Summary of the Novel:
Rama or Rama Swami was the son of a Brahmin family from the south in Mysore state. He went to study in France at his early age. He started his research work on the subject of Albigensian heresy. He was trying to find out the Indian background of Jain or Buddhist of the Cathars. A French lady, Madeleine also involved in that work but with a different reason. She fell in love with Rama and they were married after some time. They had their first child, Krishna who had died in childhood.
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| Novel The Serpent and The Rope—Brief Summary |
The story really starts with Rama's return to India when his father, a great scholar had died. He had to take his step mother and his infant step brother to Benares to perform the funeral ceremony of his father. When he was describing his journey to Benares, the writer described Rama's marriage with Madeleine as well as the death of son Krishna in a flash back. Madeleine's uncle Charles had his worldly nature.
On return from Benares they came to Allahabad where they were the guests of Professor Venkatraman who introduced Rama to Pratap Singh who was his former student. Pratap belonged to a Jagirdar family. He was married to Savithri, the daughter of Raja Raghubir Singh of Surajpur. Savithri accepted her marriage only in a formal way. Its reason was that she had the ideas of communism and she did not like Pratap who had served the British faithfully. Pratap had tried to take Rama's help to persuade Savithri to accept him. In this way both Rama and Savithri met together in India.
After performing the funeral ceremony of his father at Allahabad Rama and his family members came back to their home town.
Rama's visit to the Northern parts of India gave him a chance to describe the places and events of some places in the North. He was much inspired by Benares and he described it, “Benares is eternal. There the dead do not die, nor the living live. The dead comes down to play on the bank of the Ganges and the living who move about, and even offer rice - balls to the means, live in the illusion of a vast night and a bright city.” When he saw the plains of the river Ganga , he made many associations with it . He also remembered the old traditions related to the old places, the nearby hamlets and the ancient trees by the pond side. He supposed that the Aryans should have camped there. He also remembered Gargi and Yagnyavalkavi and their discussions of the olden period. He thought that it was the place related to the joy and sorrow of the past. He regarded the river as sorrow as well as the earth in the same farm. The green trees and the White Mountains showed the eternal truth showing the cycle of birth and death. In short, the Himalaya showed the truth and the Ganga showed humanity. This is the reason that we throw the ashes of the dead into the Ganga which takes them to the sea . In the same way holy Badrinath in the Himalaya shows the truth.
Rama returned to France and joined Madeleine in the same atmosphere. She was a mystic girl who had fallen in love with Rama because she was much impressed by the Hindu religion and its superstitions. She was of very sensitive nature but she tried to prove Rama's devoted wife. As his faithful wife she admired Hindu religion and philosophy as a true follower. There in France they also met Lezo, a refugee from Spain and Georges a refugee from Russia. Lezo knew many languages and Georges was a true Christian. They spent their time on intellectual discussions on Christian religion and Vedantic philosophy.
Rama went to London after receiving a letter from Pratap that Savithri had fallen in love with a Muslim boy. He spent some days with Savithri in her circle. Savithri was impressed by Rama, so he surrendered herself to him. As he visited the library many thoughts about libraries came into his mind. He thought about their seriousness, their space and deep knowledge. He also thought over the subjects of different books related to science, mechanics, etc. He thought again that the writers of such books should have worked hard in writing those books. He also thought over the language and style of different books. He also thought about a particular night at Cambridge which created imaginative ideas in his mind. According to him man has a fire in his heart as well as a light in his mind. He also thought about Nazism and Communism. The interlude of Jagannath Bhatta and his famous poem, ‘Ganga Lahiri’ also came into his mind.
What Savithri said about Rama it is also true about Raja Rao, the writer of this novel. He said these significant words, “Ramaswamy has always such interesting things to say about everything. He relates things apparently so unrelated, for him history is a vast canvas, for the discovery of metaphysical values. He is my guru. “As he looked at the great river, Thames, philosophical ideas came into his mind. He expressed his feelings in these words, “What an imperial river the Thames is her colour may be dark or brown but she flows with majesty, with a maturity of her own knowledge of herself.” He also remembered the tall trees and high buildings beside the great river. The people of the great city of London had lived well in the age of Queen Elizabeth who had spent her riches on grand shows. Empires were built and lost when the brave soldiers had done heroic things. Shakespeare became immortal by his great plays. After that Savithri sang the famous song of Meera, “Mere tho Giridhar Gopal” and she silently surrendered herself to Rama and her love for the Muslim boy vanished.
The events at home compelled Rama to return to India from London. His sister, Saroja had become ready to marry Subramanya Sastri but the Little Mother was not convinced if Saroja would live a happy married life with him. Rama wanted to give necessary help to Saroja in that matter. Though Saroja did not love Subramanya but each and every woman in India has to marry, so she agreed to marry him because he was a good man, respectful and affectionate to Saroja.
Rama had a weak chest so he started vomiting blood on the night of Saroja's marriage and she looked after him. Rama later on passed one week at the house of Captain Shyam Sunder in Bombay. After seducing Laxmi, the wife of Shyam Sunder there, Rama went to France. Meantime Madeleine gave birth to a child who died after a short time. That event changed her outlook towards life completely. She started taking interest in Buddhism and was converted to it. Soon she became a staunch Buddhist and started taking fasts. In this way, she became completely spiritual. Then Rama went to London where his chest disease relapsed, so he was admitted in the hospital. He recovered gradually from his illness when Savithri used to visit him off and on . Then he took a promise from Savithri that she would return to India and become Pratap's good wife.
Madeleine's cousin, Catherine, the daughter of her uncle Charles was married to Georges and Catherine became his devoted wife. Madeleine's relationship with Buddhism had become so strong that Rama was compelled to take divorce from her. Catherine served as Rama's witness in the court of the notary. After the divorce Rama bade goodbye to Catherine, her husband, Georges and Vera, their little daughter and he returned to India.