Alphonse Daudet: The Last Lesson

A short story that I read for the first time today. One that tugs at the reader’s heart. One that makes us understand how strong, powerful and compulsive the love for one’s mother tongue can be. One that lets us see in the right perspective the feelings of Tamil chauvinists when they launched and took part in the anti-Hindi agitations in Tamil Nadu in the late 1960s.

Alphonse Daudet  (1840-1897) was a French writer. It is said he was admired by Charles Dickens and Henry James. 

Link

http://www.world-english.org/stories.htm

(Please scroll down to locate the story)

Quote

“Every day we have said to ourselves: ‘Bah! I’ve plenty of time. I’ll learn it tomorrow.’ And now you see where we’ve come to.”