A Horse and Two Goats is a short story novel authored by famous Indian writer, R.K Narayan, originally published on 1970. The story of novel sets in fictional village called Kritam, a very small dehati village in India. All the houses in Kritam village are made up of mud. There is only one house in Kritam which is made up of cement.
A Horse And Two Goats By R.K Narayan
Summary of A Horse And Two Goats By R.K Narayan
The story of novel centers around a life of Muni, a very poor and old man of Kritam village who owns two goats. He lives in small hut with his wife and his two goats. Muni takes his two goats for grazing everyday. He keeps watching them grazing as he has no other work to do. One day, Muni breaks down drum stick from the tree nearby of his home. He request his wife to cook drum stick sauce for him.
Muni’s wife asks him to bring other ingredients to cook drum sticks sauce. On the other side, Muni has no money to buy any cooking ingredients for his wife. Muni goes at the shop of his village and started laughing at bad jokes of shopkeeper so that shopkeeper give him ingredients without asking for money. But the shopkeeper asks Muni to give him his previous due money.
Muni tries his best to get ingredients from shopkeeper without money but shopkeeper doesn’t give him ingredients at all. He even lies to shopkeeper to get ingredients but shopkeeper still doesn’t give him. Muni returns to home and asks his wife to sell drum sticks as he doesn’t get ingredients for it to make a sauce. Once upon a time, Muni had around 40 goats. He used to earn good amount of money with his forty goats. But with time his goats started dying.
Right now, he only have two goats. There is one statue of horse in Muni’s village at highway which made him very happy. Muni is very attached to a statue of Horse. The statue of horse is very big and Muni loves to sleep under its shadow. At first, Horse statue was in Muni’s village but now its come under a newly built highway in Kritam. Muni has grown up by watching horse’s statue. Muni’s has heard lots of interesting stories about Horse Statue from his elders.
One day, Muni was sitting at highway with his two goats. There he meet a foreigner who was in his yellow car. A foreigner asks about gas station from Muni. Muni doesn’t understand foreigner’s language as he was speaking in English and Muni knows only one language which is Tami. Foreigner was explaining about himself to Muni in English. He was telling him that he is from New York and he was a coffee trader.
However, Muni doesn’t understand anything. He is scared from foreigner as he is wearing a dress like police. Muni tells him that he doesn’t know anything about the murder which recently happened in his village. Thereafter, foreigner offers one cigarette to Muni. Muni calms down a bit with the offer of cigarette and started trusting foreigner.
Muni starts telling his childhood stories to foreigner in his Tamil language. Although, both of them are not understanding each others language. Muni also tells him all the Horse Statue stories which he have heard from his elders since childhood. Foreigner gets very excited after watching Horse statue and wants to purchase it. Foreigner tells Muni “We have come to the point where we should talk about business”.
Foreigner has a feeling that the owner of Horse statue is Muni. He wants to purchase Horse statue from him. On the other side, Muni is not getting foreigner words. Thereafter, Foreigner gives hundred rupees to Muni.
Muni thinks that foreigner needs a change of Hundred rupees from him. As Muni has no money, he asks foreigner to go at Money lander’s shop for changes. But then Muni feels that foreigner wants to purchase his goats. Afterwards, he takes hundred rupees from him and left his both goats for him.
Muni is very happy, he returns home and tells his wife that he has sold his goats to foreigner for hundred rupees. Muni’s wife has a feeling that her husband has stolen money because at that time hundred rupees has great value. At the same time, Muni’s both goats returns to home.
Alternatively, foreigner is still waiting for Muni at Horse Statue. Foreigner is thinking that Muni is looking for people to help him in getting statue. When Muni doesn’t returns, foreigner stops one truck at highway and gives few money to him for help in getting statue. At the end of story, foreigner put Horse statue on truck with driver’s help and goes back to home with him.
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