Reading Notes W11: Tagore, Part X

Rabindranath Tagore, “Punishment” (889-904)

Rabindranath Tagore:

·         First Asian to receive the Nobel Prize for literature, specified to poetry

·         1861-1941

·         Later in life he became an international influence

·         Born in Calcutta to one of India’s most famous families

·         He published his first book of poems in Bengali of 1880

·         Between 1891 and 1895, he published 42 short stories

·         A reformist and activist in education

·         He lectured on the most pressing issues of his time

·         He spoke out on nationalism

·         A notable representative of universal humanism (“Spiritual”)

·         Fluent in Bengali and English

The story:

·         Set in the Bengal Countryside

·         Set in the late nineteenth century

·         Theme: administration of justice (British colonial justice system)

·         “the first modern short story in world literature about the legal phenomenon that lawyers and judges call “the Rashomon effect” (891).

·         Rashomon effect: “Whenever there are two or more eyewitnesses to an event or a crime, even their most truthful accounts of what happened differ fundamentally from each other” (891).

·         Conflicting testimony- honest and dishonest accounts are given.

·         Biased decision by judge that is based on class and gender.

·         Question: What constitutes justice?

·         Social realism and psychological realism.

Quotes:

·         “When the sun rises at dawn, no one asks why; and whenever the two wives in this kuri-caste household let fly at each other, no one was at all curious to investigate the cause” (893). People were used to this happening so no one bothered to check on them or investigate. Kuri-caste= (in Bengal) a low caste originally of bird catchers, but by the 19^th century, general laborers.

·         “The story he had given to Ramlochan Chakravati had gone all round the village; who knew what would happen if another story was circulated? But he realized that if he kept to the story he would have to wrap it in five more stories if his wife was to be saved” (895). If the story kept changing, there would be a problem.

·         “The magistrate did not believe him, because the chief, most trustworthy, most educated witness- Ramlochan Chakravarti…” (897). It is hard to believe them, so the truth is becoming hard to obtain.