The God of Small Things Lesson Plan

What does the saying "Big man the lantern, small man the tallow-stick mean?

In this chapter, there is a television program in which a subway busker is given the chance to fulfill his dream of singing on a talk show. The man looks ecstatic to have his dream fulfilled, even though the host interrupts him halfway through and holds all the power over his performance. The "Big Man/Small Man" phrase represents this kind of situation, in which power inequalities cause people with less power to desire things that only feed back into their subjugation. In the lantern/tallow-stick metaphor, the tallow-stick burns up and is destroyed when the lantern is lit--to be...