The Veldt by Ray Bradbury

George and Lydia Hadley are the anxious and tired parents of two young children called Peter and Wendy. They live in high-tech house called the Happylife Home, where they various machines and gadgets to do their daily biddings as simple as brushing teeth or tying shoelaces. Things go wrong when the father of the house tries to bring an abrupt change to his children’s habits.

Here is my version of the analysis of the story:

• Written in third person limited narrative from George’s point of view.
• The protagonists are George Hadley and his wife, Lydia Hadley.
• I am a bit confused about the antagonists. They may be the children; or the extraordinary mind-controlled machine in the nursery; or it can be the Hadley’s too much affection for their children and making them spoilt. I am guessing, the antagonists are the kids.
• The genre is Science Fiction with some psychological horror undertone.
• No definite situational irony present. The ending was foreshadowed by the father’s actions.
• The rising action starts right from the first line, when Lydia shows concern about her children’s imagination with George.
• The falling action begins when George abruptly switches off all the machines in the whole house in hopes of getting a normal life and for the betterment of his children.
• The climax is when Peter and Wendy lock their parents in the veldt (the part of their imagination that shows the African savannah). The most disturbing part of the whole story is that the two children have hated their parents for a long time and they have killed them in their imagination a lot more times before the ultimate action and they were very chilled about it.
• The denouement of the story is when Dr. McClean, the psychologist comes over to accompany the Hadleys to a vacation and finds out the horrible truth.

Remarks: Overall the story is very grim and the tone of the story was dreadful right from the beginning. The writer does a brilliant job at creating a dark and disturbing atmosphere from the very first line. Even though the ending is expected, it sends a chill up our spine nevertheless, and I believe that is what the author intended to do in the first place. 

Rain by Somerset Maugham

Dr. Alec Macphail sets sail for the west with his wife and on the ship they befriend the Davidsons, who happen to be Christian missionaries. On the way, they get stuck on a monsoon-clad Samoan island called the Pago-Pago, where they have to rent a small room in order to stay. Their fellow renters were the Davidsons and a woman known by Sadie Thompson. The story speaks of the sense of morality, sin and temptation through the various mentioned characters. Here is my version of the analysis of the story:

• The protagonists of the story are the Macphails and the Davidsons.
• It does not have a clear antagonist. But it is not a person. Perhaps, the tension between Mr. Davidson and Ms. Thompson is the main antagonist and also Davidson’s extremist behavior.
• The story is told in third person limited narrative from Dr. Macphail’s viewpoint.
• It falls in the genre of Realism as there was no mention of any technology or supernatural entities or any fantastical beasts. It is about a few people coping up with each other in an unfriendly climate.
• The story takes about fifty-one pages to tell us about sin and morality, but the main rising action begins with the introduction of Ms. Thompson, as she is one of the most important central characters. Her lifestyle was against the principle of the Davidsons and that is where things start to fall apart.
• The falling action is when Ms. Thompson is threatened with imprisonment (it is not clearly mentioned but alluded to) in San Francisco. She begins to act hysterical and begs for Davidson’s company to comfort her.
• The story has a very clear climax. Davison suicides near the end of the story. It is literally mentioned why he did it but the Maugham gives strong allusion that he gave into temptation for Ms. Thompson in the end. His strong sense of justice (sinner must be punished) and guilt makes him do that.
• I do not know if it counts as a situational irony but I was not expecting the ending like this. Yes, the things he did to Ms. Thompson and the natives sort of make it obvious that he would die, but I thought he might be killed by the natives or Ms. Thompson or Dr. Macphail (who was losing his patience with the missionary’s rash feats). So, in the end when Davidson cuts his own throat for shame and guilt, I was surprised. So, even if it is not a major irony, it is definitely a plot twist for me.
• The story has a clear denouement – Davison dies, his wife and the Macphails mourn and Ms. Thompson has her ultimate revenge. Thus this grim story is nicely wrapped up.

The Post Office by Rabindranath Tagore

Here is my thoughts and review of the play The Post Office by one of the best Asian playwrights, Rabindranath Tagore. This is purely my opinion and in no way do I claim that this is the accurate interpretation.

  

At first read, the play felt short and utterly pointless. On the surface, this is some escapist play where the central character – a sick young boy – uses his high imagination and optimism to escape from his prison-like situation. But being aware of the fact that Tagore tends to use a lot of symbolism in his writing and the last act showed that this play is much more than that. It is packed with various symbols here and there.

The play consists of a total of two acts. In the first act we learn that Amal, a young little boy adopted by Madhav, is suffering from a terrible disease which requires him to be locked up in his room away from the so-called “autumn wind and sun” in order to cure his sickness. But Amal is a playful little boy and being confined in a room is like a prison to him. So, to escape from this, he uses his imagination and befriends different people, who happens to be passing by his window. This sounds like a simple story about children and their imagination. But it much more than that.