The River Between & Nectar in a Sieve
Successful and highly praised novels always stand out because the literature has great characters, fascinating and sometime bitter ironies, clashes, conflicts, and noteworthy objectives that rise far above the actual plot structure and embrace much bigger worldly themes. Symbolism is always part of good literature, and the alert reader should be mindful that nearly every important situation presented in the novel could be placed on a bigger stage in terms that make the book more universal. In other words, in both of the novels reviewed in this paper, The River Between and Nectar in a Sieve, the characters are doing things that have application to people and cultures everywhere else on the planet. And in both novels, the struggle between and within cultures is not only against other cultures but also against the changing times and the modernization (globalization) of the planet.What a reader finds immediately profound and dramatic about The River Between is the symbolism of the two mountains (ridges) laying "side by side" with a river running between. In the story, the two cultures are dead set against one another, with opposing religious beliefs and values. The culture living on the Makuyu ridge subscribes to the Christian belie
How hopeless can any one situation get? Their lives remind a reader of the horrible tragedies that happen to the nation of Bangladesh; it seems every year or so, a terrible typhoon slams into Bangladesh and tens of thousands of people are either washed out to sea or get sick from the diseases after the storm; cattle rot in rivers and pollute the water. When Christians take communion, they drink wine which the priest or minister says is symbolic of Christ's blood. It would seem a modern value for a woman to do whatever she must do to stay alive - whether it's prostitution or selling all of one's belongings. And so, Waiyaki will forever have a bond, a religious bond, with the earth, Ngugi continues, "as if his blood was an offering. In the case of the lives of Rukmani and Nathan, it is hard to imagine any more pathos. How many African-American men have fallen in love with a Caucasian woman but have not been accepted by the woman's conservative (racist) parents? How many times has a Jewish woman loved a Gentile man, and taken him home with high hopes only to have her parents reject him and hence brake her heart? These things happen all the time. " This story reflects bigger issues, because throughout the world there have always been religions (and cultures reflecting those religions) that have gone to war with each other, killed each other for centuries, and never intend to make peace. And so, like the search for an answer to why people have to suffer so severely as they do in this novel, there may be no answer. But just imagine the stress of being a poor rice farmer and because of the weather (which claims their crops) now you are on the verge of starvation. Another theme that emerges in this novel is a mother's unconditional love for her daughter, and a mother's concern for her daughter through the good and bad times. " The ridges in the distance were like "sleeping lions" that never woke up, but the two ridges in the story, Kameno and Makuyu, "became antagonists.
Common topics in this essay:
Nectar Sieve,
Catholics Protestants,
Rukmani Nathan,
Nathan Rukmani,
,
Kameno Makuyu,
God Christian,
Jesus Christ,
Jews Muslims,
Third World,
answer people,
selling one's,
true love,
universal modern,
marrying nathan,
sieve characters,
bigger stage,
nectar sieve,
nectar sieve characters,
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Acceptance Essays
