The Portrait Of A Lady Class 11 Notes

The portrait of a lady is a part of an autobiography by Khushwant Singh. In this autobiography by Khushwant Singh he draws a pen portrait of his old grandmother.  He loves her immensely. He beautifully unfold their relationships and how it goes under several changes. In other word, the story is a loving tribute by a grandson Khushwant Singh to his old grandmother. The story gives a picture of human Relationship. It is a realistic account of how grandparents give all their time, love and attention to their grandchildren.

About The Characters

Grandmother

Khushwant Singh’s grandmother is described as an extremely religious person. She was a very kind lady. She was short, fat and slightly bent. Her face was wrinkled and countless lines were running on her face. She always dressed in spotless white cloths. She accept the speculation when her grandson leave fr higher studies. she was very friendly in the nature as in the village she took feeding to dogs but when she move to the city as there were no street dogs so she start feeding the sparrows. It used to be the happiest half an hour of the day. She took care of all the need of her grandson when he was child and when they live in the village.

 

Khushwant Singh, The Author

He was the author of the story. He was very attach to her grandmother. Through this story he try to thanks he grandmother whatever her grandmother had done for him. He recounts his childhood days and his relationship with his grandmother.

The Author Remembers His Grandmother And Grandfather

The author recalls his grandmother as a very old lady. For the twenty years that the author had known his grandmother, he had found her old and wrinkled.

It was hard for him to believe that she had been young and pretty and she had a husband. Khushwant Singh’s grandfather’s portrait hung on the wall of drawing room. He wore a big Turban. His cloths were loose. He looked at least a hundred years old. Looking at his portrait no one can imagine him in his youth he looked as kine as he had only and only lots of grandchildren.

The Author’s Grandmother

The thought of the grandmother being young and pretty was almost revolting to him. She was short, fat and slightly bent in stature. Her face was a criss-cross of wrinkles. Her silvery white hair was scattered over her wrinkled face.

The author remembered her hobbling around the house in the spotless white cloths with one hand resting on her waist to balance and the other hand busy in her rosary. Her lips constantly moved in inaudible prayer.

To the author, sh could never have been pretty, but she reflected a divine beauty. She was like the winter landscape in the mountains.

The Authors’s Childhood With His Grandmother

The author and his grandmother were good friends. His parents left him to stay with his grandmother when they move to the city. In the village, his grandmother took care of all his needs. She was quite active and agile. She used to wake him up in the morning and get him ready for school.

She said her morning prayer in the sing song manner while she bathed and dressed him so that his grandson would learn by heart. The author listened to the prayers because he loved her voice, but never bothered to learn them.

Then she would fetch his wooden slate which, she had already washed, and plastered it with yellow chalk. She would take an earthen ink pot and a reed pen and tie them in a bundle and hand it to author. After having a thick, stale chapatti with a little butter and sugar spread in it for breakfast, they used to leave for the school. The author’s grandmother always accompanied him to the school as it was attached to the temple.

The Author At School

The priest taught children the alphabet and the morning prayer. The children sat in two rows in the verandah. They would sing the alphabet or the prayer in a chorus. While the author learnt his lessons at school, the grandmother would read scriptures in the adjoining temple. On their way back, they would feed stale chapattis to the dogs.

 The Turning Point In The Relationship Of Grandmother And The author

The turning point came in their relationship when they moved to the city to stay with Khuswant Singh’s parents. In the city, the author went to an English school in a motor bus. The grandmother could not accompany him to the school. As there were no dogs in the streets, the grandmother took to feeding the sparrows.

As the years rolled by, they saw less of each other. In spite of her immense interest in his studies, she could not help him in his lessons as he was learning English, the law of gravity, Archimedes’s principle and many more such things which she could not understand, and this made her unhappy. Sometimes she would ask him what the teacher had taught him.

Grandmother Distressed And Disturbed

Grandmother didn’t believe in the things taught at the English School and was distressed to learn that there was no teaching about GOD and the scriptures in the school.

Moreover, she was very disturbed at the ides of music lessons being given at the English school. To her, music had lewd associations and she considered music to be unsuitable for gentle folk.

The Common Link Of Friendship Gets Snapped

The common link of friendship between the author and the grandmother was broken when the author went to the University and was given his own room. The grandmother accepted her loneliness and rarely spoke to anyone. All the day long, she sat spinning the wheel and reciting her prayers.

Only in the afternoon she relaxed for a while to feed the sparrows. They perched on her shoulders and some even on her head but she never shooed them away. It used to be the happiest half an hour of the day for her.

The Author  Leaves for Higher Studies

The author decided to go abroad for higher studies for five years. He was sure that his grandmother would be upset but she was not even sentimental. She came to the railway station to see him off. She showed no emotions. She was absorbed in praying and counting the beads of her rosary. Silently she kissed his forehead. The author thought that perhaps it was the last sign of physical contact between them.

The Grandmother Celebrates The Author’s Return And Falls Sick.
and after that she die