SPARROW BY K. A. ABBAS

               CRITICAL NOTE ON K.A.ABBAS'S ART AND

                   TECHNIQUE AS A STORY WRITER   

The story,Sparrows,written by K.A.Abbas is remarkable for his art and neat characterization.This writing,particularly short-stories usually deal with the themes of poverty,peasantry and rural life. Starting his career as a journalist in which profession he gathered realistic experiences of rural living of village people,their struggle,hopes and aspiration,their destinies and frustration.Later, when he turned to film making, he made a great success by presenting stark realities of the poor rural people. But in all his writing, there is a unique beauty of setting a skill in characterization and artistic appeal. They leave an easy impression upon the readers of his creativeness . Two volumes of his short-stories-Rice and other stories and One Thousand Nights On A Bed Of Stone, are an eloquent evidence of his artistic sense and mission.
 The present story,sparrows seems quite remarkable for his art of narrative,rural-setting,realistic treatment and neat characterization .Abbas  draws a fine character sketch. of Rahim Khan,his frustrations,cruelty,tenderness,human sense of sympathy and his fatalism. He is farmer by profession. But farming is not his natural choice. He chooses it as a last resort as if he were submitting himself to his fate. This strong ambition in his youth has been to join a circus-party and make love to Radha. But his ambitions are frustrated either because of orthodoxy,tradition and parental authority of his father. Failing at both,he turns bitter unsympathetic to the extent of being inhuman. So,when he is married to a rustic woman,which has been his forced marriage under parental authority and orthodox tradition,he has been living an unhappy married life.He has been cruel to his wife for the thirty years of his married life. As a result of his unloving marriage and frustrations of his ambitions,he develops an odd habit having grievances against his life,family and society. He begins to scold his wife and sons on all occasions of their insignificant faults.So,one day when he returns from his field after tilling the land , tired and hungry , he does not find his wife at home and gets furious to know that she has left for her brother's home. Though an elderly woman informs him that she  has gone to her brother's home only for a few days.He knows it  fully, that she has left him for ever. Similarly, his sons have done with him.He is now alone, sad, unhappy and uncomfortable.His cruel indifference to his family may partly accountable for his sad and unhappy life.But it does not seem to be the whole truth. For, when he goes into his room,he hears a flutter caused by two sparrows in their nest inside his room. He goes to the nest out of curiosity to see what the sparrows have been doing in their nest. Looking into the nest, he discovers two more little sparrows. As he stretches his hand to get hold of the two little sparrows, he finds the mother-sparrow attacking him with all his courage and might. He is moved at her heroic defence of her family and children. This small incident proves a significant point in the story as the story writer comments;

"He was strongly amused by the little bird's heroic efforts to save his home and children. The sparrows nest suffered  no harm that day and peace reigned in Rahim Khan's hut."

This change of Rahim Khan's heart comes at last to the notice of his villagers When he is no longer seen outside his room for many days,village people become curious to know as to what has happened to him. So, some of them peep into his room through a crack in the door and see a strange sight. They find him when I am gone."

Bundu and Nuru are the name of his two sons who have left him long ago.Ever since they have left him, his love and sympathy turns to the two meek sparrows and names them after his two sons. But his villagers make no head and tail of his speech. They take him to be mad and then they also begin to sympathise with him in his lonely life of toil and misery.They informed his wife about his madness.Responding to their request for her return to look after him, she went along with her two sons only to find him cold senseless and dead. Clearly, the story ends on a tragic note. speaking reflectively;

"O Bundu,O Nuru,who will feed you

It is thus obvious that the meaning of the story is more suggestive than what is on the surface. This suggestiveness is implicit in the tragic note at the end of the story.One may say that Rahim Khan's cruelty is not his natural instinct.It is a result of his frustration in his life-frustration is both love and career.The psychologists calls this inhuman and unnatural cruelty as 'sadism.' Human beings are not instinctively sadistic. But they acquire it in a hostile situation of their life.Secondly, the change in his heart from cruelty to tenderness, from indifference to sympathy is traceable to his instinctive human spirit. Human beings are essentially human and divine,and if they are devilish, it is a kind of supreme position born out of their hostile situations and indifferent fate. When Rahim Khan finds himself getting ill-treatment at the hands of his parents,family and society he develops an unnatural habit of being cruel,indifferent and unsympathetic. What human society fails to evoke in him, the animals and birds do it in his case. This brings out the significance of the title Sparrows. For, the sparrows do not form the central story nor does the story writer profess to offer any detailed study in their life,habitation and character. So, one may argue that the title is misleading. But it will be an unfair comment. For,sparrows provide and bring out the most significant change of heart in Rahim Khan's life and character. They mark a turning point in Rahim Khan;s character. As for Abbas's art and technique one may point out that he uses the fine literary elements of irony,contrast,symbolism through the plain narrative ans skill of characterization.It will be a common sense and general comment to say that the story has a stark realism,realism,rural fatalism and psychological significance.