Obituary is a famous Indian poem written by Indian author, A.K Ramanujan. The meaning of word “Obituary” is a notice of death, especially in news paper. It means to write a brief note about a person in newspaper who is no more.
Obituary Poem By AK Ramanujan
Summary of Obituary By AK Ramanujan
Through the poem, poet writes Obituary note for his late father in newspaper. The poem tells us about poet’s father’s life like how he lived and what changes comes in his family’s life after his death.
The story of poem begins with poet who says when my father passed away, he left dust on a table of papers. Those papers were a list of debt which he took during a marriage of his daughter. Which means father does not used to pays his debt and now it is author’s responsibility.
As well as he left his daughter so now it is poet’s responsibility to look after them and to marry them to someone. Firstly, poet has to pay his father’s debt and second he has to get his sisters married.
The poet says father has one bed wetting grandson who is named by a toss of coin after him. So basically poet is trying to tell us that his father does not did something great in life. The only thing he did is to left responsibility of family to look after by his son.
The father left one house which is leaning slowly on a coconut tree in yard. Their house is so old now that it is benting slowly – slowly on a coconut tree.
The author says being a burning type person, father is burning properly in cremation. My father’s body burned properly in fire except his eye coins which are visible in ashes. Sometimes fire does not burn body parts properly like eyes, several spinal discs while some burned to coal properly.
So now it is his sons responsibility to pick burned bones and throw in river facing east where three rivers met as the priest said. There will be no longstanding headstone for my father like Christians do.
My father was incapable to do something for himself like his cesarian birth in a Brahmin ghetto. He died by heart failure in a middle of fruit market. But someone told me my father got two obituary lines in a short column of Madras newspaper. It was that type of newspaper which are sold two weeks later to street hawkers.
These street hawkers sell these newspapers in turn to the small groceries from where I buy coriander and jaggery in newspaper which I often read.
Nowadays I read it to find these obituary lines. My father left us a changed mother who is sad and sorrowful and more than one annual ritual. Through the poem, poet is trying to tell us that his father does not did something great for him or his family. He just left the world with full of responsibilities on to his son.