Skip to main content

Book Review: A Tiger in the House by Ruskin Bond

‘A Tiger in the House’ is a short story written by Ruskin Bond. Ruskin’s grandfather once went with the party of tiger hunters in the Tarai jungles of North India. The party was from Delhi, they were naïve and grandfather was a seasoned player of the wild – he was not a hunter but knew how to tame and behave with the wild animals like tiger and lion. The trip was luxurious but they returned empty handed. None of the hunters succeed in hunting down any tiger or lion. Well, grandfather found a cub and brought it home. The cub was named Timothy. He started living with the family, as a cub he was not harmful to anyone. Initially, he drank milk but as he began growing, he was given meat as a food.


With time as the tiger grew young, his behavior towards humans began changing. Soon, grandfather transported the tiger to the zoo of Lucknow. After some months, when grandfather happened to be in Lucknow, he visited the zoo and went straight forward to the cage where Timothy was interned. Grandfather put both his hands and began caressing him. The tiger was moved by his way of handling him. Having seen Timothy was a moment of catharsis for grandfather.

Soon a guard interrupted grandfather and told that the tiger he was cuddling was not Timothy. He further said that Timothy died two months ago due to pneumonia. Grandfather withdrew his hands from the cage and gave a scornful look to the guard for disturbing him mentally.

In his books and stories, Ruskin has always talked about conserving nature and wild species. From this story it is clear that the tiger died due to change in environment i.e. from forest to house then into zoo. Being with the nature is best suited to animals and birds; probably this is the message from this story.

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

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 conversatio...
65 comments
Read more

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 ...
68 comments
Read more

Character Sketch of Binya from ‘The Blue Umbrella’ by Ruskin Bond

The Blue Umbrella by Ruskin Bond is a popular children’s story. It features Binya as the main character, though there are other important characters as well, but the story revolves around Binya and her little beautiful umbrella. The story is widely popular among children, thus it has also been included in the schools’ syllabus all across the country. Since it is often taught in the school, thus the character sketch of Binya is often demanded by students from year to year. Character Sketch of Binya from The Blue Umbrella by Ruskin Bond Binya is the main character of the novel ‘The Blue Umbrella’ by Ruskin Bond. Her full name is Binyadevi. As in the hills or anywhere in India it is a kind of trend to call children with their short nicknames. Binya’s elder brother’s name is Bijju, whereas his real name is Vijay. Binya aged eleven is a hilly girl. She lives with her small family in the hills of Garhwal. Her father died when she was two years of age. For sustenance, the...
41 comments
Read more