NOVEL~*Hiding behind a Stranger*~ Thread 5~CHAPTER 10 - Upd 10th JULY - Page 128

Originally posted by: sashashyam

The keeper of the flame:

Keeper of the flame... how beautiful

It was one of my personal favourites too... as you said...

No, this is not, not yet, romantic love. It is something better, purer, lovelier.

For now, what touched me to the core was the welling anger, the unfamiliar tightening of the chest, that Akbar feels when brooding over the threat to Heera's life. Lashykanna, these the most exquisite, the most evocative lines you have written here as yet:

Was it because his subconscious knew her spirit was unique, too unique to allow it to be extinguished? Was it because he knew she was a noble soul - a soul so noble that it would make any man want to protect its essence from dying out, though she'd never ask for such protection herself?

For it is very rare for a man to value a woman so highly not because of what she means to him, or what she could become for him in personal terms, but because of what she is in herself.

It is not just his admiration for Heera's never say die spirit, for the kind of cool courage that he has never before seen in a woman, for her tenacity, for her special skills, though that admiration is real, and is given without any resistance from his mind. It is something else. Something more.

It is the protectiveness of the keeper of a sacred flame that he is determined shall not go out.

I found a painting for you... a 16 year old struggling to keep that spirit alive... and he steps in to keep her flame alive!

Why does Akbar feel that he is stumbling headlong into unknown depths, into a chasm that might have no end? Is it because thinking of Heera has, unbeknownst to himself, set off a chain reaction? Thus:

the thoughts were beginning to ruffle other memories too. Memories so evasive that they'd somehow found their way through all his walls and masks he'd kept intact for so long. Subtle memories, which had stubbornly lodged in a far corner of his mind - that try as he might, he couldn't oust them.

I am sure most of your readers are all agog to find out, as soon as possible, what exactly are these shades from his past that haunt Akbar. But I am not one of them. I am content to wait till you are ready to open up those cards.

No ... here the memories referred to the memories of her 'eyes' the eyes that told him so many stories that he refused to care about 5 nights ago... but that thought had lodged so stubbornly in one part of his mind that he couldn't shake them off...

Oh yes he does have many dark pasts... many dark memories too... that cause him to behave this way... but here the memories were in reference to their first meeting at the canal...

A creature so evolved that she is far above the common run of womankind , in fact of humankind itself.

His nascent protectiveness towards her is not just that of a man towards a woman who has, all too soon and against his own will, ensconced herself firmly in his zehen.

And that is going, unless I am badly mistaken, to be the leit motif of your fascinating tale.

HOW AMAZING.. you have added such beauty with your words to what I'd only written as a tale...

-The girlish curiosity with which Heera discreetly peers across the fence at Bahadur and Akbar. The way in which her concentration for once wavers when she realises that not just his men, but the Khan Sahib himself is watching her at work with her herbs. And most of all, the sudden quickening of her heartbeats when she feels " a coincidental thrill" at having received, as she assumes, such an exquisite floral offering from someone as remote and introverted as the Khan Sahib.

I found all this most appealing, for it shows that there is a real, normal 16 year old as well behind all that unbelievable maturity and that patient courage.

NB: I was reminded irresistibly of Meera Bai being married off to Rana Bhoj Raj of the Sisodias of Mewar in the place of her dead cousin Krishna. Who, incidentally, committed suicide, at the request of her father, in order to prevent a destructive battle between two rival Rajput baraats for her hand.

😭

-Finally, while the lifelong burden of guilt that Durga feels - because it was her rash high spirits that led to the accident that affected Heera's eyesight - is natural, what is remarkable is that Heera feels not the slightest resentment against her jiji on this score. It says a lot for the kind of affection they have for each other.

NB:Again, this reminded me of an identical relationship between two sisters in one of Agatha Christies's best mysteries, Five Little Pigs, where this abiding feeling of guilt in the elder sister for having damaged the other's face for life is the determining factor behind her otherwise incomprehensible behaviour . To those of you who have not read it, I would recommend it unreservedly.

Oooh! very interesting...

@Shyamala Aunty,

Thank you so much for pm aunty. Your analysis is like a dessert after having a dinner. It is as usual captivating. The part I loved is"No, this is not, not yet, romantic love. It is something better, purer, lovelier.
For it is very rare for a man to value a woman so highly not because of what she means to him, or what she could become for him in personal terms, but because of what she is in herself."
You have no idea how many times I went through these lines , as you said it beautifully,this is what the Essenes of whole story . 👏 👏

My dear Zhanna,

I am very pleased that you liked this one so much, especially the part you have quoted, which I was happy about as well. One does not always know, when one starts with a post, how it is going to turn out!

Five Little Pigs is a very complex and psychologically satisfying mystery. And its artistic perceptions also ring true. It is the inspector who handled the Crale murder case who says what you have cited, about the flowers in Amyas Crale's painting, to Poirot, does he not?

I must look up that bit. It reminded me of what Claude Monet once said to a viewer at one of his exhibitions who complained that the snow in a painting on display was pink. Close your eyes, replied Monet, and you will see that the snow is pink!

I hope your knee is at least a little better now.

Shyamala Di

Originally posted by: alffim

Dear Shyamala Di!
You wrote so wonderful:
"I do not like dissecting a delicate, gossamer weave, so fragile that the slightest pull can tear it. Or a very tender bud, with all its petals still tightly furled, with one little edge opening up, near the top, just a very little. There is the promise of a full bloom some day ahead - and no, I am not taking off from that dratted zergul flower - but I am almost afraid to delve too deep, to try and prise open the tightly closed petals too soon.

On the edge of the unknown: This is where your Akbar and Heera are now, trembling on the edge of something neither understands, and one resents. No, that is not quite correct. That both resent. Thus Heera.".
This is what I feel and why I don't want to predict anything forward. And you are very finely and accurately described the "premonition (presentiment?) of love", in which no one wants to admit it. Very often people have lost loved ones feel that betray, if distracted by grief.
I also love "Five little pigs." There's a marvelous description of a painting of a vase with flowers on the table. What it was a bit distorted, a bit wrong, not academic. But after this painting, any flowers seem as incorrect, are not so good

Lashykanna,

What an exquisite painting for the keeper of the flame! Thank you!!

I am delighted that you loved this one so much. When I begin a post, I rarely know precisely how it is going to turn out, and sometimes it comes out better than I expected it to be. This keeper of the sacred flame concept came to me out of the blue today, and I was fascinated by it. It feels so good that you , and some others too, felt the same!

Oh, so those memories are about Heera's eyes. it seems our Khan Sahib is even deeper into the chasm than I had thought at first!

Finally, my dear, if I have managed to add "such beauty with your words to what I'd only written as a tale", why, I could do that only because the beauty was already there in the narrative, and in your lead characters. I cannot write well about something that does not touch me.

Shyamala Periyamma

QUOTE=lashy]

Originally posted by: sashashyam

The keeper of the flame:

Keeper of the flame... how beautiful

It was one of my personal favourites too... as you said...

No, this is not, not yet, romantic love. It is something better, purer, lovelier.

For now, what touched me to the core was the welling anger, the unfamiliar tightening of the chest, that Akbar feels when brooding over the threat to Heera's life. Lashykanna, these the most exquisite, the most evocative lines you have written here as yet:

Was it because his subconscious knew her spirit was unique, too unique to allow it to be extinguished? Was it because he knew she was a noble soul - a soul so noble that it would make any man want to protect its essence from dying out, though she'd never ask for such protection herself?

For it is very rare for a man to value a woman so highly not because of what she means to him, or what she could become for him in personal terms, but because of what she is in herself.

It is not just his admiration for Heera's never say die spirit, for the kind of cool courage that he has never before seen in a woman, for her tenacity, for her special skills, though that admiration is real, and is given without any resistance from his mind. It is something else. Something more.

It is the protectiveness of the keeper of a sacred flame that he is determined shall not go out.

I found a painting for you... a 16 year old struggling to keep that spirit alive... and he steps in to keep her flame alive!

Why does Akbar feel that he is stumbling headlong into unknown depths, into a chasm that might have no end? Is it because thinking of Heera has, unbeknownst to himself, set off a chain reaction? Thus:

the thoughts were beginning to ruffle other memories too. Memories so evasive that they'd somehow found their way through all his walls and masks he'd kept intact for so long. Subtle memories, which had stubbornly lodged in a far corner of his mind - that try as he might, he couldn't oust them.

I am sure most of your readers are all agog to find out, as soon as possible, what exactly are these shades from his past that haunt Akbar. But I am not one of them. I am content to wait till you are ready to open up those cards.

No ... here the memories referred to the memories of her 'eyes' the eyes that told him so many stories that he refused to care about 5 nights ago... but that thought had lodged so stubbornly in one part of his mind that he couldn't shake them off...

Oh yes he does have many dark pasts... many dark memories too... that cause him to behave this way... but here the memories were in reference to their first meeting at the canal...

A creature so evolved that she is far above the common run of womankind , in fact of humankind itself.

His nascent protectiveness towards her is not just that of a man towards a woman who has, all too soon and against his own will, ensconced herself firmly in his zehen.

And that is going, unless I am badly mistaken, to be the leit motif of your fascinating tale.

HOW AMAZING.. you have added such beauty with your words to what I'd only written as a tale...

-The girlish curiosity with which Heera discreetly peers across the fence at Bahadur and Akbar. The way in which her concentration for once wavers when she realises that not just his men, but the Khan Sahib himself is watching her at work with her herbs. And most of all, the sudden quickening of her heartbeats when she feels " a coincidental thrill" at having received, as she assumes, such an exquisite floral offering from someone as remote and introverted as the Khan Sahib.

I found all this most appealing, for it shows that there is a real, normal 16 year old as well behind all that unbelievable maturity and that patient courage.

NB: I was reminded irresistibly of Meera Bai being married off to Rana Bhoj Raj of the Sisodias of Mewar in the place of her dead cousin Krishna. Who, incidentally, committed suicide, at the request of her father, in order to prevent a destructive battle between two rival Rajput baraats for her hand.

😭

-Finally, while the lifelong burden of guilt that Durga feels - because it was her rash high spirits that led to the accident that affected Heera's eyesight - is natural, what is remarkable is that Heera feels not the slightest resentment against her jiji on this score. It says a lot for the kind of affection they have for each other.

NB:Again, this reminded me of an identical relationship between two sisters in one of Agatha Christies's best mysteries, Five Little Pigs, where this abiding feeling of guilt in the elder sister for having damaged the other's face for life is the determining factor behind her otherwise incomprehensible behaviour . To those of you who have not read it, I would recommend it unreservedly.

Oooh! very interesting...

My dear Nandini,

I am really very pleased that you liked this take of mine so much, and that my PM was useful in alerting you to it. As I usually post my takes at the very of Lashy's very long threads, without my PMs, neither you nor anyone else would have been able to find them!

You are very kind in all that you have said about my analyses, my dear, but the truth is that no one who is not attuned to excellence can either recognise it or really appreciate it. So, if my post seems exceptional to you, the compliment is due as much to you as to my post!

I am glad to have you as a regular new reader for my analyses of this tale of Lashy's, and I hope that you will still be with me if and when I start doing takes on Chandragupta Maurya.

Shyamala Aunty

Originally posted by: durgeshnandini

@Shyamala Aunty,

It was a pleasure reading your update analysis as always. 👏

Thanks for the pm, else I would have missed this amazing take.

Reading your analysis is like reading a beautifully written encyclopaedia, so weighed with knowledge it is...

Hats off for that. 👏

Even I was reminded of Five little pigs after reading Heera's childhood accident, but the mention of this book reminds me of another similar one, Elephants can remember by Agatha Christie.

Hello Shyamala Aunty,😊 I never really thought you would notice the "like".I am sort of a secret admirer of yours😛.I have read almost all your analysis of JA episodes and some of DKDM too.I have made a point to read your take after Lashy di's every update,helps me to understand the characters and their behaviour more.This too was beautiful loved every bit ..Thankyou for the PM😃

Of course I noticed the Like from you, my dear, how would I not do so? I value my readers, those who really enjoy my posts, for without them I would be nothing. I am so glad that you liked this one so much.

I am very pleased to know that you have been with me for a long time, but you never marked any of the Jodha Akbar or DKDM Jalandhar track posts with a Like did you, unless you have changed your id since then? I would surely remember it if you had done so.

I am only sorry that you did not surface and write to me for so long; I would have loved to hear from you much earlier. Anyhow, better late than never,and I hope that from now on, you will not only follow my posts but also comment on them. This is a good beginning, and all you have to do now is to keep it up! I will make it a point to PM you about all my future posts.

Shyamala Aunty

Originally posted by: Kuki715

Hello Shyamala Aunty,😊 I never really thought you would notice the "like".I am sort of a secret admirer of yours😛.I have read almost all your analysis of JA episodes and some of DKDM too.I have made a point to read your take after Lashy di's every update,helps me to understand the characters and their behaviour more.This too was beautiful loved every bit ..Thankyou for the PM😃