Fate and Change in Sea of Poppies Anonymous College

To take care of another human being-this was something Neel had before thought of doing, not even with his own son, let alone a man of his own age, a foreigner. All he knew of nurture was the tenderness that had been lavished on him by his own care-givers: that they would come to love his was something he had taken for granted- yet knowing his own feelings for them to be in no way equivalent, he had often wondered how that attachment was born. It occurred to him now to ask himself if this was how it happened: was it possible that the mere fact of using ones own hands and investing one’s attention in someone other than oneself, created a pride and tenderness that had nothing whatever to do with the response of the object of one’s care- just as a craftsman’s love for his handiwork is in no way diminished by the fact of it being unreciprocated. (319) This tender and revealing scene from Amitav Ghosh’s novel Sea of Poppies, illustrates a core theme of the novel, change and it’s drastic effects on the characters’ lives, through the character Neel’s situation.

Neel is a former raja, who while imprisoned gets assigned an opium addicted cellmate. For the first time in Neel’s life, he is forced to live without access to his assistance...