Nagaina In Rikki-Tavi, By Rudyard Kipling

Nagaina, from the short story “Rikki-tikki-tavi”, by Rudyard Kipling, is the wife of the antagonist Nag. Nagaina also being an antagonist, she and her husband try to kill an innocent family living in a bungalow so that there is room for her children to move around when they hatch. Throughout the story, you can see that Nagaina is smart, murderous, and comprimising.

Nagaina was smart when she hid her eggs “In the melon bed on the end nearest the wall where the sun strikes nearly all day. She hid them there weeks ago.”(23) She also shows she is smart when she sneaks up on Rikki-tikki while Nag is talking to him. “He jumped into the air as high as he could go, and just under him wizzed the head of Nagaina, Nag’s wicked wife. She had crept up behind him as

One being murderous. She is willing to kill an innocent family for the sake of more room for her children. She proves to be quite the killer when Darzee’s wife tells Rikki-tikki “-oh, come quickly-she means killing!”(24) She plans on killing Teddy when she goes up to his leg and says “...move I strike, and if you do not move, I strike.”(25) As you can tell, Nagaina does not value the lives of anyone except Nag, her kids, and herself. Only a murderous snake would do these kinds of things.

To Nagaina’s misfortune, Rikki-tikki gets the upper hand when they fight to the death. She knows that Rikki-tikki could kill her easier than she could kill him so she tries to compromise with him. “Give me the last of my eggs,and I will go away and never come back.”(25) Clearly she is lost at what to do, so she tries to talk Rikki-tikki out of killing her and her last egg. Nagaina tries to avoid violence but to no avail. “Give me the egg, Rikki-tikki.”(25)

In conclusion, I would like to say that Nagaina is smart, murderous, and comprimising. She is smart enough not to under-estimate Rikki-tikki. She is murderous towards others. And, she is comprimising for good