The Dreamy World of Children in Ruskin Bond’s “The Funeral”

Abstract

This paper examines the depiction of children and their world in Ruskin Bond’s short-story “The Funeral.” Nature nurtures children who become adults who nurture nature. Natural world plays a prominent role in children’s development. The experience with nature plays a unique, irreplaceable role in healthy child development. Early experiences with nature are vital to the forging of later environmental commitments. In the short-story “The Funeral” Bond narrates the emotional feeling of the boy over the death of his father in a melting way. It is an autobiographical story of Bond who shares his loss or demise of his father when he was a boy. The boy imagines that his father resuming back to life through new shoots. The boy is asking series of questions to himself regarding the funeral which projects very vividly the insatiable curiosity of children. Bond depicts the indelible moving emotional feelings of the boy who lost his father. He has been comforted and consoled by the trees, plants, flowers and mountain peaks which assure him faith of meeting his father. Bond hints at the eternal force of nature and human soul in this story.