Saturday, February 19, 2011

The Owl--Philip Edward Thomas.(3 March 1878 – 9 April 1917)


Edward Thomas

The Owl

Downhill I came, hungry, and yet not starved;
Cold, yet had heat within me that was proof
Against the North wind; tired, yet so that rest
Had seemed the sweetest thing under a roof.

Then at the inn I had food, fire, and rest,
Knowing how hungry, cold, and tired was I.
All of the night was quite barred out except
An owl's cry, a most melancholy cry

Shaken out long and clear upon the hill,
No merry note, nor cause of merriment,
But one telling me plain what I escaped
And others could not, that night, as in I went.

And salted was my food, and my repose,
Salted and sobered, too, by the bird's voice
Speaking for all who lay under the stars,
Soldiers and poor, unable to rejoice. 

Textual Analysis

  1. ‘Downhill I came, hungry, yet not starved...’ who says this? Why does the speaker contrast hungry with starved?

The speaker here is the poet himself.
This poem is a true representation of a man’s inner conflict. The speaker under certain condition came down laden with hunger and fatigue, while his comrades were on the hill. He wanted food and rest but felt penitent for his desires, which he thought were selfish because he was not so hungry that he would have died that night.
    
  1. ‘But one telling me plain ....escaped....’ who was the one referred to here? Explain what was told by the ‘one’?

The ‘one’ referred to here is the cry of the Owl.
The cry of the owl reverberated across the hill and spoke on behalf of the poet’s comrades. The poet in its melancholy and piercing cry found himself penitent for his coming down to a shelter leaving his comrades on the hill. He felt that for the time being he had escaped the clutches of death while the poor soldiers waited their imminent fate.

  1. ‘All of the night was quite barred out...’ what is the meaning of ‘All of the night’? To whom was it barred out and why?

The poet by this expression wanted to convey the intensity of suffering and eventual death that night could have brought on him. ‘All of the night’ stood for hunger, cold, fatigue and death that night.
He had come down and procured himself food and rest in an inn. He had paid for those amenities and so the suffering of that night was restricted from reaching him.

  1. ‘...Except an Owl’s cry...’ Why wasn’t the owl’s cry barred out?

Amidst his frugal amenities, which he thought the sweetest thing under a roof, the poet found that the owl’s cry couldn’t be barred out. He, being a sensitive poet, took its cry as the call of his own conscience that seemed reproaching him for being so weak and selfish.

  1.  ‘And salted was my food...by the bird’s voice.’ In what sense does the poet use the word ‘salted’? How was his food ‘salted’ by the bird’s voice?

The poet was too hungry to differentiate between tasty and vile food. He was also fatigued and desperately needed rest. At such an hour the cry of the bird raised a storm inside his sensitive mind.
He felt that at his food and rest were salted in the sense that they became obnoxious to him. He could neither fulfil his hunger nor lie down on the couch, as he suffered scruples which left him utterly disappointed and broken.

  1.  How does the call of the owl affect the poet? OR What is the significance of the title ‘The Owl’?

The owl being nocturnal has long been considered a sinister creature that calls upon misery, adversity and death. These symbols work upon the poet as the mirror of his conscience, as he realised that his needs were the reflection of a weak and selfish mind rather than of a sensitive poet. He felt that he had betrayed his comrades by coming down to the comfort of a secured place, while they awaited their imminent doom.
   
  1. Describe the situation in the poem ‘The Owl’.
The poet, Edward Thomas, came down the hill in search of food and rest, being utterly fatigued and hungry. He got what he needed in an inn and all that stood for agony that night were restricted. However, an owl’s cry penetrated the numb darkness and hit him hard on his conscience. It spoke on behalf of the unfortunate soldiers who had no comfort that night but to fight in the cold and die. The poet could neither eat nor sleep as his soul fell apart in remorse.


Thursday, February 17, 2011

OUR TRIBUTE TO RAJEEV DAS...!!!

We firmly believe that Barasat resident, Rajeev Das, could have been saved had the District Magistrate and the Superintendent of Police, 24 North Parganas been BENGALIS.
We therefore Protest yet again against induction of Non-Bengalis into Administration.
We demand that the Officers concerned be immediately Show-caused and Removed from Office.

We ideologically maintain that Outsiders as Administrators cannot empathise  with the feelings and aspirations of people with whom they share little common touch because they as individuals are Career Bureaucrats, whose allegiance and loyalties rest with different interests, and who are far removed from the decorum of Public Service.

Sunday, February 13, 2011

Political Harakiri....!!!!

[It reads that the Govt. of West Bengal is mulling over the issue to include Hindi as a medium of education in North Bengal University. We the progressive people of Bengal strongly protest against this move and request Bengalis all over the world to support us in our agitation.]
This is what we call political suicide...! At a time when we, the Bengalis, are trying our best to alleviate our      socio-economic and cultural position and trying to rope in like-minded Bengalis to be a part of a movement to further the cause of  our self determination and the right to protect our language and our traditional                progressive humane identity, such myopic acts by a section of our own community put us on back foot or from where  we had begun. they do not see the danger lurking in the guise of nationalism that tends to betray the very  concept on which it was built with many parts of India rising to assert their political identity. There was a time when people from Bengal settled and travelled across the length and breadth of India and spread the message of freedom and education and the value of modern thinking, they also spread the light of this beautiful language Bengali. However in recent times if we really spare a moment and cast a cursory look over the scenario, we will certainly find that Bengali is no longer a part of education anywhere in the rest of India All the Schools in  Bihar and Jharkhand and Madhya Pradesh, where once Bengali was taught as a subject have been  deliberately done away with or on the brink of closure due to lack of funds (?). It's a darn lie, which even a child can understand.                                                                                                                                
It's high time we understood that if we are to save ourselves we need to protect our language on our land and make all possible efforts to restore it to a height of glory which in turn would ensure us a place in History and on the demographic Atlas of the earth...!!                                                                                                                                                                                  
Remember a linguistic denomination is no Community if it has no land under its feet...!!!.                                A Community commands no respect if it taboos its own language and denigrates its ethos to another..!!                                                             

Saturday, February 12, 2011

If Bengalis still prefer to sleep and afford to overlook...!!!

The Telegraph
Kolkata
Friday , January 21 , 2011

The City Diary
Held for assault on HC judge’s guard
Ajit Kulkarni, a Pune resident, was arrested for allegedly beating up the guard of a Calcutta High Court judge when the latter protested Ajit’s spitting on the road. The incident occurred when the judge’s car was passing through Karaya on Thursday morning.
When Kulkarni was confronted by Alok Kole, a constable of Calcutta police reserve force, he allegedly started abusing the cop and slapped him before trying to snatch his service revolver. Kulkarni was overpowered and later arrested.
Kulkarni has come to Calcutta on an official trip, police said.




It is not just an incident but a manifestation of a mindset that is very much instinctive and may not be racially or any way motivated for that matter. if an outsider just stepping into the state can show such aplomb, one can quite as well imagine what other non-Bengalis are capable of doing should there be a need at all.
the question is 'WHITHER BENGALIS...? Do we yet learn to read the writing on the wall? Are we reading at all? One Kulkarni was arrested. What about the thousands of Kulkarnis,Todis, Shaus,Singhs,etc, etc swarming about like cockroaches ready to and even eating up our resources to the extent of denuding us to paupers.
We are on the verge of becoming a minority. Wake up before it is too late...!!!