Junkie by William S. Boroughs | Themes, Summary, Analysis

Junkie by William S. Boroughs | Themes, Summary, Analysis

Hello and welcome to the Discourse. William S. Boroughs was an American writer, and visual artist known for his ‘Shotgun Art.’ He was born on February 5, 1914, and died on August 2, 1997. He was one of the primary proponents of the Beat Generation and Beat literature and celebrated nonconformity and spontaneous creativity. He is mostly known for his Naked Lunch published in 1959, which is considered as one of the best examples of Beat literature. In addition, he also wrote The Nova Trilogy in which he experimented with the Cut-Up technique.

His first novel was Junkie which was published in 1953. The novel was published under the pseudonym William Lee and he used the same name for the main character of the novel.

Themes of Junkie:

William S. Burroughs was a morphine addict and he also peddled and sold heroin and other drugs to support his own addiction. The novel appears to be a confessional writing. Many scholars argue that Junkie is not fiction rather it is a semi-autobiographical memoir. The character William Lee directly represents William S. Burroughs in some instances in the novel while offering a fictionalized caricature of him in others. The novel is based on the theme of drug withdrawal and associated struggles. The novel illustrates how a person is stripped of his humanity when he becomes drug-dependent.

In the novel, William S. Burroughs used a metaphor to describe the situation of a drug addict and compared a drug addict to a plant. He says that when a person becomes a junkie, he becomes as dumb as a daffodil. The writer also compared the opioid addicts to wooden puppets or deep-sea creatures.

"Junk turns the user into a plant. Plants do not feel pain since pain has no function in a stationary organism. Junk is a painkiller. A plant has no libido in the human or animal sense. Junk replaces the sex drive. Seeding is the sex of the plant and the function of opium is to delay seeding. Perhaps the intense discomfort of withdrawal is the transition from plant back to animal, from a painless, sexless, timeless state back to sex and pain and time, from death back to life." ~~ Passage from Junkie.

The novel follows a first-person narrative style and William Lee is the narrator. However, the writer didn’t delve much into the psychology or motivations of William Lee, nor did the novel condemn or justify William Lee. On the other hand, the novel does criticize the governmental crackdowns, anti-drugs legislation, and police procedures which make the struggles of Junkies, even those who are trying to get rid of their addiction, much more difficult. The novel emphasizes the negative aspects of addiction and the pain of withdrawal, with relatively little focus on the pleasurable effects of drugs. The author describes addiction as simply the path of least resistance, not a conscious choice.

Summary of Junkie:

The story is set in the 1940s. William Lee is a thirty-year-old married man living in a Midwestern state of the United States. Though he is married and has children, he hardly cares for his family. William Lee is struggling financially as he is unemployed. He gets a job selling stolen morphine that may give him a good profit. Lee decides to take a shot of morphine and saves some from the stolen morphine. He sells the remaining to a friend named Roy who is an addict. Roy warns him that though he is engaging in the opium business, Lee must remain away from morphine and how its addiction can ruin life. Lee doesn’t listen to him and over a few months, he keeps using the morphine he saved for himself. As a result, he too becomes an addict. However, it is difficult to get any more morphine. He and Roy try to get a prescription for morphine from various doctors whom they visit but they get no help.

In his desperation, Lee uses a fake name on a prescription to get some morphine and gets caught. His wife bails him out and Lee promises to keep away from morphine. However, he begins experiencing withdrawal symptoms and suffers hallucinations. He tries to look for an alternative to morphine to ease himself. In such a situation, Roy introduces him to a Heroin dealer and Lee begins using heroin. It doesn't take long for Bill to develop a full-fledged addiction. "I drink a lot of coffee," he says, "but you know what's really addictive? Heroin." His habit propels him through the dark underworld of New York City. He engages in petty crime and becomes a small-time dealer himself to support his growing dependence. As his drug dependence continues to increase, he becomes more and more alienated from his wife and children. He becomes a partner of Bill Gains, a drug dealer, to buy, cut, and resell heroin, keeping some for himself each time.

Lee continues to lose all his respectable friends and colleagues while he forms a new social circle of addicts and customers. The police decide to crackdown on drug dealers and users and this creates problems for Bill Gains in the business. He decides to close his drug business and gets admitted into a medical hospital to treat his addiction. Lee tries to sustain but fails and he too decides to get admitted into the medical hospital for curing his addiction.

He recovers and after remaining away from morphine and heroin for four months, he decides to go to the Brownsville area of Texas and manages to stay sober for a few more months. However, he feels alone and bored. Thus, he goes to New Orleans and begins visiting a gay bar where he is invited by a man to have sex with him. The man takes him to a private place and then robs him. William Lee gets disheartened and relapses. He continues to visit the gay bar where he starts having regular sex with men. To support his expenses and addiction, he begins selling heroin again. During a police crackdown, the police find evidence of drugs in his possession and arrest him again. In jail, he fails to get any help and again suffers withdrawal symptoms. His lawyer helps him to get into a sanitorium where a new medicine is being experimented to help heroin addicts.

Though he goes down a dark path, Bill is aware of his actions and the consequences they have; namely, the loss of humanity that one experiences when in the throes of an addiction. And while he understands that getting clean is a necessary pain for the addict who wants to become sober, it's one he struggles to make peace with.

After getting out of jail, while awaiting trial, Bill heads back to Texas. There, he makes a valiant attempt to control his drug use—though, now again in the grips of a full-fledged addiction, he does not surrender the habit completely. Bill realizes that he will face long-term imprisonment, so he decides to relocate to Mexico City. His wife and children follow him. He makes a genuine effort to get his drug use under control and remains sober for more than a year. He maintains a low-key life away from chemical temptation, wiling away his days reading newspapers in the city's cafes and generally lying low. But old habits die hard, and once more the more humdrum aspects of a sober life begin to grate on him. He continues having sex with men, both with male prostitutes and other partners. However, that, too, pales in comparison to junk.
He accidentally meets a group of drug users and soon he relapses and his addiction returns. He discovers that heroin is more expensive in Mexico than in the US since dealers have to bribe the police. He seeks out a new set of doctors to prescribe morphine, then learns he can get a permit to purchase it himself. After a year or so, he again decides to get rid of his addiction. He quits the junk, switching it out for heavy drinking and prescription amphetamines. Inevitably, these take a toll on his health, and his mental stability starts to falter. His doctor warns that he's drinking himself to death, and his wife leaves town with their kids. Lee becomes sober and contemplates returning to the US.

He again meets Bill Gains who informs him about the heavy crackdown of police on drug dealers and users. Bill Gains informs that Roy died in police custody. Lee decides that he will never return to the United States to face his trial. He begins using morphine again and helps Bill Gains get a large amount of heroin but the heroin was adulterated and Gains nearly died when he injected it. Lee decides not to use heroin again. He hears that there is a new drug that has the mind-altering ability to awaken dormant telepathic and mystical powers in the user. As the novel ends, Bill travels to South America on a quest to find this miraculous drug.

So this is it for today. We will continue to discuss the history of American English literature. Please stay connected with the Discourse. Thanks and Regards!

Thanatopsis by William Cullen Bryant | Structure, Summary, Analysis

Thanatopsis by William Cullen Bryant | Structure, Summary, Analysis

Hello and welcome to the Discourse. “Thanatopsis” is a poem by American poet William Cullen Bryant originally published in 1817 in the North American Review. Written early in Bryant’s life and career, and heavily influenced by Romanticism as well as the Graveyard School of poetry, the poem explores the subject of death and what it means to be mortal—its title, Thanatopsis is derived from the Greek roots Thanatos (death) and Opsis (sight), and thus it means “a view of death.”

Bryant urges his reader to accept death as an inevitability that should not provoke angst or fear, as it is the fate of all humans. The poem instead offers solace—the fact that all people must face the end of their lives should be a unifying and comforting thought.

William Cullen Bryant wrote this poem when he was 19 years old. The poem shows his interest in Deism and his rejection of religious Puritanical conservatism. The poem became an inspiration for Transcendentalists like Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau.

Structure of Thanatopsis:

William Cullen Bryant wrote this long 82-line poem in a single stanza with no specific rhyming pattern. However, he mostly followed blank verse or unrhyming iambic pentameter for this poem which means that most of the lines contain five sets of two beats, the first of these is unstressed and the second is stressed. Yet, Bryant chose to change the pattern in some instances and hence, in some lines, the iambs become trochees (as in line 30). The stressed syllable is first and the unstressed second. In this poem, William Cullen Bryant used personification, enjambment, alliteration, caesura, imagery, metaphor, and simile.

Summary of Thanatopsis:

Lines 1-8

“To him who in the love of Nature holds

Communion with her visible forms, she speaks

A various language; for his gayer hours

She has a voice of gladness and a smile

And eloquence of beauty, and she glides

Into his darker musings, with a mild

And healing sympathy, that steals away

Their sharpness, ere he is aware. When thoughts”

The speaker begins by introducing someone who loves nature. This person is a naturalist with an almost holy relationship with nature as he holds ‘Communion’ with the visible forms of nature (like rocks, trees, rivers, natural scenery). The poet uses personification of ‘nature’ and posits nature as a female gender as ‘She’ speaks to him, that naturalist someone, in a voice of gladness.’ Nature smiles, and speaks to him happily with an "eloquence" (smooth and lovely speech) "of beauty." Sometimes, when this nature lover is brooding over depressing thoughts, nature treats him with gentle sympathy, which heals him. She takes away the pain ("sharpness") of his thoughts before he even realizes it. Her presence acts benevolently and charitably.

Bryant used enjambment in lines 2 and 3 as the second line runs into the third without end punctuation. In line 3, caesura has been used. ‘Gladness,’ and ‘glides’ in lines 4 and 5 are examples of alliteration.

Lines 9-17

“Of the last bitter hour come like a blight

Over thy spirit, and sad images

Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,

And breathless darkness, and the narrow house,

Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart;—

Go forth, under the open sky, and list

To Nature’s teachings, while from all around—

Earth and her waters, and the depths of air—

Comes a still voice—”

Lines 8 and 9 are again an example of enjambment as the line was broken in two without punctuation. In the ninth line, the speaker brings up ‘death’ the main subject of the poem. The speaker says that when this nature-lover at times turns to think about the “bitter hour” of death, it comes “like a blight” over his “spirit”. Thoughts of death consume this person. It acts as a disease, making this person ill. They go into great detail as they dwell on the inevitable. The poet describes death as "stern agony", it is sharp and severe. The speaker further mentions the "breathless darkness" of the grave and the "narrow house" of the coffin. The speaker then mentions nature again and says that when someone is worried about death, they should go back to nature and listen to the calming voice that comes out of the “waters” and the “depths of air”. Nature can soothe the spirit of the nature-lover even in such dark brooding fears like death.

The poet used a simile in line nine, comparing death with blight. In the following lines, he offers a strong imagery of death.

Lines 18-31

“Yet a few days, and thee

The all-beholding sun shall see no more

In all his course; nor yet in the cold ground,

Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears,

Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist

Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim

Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again,

And, lost each human trace, surrendering up

Thine individual being, shalt thou go

To mix for ever with the elements,

To be a brother to the insensible rock

And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain

Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak

Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould.”

The speaker continues with the imagery of death while alluding to the absence of light after death as there will be no sun to embrace “Thy image” on his course through the sky. The sun will not penetrate the ground where someone is buried, nor it will reach the depths of the ocean where they have been thrown, and thus, the light will never see your face again, your face will be lost forever.

In the next lines, the speaker contradicts the Puritan notion of the ‘Afterlife’ while exclaiming the superiority of nature. The speaker says that after your death when there will be no sun, your image will “claim Thy growth” and take back everything that it gave. The listener’s body will be used to nourish the earth in return. Once dead, your humanity will be lost. “Each human trace” will vanish and that “Individual being” will be consumed by the elements of the earth. The speaker says that after death our bodies will "mix […] with the elements." We’ll basically be no different from an "insensible rock," unable to feel anything. So, all the touch sight, hearing, and emotion that made us human will be gone, leaving us no different from rocks. But this death will again unite us from nature. We won’t be lonely for long as the roots of the oak will reach us to embrace us. In lines 30-31, the poet used personification of the Oak tree.

Lines 32-46:

“Yet not to thine eternal resting-place

Shalt thou retire alone, nor couldst thou wish

Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down

With patriarchs of the infant world—with kings,

The powerful of the earth—the wise, the good,

Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past,

All in one mighty sepulchre. The hills

Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun,—the vales

Stretching in pensive quietness between;

The venerable woods—rivers that move

In majesty, and the complaining brooks

That make the meadows green; and, poured round all,

Old Ocean’s gray and melancholy waste,—

Are but the solemn decorations all

Of the great tomb of man. The golden sun,”

The speaker continues to describe the ‘Afterlife’ and says that although everyone will die and they’re headed into death where they’ll lose their humanity and their body will decay into the earth, they won’t be alone. From the ‘narrow house’ of coffin, the dead will soon be transferred to a "magnificent" and comfy resting place, like a "couch." And they won’t be alone, the “patriarchs” from ages past, kings, and “The power of the earth” will be there to greet you. They are all going to be residing in one “might sepulchre” or tomb. The idea is that when we die we all lie down together in one big grave, that is the Earth, and that is the importance and wonder of the Earth, it is the tomb of Humanity, and all other things are mere decorations. The poet used metaphor while comparing the Earth to a big tomb.

Lines 47-58

“The planets, all the infinite host of heaven,

Are shining on the sad abodes of death,

Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread

The globe are but a handful to the tribes

That slumber in its bosom.—Take the wings

Of morning, pierce the Barcan wilderness,

Or lose thyself in the continuous woods

Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound,

Save his own dashings—yet the dead are there:

And millions in those solitudes, since first

The flight of years began, have laid them down

In their last sleep—the dead reign there alone.”

The speaker continues to elaborate on the world after death while explaining that the world after death where everyone is expected to enter isn’t as dark or lonely as one might expect. The planets and the stars “the infinite host of heaven” or sky see us from above on “the sad abodes of death.” There are ages of humanity buried in the earth, far more than ever walked the earth. They “slumber in” the “bosom” of the earth, a very pleasant image. The dead rule this world, one which stretches over the whole of the world. The dead are everyone “you” would want to be. From the dunes of the desert to the river of “Oregon”. It is the world of the dead, no one else reigns there.

Lines 59-73

“So shalt thou rest, and what if thou withdraw

In silence from the living, and no friend

Take note of thy departure? All that breathe

Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh

When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care

Plod on, and each one as before will chase

His favorite phantom; yet all these shall leave

Their mirth and their employments, and shall come

And make their bed with thee. As the long train

Of ages glide away, the sons of men,

The youth in life’s green spring, and he who goes

In the full strength of years, matron and maid,

The speechless babe, and the gray-headed man—

Shall one by one be gathered to thy side,

By those, who in their turn shall follow them.”

The speaker mentions the inevitability of death and says that just like the millions who have died before us, we shall accept death and rest. The speaker says that It really doesn’t really matter in the end, how, where, or when one dies. Everyone meets the same fate so the reader should not worry about dying alone or being un-missed. “All that breathe / Will share thy destiny”. These are meant as words of comfort in the face of the unknowable. The speaker further says that after death, the happy will continue to be so as well the depressed continue to be sad. There’s nothing that can change this and one should not attempt to do so. The world of the living is filled with illusions of death, religious explanations, and otherwise. Those who enjoy those illusions will continue to engage with them but in the end, they too shall come and “make their bed with thee”. As time progresses, all of these people from “The speechless babe” to the wise man and woman will be taken to death. They shall be “gathered to thy side” just as everyone else after them will be.

Lines 74-82

“So live, that when thy summons comes to join

The innumerable caravan, which moves

To that mysterious realm, where each shall take

His chamber in the silent halls of death,

Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night,

Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed

By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave,

Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch

About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.”
In these lines, the speaker is still talking about death but he reminds us of the importance of life and says “So live.” You should enjoy the time you have. Sooner or later you will hear the call ("the summons") of death. You will join the endless train of people leaving this life. We are all headed to "that mysterious realm, where we’re all going to get a room ("chamber") in the quiet "halls of death." One should live in a way that is accepting of death. You don’t want to be burdened by it all of your life and then feel dragged there as if to a “dungeon”. You should be fulfilled by faith that you will rest with the ages of humankind in the ground that nurtured you. If you do live this way, the speaker concludes, then death will come peacefully. It will “wrap” you up as if in blankets and lay you done to “pleasant dreams”.

“Scourged,” “sustained,” and “soothed” in line 79 are examples of alliteration.

So this is it for today. We will continue to discuss the history of American English Literature. Please stay connected with the Discourse. Thanks and Regards.

All About H. Hatter by G.V. Desani | Characters, Summary, Analysis

All About H. Hatter by G.V. Desani | Characters, Summary, Analysis

Hello and welcome to the Discourse. G.V. Desani was a British-Indian writer, novelist, educator, and lecturer. His full name was Govindas Vishnoodas Desani. He was born in 1909 in Kenya in an Indian family. His family moved back to India in 1917. At the age of 17, Desani left his home and traveled to England. He was not well-educated and couldn’t speak English but soon he learned well and was befriended by several prominent Londoners. He joined the British Museum Library as a reader and worked as an artist, model, and correspondent for Reuters, Times of India, and The Associated Press. G.V. Desani is known for his only novel, All About H. Hatter, published in London in 1948. All About H. Hatterr chronicles the adventures of an AngloMalaya man who calls himself, Hindustaniwallah Hatterr. Like the classical Bildungsroman, the plot of Desani’s novel revolves around its protagonist H. Hatterr in search of wisdom and enlightenment. The novel has seven chapters and it deals with his search for the self. He visits seven cities and consults seven sages, each of whom has specialized in a different aspect of “living”. The novel is a comic extravaganza. The character of Hatterr is presented in a comic vein. The charm, vitality, and linguistic humor created a unique hero with dazzling and puzzling prose. The novel gained instant fame and was praised by the likes of T.S. Eliot, Salman Surshdie, Anthony Burgess who wrote the Introduction to the 1970 edition of All About H. Hatter, and many others. Salman Rushdie praised the nativization or Indianization of the English language in the novel and mentioned it as the “chutney-fication” of English. G. V. Desani’s All About H. Hatter has been compared to Laurence Stern’s Trishtam Shandy and James Joyce’s Ulysses.

Characters of All About H. Hatter:

H. Hatter is the main character of the novel. The name H. Hatter stands for Hindustanwallah Hatter who is a fifty-five-year-old man who writes his autobiography. H.Hatter’s father was a European gentleman while his mother was an Oriental, a Malay Peninsula-resident lady. After his birth, his family moved from Penang, Malaysia to East India (or undivided Bengal). When he was one year old, his father died of malaria and pneumonia. The Anglo-Indian court gave the infant boy to “a Dundee-born Scot” jute trader instead of his mother for adoption. H. Hatter remains uneducated yet an erratic, well-read, almost endearing soul who is constantly getting into hilarious situations and getting out of the mess he has created for himself. He can’t decide whether he is an Eurasian philosopher or a believer in Buddhism, Christianity, or Hinduism.

Nath C. Banerjee is a friend of H. Hatter. He is older than Hatter and tries to help him out during his tough times. Banerjee is very fond of H. Hatter and believes that he has great potential. Nath C. Banerjee encourages H. Hatter to move out of India and visit London where he may succeed and become a famous successful man. Yati Rambeli is a lawyer friend of Nath C. Banerjee who befriends H. Hatter and defends him whenever he gets caught in legal matters. Yati Rambelie means ‘gigantic belly.’ Yati Rambeli is also known as Y. Rambeli or ‘Why Rambelling’. He believes that H. Hatter is a genuine, innocent, and truthful gentleman with a pure heart. In the search for his philosophical and spiritual quest, H. Hatter meets seven sages namely The Sage of Calcutta, Rangoon, Madras, Bombay, Delhi, Mogalsarai- Varanasi, and the Sage of All India. However, he realizes that most if not all of them are fake, pretenders and false mendicants. Mr. Chari-Charier is a newspaper editor who employs H. Hatter as a reporter. Mr. Bill Smythe is a circus owner in India who employs H. Hatter to work in the circus. Rosie Smythe is Bill’s wife who is a lion tamer. Hatter gets infatuated by Rosie and she exploits him for her benefits. Rialto is an English lady whom H. Hatter marries. She is an aged woman who marries Hatter for her sexual desires but leaves him when he insists on a family. Sadanand XX is an Indian saint whom Hatter meets and becomes his assistant. Jenkins is a street dog whom Hatter considers his pet.

Summary of All About H. Hatter:

The story is about the spiritual and philosophical quest of H. Hatter told in a comedic and hilarious manner and how he succeeds in finding his own truths. The novel is divided into seven chapters.

H. Hatter’s father was a Christian European merchant seaman who met her mother in Malaya, Penang, and married her. His mother was a pagan native of Malay who had never traveled outside her nation. She gave birth to her first son and soon after that, her husband insisted on traveling to India and settling there. The family came to East India and settled in Calcutta, Bengal. When H. Hatter was just one year old, his father died of malaria and pneumonia and the court decided not to let the Oriental pagan mother have the custody of the son of a European Christian man. A Dundee-born Scot Jute trader got the custody of the infant boy. The jute trader didn’t have much time for the boy so he decided to give him to an English Missionary Society to be raised as a Christian orphan child. Thus, H. Hatter became an Anglo-Indian Sahib, a Christian Englishman born in India. However, Hatter always found himself more Indian than European. Yet, he had a great desire to England and observe the land of his dead father. He gets elementary education at the Missionary school but being an orphan and of mixed race, he feels discrimination. He runs away from school at the age of 14 and we find him getting a different kind of education. He is educated by five Indian sages, three women, and a South Indian loanshark.

As a young growing boy, H. Hatter had huge dreams of gaining the admiration of the world and establishing the H. Hatter dynasty. He always dreamed of marrying a sweet woman and having a big family. Being of European lineage, he easily got admission into an English men's Club. The washerwoman or the Dhobin of the club had an interest in Hatter. However, H. Hatter rejects her sexual advances. Angered by him, the washerwoman makes a scene at the Club accusing him of not paying her bills. The Chief Secretary of the club was Harcourt Pankhurst-Sykes who admonished Hatter and decided to forfeit his membership in the club. This hurts Hatter’s ego and he decides to be completely Indian. His friend Nath C. Banerjee introduces Hatter to Mr. Chari-Charier who runs a daily newspaper titled Bazaar. Mr. Chari-Charier appoints Hatter as a reporter. His first assignment is to interview the ‘Sage of Wilderness’ or the ‘Sage of Calcutta.’ The sage turns out to be a fake man who makes him drink six glasses of highly intoxicating todi, the beer of the tropics, and then fleeces him of all his belongings including his clothes. The Sage tells him the story of the crafty potter Ali Bee and his fluent parrot Ahmed instructing him to master the technique of “dispelling credible illusions” and to be always suspicious of others’ motives.

Later, Hatter discovers that the sage ran a second-hand clothes business with the aid of his brother in Lucknow. When Hatter informs Banerjee about this incident and many such others, Banerjee advises him to go to London as he believes he is a good man, a good Christian, and will succeed in his father’s land. Hatter too wishes to go to London but realizes that he loves India more and cannot leave Banerjee.

Banerjee then introduces Hatter to Mr. Bill Smythe who runs a circus. His wife Rosie Smythe is a lion tamer. Hatter begins working at the circus. He soon gets infatuated with Rosie Smythe who begins exploiting him for her purposes. She deliberately fans Hatter’s illicit passion towards her and makes him do her bidding. Once, she convinces him to become a human plate for her lion as she lets her lion eat a piece of steak served on his bare chest, which frightens him and sends him into a reverie. He remembers Braganza, the previous helper of Rosie who ran away and whom Hatter replaced. He realizes that Rosie is ‘sexploiting’ him. He leaves the circus and complains about Bill Smythe to Banerjee saying that Bill deliberately tried to excite his libido towards his wife to serve his purpose. Banerjee comforts him and says that he got caught in a crossfire between his ‘inborn goodness’ and the ‘Vienna libido school’ and has made his inborn goodness triumph.

Hatter then meets an aged English woman named Rialto and engages in an amorous relationship with her. Hatter calls her Kiss-Curl and marries her wishing that he will have a huge family with her. However, Rialto is only interested in sex and she doesn’t wish to be a mother. This creates a rift between the two. While Banerjee tries to help the couple, Hatter begins to worry that Rialto is unable to become a mother. At a gathering where Hatterr was being conferred the title "Ocean of the Musical Art" or Sangita Kala Sagara by a music society, his wife Kiss-curl Rialto appears with her Anglo-Indian lover in her arms and asks to disperse from the spot and threatens to shoot everybody with her six gauge shotgun foiling Hatterr's ambition of possessing the prestigious title and making Hatterr run semi-nude in the garden in lashing rain.

Hatter then meets the Sage of Rangoon the second religious imposter, instructs him to destroy his desire for physical gratification, and says, “In the female lies moral degradation. I say save thyself from amorous temptation!” This Sage too turns out to be an imposter who robs Hatter of all his belongings.

Hatter then decides to go to England. He boards a tramp ship and reaches Liverpool where he is accepted as a Western-looking man owing to his mixed race. However, Hatter is terribly disappointed by the English society. He tries to settle in England and earn a good fortune. He pursues many hair-brained schemes such as digging up a pyramid to search for diamonds but instead finds five fleeing mice. Hatter fails to adjust to the materialistic modern West and begins missing the spiritual and metaphysical traditions of India.

Hatter returns and reaches Madras where he meets the third Sage, the Sage of Madrass who instructs him to become a vegetarian once a week to overcome greed and avarice. Hatter tries to follow the sage but soon learns that the Sage of Madrass was a stock exchange business in his mundane life. Due to his elevation in his business, he had a conflict with his father and had to be separated from his family for four years. After acquiring a lot of wealth, he toured around the world and tasted all kinds of meat, including beef. The sage charges money from his disciples and dispels them away when they cannot afford to pay. The sage tells Hatter to meet another wise man named Sheikh Ell See Arabi who ‘instructs’ Hatterr to become a prosperous ‘burrasahib’ by exploiting upper-class connections and following the dress code of an elite ‘brotherhood’. The two wise men again rob Hatter and he runs away from them. He goes to Mysore and begins working as a salesman for a Sandalwood wholesaler. During his stay in Mysore, he encountered an unknown south Indian swindler, who deceived him arousing his sympathy by narrating his acute poverty and emotionally blackmailing him to borrow an amount on loan on his behalf, which doubled in one month. The South Indian loan shark stops correspondence with Hatterr later and he is prosecuted for repayment of the loan amount. Hatter meets Yati Rambeli, a lawyer for help who finds him a good man and promises to help him. Hatter loses his job and runs away to avoid paying Rs 600 to the swindler. He begins living in the forest as a mendicant. Meanwhile, Banerji tells the court that Hatterr has been eaten up by a tiger.

He then meets Sadanand XX who is a young saint. Hatter befriends him and becomes his assistant. He learns that Sadanand XX i.e. “Always Happy XX” was a private lottery agent in his materialistic life and enters into an agreement with him to cooperate as a disciple under his pseudonym the "Bitter One" and agrees to share the profit in the ratio of sixty and forth between them. The sage uses Hatterr to get rid of another competitor sage named Hiramanek Mukti. After accomplishing his motive, the sage gets rid of him without giving him his promised forty percent share of profits from the lottery commission. Hatter begins developing his own philosophy and learns that “Life is a contrast.” There are always opposites or contrasts in life that every man confronts.

Hatterr meets the Sage of Bombay also known as Master Ananda Giri-Giri who becomes infatuated with Hatterr and attempts to have a physical and spiritual union with him and also attempts to murder Hatterr in a fit of delirium. When Hatterr tries to escape, the sage's disciples accuse him of being possessed by a ghost and try to burn him at the stake. He somehow saves himself and runs to Delhi where he meets the Sage of Delhi and his disciple. The Sage of Delhi preaches to Hatterr that the reality of the world is a mystery. The Sage of Delhi teaches him, “All Appearance is false. Reality is not Appearance.” Hatterr meets a sage of the “Order of Nagas” or Naga Sadhu. Pretending to be concerned about Hatterr, the sage finds out that Hatterr is hiding his money in his loincloth. The sage then steals his money and disrobes him in a mock wrestling duel.

Hatter admits to his friend Banerrji that he lost his mother early in life and has no relatives at all. He says, “’ I haven’t had my mother to love me. Not long enough, old friend. I have no relations, don’t you see? I am afraid, can’t you see?’” Baneerji advises him to trust in God and Hatterr admits that even if God does not exist it is worth loving him. Hatter says that he thinks God is his father, his Governor and he believes that God looks after her mother like his dad used to.

Hatter then gets engaged in treasure hunting as he searches for maps for the treasure looted from the Moghuls by Shivaji and the Marhatta soldiers, now buried somewhere in the Western Ghats. He procures 200 rupees and goes to UP, Mewar to look for Shivaji’s buried treasure where he meets a sage in a bush, gets into a fight with him, and loses all his money.

The last sage Hatterr encounters is Pandit Punchum, a fat and naked ascetic, whose satsangHatterr attends. He brainwashes him to donate his month's salary to charity. Hatterr realizes that the satsangs were a trick by which Punchum and his men cheated people. Hatter was still working as a correspondent for the daily newspaper Bazaar but he lost this job too. Hatterr becomes an insolvent and has to leave society due to his insolvency. Hatterr is bereft of any family too. Hatterr loses his father at an early age. The whereabouts of Hatterr's mother are unknown. Rialto, Hatter's wife, takes an Anglo-Indian lover from the English club and leaves Hatterr. In the end, Hatter is alone, he begins writing his autobiography and while he is not sure if anyone will support him, his own lawyer Y. Rambeli supports him and writes a strong supporting critique of his work under the heading “With Iron Hand, I Defend You Mr. H. Hatter, Gentleman!” Hatter begins to realize his philosophy of “Life is a Contrast.”

So this is it for today. We will continue to discuss the history of Indian English Literature. Please stay connected with the Discourse. Thanks and Regards!

Learning to be a Mother by Shashi Deshpande | Summary, Analysis

Learning to be a Mother by Shashi Deshpande | Summary, Analysis

Hello and welcome to the Discourse. Shashi Deshpande has established herself as a key authentic voice in Indian English Fiction, and she continues to do so. Her novels are rife with female identity quests. Most of the time, they are told by female protagonists, who are trying to figure out who they are throughout the book. Deshpande's writings help ladies constructively discover their potential. Deshpande does not allow her female characters to deviate from the established rules of society in any of her short stories. Most of her stories are themed around family ties, such as those between husband and wife, mother and daughter, or father and granddaughter. Women's struggles as a wife, mother, and daughter are highlighted. A mother or a wife is not an imposition, she argues while discussing the importance of human relationships. When the woman is given tight rules on how to behave, she believes it becomes an imposition. A woman must learn to exist in relationships, according to her.

In her essay ‘Learning to be a Mother’, Shashi Deshpande accuses the patriarchal social structure that imposes certain ‘roles’ on women and restricts their potential within the four walls of the house. It is an essay and hence, she relies on her own experiences as a daughter when she observed her mother, and as a mother when she gave birth to her children and when she grew them well. She begins her essay by expressing what Deshpande has learned about motherhood over the years. She says that she like all others first learnt about motherhood from her own mother. The author then talks about how childbirth is considered to be a painful yet joyous process at the same time.

Deshpande also talks about how women are believed to transform into noble, sensitive beings

after giving birth. Then she begins demystifying the stereotypical notions of mothers and motherhood while rationalizing it. She tries to debunk the myths attached to motherhood that often burden women as society expects and forces them to behave in a particular way. Mothers are compared to God as they are all loving and forgiving. It is considered to be a sin to disrespect and hurt her.

The writer then mentions the irrational myths attached to motherhood. A mother is a selfless person who wants nothing for herself but everything for her children; a mother can never be unjust and unfair and she loves her children equally; and others. She then offers her observations while checking and rationalizing these myths and questioning the idea of being an ideal mother at the cost of one’s individuality.

Shashi asserts that motherhood is not a state of grace or a transition of a woman to nobility and virtue. These are cultural attributes that are thrust upon women. If a woman is noble and virtuous in her intentions, she will remain so despite being a mother. While all women know this truth, they never dare to contradict these attributes and tell their truth even to their own mothers or children. Rather they begin trying to stay true to the expectations. They often try to retain the myth of the ideal mother by telling cooked-up stories of the self-sacrifice of mothers. This results in a pang of guilt and conflict in the mind of the woman who tends to be free and independent. Often this guilt results in a traumatic experience of motherhood.

In her novel, The Binding Vine, Deshpande raised the issue through her created character of Kishor’s mother Mira who died when Kishor was just one day old. Mira was a well-educated girl and a poet. Mira once met a poet named Venu and showed him some of her poems. Venu discouraged and ridiculed her and said, “Why do you need to write poetry? It is enough for a young woman like you to give birth to children. That is your poetry; leave the other poetry to us men."

Is motherhood a full-time job? Can a mother be a writer too? Yes, if she can manage the workload, lack of rest, and constant guilt. Shashi herself was a writer and a mother. Her own performance as a mother filled her with feelings of guilt and inadequacy. Her urge to write added fuel to her creativity but the question was, how could she shut down the door on a child who wanted her? Yet, how could she shut the door to her own creativity? The essay depicts the Tug of War between motherhood and individuality in various responsibilities. Her urge to write hinders her motherly duties. Yet, she understands that selflessness and creativity do not match each other. Creativity requires her to put herself first and to be selfish. If she puts herself, her work, and her aspirations first, she fails her child. Children of all ages expect their mothers to put them first and they are never comfortable with the thoughts of their mother having a life of her own.

The writer says that she wasn’t fit to be a mother in terms of the patriarchial system. She was short-tempered, lacking patience, wanting freedom, and hated to cling on. She aspired to write, which required a lot of time on her own. Being self-critical, Shashi felt that she was inefficient, confused, unreasonable, and tyrannical. On the other hand, she had this strong urge to be an ideal mother always willing to be for her children, yet she couldn’t. She could never surrender herself to the selfless service that motherhood demands amid her desire to write books. She was caught up in the crossfire between individual responsibility and motherly duties. Deshpande preferred to choose her career, leaving her children aside to fill up the vacuum that existed within her. This helped her when her children grew up. She claimed that when her children no longer needed her, she didn’t feel empty, she already had a career to take care of.

It was when Deshpande became a mother, that she truly understood how painful, cruel, ugly, and hideous the process of childbirth was. Nothing comes naturally, not even breastfeeding. Everything has to be learned with practice. She realized that motherhood is a state of vulnerability while people expect nobility and goodness. She was confused by the mixed feelings of joy and rage that she felt when she was with her child. Even when her children grew old, she couldn’t eliminate that confusion. She even quarreled with her children when they grew old though she thought she would never do it.

Deshpande raised another issue related to motherhood. Does a mother love all her children equally and at all times? She related to her childhood memories and said that even as a child, she understood that mothers get tired of their children. Mothers may become tyrannical too. They want their children to live as they want to not as what the children are. Deshpande says that often a mother’s love is not unconditional, rather it is presented as a reward for good behavior. As Shashi Deshpande grew old, she also realized that mothers often stand against the desires and aspirations of their children. The writer says that though mothers continue to mention that they want nothing for themselves, they try to get things from their children.

The writer says that she realized the reason for her confusion later. She says that she had so many fantasies regarding the role of a mother. She was not able to live up to the fantasies of a perfect mother. This fantasized concept of a perfect mother confused every woman. Such images of selfless, self-sacrificing mothers are conveyed to us in the form of myths and prioritize the love of mothers for their children. She is unable to cope with the expectations of her as a mother with no desires of her own not even the simplest feeling of hunger.

When one becomes a mother, one does not automatically shed all one’s personality and become just a mother. One is still the person, an individual, who has lived and developed for years before becoming a mother. Motherhood is neither sacred nor holy; it is natural. She looks at motherhood as one of many roles of a woman. Not a state that defines her and puts her in a trap, but a role that helps her to grow as a human being. “I am a human being first and a mother next,” Deshpande ends her essay with that declaration.

Beowulf the Oldest Written Epic | Structure, Characters, Summary, Analysis

Beowulf: The Oldest Written Epic | Structure, Characters, Summary, Analysis

Hello and welcome to the Discourse. Beowulf is the first surviving epic written in the English language. The poem was probably created by a scop, a professional Anglo-Saxon poet. A Scop used to be like bards who were engaged in creating poems to preserve the myths and histories of their people. These poems would be performed from memory at feasts or other public gatherings as part of an oral story-telling tradition. Since we do not know who actually wrote Beowulf, the anonymous writer is often referred to as the Beowulf poet.

It is a long Old English epic poem in the tradition of Germanic heroic legend consisting of 3,182 alliterative lines. It is one of the most important and most often translated works of Old English literature. During the 11th century, two scribes got the job of preserving the oral story of Beowulf in a single cotton manuscript. The original poem and the poet were pagan, but the scribes were Christian and added Christian details to the poem: the poem now calls God the ultimate judge and ruler and even refers to events in the Old Testament. Through the study of Old English verse, most scholars believe that the poem was composed much earlier than the Cotton manuscript, between 650 and 800.

Beowulf has many Digressions from the main story. These digressions can be divided into four groups, namely the Scyld narrative at the start; many descriptions of the Geats, including the Swedish–Geatish wars, the "Lay of the Last Survivor" in the style of another Old English poem, "The Wanderer", and Beowulf's dealings with the Geats such as his verbal contest with Unferth and his swimming duel with Breca, and the tale of Sigemund and the dragon; history and legend, including the fight at Finnsburg and the tale of Freawaru and Ingeld; and biblical tales such as the creation myth and Cain as the ancestor of all monsters. Many scholars have researched Beowulf including J.R.R. Tolkien who was a Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford University, and an authority on Beowulf: His novels The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings trilogy are steeped in the mythology and culture in which Beowulf is set. In addition, Tolkien borrowed the episode of the thief stealing a cup from the dragon in Beowulf and used it in The Hobbit.

Structure of Beowulf:

Beowulf is the longest poem written in Old English. Old English poetry uses an alliterative meter, meaning that the stressed words in a line begin with the same sound. A line of Old English poetry has two halves, with a brief pause, called a caesura, in the middle of the line. The two halves of a line are linked by the alliteration (repetition of an initial consonant); at least three words in a line alliterate. Old English poetry also uses kennings, compressed metaphors like "heaven's candle" for the sun, "whale's road" for the sea, or calling a woman married to gain peace a "peace weaver."

Characters of Beowulf:

The poem is narrated by an unnamed speaker. Beowulf is the main character of the epic. He is a Geatish warrior, or Thane, loyal to his king, Hygelac. Beowulf's father was the warrior Ecgtheow, and his mother was a sister of Hygelac. Beowulf is brave but he is young and inexperienced and a little was expected of him. But he proved his valor and grew up to be a great warrior. He has the strength of thirty men in his grasp and rather remarkable swimming ability. The poem relates his heroic exploits over 50 years, including the fights with Grendel and his mother and with the treasure-guarding dragon. Hygd is the wife of Hygelac and the queen of the Geats. She is a good and generous queen. Hrothgar is the King of the Danes, the son of Healfdene, Heorogar and Halga's brother, and Onela the Swede's brother-in-law. Hrothgar is an excellent and successful king. He builds Heorot, a magnificent hall, and builds love and loyalty through his generosity and wisdom. However, though once a great warrior, he can no longer defend his people from Grendel, and his sons also are too young to take up leadership of the Danes. Though a good king, Hrothgar's position – too old to protect his people, but without heirs ready to take his place – represents a potential threat to the Danes and all other Scandinavian tribes: the lack of a king. Wealtheow is the wife of King Hrothgar and queen of the Danes, the mother of Hrethic and Hrothmund. She is a good and generous queen. Wiglaf is the most loyal warrior or Thane of Beowulf. He is the son of Weohstan the Scylfing and a relative of Beowulf. In the battle against the dragon, he proves to be the only Geatish warrior with courage even moderately equivalent to Beowulf's. Wiglaf rules the Geats after Beowulf dies from wounds from the battle against the dragon. Unferth is a Dane, the son of Ecglaf, and a loyal Thane of Hrothgar. His name means Discord. Unferth is boastful, just as Beowulf is, but unlike Beowulf Unferth lacks the moral courage to back up his boasts (and unlike Beowulf Unferth never does anything to stand against Grendel). he taunts Beowulf in the hall about his swimming contest with Breca. However, Beowulf shames him in the boasting match. Grendel is a man-eating monster descended from the Biblical Cain. Grendel is described as a "walker in darkness," who is "wearing God's anger" and "lacking in joy" because he has inherited the curse the Biblical Cain received as a result of his murder of his brother Abel. He attacks the Danes because his own enforced isolation has made him hate those who can enjoy society and companionship. The Dragon discovered a lost tribe's treasure and moved into the barrow housing the gold. The Dragon is exceedingly greedy – marking a stark contrast to good kings, who create loyalty and love among their people and warriors through generosity. Scyld Shefing was one of the first kings of the Danes and great-grandfather of Hrothgar. Beow was the son of Scyld Shefing who is sometimes called Beowulf I or Beowulf the Dane, he ruled the Danes after his father Scyld Schefing. He is not the hero of Beowulf. Sigemund is an ancient Germanic hero whose story is recounted after the fight with Grendel. He was known as the famous dragon slayer. Breca is a Geat who competed with Beowulf in a swimming contest as a youth. Wulfgar is a loyal Thane of Hrothgar who is the watchman of the Danes. Heremod was an ancient Danish king who went from being a good king to a ruthlessly evil king. Hrothgar uses him as an example of bad kingship for Beowulf.

Summary of Beowulf:

The poem begins as the narrator offers a brief genealogy of the kingship of Danes. Scyld Shefing was the first great king of the Danes, known for his ability to conquer enemies. Beow was his son and an able king in his own right. Currently, Hrothgar is the king of the Danes. He is the great-grandson of Scyld Shefing. Through success in battle, he has become rich and mighty. As a symbol of his power and prosperity, he builds a magnificent mead-hall, called Heorot, in which he and his loyal warriors can feast, drink, boast, and listen to the tales of the scops, the Anglo-Saxon bards. The revelry attracts the attention of the monster Grendel, who decides to attack during the night. In the morning, Hrothgar and his thanes discover the bloodshed and mourn the lost warriors. This begins Grendel's assault upon the Danes. Every night, Grendel attacks King Hrothgar's wealthy mead hall, Heorot, killing Danish warriors and sometimes even eating them. The monster repeats his nightly raids until no one dares sleep in the hall. Heorot, once the symbol of the Scyldings' greatness, is now a place of shame and terror.

Twelve years pass. Eventually, the news of Grendel's aggression on the Danes reaches the Geats, another tribe. A Geat thane, Beowulf, decides to help the Danes; he sails to the land of the Danes with his 14 best warriors. Upon their arrival, Hrothgar's thane Wulfgar judges the Geats worthy enough to speak with Hrothgar. Hrothgar remembers when he helped Beowulf's father Ecgtheow settle a feud; thus, he welcomes Beowulf's help gladly. Beowulf hopes to return the favor while enhancing his own reputation and gaining treasure for his king, Hygelac. At a feast before nightfall of the first day of the visit, an obnoxious, drunken Scylding named Unferth insults Beowulf and claims that the Geat visitor once embarrassingly lost a swimming contest to a boyhood acquaintance named Breca and is no match for Grendel. Beowulf responds with dignity while putting Unferth in his place. In fact, the two swimmers were separated by a storm on the fifth night of the contest, and Beowulf had slain nine sea monsters before finally returning to shore. His fellow Thanes support him and celebrate his courage. At the height of their celebration, the Danish queen Wealhtheow comes forth, bearing the mead-cup. She presents it first to Hrothgar, then to the rest of the hall, and finally to Beowulf. As he receives the cup, Beowulf tells Wealhtheow that he will kill Grendel or be killed in Heorot. This simple declaration moves Wealhtheow and the Danes, and the revelry continues. Finally, everyone retires. Before he leaves, Hrothgar promises to give Beowulf everything if he can defeat Grendel. Beowulf says that he will leave God to judge the outcome. He and his thanes sleep in Heorot, with Beowulf keeping watch. Grendel arrives and consumes one of the warriors, then reaches for Beowulf. Beowulf, famous for his powerful grip, which is as strong as the grip of thirty men, struggles with Grendel. Soon Grendel tears away, leaving his arm in Beowulf's grasp. He slinks back to his lair in the moors and dies.

Hrothgar generously rewards Beowulf with treasure. The scop sings again, and Beowulf is praised along with other great characters of the past, including Sigemund (who slew a dragon) and Heremod (who ruled his kingdom unwisely and was punished). In Heorot, Grendel's arm is nailed to the wall as a trophy. Hrothgar says that Beowulf will never lack riches, and Beowulf graciously thanks him. The horses and men of the Geats are all richly adorned, in keeping with Hrothgar's wishes.

Hrothgar gives a second feast to celebrate Beowulf's victory. The scop tells another story at the feast, the story of the Frisian slaughter. An ancient Danish king had a daughter named Hildeburh; he married her to a king of the Frisians. While Hnaef, Hildeburh's brother, visited his sister, the Frisians attacked the Danes, killing Hnaef and Hildeburh's son in the process. Hengest, the next leader of the Danes, desired vengeance, and in the spring, the Danes attacked the Frisians, killing their leader and taking Hildeburh back to Denmark. Wealhtheow appears and Wealhtheow presents a necklace to Hrothgar while pleading with her brother-in-law Hrothulf to help her two young sons if they should ever need it. Next, she presents many golden treasures to Beowulf, such as necklaces, cups, and rings. Soon the feast ends, and everyone sleeps peacefully. That night, Grendel's mother comes to the hall from her home at the bottom of a lake, seeking revenge for the death of her son. She grabs Aeschere, a favorite warrior and adviser of Hrothgar's, and consumes him, then returns home. In the morning, the warriors follow her tracks to her lake, where they see Aeschere's head. Beowulf enters the lake, and swims for hours before reaching her cave at the bottom. He fights with Grendel's mother, but the sword Hrunting, which Unferth lent to Beowulf as a sign of fellowship, fails for the first time. From the treasure hoard in the cave, Beowulf seizes a sword forged long ago by giants and kills Grendel's mother. He sees Grendel's body, removes the head, and takes it and the hilt of the giant's sword (the blade melted in contact with the monster's blood) back to Hrothgar.

After more celebration and gifts and a sermon by Hrothgar warning of the dangers of pride and the mutability of time, Beowulf and his men return to Geatland. King king Hygelac and his queen Hygd greet them. As an aside, the narrator compares Hygd to the queen of the ancient Offa, who is not tamed until Offa comes to subjugate her. Beowulf tells his lord the events of his trip to Denmark. He also informs that Hrothgar betrothed his daughter Freawaru to a prince of the Heathobards to settle an old feud. Beowulf speculates that someone will goad this Heathobard prince to take vengeance upon the Danes for all their past wrongs. Hygelac praises Beowulf for his bravery and gives him half the kingdom. They rule the kingdom together in peace and prosperity. Hygelac is eventually killed by the Swedes; his son Heardred, though young, takes the throne with Beowulf's support. At Heardred's death, Beowulf takes the throne of the Geats, and rules in great prosperity and fame for fifty years.

In the fiftieth year of Beowulf’s reign, when he is too old, a monster arises to terrorize the Geats. A treasure trove was left by an ancient civilization, which guarded it jealously until only one member of the race was left. After the last person's death, a fire-breathing dragon found the treasure and guarded it for three hundred years. One day a Geat servant finds a passageway into an old barrow. Inside, the dragon guards the treasure trove. The servant steals a cup, but the dragon discovers the theft and burns the land, including Beowulf's mead-hall. Beowulf learns that this dragon has destroyed his own great hall. This attack sends him into deep thought. Soon he orders a shield to use for battle, but not without a heavy heart at what may happen to him. He recalls Hygelac's death in battle and his own narrow escape from this battle. He recalls several battles he has seen as he travels to the dragon's lair accompanied by his kinsman Wiglaf, ten more thanes. The servant who stole the cup leads them to the lair. As they wait to attack the dragon, Beowulf recounts the Geat royal family's plight, in which Hygelac's oldest brothers killed each other and left their father to die of a broken heart. Beowulf says he served Hygelac well, and a sword (named Naegling) that he won while serving Hygelac will help him save the kingdom once again.

Beowulf sets out to confront the dragon. But when Beowulf and the dragon fight, all of Beowulf's men flee except Wiglaf. With Wiglaf's help, Beowulf kills the dragon. The dragon is beheaded, but Beowulf is bitten and has a mortal poison from the dragon flowing through his body. Wiglaf bathes his lord's body as Beowulf speaks on the treasure. He says that Wiglaf should inherit it as his kinsman, and to build him a funeral barrow that overlooks the sea; then he dies. As the other Thanes see that the dragon is dead, they return back. Wiglaf chastises the men for abandoning their king. He sends a messenger to tell the people of their king's death. The messenger envisions the joy of the Geats' enemies upon hearing of the death of Beowulf. He also says that no man shall ever have the treasure for which Beowulf fought. Wiglaf and Beowulf's thanes toss the dragon's body into the sea. The Geats build a pyre and cremate Beowulf, then construct a barrow overlooking the sea, burying the dragon's cursed treasure with him.

So this is it for today. We will continue to discuss the History of English literature. Please stay connected with the Discourse. Thanks and Regards!