Love makes men big, and hate makes them small

“Love makes men big, and hate makes them small” is Lin’s answer to Prabaker’s fear that he is too short and small to make a good husband. The expression makes emotional character, rather than physical size, the measure of a person: love enlarges, while hatred diminishes. In the scene, its force lies not only in the maxim but in Lin’s effort to make Prabaker recognize the goodness Lin already sees in him.

Meaning and Form

The phrase is built around a balanced contrast: love and hate produce opposite kinds of bigness and smallness. Its language reclaims Prabaker’s own anxious description of himself, shifting the question from whether his body is large enough to whether his character is. Lin’s answer is affirmative because, in his view, Prabaker’s lack of hatred makes him great.

The Conversation in the Cab

Lin offers the principle while sitting in Prabaker’s cab and watching him cry. Prabaker has asked whether, as a very short and small man, he can become a good and attractive husband. Lin responds by calling him one of the biggest men he has ever met, explaining that he sees no hatred in him and that Prabaker seems bigger the better he is known. The maxim thus becomes a personal reassurance grounded in their friendship, not an abstract lesson detached from the person receiving it.

Lin also tries to convey how rare this quality is. He jokes and laughs with Prabaker until the friend’s broad smile returns. Prabaker then drives toward the bachelor party waiting in the slum, sounding his horn triumphantly until he is out of sight. The scene gives the expression a visible consequence: reassurance helps restore Prabaker’s confidence and sends him toward the celebration.

Echo in the Night

After Prabaker leaves, Lin walks to Prabaker’s slum at Cuffe Parade rather than returning to Leopold’s. He sits near the place where he and Tariq once fought the wild dogs, thinking of Prabaker’s smile, which still makes him smile in turn. Yet Lin cannot bring himself to attend the bachelor party. He remains close enough to hear its happiness but far enough away not to feel part of it.

That contrast gives the maxim a quiet afterlife in the scene. Prabaker’s restored joy travels outward into the party, while Lin’s own loneliness keeps him at its edge. The words affirm the expansive power Lin attributes to Prabaker’s love and lack of hatred, but the surrounding action also shows that recognizing such goodness does not by itself dispel the narrator’s isolation.