Michelle's Writing Portfolio

Essay Draft Three

Michelle Shi
June 1, 2007
Draft Three

Symbolism In The Grass-Eaters

For centuries, India has been a poor country, especially before 1947 when she was a colony of Britain. Because destiny usually draws an individual and his/her society together, most Indians had led a wretched existence during that period of time. However, those victims had got too adaptable to misery -- even ignoring their basic right of pursuing happiness.

Despite the silence of the lowest caste or the numbness of the local authority, a man named Krishnan Varma was brave enough to reveal the dark reality, waking up those ostriches. In his story The Grass-Eaters, Ajit Babu and his wife Swapna represent typical victims of Indian social tragedy resulting from the colonialism, the despotism and the caste system. They live a refugee's life though Babu is well educated to work as a school master, which usually ensures a relatively affluent life. The poor couple are unbelievably always in a condition of moving. A stationary home of their own is absolutely beyond extravagant hope. To create such a couple, and to mirror the dark reality behind those contradictions, Krishnan draws many extraordinary symbols. Those symbols including "home", "grass-eaters", "Babu" and many others can offer a distinctive angle of interpreting this short story.

As in most people's opinion, a good story usually has at least one key clue running through it, and The Grass-Eaters is of no exception. If we give a full read to the story, the several repeats of the word "home" will immediately catch our eye. At first, we are informed that the Babu couple once lived comfortably in a pipe. "A piece of sack cloth" serves as the door and the window of this weatherproof shelter, and even as the protective screen for its dwellers' privacy(56). Then "home" is mentioned in Swapna's desire for "a stationary home"(57), their former home in Dacca(57) and their last "home made of coal tar drums"(59). The images of those concrete objects play different roles in detailing the couple's living condition, but on the whole they share a relatively similar meaning in symbolizing the powerless control of one's own destiny, especially for the poor in a dark society.

To everyone of us, when it comes to home, we usually associate it with such words as stability, security, privacy, comfort and memory. However, in The Grass-Eaters, home does not look like this. It is variable since many times the couple "went to bed in Calcutta and woke up in another place"(57). It is insecure because spending one night at such place can even cost hurts like losing one ear if you unfortunately get too close to a strange opposite sex by mistake(56). Still, it is not private or comfortable because the places served as homes are often crowded, cold and communal, forcing one to share his/her home with strangers, which really sounds intolerable. What's worst, the homes are easy to get and easy to lose -- the everlasting memory of one's own home fades away easily along with the process of accepting a former one soon to be others'(57). Home has almost lost its common meanings only except love, which we can feel from the communication between Babu and Swapna. The complete love contrasts sharply with their incomplete homes. All this absence may arouse our curiosity of exploring the reason why Krishnan creates such an incomplete home. Does it symbolize something? In order to answer it, we had better explore Babu's home in several aspects.

The most common feature of Babu's homes is their identity of approaching railways. Though the first home, a footpath near an avenue, is an exception, its location in a sense expresses similarity in instability. What kind of a home will it be if near a railway or even over a railway (e.g. the freight wagon)? In poems, essays, pictures and also music, railway is more than once used to symbolize a vagrant life. Moreover, the shape of a rail often evokes a sense of eternity. Watching trains approaching and departing, readers are easy to be immersed into a thought of life, death, time, space or anything else that has something to do with eternity. In The Grass-Eaters, Babu and Swapna are Hindus. Hinduism is a religion holding a belief in reincarnation. Therefore we may infer that railway conveys the idea of reincarnation by connecting the present and the future, vicinity and distance. Babu and Swapna's moving non-stop  all the way along railways perhaps symbolizes the process of their reincarnation which is believed in leading to a better destination.

Besides, all homes of the couple's are obtained by occupancy, even the last one with rent is also described as "the house I might occupy"(58). Here the use of "occupy" emphasizes the low social rank of the couple. Despite that these homes are communal and anyone has access to living in, Babu and Swapna long for one. Compared to the fact that thousands of refugees, locals and residents are even not able to squash into one, getting a place to live in, bad as it may be, is worthy of celebration.

Nowadays, endlessly growing desire for more houses providing more functions has been taken for granted by modern people. However, not long ago Babu's homes are so rudely constructed just to realize their simple dreams of lying low in a container with doors(57). From the footpath to the freight wagon only with a door and no roof, even the pipe "with a piece of sack cloth hung at either end"(56) or their Babylon home on the roof(58), each merely meets the basic needs of human beings while sometimes this is also beyond possibility.

Apart from those common features, a special home for Babu and Swapna cannot be neglected. This home is their eternal home -- their tombs. In The Grass-Eaters, Krishnan first indicates this when Babu at last is told why Swapna has insisted on a stationary home. Imformed of the coming baby, immediately Babu recalls death to mind instead of more logical birth, and defines the baby as someone to "do our funeral rites when we died" instead of a fresh and lovely life to bring them happiness(57). Here Babu's act clearly proves his despair of life and faint hope of death. Later this eternal home is repeated in the last paragraph for emphasis(58). It is not difficult to find out that only a tomb can serve as a stable, secure, private, comfortable (to one's remains) and everlasting home for Babu and Swapna. The realistic world cannot meet their poor requirements, so they resort to the reincarnation, hoping that the next round of life will be fair to them. Their ecstasy fully shows their value of death, which also hints that to the poor perhaps death is much better than struggling in this real world.

Now we are able to piece together the very home Krishnan intends to show to us. It badly lacks stability, security, privacy, comfort and everlasting memory. Moreover, living in such a home is worse than sleeping dead in a tomb. Moving from one home to occupying another is nothing but a continuous process leading to death and reincarnation. The description of this home evokes a sense of despair, which is exactly the feeling that Babu and Swapna lock to their mind. They lose the control of their own destinies because life abandons them. The home stands for their fate, vagrant and helpless.

Just as characterization, dialogue and plot work on the surface to move the story along, symbolism works under the surface to tie the story's external action to the theme. In The Grass-Eaters, symbolism plays an important role together with its ironic tone. Krishnan's wording, especially adjectives, is full of significance. Despite his intention of creating a symbol of home, he also trys to show the people, the society and the life of that time to readers in a similar way.

Babu and Swapna are representatives of poor people of that time. Their actions, talks, manners, feelings and thoughts piece together a typical Indian of that class living under certain historical background. For example, the "vague smile" of Swapna embodies her vague expectation of future(57). Specifically, the smile is vague partly because she is not sure herself why she insists on moving into a stationary home since their economic condition does not allow them to balance between eating and housing. However, on a symbolic level, this could mean that, this class of people are short of sense of security, which leads to their uncertainty of future. Moreover, Krishnan describes the Babu couple as "nightblind"(58). Basically "nightblind" refers to a disease called nyctalopia, which results from lack of certain necessary nutrition. Or we can understand this "nightblind" as a result of no electricity in their home. Both are brought about by their poor economic condition. However, if we turn it over, we will find it possible to interpret this word in another symbolic way -- this "nightblind" may mean being blind to night which stands for the dark reality. Because the only way to live in that realistic world is to be numb of the injustice, the grass eaters have to practise their ability of being "nightblind" even against their real will.

In India of that time, there are wide gaps between person and person. Babu and Swapna were numb at "looking at the passing scene: a tram burning, a man stabbing another man, a woman dropping her baby in a garbage bin"(59). We may discuss a verb in this sentence. Krishnan uses "look" instead of "see". By doing this, he stresses the flow of thoughts in the couple's mind rather than simply describe the shocking scenes. There is a line in the movie Princeton Girl said by Sam to Austin that "You're just looking but not really seeing". As she points out, the act of seeing needs more concentration than looking. If one looks at surroundings rather than see it, the act in a sense shows his/her loss of interest in what is happening around. When it comes to The Grass-Eaters, we may infer that the act of "looking" implies Babu and Swapna's indifference to the realistic world.

On the other hand, in the fifth paragraph of the story, Krishnan describes the background as "one cold morning"(56). The "cold" denotes the low temperature of the weather. However it also prefigures the unfriendly people, who are irritable and violent as described followed. "Cold" connotes people's numbness and the social environment's unfitness for the poor to live in.

In addition, people's lives of that time can be described as "eventful" and "passing"(59). The literal meaning for eventful is "full of interesting or exciting events"(59). But to Babu and Swapna, their life is not an interesting fairy tale. It is full of exciting tragedies. Those tragedies actually do not happen in one time or at one place. They happen throughout Babu and Swapna's life. That Babu and Swapna take them as passing and temporary scenes reflects their positive attitude towards the tribulation. Life moves on, and the couple will not let those barriers to rob of their happiness. Here "eventful" refers to its second literal meaning. Also "passing" is not used to express the couple's complaint about life. But why don't they blame the god for their piteous destiny? The answer may be that they understand complaints are useless in that dark society. Here, Krishnan's avoidance to use negative words in describing Babu and Swapna's attitude towards life has created an effect of black humor, which implies the lowest caste's compromise to destiny.
Now that we have run through the whole story, we cannot help wondering what the first obvious symbol, the grass eaters, tells about. It is set as the title of the story, so Krishnan must have his own reasons. In fact, the title does play a key role in the development of the story as well as the establishment of symbolism in it. Grass-eater is basically a type of animal rather than vegetarian. That Krishnan uses it to define a group of people conveys the idea that those people have been reduced into leading a dog's life rather than of human being's. Later in the novel, Swapna is described as "fang bared, claws out", which just responds to it(56).

Krishnan is good at showing the poorest people's life in his society through vivid detailed description. In his works, life of piteous people in India becomes lifelike. This time, in The Grass-Eaters, again, Krishnan shows the reality of Indian society to us, though a reality full of misery, by way of symbolism. It is not too difficult for a careful reader to discover that there is a dramatic coincidence in the story. In the dilapidated building lived two Babus -- one is Bijoy Babu while the other is Ajit Babu(59). The coincidence is deliberately arranged to suggest the caste system in India. At that time, "Babu" refers to a middle-class group of people who have received adequate education and thus know English well. If such a group of people lead a refugee's life, what will the real refugee's life be? It is hard for any of us to think over "Is there any hope in that society?"

Reflecting the dark reality and waking up the ostriches are not enough to Krishnan. He wants more. It is hope that Krishnan really wants to call upon through this novel. He wants the poor, Indian or not Indian, to face up to the misery in life, to have courage to conquer it, and then to start to fight with their own destiny. For this reason, he chooses English, instead of his mother tongue, to compose this novel. The choice itself obviously shows the author's aim of arousing a worldwide attention. (Although writing in English is not necessary to discussing a general topic of human beings, it is right considered a sufficient condition.) What he depicts may show a regionally limited life, but some elements of The Grass-Eaters are of all human beings, which should be paid enough reflection to by all of us.

Work Cited

Krishnan, Varma. "The Grass-Eaters." 1985. Rpt. In the International Story: An Anthology with Guidelines for Reading and Writing about Fiction. Ruth Spack.  New York: St. Martin's, 1994. 6-8.

27.5.07 13:12