Great Works of Literature II

Well for starters when i began reading Punishment i thought it was going to be something rather different, in that there was going to be something along the lines of enslavement punishment not punishment from the murder of a sister-in-law.  The more i read the more interesting it got, the scheme to blame all the problems on to Chandara and later attempting to save her from the false accusations of having killed Radha. I can sympathize for Dukhiram and how he puts up with a day full of work and stress to come up and get verbally abused  for not having anything to give to feed the family. Dukhiram goes to kill his wife with a simple but swift farm knife blow straight down into Radha’s head. I found that at the very end when Chandara goes to say “To hell with him,” was rather appropriate with the situation, given that she was framed for murder despite how much her husband loved her. From the looks of it love is not stronger then the bond of family, and love eventually becomes hate with betrayal. Maybe that is how life is that love can instantly become hatred with a small push it becomes something serious.

Much like with The Road to Salvation, Jhingur decides to mess up his life along with his family’s. Though it might seem like it does not fit in with Punishment I find that they are much very alike. Jhingur learns that he needs to accept what he has done to Buddhu. One major thing i noticed is the one section where he goes to the tanner’s and goes to say this one line that really stood out for me, “if a Brahman Pandit stumbles in the dark and falls then another Pandit, instead of giving him a hand, will give him a couple of kicks so he won’t be able to get up. But when a thief finds another thief in distress he helps him.” Rather interesting in that a man with less honor and moral compassion would go to help a fellow in trouble. This seems like to be willing to help one another we as humans have to be ruthless and nearly no morals.