(SHORT STORIES) Chapter 2- Fritz - By Satyajit Ray Workbook

                                                          REVIEW QUESTIONS

Question -1

(b) Describe how memory plays an important role in Satyajit Ray's short story "Fritz".

Answer:  Memory plays an important role in Satyajit Ray's short story "Fritz". The memory of Jayanto has been presented in broad outline. Jayanto went to Bundi in Rajasthan with his father when he was a mere child of six and he retained his memories in his mind which helped him to relive the past by comparing the new Bundi with the old one. On reaching Bundi with his friend Shankar, Some of the memories of his childhood days spent in the same circuit house 31 years ago came crowding in his mind. He was feeling nostalgic. Slowly and silently he started recalling the doll gifted to him by his uncle. The doll looke very life like. It was named Fritz. Jayanto Reminisced that he used to play with the doll all day long. Although it was not mechanised, it could bend and twist its limbs.

          On knowing from Jayanto that the doll had been torn asunder by stray dogs and was buried under the deodar tree, Shankar told him to dig up the ground in order to confirm the existence of the doll which was broken in small pieces. They got the spot dug up and they were amused and bemused to find a 12-inch long human skeleton. There was no sign of the doll, so we see that it was Jayanto's childhood memory which brought back the little doll Fritz to life in a new light.

Critical Appreciation of the poem "The Darkling Thrush"

      "The Darkling Thrush" at first appears to be a nature poem of indefinable beauty. Here we come across the lurid scene of December evening. The air is drawing to a close. It is really a cold and frosty evening. The poet uses a frost metaphor in order to present a scene of desolation and dreariness. It's a twilight time. The sun is setting. The whole landscape is enveloped in deep darkness.

        The mood of the poet is gloomy and glum. Every spirit on earth seems cheerless. The poet seems to share the general mood of desolation. He looks dejected and depressed against the backdrop of such a cheerless landscape. He hears the joyful song of a thrush pouring out its music in full throated glee. The poet's heart overflows with a feeling of hope. He thinks that the thrush seems to sing a song of hope for the world torn and tormented  by hopelessness and despair. The songbird by singing a joyful song heralds a sense of hope for the hopeless world.