Complete reading of ‘The Thing Without a Name’ by V. S. Naipaul
‘The Thing Without a Name’ is one of the many short stories from the book ‘Miguel Street’ which was written by renowned author V. S. Naipaul. It talks about a carpenter named Popo who seems to always be making the “thing without a name”.
The story, like the other stories from the book is written from the point of view of a small boy. It is set in Miguel Street as suggested by the title of the book. The street is known to most people as Luis Street and is located on the coast of Spain.
The main characters are Popo, the boy who is also the narrator, Popo’s wife, Hat, and a gardener. There is a mention of Bogart, but he does not appear in the story.
Popo is a carefree soul, who does not bother himself with materialistic things and the idea of earning money. He is the narrator’s most liked person from all of Miguel Street. He always seems to have time for the narrator and he never appears to be making anything ‘constructive’.
His wife cheats on him with the gardener who also works at the same house where she works as a cook. She is also fond of the narrator and is always giving him things to eat. She comes back to Popo only when she learns that he has painted the house and is actually earning his living.
The boy, who is also the narrator is a keen observer of all the people surrounding him. He adores spending time with Popo until one day Popo succumbs to the pressures of society and actually starts focussing on earning money and making furniture instead of making the ‘thing without a name’.
Hat is a character that is present in most of the stories if not all in the book. In the beginning of this story, he believes that Popo is a showoff and he despises him. But when Popo’s wife runs away with the gardener he feels sorry for Popo and he takes his side when someone passes a harsh comment on Popo by beating the man up.
The main theme of the story for me is how a person is sometimes unable to explore his or her creativity owing to the constant pressures of society to be similar to others. In the story, Popo is called a half man and a man woman because he doesn’t earn money and his wife does instead. People make fun of him because he is always making the thing without a name instead of actually making normal furniture. Hence, he becomes a grumpy man at the end of the story who stops thinking about the thing without a name, much to the boy’s utter dismay.