22 pages • 44 minutes read
V. S. NaipaulB. Wordsworth
Fiction | Short Story | Adult | Published in 1959A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
Grief and Loss
Though the characters rarely discuss death or loss, their lives are influenced by grief. The theme of grief and loss shapes the characters and can be traced through the empty spaces in their lives. For example, the boy’s father is not mentioned in the text. If he is not dead, he is absent from his son’s life. Similarly, Wordsworth’s wife is presented as being dead. He tells the boy a story about a poet whose wife died, implying that he is referring to himself and that his overgrown garden is a tribute to her. Later, he tells the boy that this story was a lie. However, the boy’s narration suggests that Wordsworth’s confession may be a lie, and his wife did die young after all. Either way, she is absent. The boy’s father and the poet’s wife are missing from their lives, and the palpable absence shapes the personalities of those who are left alive.
The characters deal with their grief and loss in different ways. The boy’s mother has a jaded, cynical worldview, which might be expected from a woman who is forced to raise a young boy alone. However, she takes time to feed the poor and the desperate. She feels pain at her loss but contributes something to the world to express the compassion and humanity missing from her life. Wordsworth strives to find poetry in life for the same reasons. He writes poems and teaches the boy about the wonders of nature as a tribute to his absent wife. He allows her garden to grow beyond his control to cherish the abundance of life. The boy does not yet know how to make sense of the loss of his father, so he is caught between his mother’s cynicism and the poet’s quest for beauty.
Near the end, as Wordsworth lays dying, he tells the boy that the story about the poet and his wife was a lie. The boy is heartbroken, overwhelmed by another loss, and he begins to cry. Wordsworth attempts to prevent the boy from making his mistakes, but he fails. He has already opened the boy’s heart to the poetry of the world. This gift acts as a legacy from the dying poet to the boy, giving him something to cling to in a difficult time. The boy may be sad, but he now has the poet’s tools, which will help him navigate grief and loss.
Unlikely Friendships
The friendship between the boy and Wordsworth is unlikely but rewarding. The two characters are generations apart and, at least at the beginning of the story, separated by the ways they view the world. They share similar voids in their lives, however. These voids ensure that their unlikely friendship becomes a real and rewarding bond. The boy and Wordsworth become friends because they settle into a substitute father/son relationship. Wordsworth takes on the father role, guiding the boy through a complicated but wonderful world. The boy replaces the son that the poet thought might come from his marriage. The boy is missing a father, and Wordsworth is missing a son. In each other, they find a surrogate who brings something rich and rewarding into their lives.
The friendship between Wordsworth and the boy can be extended to the unlikely relationships they find in the rest of the world. The poet teaches his pupil to observe nature with care. He teaches him the constellations, showing him the apparent connections between stars that are light years apart. He introduces him to the garden, where the complex interplay between bees, flowers, and fruit provides him with a delicious meal. He tells the boy about his dead wife, showing him that a metaphorical bond can be drawn between an overgrown garden and an enduring sense of grief and loss. The interconnectedness of everything in the story is a result of Wordsworth teaching the boy about the unlikely relationships that can be found in the world.
At the end, Wordsworth tells the boy that the story about his past was a lie. His revelation is an attempt to undo the closeness of their relationship by portraying himself as dishonest, but this devastating move is conducted for a humane reason. The poet is worried that their unlikely friendship will cause the boy pain. He wants to save his friend from grief to come. The unlikely friendship ends in an unlikely way but leaves a lasting impression on the boy.
The Poetry of Life
Wordsworth’s legacy in the story is to teach the boy about the poetry of life. Wordsworth calls himself a poet but admits that he has never sold a single poem and, later in the story, confesses that he will never finish the poem he has worked on for so long. Poetry does not take the form of poems alone. Wordsworth shows the boy that poetry can manifest in many ways. As poetry is a sincere exploration and expression of emotion, it can be found in nature, friendships, and the city they inhabit. One example of this theme is the overgrown garden. Wordsworth explains that the garden itself is a poem, a tribute to his wife, who loved plants and flowers. The poem continues her legacy and allows her to live on.
The boy quickly internalizes this idea. After being shown the beauty of the bees, the constellations, and the fruit in Wordsworth’s garden, the boy and the poet tour the city. They see the world around them with new eyes, and the boy discovers how vibrant and alive the world feels when he forms a sincere connection with everything around him. The world can become a poem if he teaches himself to understand the expression of emotion in every gesture and action. The poetry of life gives the boy a new appreciation for the world around him.
Wordsworth may be the only person who puts this idea into words, but he is not alone in practicing the poetry of life. The boy’s mother feels a tangible and sincere connection with the world, but she lacks the artistic vocabulary to express the experience. Instead, she feeds the poor and the helpless while attempting to raise her son alone. These gestures are her poetry, as they allow her to share herself with the world and give something to the society she inhabits. The boy’s mother may remain cynical and suspicious, but she feels the desire to bond with society. In doing so, she writes her own poem.
