Kanthapura Literary Elements

Fiction

Kanthapura, a village in South India, during the 1930s

The story is narrated in the first-person perspective by Achakka in the form of a traditional oral history of the entire village.

Tone: direct, proud, zealous, frightened, resolved

Mood: determined, empowered, tense

The protagonist of the novel is Moorthy and Gandhi-women. Bhatta, Bade Khan, and the British Government can be categorized as the chief antagonists.

The major conflict of the story, in a broader sense, is the Indian struggle for independence. During the 1930s, with the advent of the Civil Disobedience movement, Indians began to envision a liberated India. Raja Rao shows the struggle and the tribulations of the nation through the microcosm of a village.

The story reaches its climax after Moorthy's arrest. Bade Khan arrests Moorthy in front of his supporters and well-wishers. The events that ensue after this climactic point can be seen as the resolution or the denouement of the story.

When Patel Range Gowda speaks with impunity and refuses to find lodging for Bade Khan, he feels agitated and declares, "I shall squash you like a bug." Towards the latter half of the novel, Bade Khan, along with his fellow policemen, viciously beats the villagers practicing non-violent resistance.

1. "Two days later, Policeman Bade Khan came to live with us in Kanthapura" (12). Khan isn't just there to live; he is there to spy, to persecute, to uphold the Government's position and power.
2. "I wish I had closed my eyes with your father instead of living to see you polluted" (40). Narsamma says this to her son, which is an understatement saying she wishes she was dead.
3. "...we see a policeman upon her" (149). This is an understatement for rape.

1. Mahatma Gandhi and Jawarhal Nehru
2. The Bhagavad-Gita: the main Hindu scripture
3. Ekadashiday: a holy time in the lunar cycle, usually characterized by fasting
4. Rama: Hindu god, married to Sita
5. Sita: Hindu goddess, married to Rama
6. Brahma: Hindu god of creation
7. Queen Victoria: British ruler during the heyday of imperialism/colonialism

The imagery is of strife and struggle, of nonviolent resistance being met with aggression. It is of women standing up to men, the weak standing up to the poor. It is a war over the natural world and the world of men, fought in temples, toddy groves, the streets, and at the sea.

1. "Less strange are the ways of the gods than are the ways of men" (25).

1. There is a parallel that runs between the struggles of the village and that of the entire nation.

1. "He wanted me to be his dog's tail" (68). Here, Range Gowda talks to Moorthy about Bhatta.

1. "Cart after cart groans" (1).
2. "the trains sneezed and wheezed and snorted and moved on" (45).
3. The rain is "thumping [the weak coffee leaves], thumping them down to the earth, then playfully lounging up" (50).
4. "Ah, in the country it's like this," says Siddayya. "And once it begins there is no end to her tricks" (51).
5. "The brass vessels shimmer and shake" (57).
6. "know for sure what religion is wearing behind its saffron robes" (91).