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Kathmandu Sunday February 25, 2001 Falgun 14, 2057.
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A Promise in
Chaos
By Babu Ram Neupane
Man is oriented towards expression when he is
well-equipped with epochal awareness. Amidst budding English writers in Nepal, here comes
a voice never heard, but now to be realized.
The insight gets illuminative treatment in
the material setting wrought to expose an inhuman, base, ugly and sordid section of
society. Gopal Tegi’s novel, The Death of a Nurse, dedicated to the hospital patients
of the third world actually does deserve the applause regarding its appeal for their
never-ending fortitude and courage. The writer has done a good job of digging out a
problem lurking so dreadfully in the service rending organizations.
The fiction revolves around a character
called Deepa, a professional staff nurse, who is witness to a series of obstinacy,
arrogance and neglect of duty on the part of responsible doctors at her own workplace. She
undergoes a severe experience of being an unheeded patient there. She has her loving
husband, the narrator himself, who cannot but watch his sweetheart fret in her deathbed.
He has grudges against the cruel circumstances with no aid to him except for some
colleagues of his wife. The end of the novel is eponymous to the death of the generous,
humane, dedicated and stoic nurse, Deepa.
The novel is but a glaring example of the
exploitation of staff nurses, the dirty environment of hospitals, the terror of the
seniors, morbid sentimentalism and so on. The soul-moving calamity of the moral life has
an emotional effect as a matter of fact. The novel verges on the edge of technical
terminology almost incomprehensible to lay readers. The natural symbols serve the purpose
of bringing out the happenings in the minds of characters. The final catastrophe is the
one that has alarmingly appalled the readers. The attack against the doctors, "a
doctor with a license to do any thing", is convincing. A kind word or compassion
supposed to be an essential part of treatment, besides medicines, is hopelessly lacking in
the so-called doctor. The destiny has willed otherwise and the last breath of Deepa
happens in a hospital other than her own. She thinks nursing to be a service in the name
of God to help the sick and needy. But ironically she herself is segregated in this
regard.
The characters in the novel are somewhat
vague and their personality is hardly revealed throughout the novel. The writer has
indulged in medicinal term so much that sometimes the readers are compelled to take the
novel as a dissertation on diseases helpful to the practitioners in the related field. The
point of view is striking with a diagnostic touch. The plot is meticulously followed with
no diversions making the novel a hectic reading. The advocacy of vegetarianism is a
projection with positive mission.
The emergence of the writer with an outlook
so compelling is unprecedented as the scenario is dominated by some mafia dons and their
network, weaving a trap in which stagnant and boastful voices reverberate, creating a
frustrating feeling when it comes to the avenues of expressive promise. Though the writer
has failed to capture the graveness of the content in the body of the novel, the price is
fair.
(Neupane teaches English literature at Patan
Multiple Campus)
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