Monday, February 3, 2003

Possible Questions:

Reading Response #1

Choose one question and construct a 3-page essay based on the questions asked. You do not need to answer every one of the questions under each number. Rather, use the questions to springboard your own thinking to create an argument about the novel and the specific passages or ideas.

Remember: an argument should be arguable, meaning that people should disagree with you. Then you should back up your thesis with evidence from the text. Do not merely quote from the text but explain what the passages say and mean.

You do not need to include the question in your essay. Your thesis and evidence should be enough for me to know what question you are dealing with. Begin with you own introduction that leads into your thesis.

1. “’Yes, Macumazahn,’ he put in, in Zulu, ‘the diamonds are surely there, and you shall have them since you white men are so fond of toys and money’” (125). What are the implications of this statement? How do these implications work with the rest of the novel? Is the novel an indictment of greed or capitalism? Your thesis should consider whether or not the novel seems to be a critique of wealth.

2. On page 43, Quartermain questions what a gentleman is, wondering whether he is one. Then, on page 138, Sir Henry claims that “a gentleman does not sell himself for wealth.” But Quartermain accepts the offer of diamonds. What do you make of this? Construct a thesis about the nature of “gentlemanliness.” What is a gentleman and is Quartermain a gentleman or not?

3. The white men trick the Kukuanas into believing they cause an eclipse. Have there been other types of trickery or lies towards the Kukuanas? Can we read these scenes as allegorical? Construct an argument that explains these tricks or lies as allegorical of something in colonialism/imperialism.

4. On pages 166 and 167, Quartermain notices the similarities between Sir Henry and Ignosi/Umbopa. What do you make of this identification? How does this fit into the novel’s “racism” or view of Africans? Construct a thesis that argues a point about how the identification works.