Grandfather

By

Jayanta Mahapatra

Jayanta Mahapatra is an Indian Poet. His style is simple and dealing with rel life
problems and situations. The themes are often philosophical. He treats human emotions and
sufferings in a very realistic way.

This poem is based on the 1866 famine which struck Orissa. The poet writes about how
the famine affected the lives of the people and in particular his grandfather who a staunch Hindu
was compelled to convert to Christianity to escape the deadly clutches of hunger and poverty.
He also deals in detail the dilemma, fear and humiliation experienced by the grandfather

1. The poet is reading the old diary of his grandfather. The words in the diary express the
pain and suffering undergone by the grandfather. By reading it the poet comes to know
about the painful and struggle-filled life of his grandfather and about the life at that time.
2. The climate was very hot and dry. The land was fallow and barren. The people are
wasting away due to lack of food. Everything and everybody is at a blank not knowing
hat to do.
3. The grandpa is faced with a very toughest question in life. He has become weak and is
standing on the edge of life between living and dying. He was thinking about the
decision he is forced to take for the sake of his family. He stands thinking about the
dangers facing his and his family’s life and wondering what he should do.
4. The grandpa has spent several sleepless, cold and hungry nights foreseeing his on death
and lacking the strength and ability to even cry at his own fate.
5. The grandpa was very young. He was defeated b the force of hunger and was made into
a coward. So to protect himself and his family from dying due to hnger he converted to
christianity. His will power has abandoned him and he abandoned the faith into which he
was born and lived so far including all the rituals and practices and even the deities he
has worshipped so far.
6. The pangs of hunger had completely changed him. The poet asks that if the faith and
religion did not provide food and comfortable living then what is the use of sticking on to
it. so he left his faith and took a new faith which he did not know anything about.
7. The life as a Christian chosen by the grandpa let him live while he still continued to be a
Hindu deep in his heart. Now, in the time of comfort nd plenty, the poet and the on ry to
talk abou the famine about which they have no real knowledge.
8. A gap years an understanding is between the poet and his son and between the poet and
his grandfather. For the son, his future is very clear, bright and achievable. The poet
wonders how his son will look at the life of the father and the grandpa. He thinks that he
 will think their lives were nothing but a loss or failure. Now the poet and the son look at
the life of the grandpa In silence.
9. The poet says that there is hope for the present generation. But the hope away from the
grandpa. He makes a reference to the chess board and says how the move made by the
grandpa whom he has not met has changed the life of the poet and his son.
10. The knowledge of the suffering and the sacrifice made by the grandpa maks the poet and
his son to be silent. They want to know more about him and the type of life he had lived.
They want to know how it will be to live giving dignity to escape from dying.
(abandoning religion is considered an indignity).
11. The poet ends the poem with the note that the life of the grandpa and the decision made
was terrifying and puts in a prayer that those situations should not repeat.