‘The Missing Mail’ by the ‘Grand Old Man of Malgudi’ R.K. Narayan is a short story set in the fictional South Indian town of Malgudi explaining how a postmaster saved the marriage of a young seventeen-year-old girl by not delivering a postcard and then a telegram on time. The short story is a classic example of R.K. Narayan’s usual Malgudi short stories and is contained in his internationally bestselling collection titled ‘Malgudi Days’. The short story was originally published for the first time in 1947 in another short story collection titled ‘The Astrologer’s Day and Other Stories’, which was R.K. Narayan’s fourth short story collection. Many readers get these facts mixed up, so it is important to clarify the origins of the short story ‘The Missing Mail’. R.K. Narayan was one of the first Indian-origin writers to have written his books in English and was a contemporary of Mulk Raj Anand, Raja Rao, and Graham Greene, the last being his mentor and godfather in the publishing world.
Summary
Thanappa was the Malgudi postman who, more than just delivering mail to his clients, also took part in their everyday activities and struggles. His beat covered Vinayak Mudali Street, and he practically knew everyone there very closely, from a man who loved solving crossword puzzles to gain a lottery to another individual who had applied for a Madras job; to an elderly lady whose son constantly wrote from Hyderabad and to those who received money orders.
He was especially close to Ramanujam, a senior clerk in the Revenue Division Office who lived at No.10 Vinayak Mudali Street. They shared a close bond, and Thanappa had been delivering letters to Ramanujam’s family for over a generation. After Ramanujam got married, it was Thanappa, through his delivery of a letter, who was the first to learn about the birth of Ramanujam’s child, and therefore, he congratulated Ramanujam. When a girl was born to Ramanujam, Thanappa was one of the first individuals to know about the news and that the name of the girl was Kamakshi.
By the time Kamakshi was seventeen years old, Ramanujam’s father-in-law was putting pressure on Ramanujam to get the girl settled down. This was because the father-in-law had kept five thousand rupees in cash especially for the wedding expenses, and so was twisting the hand of his son-in-law to desperately seek the hand of a willing groom before the wedding season for the girl would end. However, a marriage agreement kept eluding Kamakshi, and her father was getting desperate as the days went by.
Seeing his desperation and anxiety, Thanappa immediately aided him by mentioning a boy from Delhi earning two hundred rupees and whether he would be a suitable groom for Kamakshi. Ramanujam and the Delhi boy’s family exchanged letters, and Thanappa even forced Ramanujam to go to Madras with his daughter to meet with the boy and his family, who had come down from Delhi for a day. The proposal was accepted, but the boy’s family was insistent that the marriage should take place on the 20th of May, whereas Ramanujam wanted to delay the wedding to the next Thai month. He, however, could not afford to do so. If the young couple did not get wed on the 20th of May, then according to the horoscopes of the two individuals, the boy would not be able to enter into any marriage alliance for another three years. So it was decided that the wedding would indeed take place on the 20th of May as selected by the boy’s family after a substantial dowry from the girl’s side.
On the day of the marriage, Ramanujam was very worried, and Thanappa made an appearance by delivering a number of letters and telegrams to the family. However, Thanappa seemed very austere and serious that day, though he greeted the bride and blessed her wholeheartedly. After fifteen days, Ramanujam was informed by his old friend Thanappa that on the actual day of the marriage, Ramanujam’s paternal uncle had passed away after a serious illness. This information was first contained in a card and then a telegram, both of which would have been delivered on the day of Kamakshi’s wedding, and then the wedding would have had to be stopped. Therefore, to prevent such a situation from occurring and from Kamakshi’s life being totally destroyed, Thanappa did an unethical act by intentionally not delivering the fateful card and telegram on the day of the marriage.
Ramanujam was indignant about what Thanappa had done and mentioned that he would tell on his old friend at the workplace. Thanappa, on the other hand, was sure that the department would eventually dismiss him for this unethical act. The story thus ends on that note of abrupt uncertainty about the ultimate fate of Thanappa.
Short-Story Analysis
‘The Missing Mail’ highlights the compassion shown by an otherwise dutiful postmaster who intentionally, in order to save the marriage of a young bride and the dignity of his close friend, does not disclose to Ramanujam about the demise of his paternal uncle. The short story contains the main themes usually seen in R.K. Narayan’s Malgudi literature, like superstition, horoscopes, and the position of women in the early part of Independent India. We see these themes cropping up in R.K. Narayan’s early novels, like ‘The Bachelor of Arts’ and ‘The English Teacher’, both partially based on R.K. Narayan’s own marriage and how he lost his wife early in their marriage. The following topics and themes can be studied and analyzed in relation to this short story:
The Role of a Postman
In Indian society during the first decade of Indian Independence and during the early part of the 20th century, a postman was more than just the mailman of the locality. He could have also been the local village or town schoolmaster, the after-office hours tutor, a translator, writer of letters for the uneducated, and used to be a big part of the life and times of the people in a small town or village. According to R.K. Narayan, this was also so partially in the case of Thanappa, who in our age would have seemed like a gossiper or a busybody but was a well-respected individual in the town of Malgudi. A postmaster was one of the most lucrative and steady government jobs that middle-class Indians loved and looked up to. The mailman’s job was looked up to with respect, so Thanappa was perpetually invited into the homes of his patrons for either buttermilk, sweetmeats, coffee, tiffin, etc. It was an unusual twist in the tale at the end of the story to see this ethical and well-loved individual go against the norms of his kind for the sake of Kamakshi and her marriage.
The Status of Women in Indian Society
Women were not emancipated enough during the early part of Indian Independence, and it was yet a custom, especially in South India, to get young girls of sixteen or seventeen married off to well-earning young men, preferably with government jobs. The girl’s family would have to be subjected to a lot of pressure to get their bride married off, along with the additional burden of paying a huge dowry to the boy’s family and other gifts and food items. Ramanujam also had to go through this tiresome procedure, as mentioned in the short story by R.K. Narayan. Being seventeen years old, his daughter would actually be considered ‘too old’ for the marriage market. If the marriage were delayed for another three years, then it was obvious that Kamakshi would remain unmarried, and her family would then be disgraced in their community. The five thousand rupees of the grandfather then would have been all spent in vain, and Ramanujam would have faced a lot of setbacks if the marriage had not occurred on that particular date. Arranged marriages like these would, however, hinge on astrology as seen in the ‘signs in the stars’, which R.K. Narayan constantly critiques in his literature in a satirical manner.
Horoscopes
R.K. Narayan often critiques the study of horoscopes for marriage purposes in his fiction as well as in his non-fiction. In his autobiography titled ‘My Days,’ he even mentions how he ‘tweaked’ his own horoscope for the purpose of marrying the woman he wanted. His second novel, ‘The Bachelor of Arts,’ shows this effectively. Some deem his fourth novel ‘The English Teacher’ to be the sequel to ‘The Bachelor of Arts’ which, in a fictional form, chronicles the ‘unfortunate result’ of not following the signs in the stars, which had led to much conjecture about the mind of R.K. Narayan when he wrote the fourth novel and when he at the same time in a satirical form always ridiculed the study of horoscopes both before the publication of ‘The English Teacher’ and even after the publication of ‘The English Teacher’. In this short story titled ‘The Missing Mail’, however, it is evident that the horoscope theme was intended merely to create suspense and to indicate the heightened superstition possessed by even educated urban individuals from Delhi about matters in the spiritual realm. Such individuals don’t mind putting their desperate in-laws like Ramanujam at a great financial and emotional inconvenience just so long as the ‘stars’ are placated. The practical and rational nature of the postmaster is evident in this last part of the short story, where he dares to break convention and write destiny with his own hands by not delivering the two pieces of information to his old friend. He chooses the bride’s happiness over the superstition of his time, his job, and his work ethic, bringing forth the essence of Narayan’s literature, and that was to emphasize the ‘rational’ over the ‘superstitious’. This is ironic because R.K. Narayan, after his wife’s death, also dabbled for a time in the spiritual realm to contact her because of his inconsolable spirit. We often see horoscopes linked with the theme of superstition in R.K. Narayan’s fiction.
Other Points of Note
Character-Propelled Short Story
‘The Missing Mail’ is a character-centric and character-themed story where the main character, Thanappa, takes the story forward, not merely the plot. The daily activities of Thanappa, as described in this short story, show a deft skill used by Narayan in bringing out the passage of time, with the postmaster playing an important part in the life of Ramanujam and his daughter Kamakshi. Other writers have adopted this same style, like Rabindranath Tagore, but Tagore used a richer and more flowery style than R.K. Narayan.
The Name Kamakshi
Kamakshi means ‘the one with loving eyes’, which is indirectly poignant in this short story. This is evident because Thanappa manages to hide from the ‘loving eyes of Kamakshi and her father’ on the day of the marriage the two posts regarding the demise of a paternal relative so as to allow Kamakshi to look on lovingly at her husband and a bright future.
The Thai Month
The Thai month in the Tamil calendar is the month of Tai, which falls between mid-January and mid-February in the Gregorian calendar. The Thai month is considered auspicious because it is harvest season and perfect for marriages to take place. We see this theme occurring in many of R.K. Narayan’s literature.
Conclusion
Thanappa waited for a full auspicious fifteen days to pass till he handed over the delayed or ‘missing’ two posts to Kamakshi’s father. He made sure that all the festivities related to the marriage took place before he did so because, as per the father’s own admission, he would have never been able to go through with the marriage with the knowledge that his paternal uncle had passed away. He did a great service to his old friend, thus proving that he was a postmaster with an empathetic heart, especially after seeing the cruel way in which the whole fiasco of getting a marriage for the seventeen-year-old girl had been going on between Ramanujam and his father-in-law. Sometimes, to gain something positive, it is essential to lose or even lose something or let go of something for the purpose. Those who show such discernment prosper, while some remain victims of society and their own tumultuous emotions.
I enjoyed re-reading and analyzing this short story penned by R.K. Narayan titled ‘The Missing Mail’. I hope to re-read and review more of R.K. Narayan’s novels and short stories in the coming days. R.K. Narayan is my favorite author of all time, and I’ve written about him in great detail in my award-winning memoir Scenes of Reclusive Writer & Reader of Mumbai, which you can check out on Amazon. If this short story analysis aided you and you wish to read some multiple-award-winning short stories, you can check out my LGBTQIA+ collection titled The Love That Dare Not Speak Its Name. I hope to read and review more Indian short stories in the coming weeks.
If you are interested in more book reviews, book analysis, short story analysis, poems, author interviews, essays, essay analysis, and other bookish content, check out my blog, insaneowl.com. If you are interested in purchasing my books, you can check the products page of my blog or on Amazon. There is a lot of good stuff to buy! Happy reading to you always!
©2024 Fiza Pathan
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