Ram Sharma
Empowerment of Women through the Character of Rosie in R.K. Narayan's 'The Guide'
The perspective of Indian English novelists represents different levels of the Indian Consciousness, shaped by the tradition of Indian humanism and western enlightenment. The theme of emanicipation of women, a wide spread and genuine concern for the amelioration of their condition for the first time became a social issue in the early twentieth century. It shaped the creative consciousness of all the Indian English writers including R.K.Narayan. George Lucas rightly points out:
"Development in India shows that socialism may figure among the forces working against medievalism. The unusual character of this social evolution will, no doubt, give rise to equally unusual literary developments not to be filled into any of our abstract categories."
It is through the character of Rosie in The Guide, that Narayan truly takes up and treats the concept of women's emanicipation. She is artistically inclined young wife of 'Marco' the eccentric art critic, who meets Raju- an enthusiastic tourist guide at Malgudi Railway station and this meeting gives a new turn to her life. Rosie's marital life with Marco was woefully incompatible. In the initial stage, he aggresively defies the wishes of his wife who desires to see a king-cobra. He snubs her. "Don't expect me to go with you. I can't stand the sight of a snake-your interests are morbid." On the other hand Rosie has a distaste for "cold, old stone walls". She is perturbed by the fact that her husband, whom Raju calls 'Macro' is more interested in books, papers, painting and old art than in being a "real live husband". He is too steeped in his zeal for archaeological studies, that he neglects his elegant and fascinating wife. Not realizing the invaluable treasure his wife is, he is "like a monkey fricking up a rose garland."
Marco was incompatible and tedious so much so that Raju couldn't help marvelling at the glaring contrast between the two-one, full with promise of life, vibrant and aglow whereas the other appeared a 'grotesque' creature, proccupied with dead and long lost things like cave walls "gazing ., Raju thinks in horror, “ This man would go on wall-gazing all his life and leave her to languish in her hotel room. Strange man!" ( 63)
Rosie belongs to a family of professional dancing girls, devoted to the art, for whom dance is a part and parcel of life. Seeing the cobra dance, she too unknowingly sways, imitating it and for the shrewd Raju, “ it was sufficient to tell me what she was the greatest dancer of the centuary." She craves to dance and longs to express herself through dancing. But far from giving encouragement. Marco has compelled her to give up dancing in return of a respectable life. Marco's only enthusiasm is for collecting and annotating ancient art, and his icy temperament suggests an implacable malevolence towards love, warmth and life. She becomes the victim of her husband's indifference and suffers psychologically as his discontented wife. Macro is only interested in sculptured figures on walls and stones and not in his wife "who as dancer was the living embodiment of those images." In this initial meeting with Rosie, Raju profusely praises her art: "I spoke my mind, I praised her dancing. I spoke out my love---- what a glorious snake dance' oh, I kept thinking of you all night World's artist number one!" (74)
Interesting, Rosie as she reveals to Raju, inspite of being born in a family traditionally dedicated to temple dancing, came to be married off to Macro, a rich bachelor of high social standing and academic interests . All the same, she might have hidden in her the seeds of a talented classical dancer. Raju realises with a touch of regret that she could have risen like a meteor if only her husband had taken an interest in building up her career. Unfortunately Macro, her husband, is so much a slave to his self-chosen professional role as a scholar that he is incapable of playing his other human and social role as a good husband, with serious repurcussions on the life of his wife.
Finding encouragement from Raju, Rosie earnestly begins her dance practice. "Plans! said the sleeper, awakening 'what plans? she smiled at this and said 'There you are always lying on the mat watching me or holding me in your arms. I have now had good practice. I can manage a show of four hours, although with accompaniments it would have been much more helpful. i'm here accompanying and marking time for you. What other accompaniment do you want?"
"I need a full orchestra- we have stayed indoors long enough she said. I found her so earnest that I had not the courage to joke any more.(155-156)
In all fairness to Rosie , R.K.Narayan tries to show how the instincts of a faithful wife were not dead in her. Quickly realising her mistake, a repentent Rosie tries to mend fences with Marco.
"I realized I had committed an enormous sin.......... My mind was greatly troubled. I didn't want anything more in life than to make my peace with him. I did not want to dance. I felt lost.....". (133)
A gifted dancer Rosie was, she at the moment, wanted nothing more than her husband's forgiveness. She sincerely apologizes to him, but in vain.
"I followed him, day after day, like a dog-waiting on his grace. He ignored me totally. I could never have imagined that one human being could ignore the preference of another human being so completely. I followed him like a shadow, leaving aside all my own pride and self respect. I hoped that ultimately he'd come round (134)
She even asks Raju to go away and leave them alone after his show down with Marco at the Peak House. But Marco reacts by categorically disowning his wife.
"I'm trying to forget..... even the earlier fact that I ever took a wife you are free to go and do what you please." (134)
After the break up of her marriage, Rosie comes back to Raju and takes up her dance practice with a renewed vigour. Raju's mother, however, had her own misgivings about having a dancing girl at home and frowned at Rosie's newfound freedom. She failed to comprehend the real problem.
"After a few days she began to allude to the problems of husband and wife whenever she spoke to Rosie and filled the time with anecdoters about husbands, good husbands, mad husbands-- but it was always the wife, be her doggedness, perseverance and patience, that brought him round. She quoted numerous mythological stories of Savitri, Seeta and all the well-known heroines." (137)
Raju's mother flies at Rosie and calls her 'a viper' and 'a serpent-girl' out to wreak havoc on her son. With Raju's co-operation and her own untiring efforts Rosie manages to build up a dancing career for herself. Soon she rose phenomenally reaching new heights and became a public heart throb.
"With the attainment of a new name, Roise entered a new phase of life. Under the new name Rosie and all she had suffered in her earlier life was buried from public view. I was the only one who knew her as Rosie and called her so. The rest of the world knew her as Nalini."(157)
The reverse of the well known adage 'behind every successful man is a woman' may be applied in the case of Nalini alias Rosie. Blinded by the unprecedented publicity and glamour Raju in a self -congratulatory mood allows himself to believe that Rosie owed her new-found status entirely to him and conldn't do without him.
"She needed my inspiring presence” (162) " I had a monopoly of her and nobody had anything to do with her...... I resented anyone wanting to make a direct approach to her. She was my property. This idea was begining to take root in my mind." (168)
Raju came to monopolise Rosie to the extent of disliking her enjoyment of others' company. "Apart from them, sometimes musicians or actors on other dances called on Nalini and spent hours with her. Nalini enjoyed their company immensely, and I often saw them in her hall. Some lying on carpets, some sitting up, all talking and laughing, while coffee and food were being carried to them. I occaionaly went up and chatted with them-always with a feeling that I was an interpoler in that artistic group. Sometimes it irritated me to see them all so happy and abandoned." (169)
He grudged her any reprieve from a hectic shedule. "She never minded a chance to get a gathering of such friends whenever she might be. She said "They have the blessing of Goddess Saraswathi on them, they are good people. I like to talk to them." ( 169)
"If I examined my heart I knew I had pulled her out because I did not like to see her enjoy other people's company. I liked to keep her in a citadel.” (172)
Raju had made a fortune out of Rosie's dancing career and liked to live lavishly Nalini alias Rosie seemed to accept it all with a touch of resignation but she no longer has old happy self.
"We were going through a set of mechanical actions day in and day out- the same receptions at the station, fussy organizers, encounters, and warnings, the same middle sofa in the first row, speeches and remarks and smiles, polite conversation, garlands and flash photos, congratulations, and off to catch the train ,pocketing the most important thing, the cheque."I demanded the highest fee, and got it if anyone in India."(172)
Rosie is reminded of Marco whom Roji had almost forgotten, through his book,’ The Cultural History of South India.' It seemed Rosie still cherished fondness for her husband. He seemed to have gained high place in her estimation through the widespread recognition of his latest scholarly achievement. Raju was alarmed over Rosie's sudden mood savings.
"What were her moods? Was she sane or insane?--- I felt bewildered, her sudden affection for her husband. I did my best for her. Her career was at its height. What was it that still troubled her? .... I had been taking too much for granted in our hectic professional existence."(180)
As things stand, once Rosie becomes a well-known danseure, she finds her newly acquired halo as irksome as Raju finds his own. She gets tired of a circus existence'. She tells Raju, " The Thought of it makes me sick. I feel like one of three parrots in a cage taken around village-fairs or a performing monkey."(181)
Raju forges Rosie's signature on a legal document in order to guard against the possibility that her attitude to her husband might soften if she comes to know about the generous gesture of Marco, offering her jewels, yet it is this very act of his that ultimately leads to Raju's loss of Rosie.
It was in her hour of predicament. after Raju's arrest that the 'independent and self-reliant' woman in true sense, rears her head. "A sudden activity seized her..... She sold her diamonds.... She sent him (Mani) to Madras to pick up a big lawyer for me..... She went through her engagement, shepherding the musicians herself." (198)
A dismayed Raju realizes belatedly that Rosie had come of age and there was no stopping her. He was no longer indispensible for her. She needed no Raju. "I knew I was growing jealous of her self-reliance.... She would never stop dancing. She would not be able to stop. She would go from strength to strength." (199)
What Raju newly discovers about Rosie is also a trobule to the emanicipated 'new woman'. He realises, "Neither Marco nor I had any place in her life, which had its own sustaining vitality and which she herself had underestimated all along." (199)
The study of the character of Rose show that the women owe their characteristic position in society mainly in two fields-economic dependence and mute servility. Intensifying this situation is the cumulative nature of gender inequality in India-strikingly similar in the lower as well as the upper classes. The condition in general of the misunderstood and hapless women, inspite of occasional sparks of rebellious self, does not undergo any significant change.
Works Cited
Lucas, George . The Meaning of Contemporary Realism . London: Merlin Press,1963.
Narayan, R.K. The Guide. Mysore: Indian Thought Publications, 2000.