Character sketch - Mr Oliver

Mr. Oliver is an Anglo-Indian teacher who has been teaching in an English

Public School, located three miles away from Shimla, for several years. As he is
a bachelor, he is staying alone on the school premises. He is a man of a strong
personality and easily shoes away from the gossips of ghosts and devils. As a
man of a strong personality, he staunchly dwells on individualism. He is a
daring and adventurous person who is not scared to pass through the pine
forest in the dark of the night while returning from Shimla .

Background
The story “A Face in the Dark” by Ruskin Bond is set in Simla where an Anglo-
Indian teacher Mr. Oliver teaches in a reputed English public school which is
regarded as the “Eton of the East. But going by the title of the story “A Face in
the Dark”, it may also mean that a face in the dark is always blurred. On a
metaphorical level, it signifies that we find every single person just the same
when we don’t really have a closer look at them.

Summary
On the day of the story when Mr Oliver is returning late at night, the strong
wind is making an eerie sound through the pine trees and the batteries of his
torch is running down. Suddenly, he comes across a boy who is crying silently
with his head hung down, sitting on a rock. Following a number of questions
from the teacher, when the boy finally looks up, Mr. Oliver sees that the boy
has no eyes, ears, nose or mouth on his face. “It was just a round smooth head
– with a school cap on top of it! Panicked by the horrific scene, Mr. Oliver runs
down the path calling for help. He finally stops when he sees the watchman
swinging a lantern on his way. Oliver tells the watchman what he has seen. But
soon after, he finds out in the light of the lantern that the watchman too has
no eyes, ears, nose or mouth. Then the wind blows the lamp out.
Appreciation of literary qualities
A Face In The Dark is amongst the most intriguing stories by Ruskin Bond. The
narrative holds the reader right from the beginning and at each point in the
story, he is curious to know what would happen next. The main character of
Mr. Oliver and the other two ghostly characters (the boy and the watchman),
their interplay in the pine woods and Mr. Oliver's reaction to the situation, all
provide the elements of a thriller in the story and the reader is hooked to
it. The figures of speech use in the story are alliteration , metaphor, Allusion
and Oxymoron.