Lost Spring
Stories of Stolen Childhood
Anees Jung
Thinking About Language
Although this text speaks of factual events and situations of misery it transforms these with an almost poetical prose into a literary experience. How does it do so? Here are some literary devices.
- Hyperbole is a way of speaking or writing that makes something sound better or more exciting than it really is. For example: Garbage to them is gold.
- A Metaphor, as you know, compares two things or ideas that are not very similar. A metaphor describes a thing in terms of a single quality or feature of some other thing. We can say that a metaphor ‘transfers’ a quality of one thing to another. For example: The road was a ribbon of light.
- Simile is a word or phrase that compares one thing with another using the words ‘like’ or ‘as’. For example: As white as snow.
Question 1: Saheb-e-Alam which means the lord of the universe is directly in contrast to what Saheb is in reality.
Answer: Here, the lord of the universe is entirely different than the condition of Saheb. So, the author has used metaphor in this case.
Question 2: Drowned in an air of desolation.
Answer: Drowned in an air of desolation is an example of hyperbole, because a mundane thing like a solitary temple has been depicted in more exciting term.
Question 3: Seemapuri, a place on the periphery of Delhi yet miles away from it, metaphorically.
Answer: This is a clear case of metaphor. Seemapuri is on the outskirts of Delhi but author thinks that it is miles away from Delhi, in terms of development and facilities which is taken for granted in a metro city.
Question 4: For the children it is wrapped in wonder, for the elders it is a means of survival.
Answer: Sense of wonder and means of survival are entirely different from each other. So, this is a case of metaphor.
Question 5: As her hands move mechanically like the tongs of a machine, I wonder if she knows the sanctity of the bangles she helps make.
Answer: Drudgery of menial work and the abstract concept of sanctity of a bangle are entirely different from each other. So, this is an example of metaphor.
Question 6: She still has bangles on her wrist, but not light in her eyes.
Answer: Bangles signify the beauty of a blissful married life, but blindness is sans all the beauty. So, this is an example of metaphor.
Carefully read the following phrases and sentences taken from the text. Can you identify the literary device in each example?
Question 7: Few airplanes fly over Firozabad.
Answer: Here, few airplanes flying over Firozabad signify lack of opportunities in Firozabad. This is an example of simile.
Question 8: Web of poverty.
Answer: This is hyperbole because poverty has been compared with a web which grandiosely explains the complications that arise due to poverty.
Question 9: Scrounging for gold.
Answer: This is hyperbole because rag-pickers are scrounging for useful items from garbage so that such items could be sold in exchange of some money. Even a small amount of money is gold for poor children.
Question 10: And survival in Seemapuri means rag-picking. Through the years, it has acquired the proportions of a fine art.
Answer: Rag-picking is a menial job. By comparing it with a high sounding thing like fine art, the author has used hyperbole.
Question 11: The steel canister seems heavier than the plastic bag he would carry so lightly over his shoulders.
Answer: Here, relative weights of the plastic bag and the steel canister are explained to depict the extra burden which comes after trading one’s freedom for the apparent security of a job. This is an example of metaphor.
Things to Do
The beauty of the glass bangles of Firozabad contrasts with the misery of people who produce them.
This paradox is also found in some other situations, for example, those who work in gold and diamond mines, or carpet weaving factories, and the products or their labour, the lives of construction workers, and the buildings they build.
- Look around and find examples of such paradoxes.
- Write a paragraph of about 200 to 250 words on any one of them. You can start by making notes.
Here is an example of how one such paragraph may begin:
You never see the poor in this town. By day they toil, working cranes and earthmovers, squirreling deep into the hot sand to lay the foundations of chrome. By night they are banished to bleak labour camps at the outskirts of the city.
Answer: After a day’s hard work, Samir is changing his dress. He takes off the paint-stained shirt and trousers and slips into a pair of jeans and T-shirt which do not have the tell tale signs of the painter’s job he does for a living. He has just finished making attractive texture on a wall of the drawing room but it is no match for various textures carved by dabs of paint on his working dress. Samir’s dexterity puts life in concrete walls to turn a mundane room into an abode of pleasure which Samir can only create but can never dream of living in. Sometimes, he gets an approving accolade from the people whose houses he decorates by painting the walls and by creating interesting textures on some of the walls. But most of the time, his day ends with haggling with the supervisor over payments which he has to get from the contractor. Once Samir is back to his hutment, walls of rusted tin and creaking doors welcome him to his home. The textures on the rusted walls evoke a sense of dread rather than beauty. He cannot even afford to paint them because he needs to save enough for the rainy day. Moreover, most of his earnings need to be regularly sent back to his village to support his family which is composed of his wife, five children and two ailing parents. While enjoying dinner in a rickety plate, Samir often reminisces about the bone-china cup in which he is sometimes served tea while painting someone’s home.