Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Games at Twilight, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Coming of Age, Glory, and Insignificance
Social Hierarchy
Safety vs. Fear
Summary
Analysis
One afternoon, a group of children begs to be let out to play after spending all day confined in their house because of the extreme heat. Their mother insists that she doesn’t want them to go outside of their house’s veranda, and they promise that they won’t. Despite her protests, they plead relentlessly, until she finally lets them go outside. The children pour out of the house, where it is extremely hot and bright.
Desai initially establishes the children as a kind of monolith, illustrating that in their mother’s eyes, they are simply a group with a singular desire which lacks a hierarchy. Additionally, their mother establishes the veranda as a place of safety because it is familiar and close to home, as opposed to places outside the veranda which are less familiar and potentially dangerous.
Themes
The children decide to play hide and seek, fighting over who would be “It” first. Mira, the mother figure in the group, intervenes and determines that they will play a game to determine who will be It. The game results in Raghu, the oldest, becoming It. He protests, but the others start to run away, ignoring their mother’s instruction to remain on the veranda.
As the children gear up for their game of hide and seek, their roles within the group are quickly clarified and reinforced, in contrast with their monolithic nature earlier. Mira, who is the “mother” of the group, breaks up their fight and comes up with a diplomatic way to choose who will be the first “It.” Thus, the game evokes characteristics and roles that the children already have within their social hierarchy.
Themes
As Raghu approaches his count of 100, one of the younger children named Manu reappears, unsure of where to hide and near tears. Raghu finishes his count and catches a glimpse of Manu as he runs away. Raghu runs up to him and easily catches him. Manu cries and says that Raghu still has to find all of the others. Raghu sets off to find the others, whistling so that the other kids will hear him and fear being caught.
The children’s hierarchy is further illuminated here: Raghu is the oldest and strongest, whereas Manu is described as one of the younger children. As a result, Raghu is easily able to hunt down Manu and establish his own dominance in the game, reflecting and reinforcing their dynamic outside of the game.
Themes
Ravi hears Raghu whistling and is also unsure of where to go. He is sitting in an upturned flowerpot but feels too exposed and knows that if Raghu chased him, Raghu’s powerful legs would quickly allow him to catch up to Ravi. The garage behind Ravi is locked, and Ravi wishes he were tall enough to reach the key hanging on a nearby nail. Next to the garage is a smaller shed, which is also locked. However, the door is nearly off its hinges, and there is a small gap between the door and the walls just large enough for Ravi to slip into. As he hears Raghu approaching, he slips through the crack.
Desai establishes Ravi as one of the younger and weaker members of the group as well, illustrating with these descriptions that he is closer to Manu in age and status than he is to Raghu. However, Desai also illustrates Ravi’s hope that he might be able to subvert the dynamic between himself and Raghu, because only through his small size is he able to slip into the locked shed where he can likely avoid being found in order to win the game.
Themes
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Ravi is impressed with himself for his boldness as he waits in the shed, particularly because the shed is very dark and somewhat eerie. Because he cannot see, he worries about what kind of creatures might lurk inside it—perhaps there are insects or snakes slithering around. Ravi refuses to move, also worried about what he might touch. Raghu hits the wall of the shed with a stick, and even though it frightens Ravi, he feels protected knowing that Raghu is there.
Here, Desai establishes the shed as a symbol of Ravi’s fear of the unknown. The fact that Ravi can’t see inside the shed due to the darkness, and the fact that he doesn’t know what might be touching him or what might be around him, cause a deep sense of fear in him. That Ravi feels protected by Raghu further reinforces this fear. Even though Ragu is trying to intimidate Ravi, simply having someone around him who is familiar fills him with a greater sense of security.
Themes
Raghu then moves away from the shed, and Ravi sits in the shed for a long time. He feels something tickle the back of his neck and gradually builds up the courage to feel what it is. He realizes it is a spider and squashes it against his neck, and he worries again about what other creatures might be watching him. Soon, Ravi’s eyes get used to the dark and he sees pieces of old furniture. He finds an old bathtub that he recognizes and sits inside it.
Desai again establishes the idea that the unknown is the primary source of fear for Ravi. He is terrified to check what might be crawling on his neck, but as soon as he realizes it is a spider, he squashes it readily. What terrifies him is not the spider, but rather the fact that he doesn’t know what kind of things could be lurking in the shed. By contrast, he is clearly drawn to and protected by things that are familiar to him, like the bathtub that he recognizes.
Themes
Ravi contemplates getting caught by Raghu so that he could be free to be out in the sun with his siblings and cousins once more. But then he hears one of the girls scream as Raghu catches her before she touches the white pillar on the veranda, which they call the den, that serves as their home base. Ravi contemplates the idea that everyone else might be caught and he would be the sole winner. He’s never felt that kind of victory over “a circle of older, bigger, luckier children.” He decides to wait, hoping to win and smiling to himself at the thought of his future triumph.
Desai contrasts the darkness and eeriness of the shed with the vision of sunlight and the comfort of playing with the other children, emphasizing how the unknown breeds fear, while clarity and familiarity bring about a sense of safety. Additionally, it is at this point that Ravi starts to dream of glory, maintaining the innocent fantasy of being able to win the game over other children. The fact that Desai particularly calls out the others as “older,” “bigger,” and “luckier” emphasizes Ravi’s desire to improve his status in the social hierarchy.
Themes
Time passes, and Ravi occasionally gets up, tries to listen for sounds of the game, and then returns to the bathtub. He is determined to be the champion among the group. It grows darker, changing into twilight. Through the crack in the shed, Ravi tries to catch sight of the other children. He can’t see them, but he can hear them chanting, singing, and laughing. He wonders whether the game is over but thinks that it can’t be if he has not been found.
Desai again emphasizes how Ravi’s innocence prompts these fantasies of being lauded by the other children. At the same time, however, Desai foreshadows the idea that his dreams of glory might be misguided, and in reality the other children may have moved on to other activities.
Themes
Ravi realizes then that he could have slipped out and run to the den a long time ago: he hid so successfully that he forgot it was necessary to do that in order to win. He bursts through the crack in the door, stumbles over his numb legs, and sobs as he flings himself at the white pillar on the veranda, crying that he is safe.
The white pillar is tied to feelings of safety, particularly because it is located on the veranda connected to the children’s home and therefore provides a sense of familiarity and protection. Meanwhile, Ravi’s tears stem from the fact that he has been hiding for what feels like hours in a dark and terrifying place along with his palpable relief at ending this scary ordeal.
Themes
Out on the lawn, the children stop and stare at Ravi in amazement as he emerges. Their mother, who is sitting on a nearby chair, comes toward him, trying to calm him down and telling him not to be a baby. Ravi tears past her, adamantly shouting at the other children that he won. It takes the other children a minute to understand what he’s saying, as they had completely forgotten about him. They had played several other games without noticing that Ravi was not there.
The conclusion of the story serves as a marker for Ravi’s loss of innocence. In contrast to Ravi’s grand ideas of glory and praise, in reality his existence has been completely forgotten, thus proving his own insignificance. In addition, while Ravi thought he’d be able to rise in stature in the other children’s eyes, his display of emotion in winning the game reinforces his status as the baby of the family, as his mother’s comment underlines here.
Themes
Raghu tells Ravi not to be a fool, and Mira tells him to stop crying. She says that if he wants to join the game, he can stand at the back of the line. In the game they are playing, two children make a tunnel with their arms and the other children duck under it, singing about being remembered when they are dead.
The characters’ final dynamics echo the dynamics at the beginning of the story, illustrating how winning the game has not given Ravi a new sense of success but has instead simply replicated his lower status. It has also proved to him how his presence is essentially superfluous to the other children’s activities.
Themes
Ravi refuses to join in this “funeral game.” He thinks that he wanted victory and triumph, but instead he had been forgotten. He wonders how he can face this humiliation, and he lays on the grass face down, overwhelmed by the understanding that he is insignificant.
The final passage in the story illustrates Ravi’s sense of his own unimportance, as Desai even equates that unimportance with a kind of death. Ravi’s understanding of the game as a “funeral” implies his own recognition that he could be dead and the children would be relatively indifferent or possibly not even notice. This overwhelming reality is sobering. No longer can Ravi dream of glory; instead he loses a degree of innocence in recognizing his own insignificance and the fact that someday he will be completely forgotten, as he was on this day.
Themes
