English taking over India. Another motif introduced here is the Taine’s History of Literature
Quotes:
P.5 In order to get up early to go for a swim in Chapter 1, Krishna sets the alarm and tells it ‘Much depends on you.’
P.5 If I placed a heavy book, like Taine’s History of Literature…it stopped shrieking.
3. River:
a. A place for calming, relaxation of the soul
b. Krishna goes to relief his stress, to take a walk or to write poems.
c. River=optimism and happiness
d. Hinduism=rivers wash you clean of sins
P.6 After swimming Krishna has ‘a new lease of life.’
P.137 The municipal government use the beauty of the river Sarayu to make up for the town’s poor services
4. Praying:
a. Connects life and death (when he tried to communicate with Susila, had to sit at near a shrine or a temple)
b. Believes praying can save them from death
c. Indian’s religion over English
d. A way to express their opinions on the English colonial rule (when headmaster decided to pray before his meal).
5. The veranda:
a. A place for communication
b. A place for reunion
c. Good memories from the house are made here “My wife liked the veranda”.
d. It’s a place for “business” discussions and family time
6. Krishna’s poetry:
a. Krishna’s clichéd and pathetic attempts to write poetry reinforce his arrogant and pretentious nature
b. Krishna seems to view poetry as something romantic, a way to demonstrate that he has hidden emotional depths, when, in reality, his inability to find a subject to write about shows that he has only the most shallow understanding of what it is to write poetry.
c. Loses his pretentiousness, and his desire to write poetry as the novel progresses and as he gains emotional depth through his various experiences. Examples:
i. The poem about hostel toilets being hell and God using them as a form of punishment which ‘promises to be a very good poem’
ii. The ice pack poem‘
iii. The handsomely bound notebooks’ contain Krishna’s ‘most cherished thoughts on life and nature and humanity’
7. Indigo Saree:
a. Krishna’s appreciation of his wife in this dress
b. Symbolizes his affection towards his wife portraying his true inner love for her, “I looked at her indigo saree and smiled to myself”
c. Symbolizes wife. –it was on her when she lived and when she died it went with her
d. Shows that Krishna couldn’t bear to see it lying around the house unless it was on his wife
8. Light:
a. The first poem Krishna wrote about Susila was based around themes of light. Light can be associated with heaven, or the afterlife, and therefore the use
of light to describe Susila may have been a foreshadowing of her death.
Quote - "She was a phantom of delight
When she first gleamed upon my sight:
A lovely apparition, sent
To be a moment's ornament
...
And yet a spirit still, and bright
With something of an angel-light"
(page 41 - 42)
b. Krishna, after Susila's death, regretted the fact that he had never been able to take a walk with Susila along the river by the moonlight, as they had planned to do together before she died.
Quotes
Susila: "Even when you just think of me anywhere and everywhere, on the road, at home,
or on the river bank when a streak of moonlight lights the water surface, and
you think of me, I feel it and know your thoughts."
Krishna: " Suddenly there dawned on me the meaning of her statement: ' When you see the
moonlight lighting up the water surface.' Weeks ago, in my period of desolation, as I sat on the sands of Sarayu, a late moon rose in the east, and the flowing water shimmered with it. It only added to my desolation. Again, it reminded me of my wife. How often had she expressed a wish to walk along the river in moonlight, and for all the years of married life I had not been able to give her that fulfilment even once; some pointless thing postponed it every time; we never went out in the moonlight at all. And this regret tormented me when I saw moonlight on water, that night..."
c. When Krishna describes Susila's beauty, he usually associates her with having a glow, or having light.