The Portrait Of A Lady (Gist)

The Portrait Of A Lady (Gist)

- June 23, 2021

Introduction

Khushwant Singh Was One Of The Prominent Indian Writers.
In The Story, The Author Draws A Pen Portrait Of His Grandmother.
He Has Beautifully Written An Account Of His Relationship With Her Grandmother.

Pen Portrait Of Grandmother

Khushwant Singh Draws A Pen Portrait Of His Grandmother.
Old Woman
Its Hard To Believe That Once She Had Been Young And Pretty
His Grandfather’s Picture Hung Above The Mantelpiece
He Looked At Least A Hundred Years Old

Appearance of grandmother

Old, Short, Fat, Slightly Bent
Wrinkled Face
She Looks The Same For Last Twenty Years
She Couldn’t Walk Straight
She Wears White Clothes And Roams In The House.
She Keeps Her One Hand On Her Waist To Balance Herself.
She Held A Rosary In The Other Hand.
Her Silver Locks Scattered Over Her Pale Face.
Her Lips Constantly Moved.
She Always Prayed To Herself.

Close Friends

Narrator And His Grandmother Were Good Friends.
His Parents Had Left Him With Her In The Village.
She Used To Wake Him Up In Morning.
She Got Him Ready For School
She Used To Wash His Wooden Slate And Plaster It With Yellow Chalk.
She Takes An Earthen Inkpot And Red Pen Tie Them In The Bundle And Hand It To Him.
Prepared His Breakfast (Thick Stale Chapatti) Little Butter And Sugar Spread On It.
She Also Carries Some Chapattis For Village Dogs

Went To School With The Narrator.

Grandmother Always Went To School With Him.
Because School Was Attached To The Temple.
There A Priest Taught The Children Alphabet And Morning Prayer.
Grandmother Sat Inside Temple
Spent Her Time Reading Holy Books
She Would Walk Back Home With Him

Turning Point In Relationship

Turning Point Came In Their Relationship When His Parents Call Both To The City
Narrator And His Grandmother Shared The Same Room.
Now, Grandmother Don’t Go To His School, And She Didn’t Like The English School.
Nor Did She Like Science And Music Being Taught At The New School.
There Was No Teaching Of God
There Were No Dogs In Streets
Grandmother Took To Feeding The Sparrows.
Now They Saw Less Of Each Other.

Bond Of Relationship Broken

Their Common Link Broken When The Narrator Went To The University.
Grandmother Accepted Her Loneliness Quietly.
She Used To Set On Her Wheelchair And Recite Prayers.
At Afternoon She Used To Feed The Sparrows
She Broke The Bread Into Little Bits And Threw Them To The Sparrows.
Hundreds Of Sparrows Collected Around Her.

Narrator Goes Abroad

Narrator Went Abroad For Higher Studies.
Grandmother Came To Drop Him At Railway Station. (Kissed Forehead)
Narrator Thinks Its His Last Meeting With Her.
Narrator Returned Home After Five Years.
She Collected The Neighborhood Women And Celebrated His Homecoming.

The Grandmother’s Death

Next Morning, She Fell Ill.
She Declared That Her End Was Near.
She Continued Praying And Telling Her Beads, Then Her Lips Stopped Moving The Rosery Fell Down, And She Was Dead.
Evening time, sun was setting
Thousands of sparrows sat near her dead body.
They did not chirrup.
Narrator’s mother brought some bread and broke it into little piece, but birds took no notice.
When They Carried Her Dead Body Outside, The Sparrows Flew Away Quietly………