This is an imaginary set up that the poet has given an account of in this poem. The vivid colors, green and yellow are meant to create an atmosphere of mystery.
The poem plays around the susceptibilities and the reader is left wondering what might have happened. The character named Mad Carew is named so to identify him as someone who was not really wise or to relate to his nature of being simply mad in love for the Colonel’s daughter.
The poet has not said everything very clearly and thus the poem is not descriptive of all the events that happened in a sequence. This is to add the element of uncertainty and keep the reader interested and confused at the same time.
bookhaven.stanford.edu
ADVERTISEMENTS:
The plot is Kathmandu which was called as Khatmandu earlier when the British were ruling India. The poet has used the place for metric and atmospheric reasons and has built the story around it. The Mad Crew was probably a man of low ranks or some junior officer in the Colonel’s army. He was in love with the Colonel’s daughter. On the occasion of Colonel’s daughter’s birthday, she asked for a wish from her lover. The wish was to get her the green eye of the yellow idol which was a marble God placed on a crossing in the town. It may just be a weird wish or the colonel’s daughter may have found a charm in it and wished it from her lover.
The Colonel’s daughter was about to turn twenty one this birthday and there were grand arrangements made for celebrating it. The Mad Crew was day dreaming about his plans to fulfill his lover’s wish. His friends mocked at him at smoke time, but he didn’t care for them and never smiled or reacted to their words.
Rest of the poem revolves around the story of the Mad Crew who didn’t care for his life and went out to take the Green Eye out from the Yellow Marble Idol the same night. There is no account of how he was hurt, but the lines “his shirt and tunic torn” clearly imply that the Mad Crew was beaten up may be by the men who stood in the security of the Marble God. His forehead was profusely bleeding and the next day he lay on bed with Colonel’s daughter looking at him sitting besides. When he regained conscious after one whole day, he asked someone to get his torn tunic and took out the Green Eye from his pocket and gave it to his lover.
ADVERTISEMENTS:
She reprimanded her for risking his life for getting her the green eye. She also refused to take that stone and left his place. It was her birthday today and celebrations were at their peak, but she was missing him and rushed back to his room to meet him. To disbelief she found a knife buried into the body of Mad Crew who lay dead in his room. The poet has called it the revenge of the Little Yellow God.