Hamlet Character and Theme Quiz

Hamlet Character and Theme Quiz

B D Somani International School

Hamlet

CHARACTER ANALYSIS

1. The following phrases might be used to describe the character of Prince Hamlet. How do you think each relates to Hamlet's nature? Refer to the text for support.

*        a victim of circumstance

*        a man incapable of taking action

*        an excessively ambitious prince who lusts for power

*        a person of exceptional intellect and intelligence

*        a man in the grip of insanity

2. Consider Hamlet's behaviour when he is with each of the following characters. What is revealed about him in his dealings with each of these people?

*        Claudius

*        Gertrude

*        Ophelia

*        Horatio

*        Polonius

*        Rosencrantz and Guildenstern

3. What developments and/or states of mind do each of Hamlet's six soliloquies reveal? (I, ii; II, ii; III, i; III, iii; IV, iv)

4. How do you explain Hamlet's inability to act in avenging his father's death?

5. Is Hamlet a likeable character? Would you want to be his friend? Explain.

6. What questions do you have about the character of Hamlet? What problems do you see in analyzing his character? Do you admire Shakespeare's ability to develop a character, or do you think he leaves too many questions unresolved?

PLOT

1. When the play begins, a major event, the death of King Hamlet has already occurred. How does this affect the reader's understanding of the play?

2. What purposes do the subplots of the relationship between Polonius and his children and the political situation with Norway and young Fortinbras serve? How is the story of Prince Hamlet and his particular situation reflected in each of these subplots?

3. Look carefully at each act of the drama. What is the function of each? What important event or situation is developed in each act by Shakespeare?

4. How does Shakespeare keep his audience apprised of developments outside the primary action of the play? Why are events on the ship taking Hamlet to England not portrayed? Find other examples in the play where Shakespeare keeps his readers aware of important events, but does so without presenting the action in the drama. Is this appropriate in your opinion? Why or why not?

5. Did you find the action in the play difficult to follow? Where? What did you find challenging about these sections?

6. Consider the dramatic pacing of the play. Does Shakespeare keep the audience or reader involved in the action? How? Explain your opinion.

THEME

1. To what extent is Hamlet's quest for revenge justifiable in terms of the situation presented? Why or why not?

2. Find evidence of Hamlet's religious beliefs. How do these beliefs influence his actions and decisions?

3. Examine the characters and events in terms of appearance and reality. Cite examples of things that are not what they seem.

4. Find examples of imagery that reveal decay or corruption. What effect do these images have on the reader? How would you explain Shakespeare's inclusion of these images in the play?

5. Explain what you think is revealed about human nature in Hamlet. Use characters and situations to illustrate your points.

6. Consider Shakespeare’s use of Hamlet’s antic disposition and the madnessportrayed by his character Ophelia in this play. How would the audience react to this portrayal?

7 (Misogyny definition, hatred, dislike, or mistrust of women)

 Examine how Shakespeare treats the female characters/explores the role of the woman in Hamlet and consider what the response of a modern audience might be towards this aspect of the play.

Quotes you could use (from Hamlet: Contemporary Critical Essays ed. Martin Coyle, Macmillan 1992)

·                    “Gertrude’s inconstancy not only brings on disgust and incestuous feelings, it is also the sign of diseased doubleness in everyone who has accommodated to his or her social role.” (David Leverenz)

·                    “The divided self: in her madness, there is no one there. She is not a person. There is no integral selfhood expressed through her actions or utterances… She has already died. There is now only a vacuum where there once was a person.” (R. D. Laing)

·                    “…there are many voices in Ophelia’s madness speaking through her… none of them her own. She becomes the mirror for a mad-inducing world.” (David Leverenz)

·                    “[Ophelia’s] history is an instance of how someone can be driven mad by having her inner feelings misrepresented, not responded to, or acknowledged only through chastisement and repression. From her entrance on, Ophelia must continually respond to commands which imply distrust even as they compel obedience.” (David Leverenz)

·                    “[Ophelia] has no choice but to say ‘I shall obey, my lord’” (David Leverenz)

·                    “Not allowed to love and unable to be false, Ophelia breaks. She goes mad rather than gets mad. Even in her madness she has no voice of her own, only a discord of other voices and expectations, customs gone awry.” (David Leverenz)

·                    “[Ophelia] is a play within a play, or a player trying to respond to several imperious directors at once. Everyone has used her: Polonius, to gain favour; Laertes, to belittle Hamlet; Claudius, to spy on Hamlet; Hamlet to express rage at Gertrude; and Hamlet again, to express his feigned madness with her as a decoy. She is valued only for the roles that further other people’s plots.” (David Leverenz)

·                    “For most critics of Shakespeare, Ophelia has been an insignificant minor character in the play, touching in her weakness and madness but chiefly interesting, of course, in what she tells us about Hamlet.” (Elaine Showalter)

·                    “We can imagine Hamlet’s story without Ophelia, but Ophelia literally has no story without Hamlet.” (Lee Edwards)

·                    “Since the 1970s… we have had a feminist discourse which has offered a new perspective on Ophelia’s madness as protest and rebellion. For many feminist theorists, the madwoman is a heroine, a powerful figure who rebels against the family and the social order…” (Elaine Showalter)

·                    “Gertrude, in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, has traditionally been played as a sensual, deceitful woman.” (Rebecca Smith)

·                    …when one closely examines Gertrude’s actual speech and actions in an attempt to understand the character , one finds little that hints at hypocrisy, suppression, or uncontrolled passion and their implied complexity.” (Rebecca Smith)

·                    “Gertrude appears in only ten of the twenty scenes that comprise the play; furthermore she speaks very little, having less dialogue than any other major character in Hamlet… she speaks plainly, directly, and chastely when she does speak… Gertrude’s brief speeches include references to honour, virtue [etc]; neither structure nor content suggests wantonness.” (Rebecca Smith)

·                    “Gertrude believes that quiet women best please men, and pleasing men is Gertrude’s main interest.” (Rebecca Smith)

·                    “Gertrude has not moved toward independence or a heightened moral stance; only her divided loyalties and her unhappiness intensify.” (Rebecca Smith)

Hamlet Language

Hamlet language stuff

Blank Verse,

Although Shakespeare is written primarily in blank verse, the meter that is the closest meter to the rhythm of natural English speech. Blank verse is unrhymed iambic pentameter lines. (An iambic foot is composed of one unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable. Iambic pentameter is five of these feet in a line of poetry. It is a dah-DUM dah-DUM dah-DUM dah-DUM dah-DUM rhythm.)

In order to preserve the meter in a regular line of iambic pentameter, sometimes an extra syllable is needed to complete the line. This is sometimes accomplished by using an accent over the “ed” on a past tense verb, meaning that the “ed” must be pronounced as a separate syllable. On the other hand, a line that might have too many syllables can be shortened by the use of an elision, a contraction of two words or syllables into one syllable, as in “I’ll” instead of “I will” or “o’er” for “over,” “ne’er” for “never,” “’tis” for “it is,” and “’twill” for “it will.”

Regular iambic lines indicate that the character is in control. The metric stress tells the actors which words to emphasize. The word at the end of each line is important and should be stressed, even briefly in an enjambed line (See discussion of the enjambed line that follows). The actor has to emphasize the last word in each line to have it make sense. The line should not be pitched down or swallowed, or the word will not be heard by the audience. The end of the line should be lifted. This indicates metrically where the line ends.

However, the meter is not always regular. Variations in iambic pentameter are used for dramatic effect. There are rhythm breaks or irregular lines where a stressed word is placed in a normally unstressed position or an extra syllable is added. Words that break the meter are important words and must be emphasized. They give clues as to how the line should be read. According to Sean McEvoy in Shakespeare: The Basics, if every line were regular, the result would be monotonous. Shakespeare varies the metric form to produce specific effects (41-42).
Common variants to the iambic foot include the trochee, a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed syllable, and a spondee, two stressed syllables that comprise one foot. Students need to be aware of patterns that may be caused by variants, especially the use of the feminine ending. A feminine ending is a weak extra syllable (an eleventh syllable) added to an iambic pentameter line, as in Hamlet’s soliloquy, which begins, “To be, or not to be—that is the question.” (The stressed syllables are in bold. Some actors, however, stress “that” instead of “is,” making that one foot a trochaic foot.) The “-tion” is an unstressed syllable or feminine ending. The use of the feminine ending forms a pattern in this speech, denoting the uncertainty of Hamlet. Once he has made up his mind to live, the speech reverts to regular iambic lines. He is now in control.

A shared line is a regular metric line that is shared by two or possibly three actors. The line must be spoken without pauses or breaths between the actors’ lines. These shared lines create a rhythm. This rhythm may show tension in the scene, as with the lines shared between Macbeth and Lady Macbeth after the murder of Duncan (II.2).

Another variant of the normal iambic pentameter line is the use of the short line. A short line is an iambic line that has fewer than five metric feet. The actor must “fill” missing feet in the line with an action or a reaction. In Hamlet, the Ghost’s line, “I am thy father’s spirit,” is two stresses or three syllables short. This dramatic pause is for reaction time for Hamlet (I.5.9-20). Additional examples from this same scene include lines 46- 48:

Ghost: The serpent that did sting thy father’s life
Now wears his crown.

Hamlet: O, my prophetic soul! My uncle!

The short line by the Ghost allows Hamlet time to register what the Ghost is saying and react to this realization.

An additional variation of the iambic pentameter line is the long line. A long line is a six-foot line (hexameter). If there is a caesura or pause (discussed in a later paragraph) after the third stress, it is called an Alexandrine. The use of the Alexandrine is to make the line symmetrical, to give it balance. It may be that the character is emotionally overloaded and can’t express his or her emotions adequately in a five-foot line. In Hamlet, Claudius’ guilt and loss of control is seen in his speech to Hamlet in Act I, scene 2, lines 90-121. The speech is made up primarily of eleven and twelve syllable lines. Claudius is talking about the death of his brother, Hamlet’s father, and Hamlet’s obsessive grief. Hamlet’s dislike of his uncle has been made plain, so Claudius tries to bluster his way through this scene that is being played out in front of the entire court. He is trying to gain control over Hamlet as well as his own emotions or guilt, and, in doing so, he goes overboard. This lack of control and frustration is seen through the use of lines with feminine endings and the use of the Alexandrine or long line.


Other terms relate directly to the pauses and breaths taken in a speech. Anend-stop line is a line in which both the metric and grammatical endings occur at the end of the line. There is usually a period or semicolon. There should be a full pause and possibly a breath. If the sense of a line carries over to the next line, it is an enjambed line. With an enjambed line, there should be only a slight pause after the last word in the line is emphasized. McEvoy adds that a colon is used as an emphatic pause and capital letters were used for both proper names and for words that were particularly important in the context of the speech and should be stressed (41). Another place for a pause occurs at a caesura, a break or sense pause in the middle of a line of poetry, often at the end of the sense meaning of an enjambed line. Although an actor should pause at a caesura, short breaths should be taken only when planned and necessary. A caesura allows words preceding it to “sink in,” places focus on the word or phrase following it, slows the language down, or separates phrases and allows the listener to hear and digest them one at a time (Van Tassel, 28).

Although blank verse is supposed to be unrhymed, Shakespeare does userhyme in his plays, more often in his early plays like The Taming of the Shrew than in the later plays like Hamlet. Rhyme can sometimes be used for comic effect or to create a light-hearted or teasing tone. It can be also be used to show a bantering or challenging tone. In addition, rhyme can be used seriously. Regardless of the purpose of the rhyme, the actor must play to the rhyme and emphasize it. It is there for a purpose. Rhymed couplets are also used to indicate the end of scenes or to mark a passage as distinctive from the rest of the verse that surrounded it (McEvoy, 49-50).

Prose is also used in Shakespeare’s plays. Prose was often used for letters and proclamations, low status characters, an expression of madness, or comedy (Gibson, Acting Shakespeare, 71). However, Shakespearean prose was very lyrical and rhythmic. Shakespeare made use of imagery, repetition, antithesis, and parallelism in his prose. It was not merely everyday speech.

As Shakespeare matured as a playwright, he used more prose for serious speeches. Switching from verse to prose may indicate that a character is losing control or becoming confused, but not necessarily. An example of prose that is used seriously is in Hamlet’s exchange with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern in the “What a piece of work is man” speech (II.2.317-334). Hamlet is speaking the language of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, but his meaning in this serious speech is over their heads.

The change from verse to prose in a scene is abrupt and sets the speech apart from what came before (Epstein, 218). This is seen especially in Hamlet. Hamlet speaks in prose to Polonius, to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, to the Players, to Osric, to Claudius, and to Ophelia. In Act III, scene 1, Hamlet changes from the verse of his “To be, or not to be” speech to prose when he talks to Ophelia. They both speak in prose in this dialogue. For Hamlet, this is typical of his “play acting.” When Hamlet exits, Ophelia goes back to speaking in verse with her father and Claudius, as she laments Hamlet’s “insanity.” Her lyrical speech is a side of her that is never seen again in the play. This is really her only opportunity to reveal her true self, a self not allowed in her society where women were considered property.

Antithesis is an additional characteristic of Shakespeare’s verse. Shakespeare used antithesis, or the opposition of words or phrases, to heighten meaning and indicate important words and concepts (Van Tassel, 64-68). Hamlet’s “To be, or not to be” speech is one example. Another example of antithesis and parallelism in Hamlet is Claudius’ line to the court, “With mirth in funeral and with dirge in marriage” (I.2.12). The use of the Alexandrine here may also show the guilt that the new king feels about his brother’s murder and his (Claudius’) hasty marriage with his brother’s widow.

The use of repetition is also an important aspect of Shakespeare’s plays. Some examples from Hamlet include the first lines of two of Hamlet’s soliloquies, “To be, or not to be” and “O, that this too, too solid flesh would melt.” The Ghost speaks in sets of three, as in the line, “Oh horrible, oh horrible, most horrible.” There is also the repetition by the Ghost and Hamlet of the word “remember,” as in “Remember me” or “Remember thee” (I.5.98, 102, 104, 118).

A final term to discuss before embarking on the study of Hamlet is his use ofpuns. The actual discussion of the meaning of various puns should take place when reading and discussing the play. For example, the following scene from Hamlet shows puns on the words “sun” and “son” and on “kin” and “kind”:
King: Take thy fair hour, Laertes. Time be thine,
And thy best graces spend it at thy will.—
But now my cousin Hamlet and my son—
Hamlet: [Aside] A little more than kin and less than kind.
King: How is it that the clouds still hang on you?
Hamlet: No so, my lord; I am too much in the sun.
Gertrude: Good Hamlet, cast thy knighted color off,
And let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark. (I.2.64-71)

The point of the exchange is that it lets the audience see immediately that Hamlet is not fond of his uncle. He is now literally Claudius’ stepson and nephew, more kin than he wished! In doing this scene with the students, it is important to discuss whether line 67 is said as an aside to the audience. It is not listed as an aside in the first and second Quartos or in the first Folio. The Riverside Shakespeare lists it as an aside. What difference would this make? Is Hamlet speaking to the audience in a conspiratorial tone or to the whole court in a bold tone? Is there bitterness in his words or sarcasm? Does Gertrude intervene to keep Claudius from getting too upset? (McEvoy, 80)

Other examples of the use of puns in Hamlet include the pun on “nunnery” in Hamlet’s speech with Ophelia (III.1) and the exchange between Hamlet and Polonius before the play-within-the-play:
Polonius: I did enact Julius Caesar. I was killed I’ th’ Capitol. Brutus killed me.
Hamlet: It was a brute part of him to kill so capital a calf there (III.2.109-111).
Hamlet’s use of puns continues in this scene in his sexual references to Ophelia and in the exchange with Claudius in which Hamlet comments that the actors “do but jest, poison in jest” in a reference to the poisoning of Hamlet’s father by Claudius (III.2.257).

Soliloquy Presentations and Notes

Soliloquy Presentations and Notes

Hamlet gives seven major soliloquies:

"O that this too too sullied flesh would melt" (1.2.129-159)

"O all you host of heaven! O earth! what else?" (1.5.92-111)

"O what a rogue and peasant slave am I!" (2.2.549-607)

"To be, or not to be, that is the question" (3.1.56-89)

"Tis now the very witching time of night" (3.3.380-392)

"Now might I do it pat, now a' is a-praying" (3.3.73-96)

"How all occasions do inform against me" (4.4.32-66)

1.            Produce an A4 sheet of notes on your allocated soliloquy. Use the following headings:

Ø            Brief context of soliloquy (where does it appear, what has just happened etc).

Ø            Summary of meaning and theme.

Ø            Mood and language (dominant poetic images etc).

Ø            What it reveals about Hamlet’s character.

2.            Prepare a five to ten minute presentation on your soliloquy.  

Commentary for Moonstone

Example Commentary Response
May 2000 A1 Paper
The following is a Grade 12 student’s response to 1 a) the Wilkie Collins extract from The
Moonstone. It has been reproduced here EXACTLY as written, so errors of expression,
spelling, punctuation and grammar are included. Look out for them!

The Yorkshire coast provides the setting for Wilkie Collin’s passage extracted from ‘The
Moonstone’, (1868). Title of the passage which at first presented some difficulty to be related to
the contents and focus of the passage. The title itself is composed from two words conveying
nature, - ‘moon’ and ‘stone’. In many cultures it is believed that keeping a moonstone on you
will bring good luck, fortune and happiness. Ironic enough to represent the opposite of the
melancholy and isolation detected in the setting, mood, tone and characters of the passage.
Probably the most striking features of the passage is the abundance of contrasts between
opposite adjectives. We read about ‘beautiful walks all around us’ and a ‘horrid walk’. We can
almost see in our minds the described ‘North sit’ and ‘South spit’. We can picture and almost
feel the ‘backwards and forwards’ shifting movement of the quicksand. Collins effectively
describes the flow of the tide in ‘winter’ and ‘summer’. The passage features two opposite
characters, a young woman and an old man. Mt Betteredge offers Rosanna his beautiful
bandanna handkerchief, whilst she prefers to dry of her tears with a ‘very inferior handkerchief
of cheap cambric’. The possible effect these recurrent contrasts might have on the overall
passage is to convey the dilemma in which Rosanna is found. Moreover, in a deeper analysis,
the passage is rich in natural images which might recall the dark and bright faces of mother
Nature. A raging ocean against fierceful ridges and quicksand which man is bound to escape
and fear, and the beautiful sight of walks and the shore which comfort and inspire. When noting
the above, it made me recall the role of contrast in nature in Mary Shelley’s ‘Frankenstein’,
utilized to convey the mood and tone of the gothic novel.
Nature in Collins’ work serves as a refuge to Rosanna Spearman. A lonesome outsider, with
the physical features of a deformed creature (“to hide her deformed shoulder, 30), who is also
reminds the reader of Frankenstein’s creature, isolated and rejected by those around because
of how it looks and its nature. Though the sole description of the sand-hills are capable of
terrifying anyone who dares to reade about them, (“something goes on in the unknown deeps
below, which sets the whole face of the quicksand shivering and trembling”, 10), this is said top
be ‘Rosanna’s favourite walk’ (23). Despite “No boat ever ventures into this bay’ (17) Rosanna
retires to complete the traditions/tasks expected from a woman at the time (1868), ‘sit, and work
or read’ (21). Collins repeats ‘all alone’ (lines 21 and 30) to emphasise the state of isolation, not
only of Rosanna but the setting’s isolation as well. She is said to have one friend only (24), and
is shown to be not only spiritually lost in heart, but physically too; ‘I saw no sign of the girl in the
plantation’. In the passage’s third line it is described as ‘a melancholy plantation’, cleverly
enough, Rosanna has been placed by Collins in this plantation – lost in a sea of melancholy –
regret, emptiness and desperation, a drama allowed to unfold in the midst of am isolated
setting, which collides into one scene the beauty and rage of the ocean.

Rosanna’s tears are therefore symbolic, she is found crying by Mr Betteredge by the sea – her
isolation and memories are sinking her into a sea of tears, as well as into the quicksand; she is
collasing just as she would be found in such circumstances.
Collins’ truly makes an effort to describe the setting with such mysterious, gothic and terrifying
elements to convey the danger and suspense given way by the ‘lonesome and a horrid retreat’,
the ‘shivering sand’ ‘ the unknown deeps below’, and the bay to which ‘No children from our
fishing village … ever come to play’, and ‘the birds of the air, give the shivering sand a wide
berth.’ the above descriptions fit to perfection in the classical gothic genre that might
characterise Collins’ ‘The Moonstone’, even the title of the passage is haunting and ghostly like.
The mysterious and deformed elements and descriptions, once again made me recall with
precision Shelley’s ‘Frankenstein’ genre.

Gender roles are portrayed in the novel as traditionally, man is the comforter, practical
supporter, caregiver to the rescue, whilst women represents the weaker sex. The defenseless
creature, conditioned to man’s commands and condescendence ‘ … but she sat down by me
like a good girl, when I told her’ (42). A feminist reader would be extremely critical of this
relationship. Despite Mr Betteredge uses terms of endearment such as ‘dear’ and takes her on
his knee to comfort a woman by the shortest way,’ (43), he appears to be sweet and caring,
inquiring about Rosanna’s tears, however, at the same time demanding and practical, ‘your past
life is all sponged out. Why can’t you forget it?’ (48). Mr Betteredge’s previous line makes me
recall Lady McBeth’s line in Shakespeare’s most recognized play, “ little water shall clear us
from the deed”. Characters, whom, despite experience and nature lack genuine repentment
and conscience whatsoever.

Mt Betteredge describes himself as ‘a slovenly old man’ (50), whom ‘the women clean o his
grease. Man at this stage is reduced to senility, and must be taken care by the caring female
role at home. Behaviours and assumption all particular to the epoch (1858)
Collins employs a wide range of literary figures such as personification in the description of the
quicksand shores of Yorkshire. ‘The and-hills here run down to the sea’ (6), providing these
settings with life of their own, convey fear in the reader of these mighty rocks and hills. ‘The
mouth of the bay’ (13) transform the image of nature into a fierce, devouring monster conveyed
also in the harsh consonants employed in ‘breaks the force’ (14), which contrast to the sibilance
employed in ‘smoothly with a heave, and covers the sand in silence’, in which the soft ‘s’ sounds
convey the tranquility, peace and calmness of the movement of the waters.

Because of the detailed nature of the beginning of the passage, the structure is a continuous,
coherent one. By the end of the second paragraph we discover it to be a cyclical structure,
“which brings us round happily to our former point, and starts us fair again on our way to the
sands (24), personally I perceive this detail to as the necessary element to convey how the
beauty of the walks and the horrid shores and cliffs are strong enough and capable of
distracting both the characters and readers. Once more Collins grants utter importance to the
majestic and admirable impact of nature. By suddenly being shifted to the original starting point
of the narrative the reader feels as lost as Rosanna.

In the midst of terrifying and gothic threatening setting descriptions of both the setting and
Rosanna, Collins manages to blend humour into the passage, as Mr. Betteredge remarks
“When you come to my age, you will find sitting down on the slope of a beach a much longer job
than you think it now” (39). The humorous comment provides comic relief to both the reader
and the and Rosanna who are caught in the emptiness, isolation and melancholy which dictate
the tone and mood of the passage; it serves also to relax the tense atmosphere conveyed by
the ‘shivering and trembling’ circumstances to which the reader is introduced.
One of the most captivating and curious features of the passage is, how the reader is left with a
range and variety of questions to resolve, for the text has left them unclear. Firstly, Mr
Betteredge introduces in his thoughts a ‘Nancy’ (44). The reader is bound to question who is
Nancy? Is she perhaps Mr Betteredge’s daughter? A young woman like Rosanna whom he
once hurt?. The passage ends and the reader is left thirsty for more of Collins’ engaging
literature. Is Nancy Mr Betteredge’s stain? He argues to Rosanna, ‘your past life is all sponged
out. Why can’t you forget it’ (49) however, in his last years he is found to still be thinking about
his own past.

As Rosanna responds to Mr Betteredge ‘My past life still comes back to me sometimes’, the
reader once more begins to question what makes Rosanna’s past so disturbing? What is the
stain on her past. Moreover, the last lines of the passage I believe to be Collins’ glorious final
strike, “The grease was gone, butthere was a little dull place left on the nap of the cloth where
the grease had been’ (55), ‘ the stain is taken off’, she said. ‘But the place shows, Mr Betteredge
– the place shows (57). With such a simple comparison Collins manages to provoke deep
thoughts in the reader. Deep reflections about the certainty of this statement which in theory, is
most similar to Shakespeare’s Macbeth; the belief that many psychoanalysts hold, arguing past
experiences shall forever dictate our present behavioural patterns, defending such state as the
conscience, the most effective vehicle to keeping the past present.

The dominant effect this passage had on my person, was wanting more of ‘The Moonstone’ ,
the desire to solve all uncertainties with which the plot left me and the interest enough to make
me want to read all previous and following chapters to this passage. The determination to
inquire into the character’s past and relationship. Above all, the admiration for Wilkie Collins
work which demands to be described as engaging, thought provoking, clever and magnificent.

Now do the following tasks:
1. Have a go at marking this commentary using:
a) the English marking symbols (for spelling, punctuation and grammar) - available on this
site.
b) the Language A1 Commentary marking criteria - available on this site.
c) The IB Commentary check sheet - available on this site.
d) the CALM-O commentary sheet - available on this site.
Write detailed comments under each of the headings:
• Understanding of Text
• Interpretation of Text
• Awareness of Literary Features
• Presentation
• Language

2000 A1 (HL) answer sheet.

White Tiger Lit Club Discussion Q's

Discussion Questions Taken from http://www.litlovers.com/reading-guides/13-fiction/1151-white-tiger-adiga

1. The author chose to tell the story from the provocative point of view of an exceedingly charming, egotistical admitted murderer. Do Balram's ambition and charisma make his vision clearer? More vivid? Did he win you over?

2. Why does Balram choose to address the Premier? What motivates him to tell his story? What similarities does he see between himself and the Premier?

3. Because of his lack of education, Ashok calls Balram "half-baked." What does he mean by this? How does Balram go about educating himself? What does he learn?

4. Balram variously describes himself as "a man of action and change," "a thinking man," "an entrepreneur," "a man who sees tomorrow," and a "murderer." Is any one of these labels the most fitting, or is he too complex for only one? How would you describe him?

5. Balram blames the culture of servitude in India for the stark contrasts between the Light and the Darkness and the antiquated mind set that slows change. Discuss his rooster coop analogy and the role of religion, the political system, and family life in perpetuating this culture. What do you make of the couplet Balram repeats to himself: "I was looking for the key for years / but the door was always open"?

6. Discuss Balram's opinion of his master and how it and their relationship evolve. Balram says "where my genuine concern for him ended and where my self-interest began, I could not tell" (160). Where do you think his self-interest begins?

7. Compare Ashok and his family's actions after Pinky Madam hits a child to Balram's response when his driver does. Were you surprised at the actions of either? How does Ashok and his family's morality compare to Balram's in respect to the accidents, and to other circumstances?

8. Discuss Balram's reasons for the murder: fulfilling his father's wish that his son "live like a man," taking back what Ashok had stolen from him, and breaking out of the rooster coop, among them. Which ring true to you and which do not? Did you feel Balram was justified in killing Ashok? Discuss the paradox inherent in the fact that in order to live fully as a man, Balram took a man's life.

9. Balram's thoughts of his family initially hold him back from killing Ashok. What changes his mind? Why do you think he goes back to retrieve Dharam at the end of the novel? Does his decision absolve him in any way?

10. The novel offers a window into the rapidly changing economic situation in India. What do we learn about entrepreneurship and Balram's definition of it?

11. The novel reveals an India that is as unforgiving as it is promising. Do you think of the novel, ultimately, as a cautionary tale or a hopeful one?
(Questions issued by publisher.) 

Laxmangarh Village

Laxmangarh Fort