In the poem 'Night of the Scorpion,' the poet's father is symbolic of India's ambivalence. Discuss.
Answers
It is quite true in the poem 'Night of the Scorpion,' the poet's father is symbolic of India's ambivalence. India is a country of paradoxes. Both the extremes are found here in all areas of life. Similarly, there was a marked difference between villagers’ reaction and that of the father to the mother’s scorpion bite.
The father was earnestly trying each and everything to relieve his wife of the pain. He had already tried every possible remedy and antidote against the scorpion bite but to no avail. So he also called the holy-man thinking he might cure the mother in pain. He even poured a little paraffin oil and lit a flame on the sting to kill the effect of the poison.
The villages reacted unscientifically to the scorpion bite. They gave their own superstitious, philosophical and religious interpretations for the incident. They believed the scorpion bite was universe’s plan to cure the mother of her previous birth sins. They believed it will purify her flesh and soul. They did nothing except philosophizing or lecturing. They just sat around the writhing mother and gave their opinions.
The Night of the scorpion
In the story night of the scorpion,
the writer says the one day his mother got gotten by a scorpion but instead of helping his parents the neighbours said the it was his mother's past life sins the had made her suffer.
This angered the writer but he could not say anything as he was very worried for his mother.Writer's father applied a medicated warm oil that slowly vanished the effect of poison spread by the scorpion's bite.
The story depicts the orthodox and backward thinking of our society.They still believe in strange rituals.Human life has no value for them.This is sad but this is the reality.
We must understand that in any situation our first priority is to save human lives and not believe in old orthodox rituals.We must contribute in educating and uplifting our country