Selected Prompt:
1988. Choose a distinguished novel or play in which some of the most significant events are mental or psychological; for example, awakenings, discoveries, changes in consciousness. In a well-organized essay, describe how the author manages to give these internal events the sense of excitement, suspense, and climax usually associated with external action. Do not merely summarize
the plot.
Essay:
In the novel, The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga, Balram Halwai’s mental interpretations of events in his life drive the progression of both the plot and his character. Although Balram is born into a humble and impoverished household, his changes in determination and reactions to an oppressive societal system forcibly suggest both his future wickedness and eventual rise to power. By displaying Balram as an individualistic thinker, Adiga reveals the suspense of the story as told through the lens of both an ignorant and enlightened Balram.
Adiga begins the story with a innocent and naive Balram, who has lived his entire adolescence in a poor Indian town. Once an ordinary boy, his encounter with a school inspector pushes him forward, as he describes Balram as “an intelligent, honest, vivacious fellow in this crowd of thugs and idiots” (30). After the inspector coins Balram as “The White Tiger,” readers directly see the gears of determination slowly beginning to run in Balram’s mind. Balram, who was born into the same conditions as his peers,is given a revelation that he was born talented - which can thus allow him to escape the confines of his town - happily accepts his role as the White Tiger. This exposes the first sign of Balram’s confidence to do better, shaping a suspense of where Balram’s thoughts will lead him next.
His encounter and acquaintance with his master Mr. Ashok, a man who hires Balram as a chauffeur, doesn’t enlighten Balram, but instead pushes him further into ignorance. After working for Mr. Ashok for some time, he returns home only to expose his true self-centeredness. He ungratefully refused the food of his Granny and flings it across the wall, in an attempt to protest against his past life of poverty and lack of culture. Despite a supposed increase in Balram’s sense of individuality - in the form of refusing his past life - he actually exposes his lapse into wickedness. Once a innocent and obedient boy, he prefers the guidance of an uncaring master over that of his family. His thoughts and newly-acquired traits of wickedness foreshadow both Balram’s downfall, and his enlightenment to his ignorance.
Balram truly confronts societal evils and his own cruel ignorance during a meeting with Mr. Ashok, where Balram must take the criminal blame for the accidental murder of a young girl that Mr. Ashok committed. Before this point, Balram still thought highly of Mr. Ashok as a master. Now, however, readers see the full effect of a boy brainwashed by the elites. In Balram’s thoughts, he wants to accept the blame for the crime because he still believes it to be a duty to protect his master. But readers see a larger force arise from his mind, a force that calls for rebellion against an unfair and oppressive societal system. Balram gains the revelation that “the masters still own us, body, soul, and arse” (145). By looking into his thoughts, readers see an enlightenment, a force to escape his ignorance and servitude to an oppressive India.
His trip to the National Zoo in New Delhi furthers his thoughts of rebellion, which ultimately further the mental tension of Balram to drive the story forward. His encounter with an actual white tiger locked in a cage affects him so much that he faints. After waking up, he realizes that “[He] can’t live the rest of [his] life in a cage” (239). His realization that he must now escape from Mr. Ashok by any means necessary - with no regard to Ashok’s care anymore - shoves him into the climax of the novel.
As Balram kills Mr. Ashok by ramming into him a broken bottle, readers see the aftermath of Balram’s wickedness. With no apparent regard anymore for his master, Balram is now finally free and enlightened individual whose thoughts drove him to accept his fate as a man in individualistic power, not a boy in obedient servitude.
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