Love of Nature depicted in the story B.Wordsworth by V. S . Naipaul.

Love of Nature  depicted in the story B.Wordsworth by V. S . Naipaul.

Love for Nature in the story is reflected through the characters of both  B. Wordsworth and the narrator. The mother, however is least bothered with the feast of delight, in the form of bees, in her back yard, that attract the strangers but fail to arouse her sensibility. She depreciates  poetry and nature and  chastises the narrator for having an interest in this beauty because she is shut out to the nature that surrounds her. The story opens in a natural setting.

 B. Wordsworth, the  poet-calypsonian makes his first appearance in the  story and the first question that he poses the  young boy,  the narrator with, is if he can watch bees that have taken up residence in four small gru-gru palm trees in the narrator's backyard.
Together with the boy, who is deputed to keep a watch over him by his distrustful and  suspicious mother, they squat before the palm trees and watch  the bees for an hour. While observing the  swarm of bees, he searches for similar interests in the boy and asks him whether he liked watching bees, or if he had watched ants and scorpions and centipedes and congorees. The boy gives him the typical answer, common to the  modern lifestyle that he has no leisure to derive bliss and happiness from the tranquilizing objects of nature.

 B. Wordsworth is a poet who asserts the importance of respecting nature. He stresses that even the smallest creations of God in nature, such as bees buzzing around a bush, are beautiful and we should appreciate them as they might end up teaching us the greatest lessons of life. He believes that Nature acts as a panacea to cure the ills of society. It has a soothing and calming effect on us when we are tormented by the pains and afflictions of life. When the boy is thrashed and mercilessly whipped by his mother for having soiled his shirt, he flees to his new friend swearing that he will never return home. B. Wordsworth takes him on a walk. They lie down on the grass and watch the stars.

Wordsworth introduces the boy to the unknown realms of stars and familiarizes him with the constellation of Orion, the Hunter which the narrator remembers even today. Suddenly, the boy is overwhelmed with the feeling and realization that he has grown big and great as he had never felt before. "I felt like nothing, and at the same time I had never felt so big and great in all my life." He felt small compared to the stars, but he realized that out of every single person in the world, he is the only one who can be him. And no one can ever take that away from him.”His anger, pain, anguish, tears and cruel blows vanish away in the healing lap of Nature. This establishes that Nature has a healing influence on the aggrieved souls. The experiment outdoors furnishes us with a greater understanding of the world. For example, in the story, when the boy was looking at the stars, he started to understand more about who he is, as a person and what his purpose in life is. He took the character in the open sky and the curative property of Nature "healed" his spirits. The powerful image of the beautiful night sky makes us realize there is a universe much larger than ours.

When the young boy asks what his name is, the man responds, "Black Wordsworth. White Wordsworth was my brother. We share one heart."  The "White Wordsworth" that the man speaks of is William Wordsworth. Wordsworth, the great Romantic poet is known for his love for nature and simplicity. He had some unprecedented works to his credit. The same traits are visible in the fictional character B. Wordsworth – minus the published works. B. Wordsworth is a vagabond who lives in a simple, one room hut surrounded by overgrown weeds, luxuriant bushes and trees. The yard was all green and there were a mango tree, a coconut and a palm tree.

The place looked wild, as though it wasn't in the city at all. It was not spruced or done up, The place looked wild and there was no concrete establishment nearby. When the poet questions why he had kept the place damp with thick bushes, he narrates a tale that depicts a love for the natural wild. He shares a story with the boy, of two poets who were married and how the girl and the unborn baby poet died due to some pregnancy complications. The girl loved the luxuriant green and therefore her husband let the green lush continue in love of his wife and never touched the garden again and it “grew high and wild.” He is shown to have an appreciation for all things natural, showing a thoughtful insight toward the world and its surroundings.

In his second meeting, he invites the narrator to his house to feast on mangoes, "In my yard I have the best mango tree in Port of Spain. And now the mangoes are ripe and red and very sweet and juicy. I have waited here for you to tell you this and to invite you to come and eat some of my mangoes."

 As their relationship continued, B. Wordsworth and the boy spend their time together walking, talking, meandering and wandering about around the seaboard, the Savannah, the race course, Botanical Gardens, Rock Gardens and the Chancellor Hill watching with a renewed zest and interest, the Port of Spain gradually enveloping in darkness and the lights illuminating the city and the ships in the harbor; living as poets and explorers and interpreters of life.

As a calypsonian, B. Wordsworth takes out time to observe the mysteries of nature and existence and from these observations he distills lessons. The boy narrates an incident, “We walked along the sea wall at Dock site one day, and I said, 'Mr. Wordsworth, if I drop this pin in the water, you think it will float?' He said, 'This is a strange world. Drop your pin, and let us see what will happen. 'The pin sank.“ This image of the pin being dropped in the sea reflects the uncertainty of life, and because Wordsworth is a poet, he can see what nature is trying to tell us.

The purpose behind the depiction of Beauty lying scattered can be to motivate people lost in the hum drum of life to appreciate the beauty in the nature that surrounds us and appreciate poetry. B. Wordsworth died and the boy was left with a great memory of a great poet and  great observer of Nature and life who had taught him to view life as something new, unexplored and worth experimenting.

 It seems that Wordsworth came into the boy's life to teach him to love and appreciate the beautiful and lovely images of Nature scattered around him. He is ignorant to the beauty of the world before Wordsworth and after he dies, the boy is able to cry like a poet just as B. Wordsworth said,  I can watch a small flower like the morning glory and cry." I said, Why you does cry?" "Why, boy? Why? You will know when you grow up. You're a poet too, you know. And when you're a poet you can cry for everything."

 A year later, as he walked along Alberto Street, he saw no sign of Wordsworth's old house. "I walked along Alberto Street a year later, but I could find no sign of the poet’s house. It hadn’t vanished, just like that. It had been pulled down.” It had been demolished and a large two-storied concrete building stood in its place. His trees had been cut down and bricks littered the foundation. People’s love for concrete had made them devour the resplendent Nature. ”The Mango tree and the plum tree and the coconut tree had all been cut down.”

Cutting down of the  fruit trees and dismantling the house and green wild  yard so reverently and religiously  maintained in its wild state by Wordsworth and raising a  creation of concrete by  man symbolizes the lack of concern on behalf of man to appreciate the beauty found in nature. This razed to the ground the values Wordsworth stood for. "It was just as though B. Wordsworth had never existed."