Monthly Archives: April 2021
Week 11
As I was reading “Punishment” by Rabindranath Tagore I realized how similar the story of Chandara was to Hedda in “Hedda Gabler” by Henrick Ibsen. Chandara in “Punishment” was portrayed as a very strong woman who was well kept than Radha. She never seemed to fear anyone including her own husband, even when he threatened to break all the bones in her body if he ever catches her going to the ghat alone, yet she was fearless and responded back telling him that “the bones will mend”. When Chandara’s husband asked her to take blame for Radha’s muder even though it was done by his brother, she accepted it quietly without saying a word, she chose to remain silent about what happened until the end when she was told that her husband would like to see her, but her response was “to hell with him”. Similarly, to Chandara Hedda was described as a well maintained, elegant woman who was also stubborn till the very end of her story. After finding out that Eilert was murdered using one of Hedda’s pistols, the judge made sure Hedda knew that he was doing her a favor by keeping silent. Towards the end, the judge tried to practice his command over her “Oh, we’re going to have some good times together, the two of us” that’s when Hedda took one of her pistols and shot herself. Both were controlled by men and wanted freedom from their lives. Miserable as their life was, they both achieved freedom by death.
Assignment #11
In the short story ‘Punishment’ by Rabindranath Tagore, he illustrates or describes an incident that actually occurs in many places around the world to this day, maybe not to this extent but it does. In this story, the husband, Dukhiram comes home from work tired and exhausted, when he founds out that his wife, Radha has not made any food for him and that instead of serving him with delicious meals, she is replying with sarcasm as to how he didn’t bring home anything to cook so how can she make any food for him. All this probably triggered the misogynist inside him and out of rage, Dukhiram plunges his knife in the head of his wife Radha. Then later on, in the story, the other brother, Chidam wants his wife to take the blame for a crime that his brother committed. I think this all connects to Mary Wollstonecraft excerpt. In that excerpt Wollstonecraft talks about how in that time, it was normal for men to think that women are there just to please men and that if they fail to do so, they shall be disciplined roughly. Wollstonecraft says in the excerpt, in that era, women were merely housewives and most of them were uneducated, the men would go out in the world, get education, make money, generate wealth while the women would stay at home take care of the children, the kitchen and do whatever pleases their husband. The same thing can be seen happening in this story when Dukhiram and Chidam order their wives around and expect them to do whatever pleases them, not caring about how they might have felt. They were selfish and stubborn like the men described in Mary Wollstonecraft’s excerpt. In both, the story and the excerpt, men are seen as independent while women are dependent on them.
Assignment #11-Week #11
In “Punishment” Rabindranath Tagore narrates a story about how a women has to deal with struggles to patriarchy. Chandara is being used and tortured with by her husband and the husband’s brother Dukhirum Rai. The husband told Chandara that he will save him after she tells him about her murder. Chandara is getting blamed for killing the older brother’s wife and the older brother doesn’t want his younger brother to be in jail and have a crime. He blames his wife on the murder of the older brothers wife . The article is related to Du Tenth Sinks The Jewel Box In Anger. Du Tenth and Chandara as ignored by their partner, and they chose death to show their disappointment of being together with each other. The authors are trying to show that the feeling of sorrow because women’s can’t escape from the control of men’s. Women are being used for as objects and being used for to get the work done. In both of the articles it’s showing that that people died and there are similarities between the two stories.
Assignment #11
As I was completing “Punishment” by Rabindranath Tagore, I realized there was a similarity in the style of writing compared to that of Ibsen’s “Hedda Gabler”. The style of writing seemed very detailed which stands out in the era of Literary Realism in the sense that the characters are not “flat” and are described in great detail giving each one a backstory. The description in each character can bring a sense of better understanding to the reader to understand the person and also their actions that play a role in the story. For example, in Ibsen’s story, we see how the main 4 characters were described greatly giving us an imaginary idea of how they look like, how they might dress, and how they might act. Similarly, in Tagore’s short story we see the description of the characters including the sisters in law which also gives us the sense that they do indeed contrast in many senses as they have different attributes. Because these pieces of writings are from the 19th century we can see that great addition of details in the story as a complementary way of adding more complex and flawed scenes that will intensify the reader by engaging and intriguing which is something we see in both Tagore’s “Punishment” and Ibsen’s “Hedda Gabler”.
Assignment #11
The connection that I chose is between Chandara and Harriet Jacobs. I want to mainly focus on the way they both want to make choices on their free will and not fall into someone else’s grasp. Whether it be the egregious act of slavery for Jacobs or the act of being opressed by his husband for Chandara. Both hate being controlled by a party which they can’t control. In Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Jacob is being pursued by her slave owner which she goes into hiding in an attic so small that she couldn’t even stand in. She continued to live there for several years “Yet I would have chosen this, rather than my lot as a slave” (Chapter 21). I was reminded of this audacious act when I was reading Punishment, Chandara was offered a way out of her death sentence if she would just listen to her husband. “Don’t worry- if you do what I tell you, you’ll be quite safe.” (pg 893) is what Chidam told Chandara, however despite that Chandara refuses to use his advice and much prefers death. We understood that there was previous tension between them causing them to have a fallout. Chidam just like Dr. Flint required full control of their women, and felt that their pride was being attacked when their women were getting out of control. This led Chandara and Jacobs to build up pent-up rage inside of them and when they finally got the chance to get away, they seized it. In both texts, we see how extremely oppressed Chandara and Jacobs were. They were being suffocated in their relationships and when someone gets pushed to the edge, they were both happy with going with the choice that they felt like they were in control of.
Week 11 Assignment
Rabindranath Tagore’s short story “Punishment” is very similar to “Hedda Gabler” by Henrik Ibsen. In both texts we see that death comes upon characters who don’t really have a lot of freedom. Hedda and Chandara are both similar characters. They both are in unhappy marriages with very little freedom. They both rely on their husbands to bring home money and food for them. Chandara instead fights with her sister-in-law all Radha and no one cares because women in Bangladesh have very little power. Chidam also doesn’t allow Chandara to go to ghat by herself and forces her to have very little freedom. When Chidam’s brother Dukhiram kills his wife, Radha Chidam says Chandara did it to protect his older brother. “Chidam asked Chandara to take the blame on herself. She was dumbfounded”. This quote shows that Chandara isn’t even valuable to Chidam and that he is willing to get rid of her because he chooses his brother over his wife. Hedda and Chandara are very similar here for the fact that both are living in a male dominated society and they want to escape their lives than suffer the consequences of their husbands’ actions. “Then please give it to me sir, said Chandara. ‘Do what you like I can’t take it anymore’”. Chandara is willing to die because of Chidam and Dukhiram since she feels powerless and wants to become free of them. The only way she can become free is to be killed. Hedda Gabler dies in a similar fashion. Since she gave Lovborg the pistol that he used to kill himself she is guilty of a crime, the only person who knows this is Judge Brack. Brack promises to keep her crime a secret if she has an affair with him. Hedda decides to escape Brack and the unhappy life she is in by killing herself. Similarly, to Chandara, Hedda could only be free by doing this.
Assignment #11
Rabindranath Tagore’s short story “Punishment” I think is similar to the story Du Tenth, because I think the have similar conclusion, they both died. In Rabindranath Tagore’s short story “Punishment” The older brother killed his wife, however the younger brother do not want his brother to get crime, and go to jail, so he tell his own wife to said that is his wifi kill the older brother’s wifi. I think this is the similar point to Du Tenth, In the article, it said “This was what he instructed his wife to say:” The elder wife was about to attack me with the vegatable-slicer. I picked yp a farm-knife to stop her, and it somehow cut into her.” This was all RAmlochan’s invention. He had generously supplied Chidam with the proofs and embroidery that the story would required.” And when the police questioned Chandara, she said,” Yes, I killed her.” Also in Du Tenth, “ All day he would see Du Tenth beside him, crusing him. In time, he died. People said it was revenge exacted from the depths of the river.” In both article, the similar point is that the both article have people died, so I think this is the similar and have contract between the two novel.
Assignment #11
In Rabindranath Tagore’s “Punishment”, the reason why Chidam accuses his own wife for the murder of Radha was because he couldn’t grasp the idea of letting Chandra have an independent life. Chandra had gone to a ghat by herself and was talking with some man after finding this out, Chidam had said “If I ever hear that you’ve been to the ghat on your own, I’ll break every bone in your body” which shows the patriarchal marriage between them. When Chidam Tagore uses the theme of power in a hierarchrial society when he says that the women would constantly quarrel and no one would pay attention. It symbolizes how little or no power these women had and made me think of a class structure in where the weaker ones were fighting among themselves to have a power each other without actually gaining anything. When Chandra had fled to her maternal uncle’s house it shows how highly she valued the idea of freedom and when she realizes that her husband accuses her instead of his brother, she is faced with a harsh reality of herself and her place in this marriage and the society. A character from another reading who faced a similar conflict was Hedda Gabler. Hedda and Radha are unable to find their individuality in the marriage and are trapped in a patriarchal society where only actions of men are valued or influenced. Rather than being satisfied with this position, they both seek escapism in death. Radha expressed “I shall give my youth to the gallows instead of to you. My final ties in this life will be with them” shows how she had sacrificed herself in order to find her own expression. Similarly, Hedda Gabler had shot herself in the temple to take control over her own destiny rather than being controlled by Judge Brack.
Assignments – Week #11
In “Punishment”, Rabindranath Tagore tells a story about women’s resistance to patriarchy. Chandara being asked to be a scapegoat to exonerated for her hunsband’s brother Dukhiram Rui. Chandara’s hunsband Chidam Rui promiss he will save her after she confess her murder. However, Chandara stated categorically that she killed her sister-in-law. Even though the real murderor, Dukhiram admit his crime, but Chandara still insis her confession. At the end she was condemned to be hanged. I think it has similar idea with Du Tenth Sinks the Jewel Box in Anger. Du Tenth and Chandara are betrayed by their lovers, they are all choose death to show their disappointed. Both of the authors are feel sympathy for the fact that women can’t escape the control of men. Women are nothing but men’s accessories. The only way to get rid of the men’s power is death.
Assignment Week 10
Leo Tolstoy’s novella, The Death of Ivan Ilyich carries a valuable lesson for mankind. It elaborates through details about how making a living and creating wealth cannot always be good for you but most of the time in the end it’s all worthless in the eyes of a dying person. He argues that all human beings are eventually going to die, and the wealth and money earned or created will be left in this world but the only thing that would matter is the memories they made with the loved ones or the adventures they went on. Ivan Ilyich surrounded himself with people who were just like him, only ambition being creating money and wealth. So, when he died, the only thing they cared about was that his death created a vacancy and chances of promotion, he did not create bonds with people who would actually miss him or grieve for him, and the people who actually did care about him, he pushed them away and instead went of focusing on his work. Life is too short to be spent in one direction. This story resonates with our society today as well, especially during these times of the pandemic. This pandemic has taught us that your life can take a drastic turn at any point so we should make sure that we enjoy our life as we go and for me personally, to not just spend all my time at work and in school but to go out a little, travel the world while I can. We are always going to make money and have many opportunities at different places but there are memories that can be made before we run out of time. Life is about living, how you live is on you, you can just survive or actually live.
