The Felling of the Banyan Tree English Poem Summary.

English Poem 'The Felling of the Banyan Tree' Summary.

1. The Felling of the Banyan Tree Dilip Chitre  

2. Summary of the Poem

3. Dilip Chitre (1938-2009) was a teacher, painter, and magazine columnist. He was a bilingual writer. His major works are in Marathi, but he directly wrote in English too. ‘Travelling in a Cage’ was his first and only book of English poems. He also translated from Marathi to English, the chief translations being ‘An Anthology of Marathi Poetry and Says Tuka. Exile, alienation, self-disintegration and death are the major themes in Chitre’s poetry. His poetry belongs to the Modernist Movement, reflecting an urban sensibility and cosmopolitan views.

4. The poem is about the cutting down of the ancient banyan tree that stood in the yard in the poet’s ancestral house when he was a small boy. They were living in Baroda and there were many trees around their houses belonging to his father. There were tenants in those houses. One day his father asked the tenants to vacate the houses and one by one followed the directions of his father. His grandmother used to say that trees are sacred and felling them is a crime. The boy remembered her words. Later his father employed workers to cut down the trees like sheoga, oudumber, neem and others. But there stood an old gigantic banyan tree. It occupied a lot of places with its number of aerial roots. Its roots were very deep and they had seen many generations. The banyan tree was thrice taller than their house. His father felt that the tree was a problem and at last he ordered the workers to remove it. First the workers cut down the aerial roots and then the branches. Birds and other insects came out of their places in the tree. Later the workers started cutting the trunk whose circumference was fifty feet. It took seven days for fifty people to fell the tree. The rings in the trunk revealed its age. Now, the tree was mercilessly slaughtered.

5. The poet with his family moved from Baroda to Bombay where there are no trees. The poet sees no banyan tree. The memory of the banyan tree in his own garden was fresh in his mind and now that tree in reality is cut down by his father, but the poet carries its memories in his dreams. Though the banyan tree was no more in reality, it still existed in his imagination. The tree was angry as it had no place to send its aerial roots. He suggests about trees and harmony of a natural ecosystem. The poet is concerned about the speed with which the traditions are changing and are badly affected by modern ideas. The importance given to the trees in earlier times is not concern to people living in modern society. The cultural values are breaking the relationship between humans and ecosystem. The religious values were inculcated in a child from his childhood and are not given due consideration. Life is busy and is consuming all the natural resources. The moral values of our tradition are now treated as bygones and meaningless. The poet wonders at the change our society is undergoing. Human life is attached to the natural surroundings. The poet used a metaphor to compare the house and the banyan tree.