Essential Unit Question
- What does it mean to be in an in-between world?
- How does Vassanji convey the notion of being in in-between worlds in the novel?
For this unit the following Assessment Criteria will be utilised:
- Oral Component
- Paper One
"Tone" is the author's attitude toward a subject , audience, or character. Active reading of the text will enable the reader to recognize the is the tonal shifts of the author. One must be able to make inferences by recognising the stylistic means by which an author conveys his/her attitude(s) in a work of literature.
Find a quotation from the novel for the list of the tone words that you have been assigned, Explain by which stylistic means the author has conveyed his attitude. Your post should be completed by February 19 2011
- Tadge and Anjiya : satirical, critical
- Aleesha and Farhan: wistful, nostalgic, sentimental
- Marion and Fatema: ironic, sardonic, sarcastic mocking
- Khadija and Amreen: afraid, fearful, terrified, panicked
- Lora and Farrah: strident, harsh, angry, outraged
- Shifa and Soraya: sympathetic, pitiful
- Zainab and Michelle: sad, upset, depressed, melancholy, despairing
Who is a native? The word has many connotations such as primitive, uncivilized, ethnic etc. With reference to Part One Chapters 1-4, would you say that Vic is a native Kenyan?
ReplyDeleteSad, Depresed, Melancholy :-" I was now quite alone in my life.... I had lost a chance as good as i would get for real happiness"(page 264)
ReplyDeleteRacial differences was the reason that Vikram lost Yasmin to a "Dar boy", which he could not compete against. To think that losing her was something that wasn't his fault, and something he couldn't change made the situation even more sad.
Also, Vikram had just lost his sister to a man abroad, this would have made him feel very alone.And as we see at the beginning of this passage he was really looking forward to seeing Yasmin and being with Yasmin, this is because she was the only one person let in his life. Therefore when he found out she was with some one he became sad because as he said he had "lost a chance...for real happines"
Despairing:- "The world as i knew it has now totaly ended" (page 402)
Vikram had just lost Deepa again as she left him to go live in the United States to be close to her children, thus leaving him alone.
Upset:- "That girl(italics), is she now, i uttered bitterly" (page 185)
Vikram is upset here as Deepa talks about Annnie refering to her as a third person, not acknowledging that she was once a part of them, she was once a part of his essence,so she needs more respect.
This hurts Vikram becasue to him she was not just any firend, she what Njoroge was to Deepa.
By Zainab and Michelle
Satirical
ReplyDelete‘…what were once termed terrorists were now called freedom fighters’
This quote uses irony to bring out satire. The irony is shown through Vikram Lall and shows the way in which descriptions and perceptions of people can change depending on who is in charge and manipulating these ideas.Through this change he exposes the flaw in both the past and the present definition of the Mau Mau. He exposes the inconsistency to say that they neither can be completely true if they have both been used.
Critical
‘A colonial world of repressive, undignified subjecthood, as also of seductive order and security- so that long afterwards we would be tempted to wonder if we did not hurry forth too fast straight into the morass that is now our malformed freedom.’
This quote is critical because in it Vikram Lall is criticizing both the British rule as well as the way in which the Kenyan’s gained their freedom. While the British were suffocating the Kenyan people, the Kenyans and the Mau Mau went into the attack without knowing exactly what they were doing or going to do once they gained freedom- they rushed it.
Anjiya and Tadge
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeletesympathetic
ReplyDelete'Mr. Innes whose wife and daughter were slaughtered that Saturday, was a big gruff, red-haired and - whiskered bully of a man, who always refused to serve Mahesh uncles at Innes and Mcgeorge. Hey you son of a coolie - he would bark briskly and harshly as soon as my uncle pushed through the glass doors. Out! Go back to cowland, Bengalee bastard! '
From this quote, it is evident that the Innes family had a very negative attitude towards Mahesh uncle and they seemed rather displeased in his presence. This aroused the feeling of sympathy within readers because they felt sorry for he way Mahesh uncle was treated. The author uses strong harsh words like '- bastard!' to describe Mahesh uncle and this had an effect on the way readers interpreted his character and also the way in which the whites treated the Indians. Furthermore imagery has been used '- Go back to cowland!' and this shows that the anger from the Innes was brought about due to racial differences. This also creates sympathetic tone as the author tries to show the extent of discrimination and racial hatred.
Readers are made to feel sorry for Mahesh uncle and are furthermore given an insight into the racial discrimination at that time and the reasons why an uproar was caused between these two races.
By Shifa and Soraya
Pitiful:
ReplyDelete'Just then an uproar began outside the third house from ours…pushing out someone who, though dark as an African, was known to most people in Nakuru as Saeed Molabux…other askaris converged on Saeed, raining rifle butts and kicks on his back as his body curled up on the ground like a worm and he tried to shield his head with his raised elbows…the beating stopped and a bloody faced Saeed stood up..” page 38
The quote above was got from the event when the police had come to search for the Mau Mau’s, this brings in the theme of pity because of the fact that the police thought Saeed was a Kikuyu because of his skin colour. This shows how racist they were and took any black person to be a kikuyu. As racism is brought up, there is pityness for the other Africans as well, those who might have not been part of the Mau Mau’s and were taken to be beaten up. It is not only pitiful when they mistake saeed to be a mau mau, but also when they took mwangi and other innocent people.
By Soraya and Shifa
“There are wonderful moments sometimes- a splash of colour, the sweet taste of icy kulfi on a Sunday afternoon, the feel of hot steam on the face and arms from a gasping locomotive- that stand out purely in themselves, sparkles of childhood memory scattered loosely in the consciousness.”
ReplyDeleteVassanji conveys feelings of wistfulness, nostalgia, sentiment through the use of imagery and diction. Words such as ‘splash of colour’, ‘sweet taste’, ‘icy’, ‘hot steam’, and ‘gasping’ are used to give a feeling of immediacy and show that these are vivid memories, because of the amount of detail he remembers them in. Vassanji seems to want the reader to experience the same feeling Vikram did because of the use of intense sensory detail. He says ‘sparkles of childhood’ because these times seem to be the highlights of his childhood and them being in his ‘consciousness’ seem to show that they really matter to him and are always at the front of his mind.
Aleesha, Farhaan
Outraged and angry:
ReplyDelete‘‘ That girl, is she now, I uttered bitterly. She whitened. Her excitement had turned her callous and I, jealous but all-important chaperone, had brought her to task.’’
page 185
By using italics, it emphasizes on the strain that he feels. It’s as though that word makes him furious him. Vikram says this to Deepa when she mentions Annie as’ ‘that girl’’. Since we know that she was special to him, referring her to ‘‘that girl’’ shows how angry and outraged he felt towards Deepa.
Strident and harsh
"Out with your karatasi, your tax receipts! Show your work permits, or you have explaining to do before you go back to Kikuyuland. Hiti! Fisi! Hyenas! Chop-chop!"
By referring to the people as hyenas, suggests that the corporal is inhumane and has no repect for the natives also, by ordering them and further calling them hyenas suggests how raucous the corporals tone is. The repeated use of exclamation marks also illustrates how impatient the corporal is and how evil he is towards the Kikuyus and wants to get rid of them. The exclamation marks help to create an atmosphere of tension and fear and brings out the harsh tone.
Lora and Farah
Terrified
ReplyDelete“It was the nights that curdled the blood, that made palpable the terror that permeated our world like a mysterious ether. The faint yet persistent chir-chir-chir of crickets or the rhythmic croak-croak of frogs when it rained, the whine of the solitary vehicle on the road, seemed only to deepen the hour, enhance the menacing ominousness lurking in the dark outside” pg.46
This quote brings out a terrified tone as the author is describing how the nights appear to him through the use of personification, onomatopoeia, similes and metaphor. The author personifies menacing ominousness by saying that it is lurking outside. It is possible that the ominousness the author is talking about is actually the Mau Mau as he may feel they are “evil”/”ominous”.
The author uses onomatopoeia when mentioning the “chir-chir-chir” of crickets and the “croak-croak” of frogs. The use of this makes us a part of the picture and makes it more real to us.
“the terror that permeated our world like a mysterious ether”, the use of this simile shows how unreal the author found this, so much that he related it to the 5th and highest element(after air, earth, fire and water). Finally the author also uses a metaphor in the last sentence, “deepen the hour” this shows us the emphasis the author is putting on it as if each hour is so difficult to move past.Thus, the feeling of terror is brought about.
Panicked
“Papa was beside himself, he seemed to go berserk, venting rage at the servant Amini, slapping him around, but Amini insistently, plaintively(sorrowfully) denied stealing the weapon”pg.85
The author brings out the feeling that Papa is panicked because of the situation he is put in. His gun has gone missing and he doesn’t know what to do so he seems to blame the one person who he feels it may be. The irony is brought about when considering the worker’s name “Amini”. The name means trust yet in this situation, Papa is panicking and blaming it on Amini. Losing his only gun is a very big crisis because he could get into a lot of trouble with the police so we can understand why Papa is panicked
Fearful
“I wished for Njoroge at my side. And I worried lest my sister wake up in the dark with nobody in that alien house. My feet crunched on the hard earth. I breathed harshly the chilled outdoor air, my heart pounding…”pg14
Through diction of the words ‘worried’, ‘dark’, ‘alien house’ and ‘pounding’, the reader is able to understand that Vikram fears for his sister. He is worried that anything bad can happen to her since the Mau Mau used to attack in the dark night. The word ‘dark’ is symbolic of the Mau Mau attacks at nights and that is why Vikram fears for his sister.
Afraid
“If they saw me, I was dead. In terror, I crouched closer to the bushes by the roadside, but they could barely conceal me , unless I fell right into their creepy embrace” pg 143
Vikram is afraid to be spotted by the Mau Mau and through the first short declarative sentence he uses the word ‘dead’ to express his fear. He does not think they are going to spare him if they find him spying on them.
Done by: Amreen and Khadija