— Sumi Paul
When I think about what makes a work of literature great I think about what I am gaining from reading it. I think about what it is that the writer wants to teach the readers. I believe the story “Bewitched” by Ueda Akinari is a great work of literature because it is a text that I enjoyed reading and could actually connect to. The story is about a young man who is the black sheep of his family. His dream is to live in Kyoto, which he considers to be the most beautiful place, although he has never seen this place before. He wants to live there instead of following his family business with his father and brother. His family thinks of him as immature, irresponsible, gullible, and untrustworthy. He meets this beautiful girl which he believes to be from Kyoto. He imagines Kyoto, his dream place to live, to be a place where there are beautiful girls and a place where he would be able to learn and get educated. He feels as though he is trapped with his family and is unhappy. When he meets Manago, he becomes deceived by her because he gets blinded by her beauty. His inability to control his desire for her is what caused him his misfortune. His personality of being immature and gullible is what allowed him to be the perfect target for Manago. This text can be related to the Bengali culture as well. Bengali men are supposed to be “manly” and make sure that the women listen to them. If the women get things they want without the man’s approval, society would think the man is weak. For example, my cousin recently got married in Bangladesh. When he came back to live in America, he had to leave her in Bangladesh. Instead of living with his parents, she ended up going back to live with her parents. Everyone in the village in Bangladesh thought of him as weak because he did not tell her that she could not live at her parent’s home. They thought he was afraid of losing her as his wife if he had told her anything. The lesson of the story “Bewitched” is that beauty is not everything and if beauty blinds you, you will not notice the true intentions of a person.
