English Literature - Short Stories

Question 1

Quotes - Invisible Mass of the Back Row
A quote that uses rule of 3, back row motif, alliteration

Answer 1

‘Hidden, disposed of, dispatched to the invisibility of the back row’
- rule of 3, alliteration, back row motif + context, theme of trapped/impotency

Question 2

Quotes - Invisible Mass of the Back Row
What word describes how the words were in relation to Hortsense’s thoughts at the start

Answer 2

‘Trapped [word]’ - motif/theme of trapped vs free

Question 3

Quotes - Invisible Mass of the Back Row
what is the significance of the poem in the middle of the story and give 2 key things said within it

Answer 3

‘paraffin heaters’ [smell]
‘cold’ - motif of how she feels about England and English authority as the inspector/teacher are both described as ‘frozen’
poem shows strength of feeling , pure emotion, confusion

Question 4

Quotes - Invisible Mass of the Back Row
what word describes how Hortense greets her new clothes?

Answer 4

‘like a stranger’ - simile, theme of identity

Question 5

Quotes - Invisible Mass of the Back Row
what motif of contrast is there between Easington and England and what does the name Easington connote?

Answer 5

Easington heat vs England cold
heat also shows when she is going to rebel, she says she feels ‘hot’ and at the start ‘sweat’

Question 6

Quotes - Invisible Mass of the Back Row
What quote describes how the children are kept in the school/how they feel in the school ?

Answer 6

‘The fear which has trapped us in this rank, smelly room’ - repeated use of smell imagery, deep and physical revulsion, impotency theme, collective language, unnaturalness

Question 7

Quotes - Invisible Mass of the Back Row
what is the last part of the last line of the story?

Answer 7

claiming, proclaiming, learning the new language in dis here England.
- patois dialect, rule 3, verb, rhyme, claiming language and identity (theme), voices raised/assertiveness

Question 8

Quotes - Invisible Mass of the Back Row
what does the new information help the back row to do

Answer 8

‘they help us to assert our right to be’ - theme of identity, collective identity,

Question 9

Quotes - Invisible Mass of the Back Row
what quote encapsulates the theme of frozenness/cold in England

Answer 9

‘frozen faces, frozen information, frozen places’ - repetition, rule of 3, rhyme, motif of frozen

Question 10

Quotes - Invisible Mass of the Back Row
what quotes describes the way Hortense suddenly feels out of place in Jamaica before she leaves

Answer 10

‘I am cold in the blazing sunshine’ - juxtaposition
feeling out of place in homeland, says after she leaves that is beginning of ‘exile’ from Heartease, unnaturalness,

Question 11

Quotes - Invisible Mass of the Back Row
What word describes how Hortense and her friends approach Heartsease? what does the name Heartsease suggest?

Answer 11

‘like swarming bees’ - attracted to honey, nest, excited, free, nature connotations, sweetness versus ‘smelly room’, close connection with friends/community, simile
‘Heartsease’ - heart warming and ‘nourishing’

Question 12

Quotes - Chemistry give a quote describing the relationship between the son and grandfather at the start

Answer 12

Grandfather were pulling us towards him on some ‘invisible cord’
motif of the invisible cord, umbilical cord, strong connection and link (innate), childish conception of the relationship

Question 13

Quotes - Chemistry give 3 words showing how animalistic Ralph is described as

Answer 13

‘barked’
‘pouncing’
‘lorded it, tucking into bigger and bigger meals’
shows the child interprets difficult relationships as animalistic to simplify them, repetition, shows the child’s dislike and belief that Ralph is base and aggressive

Question 14

Quotes - Chemistry
give a quote to show the mother’s indecision

Answer 14

‘quivery look of being about to spill over’ - metaphor, overwhelming, full of emotion (water), unstable, fluid and conforms to the shape it is placed in, the motif of water symbolising relationships and their fluidity (constant changing nature)

Question 15

Quotes - Chemistry
give a description (don’t need to memorise this quote) to show the mother’s position before grandfather dies when she is with ralph

Answer 15

‘trapped and helpless’ (according to narrator) -

Question 16

Quotes - Chemistry
which motif is repeated at the beginning and end about relationship between grandfather and narrator?

Answer 16

‘invisible cord/line’

Question 17

Quotes - Chemistry
what is the quote about chemistry

Answer 17

‘chemistry is the science of change’ - links to title, relationships (and their fickleness), repeated motif/theme

Question 18

Quotes - Chemistry
what quote describes the relationship between mother, narrator and grandfather at the start?

Answer 18

‘sad symmetry’ - sibilance (softness, gentleness, sadness), the perfection of the group, another person would disrupt the ‘symmetry’

Question 19

Quotes - Chemistry
what word does the boy use to describe how he understands the relationships around him?

Answer 19

‘equation’ - the child’s basic understanding, chemistry motif, the difficulty and complicated nature of the relationship

Question 20

Quotes - Chemistry
what two words describe the motif of the pond at the start?

Answer 20

‘circular, exposed’ - the relationship between grandfather narrator and mother (like sad symmetry), exposed to Ralph ‘impregnable’ later described as (sexual connotations - masculinity of Ralph + baseness)

Question 21

Quotes - Chemistry
what forms at the feet of the father as a ghost and how do they move?

Answer 21

‘pools of water’ which ‘ooze’

Question 22

Quotes - Chemistry
how is the grandfather’s funeral described and what motif does it link to?

Answer 22

‘hard, dazzling, spangled with early frost and gold leaves’

Question 23

Quotes - Odour of Chrysanthemums
give 3 words connoting violence/hellishness in the first part description

Answer 23

smoke ‘cleaved’, ‘flames like red sores licking its ashy sides’, engine ‘threats of speed’

Question 24

Quotes - Odour of Chrysanthemums
give 3 words connoting a lack of life in the first part description

Answer 24

‘slow inevitable’ [trucks], ‘withered [oak leaves]’, ‘forsaken’, ‘stagnant light’

Question 25

Quotes - Odour of Chrysanthemums
give 3 quotes about miners in the first part

Answer 25

‘shadows’, ‘miners’ (significant as instead of people defined by job and as collective and talked about passively ‘miners being turned up’), ‘trooped’ - find the quote about regretting having left a fellow soldier

Question 26

Quotes - Odour of Chrysanthemums
give 2 quotes about the house from the outside

Answer 26

‘bond vine clutched…claw down’, ‘dishevelled pink chrysanthemums’,

Question 27

Quotes - Odour of Chrysanthemums
how does the mother say she treated her son?

Answer 27

‘understand him and make allowances’

Question 28

Quotes - Odour of Chrysanthemums
give 2 quotes about light in the house/relationship in family

Answer 28

‘dark red’, ‘lost in the darkness’

Question 29

Quotes - Odour of Chrysanthemums
give a quote showing the mother’s attitude to son and husband

Answer 29

‘faces were hidden’, ‘you’re as bad as your father’

Question 30

Quotes - Odour of Chrysanthemums