In winter, when I put a quilt over myself, its shadows on the wall seem to sway like an elephant. That sends my mind racing into the labyrinth of times past. Memories come crowding in. Sorry. I’m not going to regale you with a romantic tale about my quilt. It’s hardly a subject for romance. It seems to me that the blanket, though less comfortable, does not cast shadows as terrifying as the quilt dancing on the wall.
The first lines of "The Quilt" establish the story's narrative frame: The narrator, in her present adult life, sees the shape of an elephant on the wall when she pulls a winter quilt over her body. The image of the elephant silhouette immediately evokes memories from her childhood. She is sure to clarify for the reader, addressed as "you," that there is nothing romantic about the story she is about to tell. Rather, the quilt's silhouette brings her back to the terror of a traumatic event from childhood.
Amma left me with Begum Jaan, the same lady whose quilt is etched in my memory like the scar left by a blacksmith’s brand.
As the narrator begins to tell the traumatic story from her childhood, she foreshadows the relationship between Begum Jaan's quilt and the traumatic event. In this passage, the narrator emphasizes the intensity of her memory with a simile that likens the memory to a scar left on flesh by a blacksmith's red-hot branding iron. The passage is significant because it shows how the narrator, while being cryptic about the actual event, is overt in her emphasis on the traumatic nature of the content—an element of the story that readers and critics have historically overlooked.
No one had ever seen a nautch girl or prostitute in his house. He had performed hajj and helped several others undertake the holy pilgrimage. He, however, had a strange hobby. Some people are crazy enough to cultivate interests like breed pigeons or watch cockfighting. Nawab Sahib had only contempt for such disgusting sports. He kept an open house for students—young, fair, slender-waisted boys whose expenses were borne by him.
In this passage, the narrator details Nawab Sahib's public image as a man of virtue. However, there is an irony to his lack of interest in sex workers and female dancers. The supposedly virtuous nawab has the "strange hobby" of inviting young male students to live with him. The passage is significant because the narrator's suggestive tone implies that the nawab has sexual relations with the boys who come to stay with him. But the society treats Nawab Sahib's homosexuality and the likely abuse in which he is engaging as open secrets, never questioning his position of power or virtue despite what is clearly happening.
Or was it when she watched through the drawing-room door the increasing number of firm-calved, supple-waisted boys and the delicacies that were sent for them from the kitchen! Begum Jaan would have glimpses of them in their perfumed, flimsy shirts and feel as though she was being hauled over burning embers!
In this passage, the narrator details how Begum Jaan, as the nawab's wife, is forced to stay in her section of the house and watch a stream of young men come to live with her husband, who neglects her sexual needs. As more and more of these young men come to engage in sexual relationships and eat luxurious foods with her husband, Begum Jaan becomes angry. This passage is significant because it speaks to the patriarchal oppression Begum Jaan faces as a nawab's wife. When she witnesses the truth of who her husband is, Begum Jaan does not know what to do with her anger. Because she is still expected to obey him, she feels a sense of powerlessness and humiliation akin to the physical sensation of being dragged over burning coals.
The other maids were jealous of Rabbu. The witch! She ate, sat and even slept with Begum Jaan! Rabbu and Begum Jaan were the subject of their gossip during leisure hours. Someone would mention their names, and the whole group would burst into loud guffaws. What juicy stories they made up about them! Begum Jaan was oblivious to all this, cut off as she was from the world outside. Her existence was centred on herself and her itch.
After Begum Jaan begins her clandestine sexual relationship with Rabbu, the rest of the women in the household gossip about them and make fun of the contextually abnormal partnership they have formed. But Begum Jaan does not seem to care what anyone says. Her "itch"—a euphemism for her need for sexual release—is far more important to her than what people say about her or who the release comes from. This passage is significant because it speaks to the way Begum Jaan, who is self-obsessed, views Rabbu as more of a sexual servant than a lover. Begum Jaan's tendency to view others as beneath her consideration will later impact the narrator, who finds herself briefly turned into an object of Begum Jaan's sexual curiosity when Rabbu goes away.
I woke up at night and was scared. It was pitch dark and Begum Jaan’s quilt was shaking vigorously, as though an elephant was struggling inside.
During the narrator's first night at Begum Jaan's house, she wakes in the night to discover that Begum Jaan's quilt is shaking intensely. She likens the movement to an elephant being trapped inside. The passage is significant because the narrator is actually witnessing Rabbu bringing Begum Jaan to orgasm under the quilt. The child narrator's innocence means she cannot fathom what is truly happening. She does, however, perceive that something is wrong, having sensed that it is not appropriate for her to be in the same room while Begum Jaan satisfies her sexual desires. That the narrator thinks of an elephant bears symbolic resonance, as most readers will be familiar with the metaphorical idiom of not acknowledging the "elephant in the room." As the scene proceeds, Begum Jaan feigns a cold ignorance when the narrator expresses her fear.
The quilt crept into my brain and began to grow larger. I stretched my leg nervously to the other side of the bed, groped for the switch and turned the light on. The elephant somersaulted inside the quilt which deflated immediately. During the somersault, a corner of the quilt rose by almost a foot...
Good God! I gasped and sank deeper into my bed.
In this passage, taken from the story's closing lines, the narrator resolves to find out what is happening with her aunt's shaking quilt. The narrator switches on the light, and the "elephant" somersaults and deflates. What actually happens is that Rabbu and Begum Jaan lie flat when they realize that someone has switched on the light and can see them. For a moment, the narrator sees under the quilt. Keeping consistent with the suggestive tone of the entire story, the narrator does not disclose what she sees, although the narrator implies that she finally understands the "elephant" is the two women engaged in sex.
