Good vs. Evil in Kipling’s Rikki-Tikki-Tavi
Kipling’s Rikki Tikki Tavi has all the necessary parts of a battle story. It is full of battles, war tactics, good, evil, motive, song, and drama.
A battle story needs a gripping introduction, one that hints at the battles to come and one that brings the reader in with an exciting anticipation. This story first begins with a poem of the brave Rikki Tikki angrily chasing death with a lust to kill. It right away shows the necessary bravery and strength of the protagonist/hero and the might and evil of the antagonist. The lines like… Eye to eye and head to head This shall end when one is dead …start the book with the promise of great fights between two great forces.
The first paragraph is also cleverly written to further exaggerate the greatness of the hero and the battles that he has won.
This is the story of the great war that Rikki tikki tavi fought single handed, through the bathrooms of the big bungalow in Segowlee cantonment After the introduction the plot begins by bringing the hero Rikki to the setting by a coincidental occurrence. His home is flooded and he is washed away and near death when a family finds him and nurses him to health. Again here Kippling shows the bravery of the hero, “It is the hardest thing in the world to frighten a mongoose.” Rikki Tikki is thankful to the family and like all good heroes he is loyal and decides to protect them.
Then enters evil, which creates the conflict for which all battling and killing takes place in battle stories. Rikki is exploring the yard one-day and discovers two birds mourning the loss of an egg that was eaten by the evil snakes ruling the jungle. Just then the head snake Nag appears. Rikki already dislikes him as he is good-natured and loyal like all good heroes and Nag ofcourse has eaten his friend’s egg. This is a very important scene, the introduction of the antagonists. Nag is introduced with a boisterous “I am Nag. The great God Brahm put his mark upon all our people, when the first cobra spread his hood to keep the sun off Brahm as he slept. Look, and be afraid!” And Rikki was afraid, “for the minute; but it is impossible for a mongoose to stay frightened for any length of time.” Then out of no where the first real action of the story takes place, “’Behind you! Look behind you!’ sang Darzee” as Nagaina, Nag’s equally evil wife attempts ...
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...nd goes down with her. This is the climax of the story; it is very suspenseful. Using phrases like “and very few mongooses, however wise and old they may be care to follow a cobra into its hole;” Kippling lines the hole with exaggerations and depictions to increase this already thick suspense. All the animals assume he is dead, similar to countless action movies where there is an explosion and the hero is thought dead, but like in those movies the hero comes out to the amazement and joy of all and there again is much celebrating. And so the book ends on the happy note of Darzee’s glorious battle song of Rikki’s tale.
The story followed exactly the guidelines of a battle story; its plot, descriptions, characters, motives, and action are all proof of this. While reading I noticed that the story, if edited slightly could be confused as a story of humans fighting in the jungle.
The names mongoose, snake, and bird sound like the code names we give our pilots and fighters. Also Rikki has special training and tactics in killing snakes as if he were a trained soldier.
In conclusion, Kippling’s Rikki Tikki Tavi can possibly best be described as a classic war tale of good vs. evil.
In the book Rikki crushes all but one egg of Nagaina’s to bribe Nagaina into staying away from the kid. Rikki said, “What’sthe price for a snake’s egg? For a young cobra? For a king cobra? For the last-the very last of the brood? The ants are eating all the others by the melon bed.” Also in the book the snake flees with the egg trying to outrun Rikki. In the book it states, “He had forgotten about the egg. It lay on the veranda and Nagaina came nearer and nearer to it, til at last, while Rikki-Tikki was drawing breath, She caught it in her mouth, turned to the veranda steps, and flew like an arrow down the path.” Also in the movie the mongoose booked it right into the snake hole where many mongooses never come out. (movie) The movie shows “Rikki chasing Nagaia down a hole where the snake lived.” Also in the movie Rikki killed Nagaina, and whatever cobra ever dared to try to threaten him or the family. In conclusion that is how the Resolution is related to the book and the
As he immerses his audience into combat with the soldiers, Shaara demonstrates the more emotional aspects of war by highlighting the personal lives of the men fighting. For example, when Shaara reveals the pasts of James Longstreet and Lewis Armistead’s, I started to picture them as the men that they were and not as soldiers out for blood. After suffering a devastating loss of three of his children to fever, Longstreet is tossed into battle. In Armistead’s case, he not only suffered the loss of his wife, but also of a friend fighting on the Union side, General Winfield Scott Hancock. Shaara saves his readers a front row seat to the inner turmoil of General Chamberlain regarding his hindering duty as a soldier clashes with his duty to family as he strived to serve the Union as well as protec...
Most critics focus on the chilling way he gloriously recounts battles, narrating them in an epic fashion worthy of Homer's ageless tales. He deals with historic clashes of great importance and manages to transcend their essence to us, reading about them millennia afterwards. His clever and careful use of native vocabulary also aids in the immersion of the reader.
Without love there is no loyalty, and without loyalty, there is no bravery. In the book and movie of the story Rikki- Tikki- Tavi, they were neck and neck. Snake against mongoose, though one must surely die, neither will back down just yet. The book, Written By Rudyard Kipling, and the movie, produced by Julie Ross, generally both carry the same plot and main idea: After being washed out of his home, and cared for by a loving family of three, he wants to repay them, and in the process does an unforgettable act of service. Though both the mediums were exciting, there were also numerous similarities and differences between the book, and the movie, such as the banana scene, the scene where the family first found him, and the resolution.
John Keegan, the author of “The Face of Battle” is allowing the reader to view different perspective of history, from the eyes of the soldier. Although by his own account, Keegan acknowledges, “I have never been in a battle. And I grow increasingly convinced that I have very little idea of what a battle can be like.” Keegan scorns historians for pointing the finger of failure after an evolution occurs and not examining the soldier’s point of view while the battle is transpiring.
In Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis and in Ishmael Beah’s A Long Way Gone, both authors commentate on the romanticism of violence that is often associated with war. Because of this, the authors are able to dispel misconceptions surrounding war. Furthermore, the memoirs allow the authors reflect upon their own experiences of war during their childhoods, as well as examine how cultural shifts perpetuated by both war and the increased influence of western culture that took place within their cultures shaped who they became. Through their memoirs, the authors portray the reality of war and violence through cultural experiences.
What are the stakes of your battle? What are the possible consequences for your main character if he doesn’t win? Will he die? Or is it worse? Will his army/companions/country fall into the hands of the enemy? Will his entire race be obliterated? Or is it better? Will he win the hand of the princess and the day? Will he amass a fortune that he will use to take over the world? The higher the stakes, the more tension there is to build. Make the consequences high enough that something MASSIVE will be lost or gained. Put it all on the line. Make your readers clamor for the outcome!
Over 60 million people are obese in the world today. The socioeconomic statuses of the Americans play a major part in the obesity rates across the country. People with higher incomes are less likely to be obese than people with lower incomes. One in every seven preschool-aged children living in lower income areas are obese (Center for Disease Control and Prevention). A 2008 study showed that obesity is highest among American Indian and Alaska Native (21.2 percent) and Hispanic Americans (18.5 percent) children, and it is lowest among white (12.6 percent), Asian or Pacific Islander (12.3 percent), and black (11.8 percent) children (Get America Fit).
In the short story “Chickamauga”, the author Ambrose Bierce uses a young boy to connect to his audience with what is the disillusions of war, then leads them into the actuality and brutalities of war. Bierce uses a six year old boy as his instrument to relate to his readers the spirits of men going into combat, then transferring them into the actual terrors of war.
Did you know that people with less than a high school degree have the highest obesity rate of 32.9%? Also that Non-Hispanic black people have the highest obesity rate of 36.8%. Hispanics have an obesity rate of 30.7%. Non-Hispanic white people have an obesity rate of 25.2%. Asians have the lowest obesity rate of 16.7%. Obesity is expensive to treat. All these facts came from Business Insider. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention states, “More than 1/3 of U.S. adults are obese.” With the rates this high, it shows that Non-Hispanic blacks are more influenced by the economies set up for food.
Does being the antagonist always mean you are evil? In AELA this year, we read a short story called Rikki-Tikki-Tavi, by Rudyard Kipling. In the story, the main character, a mongoose named Rikki-Tikki-Tavi, is washed out of his home, and taken in by a family of people. In the backyard, there are two snakes, Nag, and his wife Nagaina. Rikki has to fight the snakes in order to ‘save’ himself, and the other creatures in the backyard. That is, however, only Rikki’s side of the story. This essay is about Nagaina, and how she may be more than just an evil antagonist. In the story, Nagaina is not only sly, but also intelligent and caring. Almost everything Nagaina did was for her children, still eggs at the time.
When the war breaks out, this tranquil little town seems like the last place on earth that could produce a team of vicious, violent soldiers. Soon we see Jim thrown into a completely contrasting `world', full of violence and fighting, and the strong dissimilarity between his hometown and this new war-stricken country is emphasised. The fact that the original setting is so diversely opposite to that if the war setting, the harsh reality of the horror of war is demonstrated.
Furthermore, Abdularhman El-Sayed (2010) also argues that the real reason for the obesity epidemic is down to poverty and cheap food. He describes a study conducted by one university of Glasgow which found that deprived neighbourhoods are twice as likely of becoming obese compare to residents in more affluent neighbourhoods, (El-Sayed 2010).
The story of All Quiet On The Western Front centers on a young teenager, Paul Baumer the 19 year old German together with his 4 other classmates is persuaded to volunteer for the German army by enlisting at the beginning of World War I and find themselves fighting in the French warfare. The story is told entirely through the experiences of the young German recruits and highlights the tragedy of war through the eyes of an individual, Paul. Erich Maria Remarque creates the world of the ordinary German soldier in the Great War, spanning around late 1916 to just before the armistice of November 11th, 1918. It is a world of slaughter by gas burning ones lungs, by mortar shells tearing ones body apart, by bayonet and with wounded men caught on barbed wire, as well as hundreds of thousands dying of their wounds in the inadequate field hospitals where ruthless orderlies are in charge.
Tzu, Sun. The Art of War. Trans. Thomas F. Cleary. Boston, MA: Shambhala, 2005. Print.