Strong Breed, The

Eman, a teacher but village outsider, ignores pleas to leave on the eve of the New Year, the night when the village purification ceremony occurs. Tradition requires a person, ‘the carrier’, to be a ceremonial sacrifice – to cleanse the village of ills for the coming year. His compassion compels Eman to substitute himself for the helpless idiot boy who has been selected. As Eman is hunted down by the village men, in flashback, he sees his father was also a ‘carrier’, that his own mother died in childbirth, and Eman’s wife having waited 12 years for him to return from travels of self discovery and learning also died in childbirth. Eman accepting his fate as one of the ‘strong breed’, is caught and killed.