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Thursday, February 4, 2010

A Study of the Character Rosie in the Novel “The Guide” by R.K. Narayan

Rosie is one of the main characters of the novel “The Guide” by R.K. Narayan. R.K. Narayan portrays the character Rosie as a typical Indian woman who loves her husband despite his entire fault and always feels proud of her husband. Though she belongs to a dancer family, she is highly educated and is influenced by her husband and her background. She is presented in the novel as a beautiful dancer, of the Devadasi variety of temple dancers.

As a Wife

Rosie is an attractive young wife of 'Marco'. . Her marriage has been like a curse in disguise to her as Marco is totally engaged in his career and is totally apathetic and unemotional to her. She is very passionate about dancing but her husband does not allow her to dance

She is like a traditional Indian wife. Her husband is like God to her. Marco calls her dancing skills as street acrobatics and compares it to monkey dance. Despite all these insults she continues to be his wife. When Marco came to know about the intimacy between her and Raju he became very upset and didn’t talk to her and completely ignored her presence. She sincerely apologizes to Marco. Rosie explains to Raju, "I followed him, day after day, like a dog-waiting on his grace” She tries to persuade her husband and bears all the insults. 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."

This incident shows her tremendous tolerance power and her optimistic attitude. She is basically kind and loving towards her husband’s. She appreciates the fact that he gives her freedom, security and does not kill her for her betrayal. That she is emotionally attached to him at the last is evident from the fact that she cuts his picture from The Illustrated Weekly and pastes it on her mirror.

Human Desire and Liveliness

Rosie was a dreamer and human desire is visible in Rosie’s character. Rosie tells Raju ``I`d preferred any kind of mother in law, if it had meant one real, live husband”. But Macro on the other hand is only interested in “dead and decaying things” not in his wife "who as dancer was the living embodiment of those images."

Complete Devotion to Dance

When she was left by Marco in Malgudi and was living with Raju she devoted herself completely to dancing. She loves dance and that is what matters to her. She woke early in the morning and practiced hard for three hours regularly. She is always willing to talk about dance and even tries to teach Raju some tips of it. In the end, though she loses her husband and her lover, she continues to dance. Dance is her life whatever comes to her way. According to Raju “ Neither Marco nor I had any place in her life, which had its own sustaining utility and which she herself had underestimated all along”

Religious by nature

She is religious by nature as she believes in Goddess Saraswati and has the bronze image of Nataraja in her office.

Passionate Nature

Her success doesn’t gets to her head as she remains a down to earth person even after becoming very successful in her dancing career. Once Raju became very upset because Rosie spent lot of time with different artists and not with him. He came to her and said that these artists come to her because they are inferior to her .She replies to him saying that she doesn’t believe in superior and inferior .She doesn’t discriminate people on the basis of their financial status. On one hand when Raju prefers to meet people who are very rich and influential in the society Rosie doesn’t care much about these people. Being herself an artist she respects art and likes to be in the company of artist and other music lovers.

True to Her lover

Rosie is also true to her lover. In spite of the forgery, Rosie does not desert Raju. Though Rosie comes to know about every treacherous and fraud activity of Raju, she compromises with the situation. Instead of punishing Raju for his deceit, she is determined, like a true beloved, to spend every penny that she is arranging a capable defense for Raju although she has earlier decided to give up dancing as a profession. She signs fresh dancing contracts to raise more money for this purpose.

In fact, her dignified and noble behavior brings out our sympathy. She embodies the “Feminine Principle” of ideal woman-hood.

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