51 pages • 1 hour read
Shyam SelvaduraiFunny Boy
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1994A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapter 3Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 3 Summary: “See No Evil, Hear No Evil”
Amma begins going to dinner parties and dances with two new friends, Chitra Aunty and Senu Uncle. Arjie visits the first American-style supermarket to open in the country, which is due to the Sri Lankan government changing from a socialist-style economy to a free-market or capitalist system. The family visits a beach resort, which Arjie learns is partially owned by his father Appa, who quit his job to get into the hotel business with Senu Uncle. Appa goes to Europe on a months-long trip. Arjie asks him to bring back copies of the sequels of the popular American book Little Women. Arjie read an old copy of Little Women that was owned by Amma’s older sister, Neliya Aunty, who came to live with the family after her mother’s death. Neliya Aunty is more old-fashioned than Amma and dresses in a more conservative manner.
A man with white skin known as Darryl Uncle arrives at the house one day. We learn that although he appears to be a foreigner, Darryl Uncle is Sri Lankan and is white: a Burgher. He is a journalist living in Australia now. Neliya Aunty greets him warmly. Amma is startled to see him. Arjie has a fever, so she tends to him while talking to Neliya Aunty, who implies that Daryl Uncle was once romantically attached to Amma. Daryl Uncle returns to the house again and tells Arjie that Little Women was one of his favorite books to read as a child.
Amma and Daryl Uncle argue about the war going on in Jaffna, which is another city in Sri Lanka and an area populated heavily by Tamils. There, the Sinhalese government fights against the rebel Tamil Tigers, who want a separate state. Although she is Tamil, Amma believes that the Tigers are terrorists and she does not approve of their actions. Daryl Uncle understands why the Tigers are fighting and says that Tamils are being tortured, which Amma does not believe because there is “freedom of the press” that would cover this if it really happened (107). Daryl Uncle has returned to Sri Lanka to investigate this alleged torture. Amma approves of the new Prevention of Terrorism Act, which allows the police to arrest anyone suspected of being a terrorist. However, Daryl Uncle believes the law is a “tool for state terrorism” (107).
Neliya Aunty finds Daryl Uncle’s visits to be improper; Arjie does not understand why Neliya Aunty feels that way; he likes Daryl Uncle. Daryl Uncle buys Arjie copies of the Little Women sequels. Throughout this chapter, Arjie has dreams in which he likens himself, Daryl, and Amma to various characters in Little Women.
Arjie’s illness grows worse. Daryl Uncle continues to visit Amma, which upsets Arjie’s siblings, Sonali and Diggy. Amma takes Arjie away to the countryside so that he might feel better. Daryl Uncle visits them in the countryside. One day, Arjie, Amma, and Daryl Uncle discuss the Burghers; they talk about how it was not acceptable for Burghers to marry Sri Lankans because of their difference in skin color, implying that was what prevented Daryl Uncle from marrying Amma. Daryl Uncle and Amma fight; Daryl Uncle has decided to go to Jaffna to investigate the allegations of torture, but Amma does not want him to go. Amma and Arjie return to their home in the capital city of Colombo.
A week passes, and Daryl Uncle does not visit them. Worried, Amma and Arjie visit Daryl Uncle’s house; the boy servant at the house, Somaratne, does not know where Daryl Uncle is now. They see that Daryl Uncle’s room has been ransacked. Against Neliya Aunty’s wishes, Arjie and Amma report Daryl Uncle’s absence to the police station. There, an officer known as A.S.P. Weerasinghe comes to take down their account of the situation, but Amma does not want to reveal any details of her affair with Daryl Uncle. He believes that Daryl Uncle’s house has been merely broken into, but Amma believes that Daryl may have been tortured and killed by the police for his work as a journalist. The police officers arrest Somaratne on the grounds that he has stolen from Daryl Uncle, but Amma believes the boy is innocent. A.S.P. subtly blackmails Amma, threatening to reveal her affair with Daryl Uncle to her husband if she challenges the police’s account of theft.
A fisherman finds Daryl Uncle’s body. The police ask Amma and Neliya Aunty to identify the body. Amma says that she does not believe the police’s story that he drowned; she believes that he was murdered and thrown into the sea. She seeks help in an old family friend and former civil rights lawyer, Q.C. Appadurai (known as Q.C. Uncle). Q.C. Uncle advises her that times are dangerous and that she should avoid putting her family in danger, but Amma cannot live with herself if she does nothing. Q.C. Uncle warns them that their phone is being tapped if they hear a click before speaking.
Despite Q.C. Uncle’s warnings, Amma goes with Arjie to Somaratne’s. They worry that a suspicious car is following them, but the car goes away. When they get to the village, Somaratne’s mother chides Amma, saying that she is a rich person from Colombo who is ignorant about the horrors happening in the rest of the country; Amma does not care about poor people like them. Somaratne is nowhere to be found. Arjie grows upset with his mother for putting them in danger. Arjie and Amma return home. His father returns home, and they throw a big party for him.
Chapter 3 Analysis
Norms of masculinity and femininity are present throughout this chapter, and no symbol better captures the tension between the two modes than the book Little Women. When Appa goes to Europe, Arjie asks him to bring back books for him to read—specifically, the sequels of the popular American book series Little Women, which focuses on a family of strong sisters during the time of the American Civil War. However, Arjie worries because his father once said that Little Women was a book for girls. Arjie is torn between wanting his father’s approval and wanting to express himself naturally through activities like reading books geared toward girls.
Therefore, Arjie is surprised when Daryl Uncle mentions that the book used to be one of his favorites as a child. This not only gives Arjie affirmation that it is alright for him to be himself—he can read books like Little Women and still be a boy—but also creates a bond between Arjie and Daryl Uncle. Daryl Uncle, like Radha Aunty, has traveled abroad and therefore has wider definitions of acceptable behavior. That fact that he is white and accepts Arjie’s orientation, in addition to his support of the Tamil Tigers, complicates race relations in the novel.
In this chapter, Arjie has dreams in which he likens his family members to various characters in Little Women. He compares his mother to the headstrong Jo, himself to the sick Beth—because Arjie is currently ill—Neliya Aunty to the practical and traditional Meg, his sister Sonali to the vain and childish Amy, and Daryl Uncle to the charming next-door boy Laurie, who wants to be with Jo. However, later in the chapter, Little Women shifts from a symbol of innocent childhood pleasures to adult disdain as Arjie realizes the real world is not as simple as the world in the book. Good does not always triumph over bad, and sometimes the bad guys get away with murder, as seen in Daryl Uncle’s killing. The atrocity of the escalating civil war in Sri Lanka is experienced in microcosm by Daryl Uncle’s death, and in further microcosm by Arjie’s sexuality. Danger lurks everywhere for the protagonist as he navigates questions of identity and loyalty.
Arjie’s dreams serve as a symbol of his shifting circumstances throughout the chapter. For example, as Amma probes into Daryl Uncle’s death and puts the family in danger, Arjie dreams of a big wave that threatens to drown both him and his mother. However, this chapter also shows that symbols do not always need to highlight dramatic themes. For example, Neliya Aunty’s belongings and conservative manner of dress indicate that she is old-fashioned compared to her sister, Amma, who exhibits a more carefree attitude to having men around and wears Western outfits like pants.
“See No Evil, Hear No Evil” also raises important questions that are central to the book’s themes. What right does a government have to suppress rebellion among its own people? Can a democracy bend the rule of law to their will to maintain order, even if it suppresses the rights of the people? Can they torture or even kill to maintain stability? And do we as citizens have the obligation to hold our government accountable for their abuses, even at risk to ourselves and our families? Or as Amma asks, “But where does one turn to when the police and the government are offenders?” (134).
These questions are unveiled at first in Amma and Daryl Uncle’s heated debates and, later, during the corrupt police investigation following Daryl Uncle’s death. Daryl Uncle’s death catalyzes Amma’s transformation from obedient housewife to somewhat rebellious lover trying to protect democracy itself. As she says, “People can’t get away with these things. This is a democracy, for God’s sake.” (133). But as Arjie notes when he observes the normal street activity in the wake of Daryl Uncle’s death, people can indeed get away with horrible things. Life goes on, even when tragedy occurs. And yet, to some degree, Arjie’s privilege as a wealthy boy in Colombo shields him from the worst of these atrocities, revealing the class differences in Sri Lanka. As Somaratne’s mother tells Amma, war affects the poor first and hardest: “You rich folk from Colombo, what do you know about our suffering?” (143).
Other questions are raised when Q.C. Uncle—the former civil rights lawyer—visits and advises Amma to turn a blind eye to atrocities in order to protect her family. Is it our moral duty to challenge injustice or protect our family? The inherent tension between these two ideals manifests prominently in this chapter, perhaps no better than when Q.C. Uncle says that it is best to be like the “three wise monkeys. See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil” (137). In essence, he tells her to shut her eyes and be blind to the world around her, so that she will remain safe. Amma wants to stand up for what she believes is right and believes that it is selfish to ignore injustice. However, when Arjie calls her selfish for putting the family in danger, we realize that the author is suggesting that there is perhaps no easy answer to this question, and that morality becomes much less black-and-white during times of war.
