Write the explanation of the essay entitled "The Fly".

Write the explanation of the essay entitled “The Fly”.

Ans.

EXPLANATIONS

(1) He’s a plucky little devil, thought the Boss, and he felt a real admiration for the fly’s courage. That was the way to tackle things, that was the real spirit. Never say die; it was only a question of…. But the fly had again finished its laborious task and the Boss had Just time to refill his pen to shake fair and square on the new cleaned body yet another dark drop.

Reference to the Context: This passage has been taken from the essay “The Fly’ Written by Katherine Mansfield. The Boss noticed that in its first attempt, the fly had succeeded in drying its wings and was soon ready to fly.

Explanation: Author says that the second effort of the fly had a very healthy effect on the mind of the Boss. He found that the little creature like the fly was certainly very courageous, brave. Unknowingly, there was a secret admiration for it in his heart. He began to compare it with the life of man and thought that such courage is really needed to solve the complicated problems of life and everyone must adopt the same attitude. This spirit must be maintained throughout and we should not surrender to our difficulties. It is not good to think of death, whenever something wrong happens, rather instead of thinking of death, we must be determined to face it heroically, success de pends only on courage like that he found in the fly. It had cleared its body again laboriously and soon the difficulty was overcome. He wanted to test the whole courage of the fly and dropped another drop of ink over its wings. Actu ally he did not wish to kill the fly but was simply testing whether it will face this danger again. But, by now, the whole of its courage had ended, it could not tolerate any more and at last it died.

(2) The little beggar seemed absolutely cowed stunned and afraid to move because of what would happen next. But then, as if painfully. it dragged itself forward. The front legs waved, caught hold and more slowly this time, the task began from the beginning.

Reference to the Context: This passage has been taken from the essay “The Fly’ Written by Katherine Mansfield. As the Boss stood up from his chair, he suddenly noticed a fly in the inkpot. It was trying hard to come out but failed.

Explanation: Essayist says that the fly had been working hard to make itself normal and capable to fly from there. But suddenly the fall of another drop of ink was the signal of great danger which it had not expected. That little creature now looked quite helpless, confused and stunned. It was completely afraid of the imminent danger to its life and could not imagine what was going to happen with it next. But it did not lose courage and made repeated efforts once more, though this time, it was very painful. It was very difficult for the fly to drag itself forward but slowly it succeeded. They fly. having come out of the ink, started drying and cleaning itself once again. The same process, which it had done previously started from the very beginning. Undoubtedly, it was not so quick and enthusiastic as it was previously. This incident shows symbolically that in spite of greatest dangers, man must not leave his courage and by sincere efforts he will succeeded in his goal.

(3) Six years ago, six years…. How quickly time passed! It might have happened yesterday. The Boss took his hands from his face, he was puzzled. Something seemed to be wrong with him. He wasn’t feeling as he wanted to feel. He decided to get up and have a look at the boy’s photograph. But it wasn’t a favourite photograph of his, the expression was unnatural, It was cold, even stern looking. The boy had never looked like that.

Reference to the Context: These lines have been taken from the essay ‘The Fly’ Written by Katherine Mansfield. The young son of the Boss was very popular in his office and the Boss was very hopeful but suddenly, he got the must tragic information of the death of his son and this broke the Boss altogether and his life was almost ruined.

Explanation: In these lines author says that long period of six years has passed after the death of the son of the young son of the Boss, but he has not yet lost his memory and the reminder by Mr. Woodfield has made him restless once again. He is pained to think that this long period of six years has passed so quickly. It seemed as if this tragic incident had taken place just yesterday. The Boss was willing to weep but he consoled his sad heart and slowly removed his hands from his sorrowful face, still the confusion was quite visible there. He felt that something wrong has gone with him because now he was not feeling normal as before and his emotions had suddenly undergone a great change. At last, under the burden of this tragic feeling, he decided to get up from his place and had a secret urge to go and see the photo of his deceased son. But he did not like it much because much had changed. He could not perceive that freshness and joy on the face in that photo which he originally had and there was a lot of difference between the two. Everything there looked quite unnatural because in the photo was the expression of cold ness and sternness while actually the body did not have anything like this.

(4) Other men perhaps might recover, might live their loss down, but not he. How was it possible ? His boy was an only son. Ever since his birth, the boss had worked at building up this business for him, it had no other meaning if it was not for the boy. Life itself had come to have no other meaning.

Reference to the Context: This passage has been taken from the essay “The Fly Written by Katherine Mansfield. The Boss was extremely sad to remember his young son and in spite of his urge to weep. no tears came to his eyes.

Explanation: In these lines author explains the condition of Boss at this moment. He felt that in these moments, any other man could think of recovering from this tragic incident but the Boss perhaps could not do so. He wondered how a man can ever forget such a thing. It was no more possible. It was even more serious from the fact that dead young man particularly from his father, since the very beginning, the first day of his birth, Boss had started working to make the future of his son prosperous and successful. He seriously thought about developing his business as much as he could. Without the son, he thought, his life was quite useless and meaningless. After the death of the young son, the whole dream of the Boss scattered and life became meaning less for him. But it goes to the credit of the Boss, that in spite of this greatest tragedy in the life of any man, he soon controlled himself. This is the evidence of his dauntless courage which is not common in the human community.

(5) It has been a terrible shock to him when old Woodfield sprang that remark upon him about the boy’s grave. It was exactly as though the earth had opened and the boy lying there with Woodfield’s girls staring down at him. For it was strange. Although over six years had passed away, the Boss never thought of the boy except as lying un changed, unblemished in his uniform, asleep for ever.

Reference: These lines extracted from the story The Fly by Katherine Mansfield.

Context: Once his old friend Mr. Woodfield visited him in his office and seeing the photo of the dead son of the Boss, made some sad remarks about him and his grave where his girls had visited.

Explanation: The unexpected death of his young son was the greatest shock to the Boss and though he was trying his best to forget this sad incident, he was now suddenly reminded of him, He closed himself alone in his room and felt to weep for some time to get some relief. The reference about the grave of his son was like opening his wound again by Woodfield. He felt so deep a pain as if the earth has been opened and he sees his son lying in his grave, the girls of Woodfield were staring at him in astonishment. The young boy had died six years ago and he was trying to forget him, yet he now felt that he was still lying in his grave unchanged in his shining uniform. In his imagination, he saw that his son was sleeping peacefully and he sadly sighed at his memory.