Do you think anybody is English? Really English? – Analysis
Analyze the roles of
Alsana and Samad in the development of their conflict as well as the narrative
technique used to influence the reader.
As mentioned above the parents of Millat take
in different roles in the conflict about the burning of the books. In the
development of the conversation the different positions become very clear.
Alsana Iqbal is a very strickt mother. She set great value upon justice. She
thinks Millat is acting wrong and so she tries to make this clear as she
teaches him a lesson. She burns all his stuff because he burned the book.
(ll.65-74)
On the one hand, she is a very wise and clever woman. She overwhelms her
husband with thousand of good arguments which are all very conceived. For
example she tells him about the different opinions the people in her little
group have. She says that even if she doesn’t like Divargiit Singh’s movies she
never burned one of a single video of Mohona Hossain, who likes the movies very
much. (ll.23-26)
On the other hand, she is very radical. To burn all of Millats stuff is very
hard even if she thinks Millat did something wrong and just wants him to learn
from it.
In contrast to that, Alsana is still the best example for a perfectly integrated
immigrant. She is definitely against the burning of the books which becomes
obvious in the conversation with her husband. That shows that she is against
any kind of racism.
Samad to the contrary is the best example for a not well integrated Muslim immigrant.
He supports and shares the racist attitude of his son. He says that the burning
of the books “is the most important thing to happen to (…) [them] in this country, ever.” (ll.9).
Another significant point is that Samad isn’t very smart. He passes judgment on
the bloody book even he didn’t ever read it. (l.3)
Also, he doesn’t have any good arguments to hold his opinion that it’s right to
burn the book. He wants to avoid the conversation with his wife (l.7, l.37,
ll.53-54).
As Alsana overwhelms him with her arguments he just says that he doesn’t care
(ll.61-62).
The text is written in a 3rd person omniscient narrator’s point of
view. Through this narrative technique we get a full overview of the feelings
the characters have and the thoughts of them.
”Alsana laughed bitterly.” (l.18): Here you can see, that the narrator knows
how the people feel like. If he wouldn’t know he would have to leave out the
“bitterly”. Through a simple “Alsana laughed.” one can’t imagine how she feels
like in this moment.
The most part of the text is a dialouge. By reading a dialouge thereader feels
like he’s a part of the scene. It’s like one’s sitting among the audience while
watching a play.
DE
Sende den Text als PDF