Get summaries, questions, answers, solutions, notes, extras, PDF and guides for (Folk-Tales of Bengal) Lal Behari Dey’s The Man Who Wished to be Perfect: WBCHSE Class 11 English Literature textbook A Realm of English (B) Selection, which is part of the Semester III syllabus for students studying under WBBSE (West Bengal Board-Uccha Madhyamik). These solutions, however, should only be treated as references and can be modified/changed.
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Summary
A religious mendicant offered a childless king a special drug for the queen. It would allow her to have twin sons. The condition was that the king must give one of the sons to the mendicant. The king agreed, and two princes were born. When the princes turned sixteen, the mendicant returned to claim one of them. The king and queen were filled with great sadness. This feeling is described as being “plunged into a sea of grief,” meaning their sorrow was deep and overwhelming. The brothers argued, as each wanted to protect the other by going. In the end, the elder prince went with the mendicant.
Before he left, the elder prince planted a tree in the palace courtyard. He explained that this tree was a symbol of his life. If the tree was green and healthy, he was well. If it began to fade, he was in trouble. On his journey, a puppy and a young hawk chose to join him. The mendicant led him to a hut in the forest and warned him never to travel north. However, one day the prince chased a wounded deer to the north. There, he found a house with a beautiful woman who challenged him to a game of dice. The prince played three games and lost each one. He lost his hawk, his puppy, and finally his own freedom. The woman, who was actually a demon called a Rakshasi, trapped him in a hole, planning to eat him later.
At the palace, the younger prince noticed the leaves on the life tree were fading. He knew his brother was in great danger. He immediately rode to the forest. On his way, another puppy and hawk, who were siblings to the first pair, joined him. The younger prince found the Rakshasi and also played dice with her. He won all three games, freeing his brother and their animal friends. To save her own life, the Rakshasi revealed the mendicant’s evil plan. The mendicant intended to sacrifice the elder prince to the goddess Kali to become perfect.
The princes went to the temple of Kali. Inside, the skulls of six previous victims spoke to the elder prince. They told him how to defeat the mendicant. They said he should pretend he did not know how to bow before the goddess. When the mendicant demonstrated how to bow, the prince should use that moment to kill him. The prince followed their advice. He tricked the mendicant, and when the man bowed, the prince cut off his head. The goddess Kali then appeared and granted the prince the perfection the mendicant had wanted. The six other victims were restored to life, and the two princes returned home.
Questions and Answers
1. What was the condition the mendicant gave the king for the medicine? Why did the king agree to it?
Answer: The condition that the religious mendicant gave to the king, who had no issue, was very specific. The mendicant offered a drug for the queen, and by swallowing this drug, she would give birth to twin sons. However, this medicine came with a strict condition: of the two twin sons born, the king would be allowed to keep only one for himself, and he must give the other twin to the mendicant. This was the mendicant’s price for the miraculous drug.
The king thought this condition was somewhat hard, as it meant giving away his own child. However, he ultimately agreed to the terms. The reason for his agreement was his deep anxiety to have a son. He desperately wanted an heir to bear his name, inherit his vast wealth, and continue the royal line by inheriting his kingdom. This powerful desire for a successor outweighed the difficulty of the mendicant’s condition, leading him to accept the deal.
2. Why did the king and queen dismiss their fears about the mendicant? What was the mendicant actually doing?
Answer: The king and queen dismissed their fears about the mendicant because a significant amount of time had passed since they had made the agreement. The twin brothers grew from being one year old, to two years old, three years old, four years old, and then five years old, and still, the mendicant did not appear at the palace to claim his share. Because so many years had gone by and the mendicant was old when they first met him, the king and queen concluded that he must have died. Believing him to be dead, they dismissed all fears from their minds and felt secure with their two sons.
However, the king and queen were mistaken. The mendicant was not dead; he was very much alive. During all those years, he was carefully counting the time as it passed. He was patiently waiting for the princes to grow older before he would make his appearance and demand that the king fulfill his promise. He had not forgotten the agreement at all and was simply biding his time.
3. Describe the qualities and skills of the young princes as they grew up.
Answer: As the young princes grew up, they developed into remarkable young men with many admirable qualities and skills. They were put under the guidance of tutors and proved to be excellent students, making rapid progress in their learning and academic studies. In addition to their intellectual development, they also excelled in physical arts. They became very skilled in the art of riding horses and in the art of shooting with a bow and arrow, which were important skills for princes. Beyond their abilities, the twin princes were also uncommonly handsome in their appearance. Their combination of intelligence, skill, and striking good looks made them widely admired by all the people throughout the kingdom. They were seen as ideal princes, and their presence brought joy to the court and the people.
4. How did the king and queen react to the mendicant’s return? Why were they plunged into a sea of grief?
Answer: When the mendicant finally returned to the palace gate after sixteen years, the king and queen had a reaction of pure shock and despair. The text says their hearts “dried up within them,” which is a way of saying they felt a sudden, deep sense of dread and hopelessness. They had long believed that the mendicant was no more in the land of the living, so their surprise was immense when they saw him standing at the gate in flesh and blood, demanding one of the young princes for himself as promised.
They were plunged into a “sea of grief,” a phrase that means they were completely overwhelmed by immense sorrow, as if they were drowning in it. This was because their long-held sense of security was shattered. The return of the mendicant meant that their worst fear had come true: they had to part with one of their beloved sons, a thought that caused them unbearable pain and sadness.
5. Why did the king feel compelled to fulfill his promise to the mendicant?
Answer: The king felt he had no other option but to fulfill his promise to the mendicant due to a powerful fear of the holy man’s supernatural abilities. The king and queen understood that there was nothing for it but to part with one of the princes. They believed that the mendicant possessed the power to issue a terrible curse. If they broke their word, they feared the mendicant might, by his curse, turn not only both of the princes into ashes, but also destroy everything they held dear. This potential destruction included the king and queen themselves, their entire palace, and the whole of the kingdom to boot. The thought of such complete and devastating ruin was so terrifying that it compelled the king to honor his original agreement, despite the immense personal pain it caused him.
6. Describe the argument between the two princes over who should go with the mendicant. What did each one say?
Answer: When it became clear that one prince had to be given away, a fearful struggle arose in the hearts of the king and queen. However, among the young princes themselves, there was no argument about who should stay. Instead, each of them bravely volunteered to be the one to leave, both saying, “I’ll go.”
The younger prince spoke first to his elder brother. He argued that the elder was older, even if only by a few minutes, and that he was the pride of their father. Based on this, the younger prince insisted that the elder should remain at home, and he would be the one to go with the mendicant. The elder prince then responded to his younger brother, arguing that he was the younger of the two and the joy of their mother. For this reason, the elder prince said, the younger should remain at home, and he, the elder, would go with the mendicant. Each prince tried to sacrifice himself for the other’s sake.
7. What did the elder prince plant before leaving the palace? What did he say it represented?
Answer: Before the elder prince left his father’s roof to go with the mendicant, he performed a significant act. He went into the courtyard of the palace and, with his own hands, he planted a tree. This was not just any tree; it was meant to be a living symbol connected directly to him.
He explained to his parents and his brother that this tree was his life. It would serve as an indicator of his well-being while he was away. He told them that as long as they saw the tree looking green and fresh, they would know that it was well with him. If they noticed that the tree began to fade in some parts, it would be a sign that he was in an ill case, or in some kind of trouble. Finally, he warned them that if they ever saw the whole tree fade completely, they would know that he was dead and gone.
8. How did the elder prince acquire a puppy and a young hawk as his companions?
Answer: The elder prince acquired his two animal companions shortly after beginning his journey with the mendicant. As they were wending their way towards the forest, they came across some dog’s whelps, or puppies, on the roadside. One of the whelps spoke to its dam, or mother, saying, “Mother, I wish to go with that handsome young man, who must be a prince.” The dam simply replied, “Go,” and the prince was happy to take the puppy as his companion.
A little further on their journey, they saw a hawk and its young ones upon a tree. One of the young hawks also spoke to its dam, saying, “Mother, I wish to go with that handsome young man, who must be the son of a king.” The mother hawk also said, “Go,” and the prince gladly took the young hawk as his second companion. In this way, the prince, the puppy, and the young hawk continued the journey together with the mendicant.
9. What were the mendicant’s instructions to the prince about living in the forest? What was the one prohibition?
Answer: Upon arriving deep in the forest, far from any houses, the mendicant led the prince to a hut thatched with leaves, which was the mendicant’s cell. He then gave the prince a set of instructions for his new life. The mendicant told the prince that his chief work would be to cull flowers from the forest for his devotions. He was free to eat whatever fruit or root he liked and could get his drink from the nearby brook.
However, there was one very important prohibition. The mendicant strictly forbade the prince from going to the north. He was allowed to go on every side except the north. The mendicant warned him very clearly, saying, “If you go towards the north evil will betide you,” meaning that something terrible would happen to him if he were to disobey this one command.
10. How did the prince spend his days in the forest? What did the mendicant do all day?
Answer: The prince’s days in the forest followed a regular routine. His work for the mendicant was brief. At dawn, he would go into the forest to cull, or gather, flowers and give them to the mendicant for his devotions. After this task was done, the prince had the entire day to himself. He did not dislike the place or his work and made the best of his time. He would spend his days walking about in the vast forest, always accompanied by his two loyal companions, the puppy and the young hawk. He also practiced his archery skills by shooting arrows at the deer, of which there was a great number in the forest.
The mendicant, on the other hand, was absent for most of the day. After receiving the flowers from the prince in the morning, he would go away somewhere and would not return to the hut until sundown.
26. What was the final outcome for the skulls in the temple? What happened to the two princes?
Answer: The final outcome for the skulls in the temple was a complete restoration of their lives. As they had predicted, with the mendicant’s death, his vows were left unfulfilled. Because of this, the skulls were again united to their respective bodies, and they all became living men once more. Their long ordeal as disembodied heads in the temple niches came to an end, and they were freed from the mendicant’s curse.
The two princes, having successfully overcome the Rakshasi and the evil mendicant, were safe and triumphant. The elder prince had not only saved himself but had also been granted the gift of perfection by the goddess Kali. With their mission accomplished and all dangers behind them, the two heroic princes returned together to their own country and to their family.
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