POWER & PASSION

STUDY MATERIAL ON SHAKING HANDS- An Essay By A.G.Gardiner 📚 ON  SHAKING HANDS 📚 - A.G.Gardiner Gardiner is of the view that hands shake is the most innocent and amiable custom of greeting. he gives a delightful account of the western practice of shaking hands. He compares this custom of greeting with those of other cultures, and debates that handshake is the best. He mentions few of the examples of salutation worldwide. In India we pay ‘Namaskar’ while the Japanese ‘kowtow’. Such examples can easily be multiplied. We have the theme of civility, conflict, change, perception and choice in this essay. A handshake is a type of greeting that involves grasping hands followed by a brief up and down movement. Handshakes are used as both a greeting and parting gesture throughout the world. Handshakes can be a valuable communication tool for making a first impression. A lot can be learnt about a person by the way he holds and shakes the others’ hands.  The hand shake should be firm ye...

📚 MENDING WALL 📚 - Robert Frost Mending Wall' was written by the great American poet Robert Frost.The poem is a literary masterpiece. It was first published in the year 1914. The poem deals with the subject of mending  wall between two farms as a metaphor for healthy boundaries in society. It is a stimulating and interesting poem about human boundaries or limitations and their benefits in the society. The poem revolves around the story of two neighbours who come across each other in spring every year to mend the stone wall that separates their farms. The poem demonstrates how good fences create good neighbours, and how people can preserve their long-lasting relations with neighbours by founding such walls.  It has gained massive popularity due to its publication across the globe because of its simple yet thoughtful subject. In the poem with a first-person narrator who describes a stone wall sitting between his ancestral home and his neighbor's property. The narrator says tha...

TO INDIA: MY NATIVE LAND - Henry Louis Derozio In the poem My Native Land every word of the poet expresses out his patriotism in his heart for his country.  The poet envisages his native land i.e. India which in the past had a supreme position in the world but now the country has been dishonoured to the most extend. The poet in this poem expresses his grief over the lost glory of India which has lost its grandeur. India was being worshiped by other, her prominence was beyond comparison.  The poet says that India is a country which had a glorious past and had the capabilities of providing spiritual leadership to the other nations but now India was enslaved. She has been overpowered by a foreign power.  After being overpowered by the foreign power the state of the country is pathetic and such dilapidated condition hurts the poet. She has lost her honour and prestige. The panorama of the country appears dark to the poet as the past glory of the country has vanished completel...

LIFE OF INDIAN VILLAGE AS PRESENTED  IN R.K.NARAYAN'S: THE VENDOR OF SWEETS  The  partition  of  India  shows  radical  and  lasting  changes  in  Indian  social  and  cultural  life.  We  find many  changes  in  literature.  Particularly  Indian  writing  in  English  shows  the  Indian  social  minds.  Many Indian  writers  have  changed  their  writing  trends.  Like  many  of  Indian  writing  novelists,  R.K.Narayan  is  a leading  writer.  Though  he  wrote  in  English,  he  had  a  great  attachment  to  his  mother  tongue.  Narayan depicted  ‘Malgudi’  as  an  Indian  village  in  his  novel  “The  Vendor  of...

📚 THE ASTROLOGER'S DAY 📚 -  R.K.Narayan The Astrologer’s Day” is a short story which deals with a day in the life of an ordinary but fake astrologer. The setting of the story is a town, Malgudi which is located in South India, near to Madras. It is not a story of contemporary times but pre-independence times. The story opens at the midday. This is the time when the astrologer opens his business. The writer describes how he begins his business. He removes all his professional equipment like cowries shells, charts, Palmyra writing etc. He is also dressed typically like an astrologer to attract customers. His forehead is bright with sacred ash and vermilion. His eyes are assumed to have a prophetic light by his customers. He wears a saffron turban. Thus the astrologer presented himself so perfectly that he was consequently a point of attraction for all the people. The writer describes the path along the Town Hall Park where the astrologer sits to lure his prospective customers. He c...

The novel The Vendor of Sweets is a fictional reality and give a fairy-tale feeling. The novel is written in 1967. It illustrates the conflict between modern culture and traditional Indian culture. The western society may object the Jagan’s (the protagonist) believes of a “free man” by moving away from his work, son and acquaintances for the sake of calmness and detachment. Yet, Narayan is writing wholly from an Indian perspective, not Western. The novel centers on the relationship between Jagan and his son, Mali. Jagan is a sweets vendor (seller) and strictly follows the asceticism of Gandhi, however, Mali denies his father’s beliefs and values and favors liberal western ideas. When the novel begins, Jagan is fifty-five years old man, living a strict life of asceticism. He eats only wheat, green vegetable, and honey and cuts sugar and salt from his diet. He thoroughly follows a core Hindu scripture the Bhagavad Gita of simply the Gita, as referred by Gandhi his spiritual dictionary. P...