English Spies Key quotes

Question 1

“Everything is as it was; everything has….”

Answer 1

“Changed” Paradoxical, confusion of this new place that was his home.

Question 2

“Were socially….for ease of reference”

Answer 2

“Colour-coded”

Heirachy in close, Stephen understands lower status in close. Colours are symbolic

Question 3

“He was the leader….”

Answer 3

“I was the led”

Keith is dominant person in relationship, Stephen is submissive. Relates back to class.

Question 4

“The… of Uncle Peter”

Answer 4

“Glory”

typical hero, worshipped and idiolised by the close

Question 5

“The same…. open smile as Auntie Dee”

Answer 5

“Recklessly”

Dee and Peter much more laid back than Haywards. D&P see to me right for each other unlike, Mr and Mrs Hayward. Reckless Heroism. Shows difference between Heros and non Heros

Question 6

“….. Furry animal” (Mr W)

Answer 6

“Mild Natured”

Contrast with Mr H. Gentle. Stephen belives he is both weak and harmless. Ironic due to later on in the book

Question 7

“Like an …. in his cave”

Answer 7

“Ogre”

Violence and arrogence. Garage is his “cave” Fairytale monster, S is scared of him.

Question 8

“how adults behave among themselves is a…. about which I haven’t yet learnt to have any curiosity.”

Answer 8

“Mystery”

Shows difference between adult and child world. S not interested in finding out about adult words shows imaturity and youth.

Question 9

“making perfection ever more…..”

Answer 9

“Perfect”

Impossible and paradoxial.

Question 10

“with a kind of calm amusement at the world and no….. of her lips” / “rested, calm and…..”

Answer 10

“Excessive movement”/”Composed”

Mrs H seems to have a Facade. She seems calm from the front but is really holding secrets. Alit in 2nd quote shows regularity of her regularity and calmness of her face

Question 11

“old bean”

Answer 11

Keith copies language from father. Sadistic use of language to dominate. Sort of a taunt.

Question 12

“It’s not as…. as I originally thought”

Answer 12

“Simple”

Show childhood way of looking at things. As he becomes more involved with adult lives his world becomes more complex.

Question 13

“Things start as a …., and then they turn into a test, which I fail.”

Answer 13

“Game”

Stephen feels as if his masculintity is being tested- novel is about growing up.

Question 14

“You start playing some game…and the…. goes on and on, and it’s coming out of you.”

Answer 14

“scream”

Reality of warfare. Stephen is scared of growing up. Facing reality

Question 15

“But what did Stephen make of them all? What did he actually ……?”

Answer 15

“Understand”

Stephen doubts his memory, unreliable narator. forces reader to question what they are reading.

Question 16

“I…. more or less nothing.”

Answer 16

“Understand”

S lackof understanding as a child

Question 17

“Please,” he says, in a strange, small, urgent voice.

And I give in. Against this shameless and terrible word I can’t hold out.”

Answer 17

Shows S childnessness, please will make him do anything. enforces idea of weakness

Question 18

“adults are not after all members of some completely different…. from myself.”

Answer 18

“Species”

S realisation of adulthood. Use of “Species” - formal, why is an 8/9 yr old using this phrasing

Question 19

“An odd thought comes into my head: that I’ve found a value for ….”

Answer 19

“X”

X- Throughout book is symbok of secrecy. Connotaions of difficulty and mystery.

Question 20

“How can the sunlit world have become so suddenly dark.”

Answer 20

Contast of Sunlit and Dark shows difference between adulthood and childhood. loss of innocence and realisation of adult world.

Question 21

“All that perfection she arrived with has become…..”

Answer 21

“Blurred”

Mrs H is blurred like out of focus picture, S just waiting to focus on. Focus when he realises X.

Question 22

“I’m leaving behind the old tunnels and terrors of childhood – and stepping into a new world of even darker tunnels and more elusive terrors”

Answer 22

S leaving child world. Childhood→Adulthood

Use of tunnel metaphor-Liminal space, stuck in between two worlds

Question 23

“You understand that sometimes people find themselves isolated. They feel that they’re outcasts, that everyone’s against them.”

Answer 23

Miniturised feeling of britain in ww2. Feels like a warzone to stephen

Question 24

“she sat cross-legged in the dust in front of Stephen like a beggar”

Answer 24

She is a beggar. She is begging for his forgivness/help

Question 25

“I see all kinds of things I never saw before, wherever I look, now that the …. in the air.”

Answer 25

“Lamorna”

Lamorna trigger for memories. Powerful smell

Question 26

“The game’s over because the normal has reached out to absorb the…..”

Answer 26

“Abnormal”

Personifying of the normal and use of “Absorb” suggests superatrual. Scary, childhood terror. Paradoxixal suggests confusion

Question 27

“One single…. deed, to lay at Keith’s feet in the morning.”

Answer 27

“Heroic”

S struggles to be a hero in keith’s eyes. Laying at feet, like an offering to a god.

Question 28

“he’s obviously as good as his parents are at…… his true nature from everyone around him.”

Answer 28

“Concealing”

The facade of the Haywards. Mystery, what is his true nature

Question 29

“big mocking smile” / “small conspiratorial smile”

Answer 29

Mocking smile as if B is constantly making fun of boys. Shows imamturity, don’t understand girls yet.

Question 30

“he moved invisibly among us all, like a ghost”

Answer 30

Uncle peter is a ghost of the hero he used to be. He is dead to members of the close. Many have disowned him. He is spying on them. Supernatrual- scary

Question 31

“Fading ghost”

Answer 31

Uncle peter is unimportant to members of the close so much so he is fading out of their memories

Question 32

“He was beginning to understand that he was a German who was entirely English”

Answer 32

Stephen beliving multiple things at once shows confusion in his mind now he has come to realise. German and English are two opposite ends of a spectrum. impossible to be both.

Question 33

“Everyone except you really hates him”

Answer 33

Isolation between Keith and everybody else. Micrcosm of ww2. Difference of Stephen and everybody.

Question 34

“I feel the germs entering my body” / “I was too busy thinking about the germs.”

Answer 34

Preoccupation of germs shows youth. Germs sound like Germans, mabye microcosm of ww2.