The School Teacher's Guest
- Created by: Issy
- Created on: 04-06-10 22:29
School Teacher's Guest:
Title: Ambiguous and misleading → not happy.
Environment:
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Mangoes
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Ines' reaction to the environment rather than the body.
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The environment's reaction to the death of the boy/man.
The description used reflects the emotions felt by the village at that time, by using a series of metaphors it symbolises that the death is part of society and by allowing the mangoes to grow as a lasting reminder, the death of the son is always remembered. Oxymoron are used to symbolise how his death – a young man was wrong and shouldn't have happened. The man accidentally shoots him, further reminding us that it shouldn't have happened. Its a graphic description, so it obviously had a profound effect on the inhabitants of the village. Complex sentences reflect the time and the length of decomposition. 'Burst open a viscous juice..' reflects the way that the boy was murdered. The use of commas creates a building rhythm and the enumeration reflect the growth of vegetation. Mangoes are usually sweet → bitter sweet → tragedy of the son's death.
Towards the end of the story, the mangoes have taken root and have grown into mango trees, this reflects the intensity of the emotion. Ines will never forget her son, but know she has avenged him, she can live in peace with Riad Halabi.
When Ines reveals the body to Riad, the windows are shut and the environment is described in a vivid way to provoke a reaction from the audience. The fact that Ines shows more concern over the environment than over being found, reflects her devotion to her son and her dismissal of the life front of her – that the readers shouldn't be bothered that the man is dead, he deserved it. Reflected even further when she leaves the light on and does not keep her voice down when talking about him. Ines believes that she is right and the environment rejoices in the death of the man.
Nature also plays a big role, both when the villagers throw the mangoes in the house and the swarm of insects over the 'cadaver' , once again symbolises that the death was justified, even nature hates this man: maggots inset into his house, whilst his newly dead corpse is eaten by mosquitoes. Furthering our belief that the death was justified.
Men and Women: Role of Women
Riad and Ines treat each other equally, listening to each other. Whilst she does a stereotypical women's job, she still commands authority, over men. 'Freed us.' means that they…
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