Skip to main content

Book Review: To See a Tiger by Ruskin Bond

To See a Tiger by Ruskin Bond is a short story covered under jungle stories section. Ruskin as a young boy wants to see the real tiger in a forest – in its natural habitat. Mr. Kishor drives him to a forest house and says that he will pick him after two days. In that forest house, an army corporal takes care of his luggage and room. For tea and meals, there is Bhag Singh – he is the servant in that house. They all know as why young Bond has come to the house.


In the evening, Bhag Singh informs him about a river that passes through the jungle and it is hardly fifty-meters away from the house. At night many animals come to drink water there and in the moonlight it is possible to see wild cats there from the verandah. As the night approaches, Ruskin sits in the verandah with a fire hearth around him. He keeps staring and staring but gets no view of the wild animals. Instead, he hears weird cracking of frogs, it seemed as thousands of frogs have gathered to celebrate something. The noise perturbs him. He feels bad about his luck.

Next night Bhag Singh sits with him, and from time to time he gives him tea so that he remains awake for the animal watching. They see no wild animals there. Next night Bhag Singh’s son sits with him and serves him tea from time to time. Three nights wasted – no sight of animals – especially of tiger or lion.

Next day Mr. Kishor comes to pick him up. While driving through the jungle, all of sudden Mr. Kishor stops the jeep with a jolt and there in front of their eyes stands a tiger in the middle of the road. It was crossing the path. Ruskin bemuses on his luck, he waited for this sight for three nights but now he is seeing it in the broad daylight.

Even in the jungle stories, Ruskin never stops to surprise his readers with unexpected endings. Simple but purely engaging story…recommended for kids.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Poem Summary: Where The Mind Is Without Fear by Rabindranath Tagore

Poem by Rabindranath Tagore: Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high Where knowledge is free Where the world has not been broken up into fragments By narrow domestic walls Where words come out from the depth of truth Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit Where the mind is led forward by thee Into ever-widening thought and action Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake. Short Summary: This poem is written by Rabindranath Tagore during pre-independence days, when India was a colony of the British. The underlying theme of the poem is absolute freedom; the poet wants the citizens of his country to be living in a free state. According to the poem, we see that the poet is expressing his views there should be a country, like where people live without any sort of fear and with pure dignity…they should

Book Review: The Blue Umbrella by Ruskin Bond

Among all Ruskin Bond books, The Blue Umbrella has, so far, gathered immense applaud from readers and critics alike.  This is a short novel, but the kind of moral lessons it teaches to us are simply overwhelming. This is a story of Binya, a poor little girl living with her mother and an elder brother, Bijju, in a small hilly village of Garhwal. One day while herding her two cows back home, she stumbles upon some city people enjoying the picnic in the valley. She is enthralled to see them well-groomed and rich. She craves to be one like them and among many other things of their, a blue frilly umbrella catches her attention. She begins craving for it. On the other hand, the city people get attracted by her innocent beauty and the pendant in her neck. The pendant consists of leopard’s claw – which is considered a mascot widely in the hills. Binya trades her pendant off with the blue umbrella. The blue umbrella is so much beautiful that soon it becomes a topic of conversation fo

Poem Summary: Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley

Ozymandias is a short poem of fourteen lines written by Percy Bysshe Shelley. The concurrent theme of the poem is that nothing remains intact and same forever in this world. Even the brightest of metal, one day decays with passage of time. The throne name of Egyptian King Ramesses is Ozymandias. It was his dearest desire to preserve himself forever by building a huge statue that he thought would never tumble down. Stanza 1: I met a traveller from an antique land Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand, Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown, And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command, Tell that its sculptor well those passions read Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things, The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed; Summary: The poet narrates the poem through the eyes of a traveler who seems to have come back from a remote and far-away land, referring to Egypt. The traveler r