"The Boy Comes Home" by A. A. Milne

 

“The Boy’s Come Home” is a light comic story written by Alan Alexander Milne. It is story of Phillip. He is 23 year old young man, who has recently returned from 4 years of war. He lives with his uncle James and aunt Emily. His uncle has very strict rules in house and has very authoritative nature. Phillip on the other hand has changed while being far away in war zone for 4 years. Military has changed his personality. He is no longer a boy who will take orders from his uncle. We can see this change when in the morning he deals with cook Mrs. Higgins as she threatens to leave the job if asked for breakfast at 10 o’clock. Phillip deals with her by giving her payment cheque and ask her to leave. She immediately agrees to make breakfast for Phillip.

Uncle James wants Phillip to join his jam business. Aunt Emily warns uncle James that how Phillip is no longer a boy and a changed man. Uncle James wait for Phillip and then they both talk about business where Phillip disagree and when uncle James try to use his power or purse Phillip tale out revolver and bomb. Uncle James agrees to what let Phillip take his own decision. Phillip left and enter again uncle James and Phillip has same conversation again. Phillip agrees to join jam business. Readers are along with uncle James left wondering if first talking encounter was a dream or reality. 

This story talks about the generation gap. How older generation always thinks that younger generation is not able to make their decisions and they don’t know what is good for them. It also talks about how situations shapes personality. Phillip was away for 4 years at war zone. May be Phillip before was a boy who used to obey everything his uncle told him to. After coming from war he has learned about himself and how to take charge of the situation. It also talks about education. Phillip is now 23 year old, that means he went away for war when he was 19 years old. At that age he must have to drop his education and after coming back from war as uncle James suggested its too late to pursue career and learning about it. It shows how war has affected younger generation’s future. 

Thank you.   

"The Monkey's Paw" by W. W. Jacobs

 Everyone in this world had heard a fairy tale of granting three wishes. Almost everyone has imagined that if they got their three wishes granted what they will wish for. Fairy tales are amazing with happy endings, but what if this typical story gets horrifying. Your wish would be granted but at the cost you would never agree or would willing to pay. 

“The Monkey’s Paw” by W. W. Jacobs is also a typical “three wishes granted” story. It is supernatural short story, which was first published in England in the collection “The Lady of the Barge” in 1902. The story revolves around four characters Mr. & Mrs. White, their son Herbert and Sergeant – Major Morris, he is friend of Mr. White who served British army in India. While serving in India Morris has got this mummified monkey’s paw in which the old fakir has put spell that the owner will get three wish granted but at horrifying consequences as a punishment for tampering with fate. 

Sergeant Morris has got his three wishes granted and know how this paw works through that in the fire, while Mr. White does not believe Morris and save the paw from fire. Jokingly and not believing in the power of paw Mr. White wish for 200 pounds. Herbert then left for his work and in the evening the man comes with the bad news of Herbert’s death. He has been caught in the machinery and the company wants to give them 200 pounds to compensate their loss. Both Mr. and Mrs. White fell in to grief as they only had their son as family. After few days of Herbert’s death Mrs. White with huge grief of loss of their son tell Mr. White to wish for their son back alive. Mr. White do so as his wife was forcing him after an hour or so later there was knock at the door. Mrs. White knew it was her son. She ran down stairs and hurryingly trying to open the door. Mr. White on the other hand knows the result of using monkey’s paw now and had seen his son’s mutilated body. He fears his son alive in his corpse, fumbling on the ground to find the paw he again wish for something and knocking stops. When Mrs. White opens the door there was no one. 

In this story author talks about terrifying results of wish. Mr. White and his family was happy and wealthy enough. They didn’t need those money urgently. It was their greed. That greed and wishing more than your fate is what brought that drastic loss of their only son. The story warns everybody who tries to get more than their fate, or are greedy. The outcome of your greed can be frightful which may be you will regret your whole life. So be careful what you wish for.

Thank you. 

"The Proposal" by Anton Chekhov

 Anton Pavlov Chekhov was a Russian playwright and a short story writer. He is considered to be the greatest writer of short fiction in history. His notable works are “The Seagull”, “Uncle Vanya”, “Three Sisters” and “The Cherry Orchard”. 

“The Proposal” or “A Marriage Proposal” is a one act farce written by Anton Chekhov in 1888 – 1889. It was first performed in 1890. It is very fast paced play which involves three characters. Ivan Vasilyevich Lomov who is neighbor to Stepan Stepnovich Chubukov. Chubukov has a daughter Natalya who is 25 year old unmarried young, beautiful girl. Lomov is 35 year old unmarried men with some heart disease and now wants to settle down. Lomov dressed up and visit his neighbor Chubukov to ask for the hand of his daughter. Chubukov agrees and sent Natalya but somehow hey both got in to fight upon Oxen meadows and then on their dogs. At the end Lomov and Natalya got married in presence of Chubukov. This whole chaotic situation provides plenty laugh to the audience. 

If we look at the play critically we can see how hypocrite was behavior of Chubukov and Lomov with each other. When Lomov came to visit Mr. Chubukov was calling him by pronouns like “my precious one” and “my treasure” but he would not give him a penny if he would have come for money. He also abuses him and his family when they were fighting about Oxen meadows. Lomov also take abuses to Chubukov family while fighting. 

The man who denied giving a penny to a man agrees as fast as he can to give his daughter to that person. Chubukov also says that his unmarried daughter is burden over him. When Natalya didn’t know that Lomov was here to propose her for wedding she kept on fighting for meadows but when she came to know she called Lomov back and let Lomov win the argument. This shows how important it was for a woman at that time to get married. Both Natalya and Lomov were fighting on a small thing but they both got married. It shows how wealth of a man and beauty of a woman was only considered important at that time. 

Thank you. 

Thoughts on a movie "Stranger than Fiction"

 What will happen to you if you find out that you are a part of a fictional story; or the fictional story that has being written is upon your life. Its strange. Fictional writers create their own characters, but what if that created character is happen to be an actual person. 

The movie “Stranger than fiction” follows the same story. It was directed by Marc Forster, produced by Lindsay Doran and written by Zach Helm. It came out in 2006. The main character is Harold Crick ( Will Ferrell ). He is an IRS agent. His life is quite simple and mundane like any other human being until he starts hearing a female voice narrating his actions. Things starts changing when the voice narrated that Harold Crick was going to die. He figured out with the help of professor Hilbert that he might be in a fictional story. But it is not sure whether the story is comedy where the death can be avoided or a tragedy where death of a main character can not be avoided. Then the story revolves around Crick tries to find a way to stop his death by finding that author. 

Harold Crick is a man of numbers. His life revolves around time and numbers. Everything in his life is calculated. He even counts his brush strokes and foot steps he take to reach his office. He didn’t had any family or friends. It changed when he heard about his death. The movie shows that life is unpredictable and it might be that we are wasting most of our life in doing things we don’t enjoy that much. 

Second important part of the movie is the author Karen Eiffel, who is writing story on Harold Crick. She is suffering from writer’s block. She is unable to decide how to kill her character. When she finally finds out how to kill her character she comes to know that Harold Crick is an actual person and not just fictional character, and if she kill Harold in her book the actual Harold will also die. 

The ending of the movie is beautiful in its own way. What makes it more beautiful is point of view of author Karen Eiffel. Did she killed her character anyway? If she did decided to kill, how did Harold escape the fictional death? Or he was not able to escape it? To find out you have to watch movie. 

Overall the movie is beautiful. The story is different and attractive. Actors have acted beautifully just according to the need of the story. It actually looked like a story of a human being like one of us. I am very late to post this as movie was released many years ago but it is indeed very unique, simple and impressive movie.

Thank you.

Book Review : "And I Marry Me" by Sejal Ladola

 Almost everybody remembers their teenage phase. Most of the time as how silly we were back then and how many mistakes we have made. In that phase most of the time people are confused about their life. So many things seems to happen at the same time mostly we think those things as worst or best of our life. We made choice recklessly. But almost everybody when they came out of that phase are totally different person and most of the time the better version if ourselves. 

The book “And I Marry Me” by Sejal Ladola, which is fictional biography talks about the journey of narrators life. The teenage daughter of the narrator has come home and she wants to know ups and downs of her mother’s life. Then narrator starts giving life lessons which her daughter will need in her life. 

The book basically talks about everything one face when they are young. The goals, love, money, failures, insecurities and much more. The narrator has beautifully narrated the way they made mistakes and learnt from it.  The book talks about many problems teenagers or other people might be facing in their life, and how our narrator handled it or learnt from it. 

The book has so many good lines but at the end I want to quote my favourite lines. 

“ Keep courage in your pocket, It can buy you a thing which money can’t. Courage is a bridge, much like strong bridge, strong courage takes you to your destination and like poor bridge, poor courage brings your downfall.”