Red faced

Smokes

Comes from New York

White teeth

Typical Western tourist(khaki shorts etc.)

Speaks only English

The American
He typifies the "Ugly American": he speaks only English, but is

surprised and a little annoyed to find that Muni can speak only
Tamil. Although he is in the tiniest village in India, he expects to find a gas station and English-speaking goatherds. Once he sees the statue of the horse, he must own it for his living room, with no thought for what the statue might mean or who might value it. Even when he can't speak the language, he knows that money talks.

Has two goats

an orphan

married; no children

MUNI
Speaks only the Tamil language
Hates the influence from Western world (cinema) poor naive

Muni
Our protagonist. He was once wealthy, but is not desperately poor. He relies on his wife heavily and no longer has any shame or pride when it comes to his poverty. Perfect example of a good Hindu who, because of Karmas rules, accepts his lot in life/fate without anger. Feels anger toward those bad men who have slighted him in the past, but it is not up to him to punish them, it is Gods will. Conservative values (believes the cinema has spoiled people and taught them to

do bad things, etc).

He is also disciplined, religious and lonely.

Cultural Clash
The clash of Indian and Western cultures. The two cultures exist in the same time and space, but literally and metaphorically speak different languages. The two main characters in this story couldn't be more different: -Muni is poor, rural, uneducated, Hindu and brown -The American is wealthy, urban, educated, probably Judeo Christian and white. - Muni calmly accepts the hand that fate has dealt him. -The American is willing and able to take drastic and sudden action to change his life. -A lack of respect is shown in the American, who does not consider the statues role but simply wishes to own it. -Muni has never had an opportunity to learn about the West. -The American has a very self-oriented perspective on the world.

Role of Women
There are three women in the story: -Munis good wife. -The postmans bad wife. -The Americans wife. The good wife is a caretaker and provider who stays with Muni through thick and thin. The bad wife is an adulterer and a shame on the postman. The Americans wife is a stereotypical strong wife who decides things. Women are broken down into their base stereotypes: -good -bad. Women are not full characters and are only seen by the reader through the eyes of the men in their lives, the Male Gaze, Swhich tells you more, perhaps, about the men doing the seeing than the women theyre talking about.

"A Horse and Two Goats" takes place in the Indian countryside next to an ancient statue of the horse and a soldier, which is believed to protect the village but seems to be forgotten by the natives.

The statue stands in the nowhere at the portals of a very small village, called Kritam, it is so
small that it is not even mentioned in any atlas and in the local survey map it is marked as a tiny dot.

Most of the natives who live there are poor, rare educated farmers and deeply rooted in Hindu traditions. Many of them have never left the place, even though or because of that they think this place is the apex of the world .

The earth around is dry and the sun is burning, only some cactus are growing around at the

point where the story takes place.

It seems that the story is placed in the 1960s because of the typical khaki safari dress the tourist wears and because it was written at around this time.

Literary Criticism

Feminism theory in gender criticism focuses on sexual difference and sexual politics. Women need to consider what it meant to be a woman, to consider how much of what society has often inherently deemed female traits. More than often, women have been always perceived as inferior to men and that men are more powerful and capable as compared to women. In the A Horse and Two Goats short story however, the wife has more control over the husband. According to Muni, he had trashed her only a few times in their career, and later she had the upper hand. This indicates that even though in the beginning Muni behaves like most men where they are being condescending toward the women, but eventually later the wife has more power in that marriage and Muni has to listen to her. This is very apparent when the wife warns Muni not to go back before the sun is down and Munis reaction is, he knew that if he obeyed her she would somehow conjure up some food for him in the evening. Only he must be careful not to argue and irritate her.