Summaries of three V.S. Naipaul stories, from Miguel Street (1959)


By Doctor Terence Rajivan Edward (or 0161__Rajivan, if that helps)


The Thing Without A Name. Popo called himself a carpenter but at the story's beginning, he does not ever finish anything. He is usually busy, however. He is making a thing without a name. The narrator finds that poetic. Popo's wife makes the money as a cook, his view being work is for women, not men. A character called Hat regards him as a man-woman, presumably for not being the breadwinner. One day his wife disappears, he becomes drunk, and the men accept him as one of them, trying to cheer him up. Popo goes to Arima and fights with a gardener who had seduced his wife, receiving a fine from the court. He comes back irritable, paints his house, attracting his wife back. Popo starts stealing and selling stuff, ending up in prison. His wife remains in their home. Upon release, he is regarded as one of the boys, or a man. But the narrator is sad: he makes things now, chairs, tables and wardrobes. He does not work on the thing without a name.


Man-Man. Man-Man is thought to be mad by his street neighbours, but he did not look mad. He campaigned for every election and got three votes, the character Hat suspecting they are jokers. If you ignore sight, he sounds like a good class Englishman, not too fussy about grammar. One day he was growling in the cafe [accent removed] like dog and the owner chased him out. He took revenge, entering the café a few times illicitly, finally leaving excrement on each stool, deterring customers. Man-man's best friend was a dog of similar dispositions and he seemed to exercise control over the animal's bowels. He would put droppings in women's clothes and then sell them, when they didn't want them. He then turned good, perhaps because of the death of his dog. He became a preacher at the street corner. He frightened people but the more he did, the more they came to listen, making him more and more money from collection. One day he declared himself Messiah and soon scheduled an attempted crucifixion. He was tied to a cross and asked people to throw stones at him. They started light, then met his demand for heavier stones, but then he expressed outrage at getting this met. The police took him away for observation and then for good.


The Pyrotechnicist. Morgan is the comedian of Miguel Street. He is always trying to make people laugh, but not always successfully. He was also interested in fireworks and had ambitions to put on a great firework show. He would get in a fit too and challenge the narrator's uncle to fights. The wives would insult each other. The character Hat regards Morgan as simply a fool and encourages not laughing at Morgan at all, to make him stop playing the fool. Morgan beats his children and devises a comical scene, in his eyes, which he invites some people in the street to observe. He carries out court-like trials on his children, for such crimes as ripping three buttons off clothing to sell for marbles. Each child is sentenced to some beating, but the joke frightens rather than amuses. Morgan's wife and children move to the countryside and he focuses on his fireworks. Later his wife, a big woman contrasting severely with his thin body, catches him with another woman, Teresa Blake, and the whole street is amused by how he squirms, almost naked, in his wife's angry grasp. A few nights later his house is on fire, the most spectacular fire the narrator has seen. Morgan was charged with arson, but got off. He was said to have gone to Venezuela or Colombia or simply mad.