The Orange is a story taken from a collection of stories (Half a Rupee: Stories) by Gulzar, and offered here as an independent read. It is from part six, which is about rather more personal stuff closer to heart or so it would seem from the couple of stories out of the three in this part. The third one is The Orange, and having read it now it seems this part is about parables or thinly veiled ways of saying something.
The orange here is real and a symbol both, latter for our home planet Earth. A little boy is sick but insists on his share of the few oranges even though he cannot have it until he is well (the writer picked a strange combination of fruit and sickness here - most illnesses allow one to consume an orange or at least juice thereof, and this boy only has a cold, where citrus fruits are prescribed - was the writer hitting the reader on the head with "this is parable?) but would keep it and look at it, and the story progresses with the story the boy is being told about the earth being seen as a blue green orange seen from distant space by aliens every once in a while with centuries in between viewings. As the story of the destruction of earth by humans progresses seen through alien eyes from distant space, so does that of the real orange being similarly destroyed by insects that have taken over.
It is a good way to tell the children about earth, but they don't need such convoluted deals, they accept facts fine - it is adults, especially those that cannot do without usage of various fossil fuels directly or otherwise. Or those that have invested heavily in such products and find alternatives difficult.
At that one might give a thought about other problems plaguing the earth that are generally not mentioned in conjunction with greenhouse gases or global warming, nevertheless are just as genuinely of concern about what we are doing to earth - such as the modern plumbing and what this is doing to our rivers and oceans. Most people would hate to use open fields as an alternative to secure closed spaces for toilets, and few would think poor of this world are virtuous since they don't have plumbing. Yet it is the very well to do that can afford to and do enjoy swimming in oceans, and usually people are content being taken care of by authorities informing them if the particular beach is too close to sewage pipes. Is that good enough, one might wonder - it is ocean where everything flows or floats, or can, after all.
But then most people who eat non vegetarian food don't stop to ask what the meat consumed when it was a creature alive, and most fish and other sea creatures are just as likely to have consumed human parts as sewage; crabs, one is informed on info channels, are the cleaners of the ocean, and clean up anything and everything - and most meat eaters not only are happy to consume crabs but usually it is considered a delicacy. So - so much for human thinking.
Friday, April 4, 2014.
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