Analysis of The Land of the Exile
Rabindranath Tagore 1861 (Kolkata) – 1941 (Kolkata)
Mother, the light has grown grey in the sky; I do not know what
the time is.
There is no fun in my play, so I have come to you. It is
Saturday, our holiday.
Leave off your work, mother; sit here by the window and tell
me where the desert of Tepantar in the fairy tale is.
The shadow of the rains has covered the day from end to end.
The fierce lightning is scratching the sky with its nails.
When the clouds rumble and it thunders, I love to be afraid
in my heart and cling to you.
When the heavy rain patters for hours on the bamboo leaves,
and our windows shake and rattle at the gusts of wind, I like to
sit alone in the room, mother, with you, and hear you talk about
the desert of Tepantar in the fairy tale.
Where is it, mother, on the shore of what sea, at the foot of
what hills, in the kingdom of what king?
There are no hedges there to mark the fields, no footpath
across it by which the villagers reach their village in the
evening, or the woman who gathers dry sticks in the forest can
bring her load to the market. With patches of yellow grass in the
sand and only one tree where the pair of wise old birds have their
nest, lies the desert of Tepantar.
I can imagine how, on just such a cloudy day, the young son
of the king is riding alone on a grey horse through the desert, in
search of the princess who lies imprisoned in the giant's palace
across that unknown water.
When the haze of the rain comes down in the distant sky, and
lightning starts up like a sudden fit of pain, does he remember his
unhappy mother, abandoned by the king, sweeping the cow-stall and
wiping her eyes, while he rides through the desert of Tepantar in
the fairy tale?
See, mother, it is almost dark before the day is over, and
thee are no travellers yonder on the village road.
The shepherd boy has gone home early from the pasture, and men
have left their fields to sit on mats under the eaves of their
huts, watching the scowling clouds.
Mother, I have left all my books on the shelf-do not ask me
to do my lessons now.
When I grow up and am bid like my father, I shall learn all
that must be learnt.
But just for today, tell me, mother, where the desert of
Tepantar in the fairy tale is.
Scheme | ABBCDBEFGHIHJKLMNOPOQQRSTUVBVSKVWXQYZ1 2 3 LB |
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Poetic Form | |
Metre | 100111100111111 011 111101111111111 1001010 11111011101001 1101011001011 01101110011111 011011001111 101100110111101 0110111 10101111010011 01010101010111111 1010011011011101 0101100101 111101011111011 110010111 111101110111 011110100111000 1010101101100101 1011010110110100 101011101111111 1101011 1101011110101011 10111001101110100 1101011010001010 0110110 10110111001010 10111010111110101 01010010101100110 10011111010110 0101 110111101011100 1111001010101 010111110101001 11111111100111 1100101 101111111011111 111101 111101111101111 1111 11101111010101 1001011 |
Closest metre | Iambic hexameter |
Characters | 2,212 |
Words | 434 |
Sentences | 19 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 42 |
Lines Amount | 42 |
Letters per line (avg) | 40 |
Words per line (avg) | 10 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 1,695 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 433 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 2:10 min read
- 139 Views
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