POST EARLY FOR CHRISTMAS

(one act play)

R. H. WOOD

"Post Early for Christmas" is a humorous one act play by R H Wood. It is about some hilarious
incidents that happen in a post office. When the play begins, the young lady assistant is already fed
up with the strange customers who came to her post office the previous day.

First, Mrs Smith comes for some stamps and a postal order. She is the type of a person who posts
early for Christmas. Then Mrs Jones comes with some large parcels. When the assistant tells her
that it would have been better if they had been posted earlier, she responds rudely.

Next, a deaf old gentleman comes for his old age pension. His poor hearing causes some funny
moments when he hears 'said' as 'bed' first and 'Ted' later, and 'book' as 'cook'. When the assistant
finds it difficult to get him when he mumbles, he calls her deaf.

A fussy old lady comes in thinking that it is the animal clinic. She complains about her sick cat to the
lady assistant. Then Mr Brown, a farmer comes with the news that a time bomb has been
discovered in a London post office disguised as a Christmas parcel.

A large, loud woman, Mrs Higgins and her untidy son Bertie come next. Bertie's poor manners and
bad language create some hilarious moments in the play. When his mother asks him 'where is your
grammar?' he hears it as 'where is your grandma?'

Then a foreign tourist comes with a parcel. He seems to be anxious about when it will reach the
General Post Office to be sorted. He leaves forgetting to take his gloves. Then Bertie notices a
funny noise coming from the parcel. Everyone is sure that it is a time bomb.

When everyone tries to hide for cover, the deaf gentleman thinks that they are playing hide and
seek. Bertie brings in a policeman and he tries to open the parcel. Then the foreign tourist comes
back for his gloves. He checks the parcel and announces with alarm that it has stopped ticking.

Thinking that the bomb is going to explode, the policeman throws the parcel into a bucket of water
brought by the lady assistant. The tourist takes out a clock from the bucket. He had brought it from
Switzerland.

Fed up with all these incidents the lady assistant says that she is going to resign her job and go to
work in the animal dispensary. Animals don't do such silly things.

IT IS GOING TO HURT

JUST A LITTLE BIT

(poem)

OGDEN NASH
 • It is a very funny poem. It is filled with exaggerations, puns and metaphors.

• It describes the feeling of a person going to a dentist.

• The poet portrays the unpleasant experience of sitting in a dentist chair with fear and terror.

• In the beginning of the poem, the poet shares his unpleasant experience of sitting in a dentist
chair.

• He expresses his dislike in opening his mouth wide open.

• Then he describes both physical and mental tortures related with it.

• He humorously attributes these tortures as dental.

• The poet also writes about the different ugly expressions made by patient’s fingers on his palm.

• It makes serious changes in one’s life line, love line or some other important line.

• Next the poet compares one’s mouth to a damaged road where repair work is going on.

• The mouth appears to be a place with stone-crushers, concrete mixers, drills and steam rollers.

• All the more the nerves are seriously affected.

• The poet now describes the polishing work which one thinks as demolishing work.

• This job is done terribly using a mirror.

• The poet compares the dentist to an Ursa.

• Both the dentist and a bear have same nature.

• The dentist digs the mouth to repair; the bear uses its fore- arms and pointed mouth to eat its
prey.

• The dentist takes his crowbar in one hand and mirror in the other.

• He polishes the mouth just like polishing a horse’s hoof.

• Thus this poem highlights only the negative sides of pain to make the readers laugh.

• It treats the essential treatment in life as a difficult painful process.

• Though the pain one gets is quite natural the poet makes use of exaggeration to produce
humour.

• As this poem focuses on the bad effects it creates only a feeling of fear and terror in the readers.

• It never highlights the honest and careful work of a dentist

CRIME AND PUNISHMENT

(STORY)

R K NARAYAN
In the humorous and sarcastic story "Crime and Punishment" R K Narayan presents a smart boy who is
unwilling to study. His parents are keen on getting him a double promotion to the first form. But the
boy gives a wrong answer to the teacher's question on purpose.

Losing his patience the teacher slaps the boy on his cheek. The boy starts crying and threatens the
teacher that he would tell his parents about the punishment. The parents were against any sort of
punishment. They wanted him to follow the theories of child psychology and treated the boy as if he
was made of thin glass.

For the thirty rupees he was receiving for teaching the boy, the teacher had to put up with their
ideas. But the boy takes advantage of the situation and makes the teacher stop the lesson and play with
him. He has to play the role of a station master with a toy train. When the toy stops functioning the
boy asks him to repair it. When he expresses his inability to do it, the boy runs to the parents to tell
them about the punishment.

The teacher has to run after the boy. But when they meet the parents they ask the teacher about the
boy's progress in his studies. The boy pleads with him not to betray him. The teacher tells them that he
is doing well.

He adds that as they had finished their lessons early, he was playing about with the child to keep up his
spirits.

Usually teachers punish students for their crimes. Here the punishment given by the teacher becomes a
crime. The teacher is then punished for his crime by the boy. So there is a role reversal here. The story
also presents a sarcastic picture of our education system and educational principles that we follow.