1) How did Kezia feel
about her father? What would her father do every morning? Why would Kezia feel
relieved with her father going to work?
=
To Kezia, her father was a figure to be feared and avoided.
Every
morning before going to work he came into her room and gave her a casual kiss,
to which she responded with “Goodbye, Father”.
There
was a glad sense of relief when Kezia heard the noise of the carriage growing
fainter and fainter down the long road because she was afraid of her father.
2) In the evening when
Kezia’s father would come, what would he ask? Where would Kezia be then?
=
In the evening, Kezia’s father would ask for tea in the drawing-room and look
for the newspaper.
Kezia
would stand near the staircase and hear her father’s loud voice.
3) What would the
mother of Kezia ask Kezia to do whenever father would return in the evening?
=
Kezia’s mother would ask Kezia to take off her father’s boots in order to prove
herself to be a good girl. Slowly the girl would slip down the stairs, more
slowly still across the hall, and push open the drawing-room door.
4) How would Kezia’s
father look at her? How would Kezia feel about it? What would her father ask
her then?
=
Kezia’s father, with his spectacles on, looked at her in a way that was
terrifying to the little girl.
Kezia
felt terrified and frightened.
Kezia’s
father would ask her to pull off the boots for him and keep them outside. He
also asked whether she had been a good girl the whole day.
5) What would father
say to her mother about Kezia’s afraid look? What would he say about her
stuttering? Would Kezia stutter with everybody?
=
Kezia’s father would tell Kezia that if she continued to stutter, then her
mother would have to take her to the hospital.
Kezia’s
father didn’t like her daughter to be stuttering and warned her if she
continued to do that, her mother would have to take her to the hospital.
No,
Kezia never stuttered in front of other people. Kezia was too afraid of her
mother and therefore, speaking to him made her stutter out of fear.
6) How would Kezia
think about her father being a Giant? Why?
=
Kezia always used to forget words in front of her father which resulted into
her stuttering. Her father was so big — his hands and his neck, especially his
mouth when he yawned. Thinking about him alone was like thinking about a giant.
7) What would happen on
every Sunday afternoon?
=
On Sunday afternoons Grandmother would send Kezia down to the drawing-room to
have a “nice talk with Father and Mother”. But the little girl always found
Mother reading and Father stretched out on the sofa, his handkerchief on his
face, his feet on one of the best cushions, sleeping soundly and snoring.
8) When and why would
father call Kezia a little brown owl?
=
On Sunday afternoons Grandmother would send Kezia down to the drawing-room to
have a “nice talk with Father and Mother”. But the little girl always found
Mother reading and Father stretched out on the sofa, his handkerchief on his
face, his feet on one of the best cushions, sleeping soundly and snoring. She
used to sit on a stool, gravely watched him until he woke and stretched, and
asked the time — then looked at her. Due to her cold share, her father would
call her a little brown owl.
9) What did grandma
suggest Kezia to give her father? When was it said?
=
Kezia’s grandma suggested her to gift her father a pin-cushion out of a
beautiful piece of yellow silk on his birthday
One
day, when she was kept indoors with a cold, her grandmother told her that
father’s birthday was next week and suggested such.
10) How did Kezia make
the gift for her father? What did she use as scrap?
=
Laboriously, with double cotton, the little girl stitched three sides. But she
was confused about what to fill as a scrap. So, one day when her mother was
out, on the bed-table she discovered a great many sheets of fine paper,
gathered them up, tore them into tiny pieces, and stuffed her case, then sewed
up the fourth side.
11) Why was father
angry that day? What was missing? How did they find the missing thing?
=
Kezia’s father had lost his great speech for the Port Authority. There was a
hue and cry in the house on that night.
Her
father’s speech for the Port Authority was missing.
Rooms
were being searched on account of the missing of her father’s important papers.
Kezia’s mother came to her room and asked her about the missing papers and
discovered that she used it to make his father’s birthday present.
12) How was Kezia
punished? How did she react to the punishment?
=
That night, when Kezia was Crying too much to explain, she laid in the shadowed
room watching the evening light make a sad little pattern on the floor. It was
when her father came with a ruler in his hands and beat her pink palm with that
ruler as punishment.
The
little child was terrified and sobbed all night. She asked her grandmother about the
purpose of why fathers exist. She was extremely frightened.
13) After the day of
punishment when Kezia would meet her father, how would she react?
=
The incident terrified Kezia to the utmost. After the day of punishment
whenever Kezia would meet her father, she quickly put both hands behind her
back and a red colour flew into her cheeks.
14) Through the fencing
gap, what did Kezia see in the gardens of Macdonalds?
= The
Macdonalds lived next door. They had five children. Looking through a gap in
the fence the little girl saw them playing ‘tag’ in the evening. The father
with the baby, Mao, on his shoulders, two little girls hanging on to his coat
pockets ran round and round the flower-beds, shaking with laughter. Once she
saw the boys turn the hose on him—and he tried to catch them laughing all the
time.
15) What happened to
mother one day? Why was she left alone?
=
One day, suddenly, mother became ill and she and Grandmother went to the hospital.
The
little girl was left alone in the house with Alice, the cook because her
grandma and mother went to hospital.
16) What did Kezia tell
Alice, the cook? How did grandmother help her at night till today?
=
The little girl was left alone in the house with Alice, the cook. That was all
right in the daytime, but while Alice was putting her to bed, she grew suddenly
afraid. Alice told her to go to bed and forbade her to scream as that might
wake her pa.
Till the date at night, Kezia’s grandma took her to her bed since Kezia was afraid of
being in dark.
17) What nightmare did
Kezia have again? Who was near her bed this time? What did he do to save her?
= The
same old nightmare came — the butcher with a knife and a rope, who came nearer
and nearer, smiling that dreadful smile, while Kezia could not move, could only
stand still, crying out, “Grandma! Grandma!”
When
Kezia woke up, she found her father beside her bed.
He
blew out the candle, bent down and caught up the child in his arms, carrying
her along the passage to the big bedroom. A newspaper was on the bed. He put
away the paper, then carefully tucked up the child. He lay down beside her.
Half asleep still, still with the butcher’s smile all about her it seemed, she
crept close to him, snuggled her head under his arm, held tightly to his shirt.
18) How did Kezia’s
father make her feel safe and comfortable in the big bed?
=
Kezia woke up and shouted hysterically because of the terrifying nightmare.
When she woke, she found her father beside her. He made her comfortable. He
blew out the candle, bent down and caught up the child in his arms, carrying
her along the passage to the big bedroom. A newspaper was on the bed. He put
away the paper, then carefully tucked up the child. He lay down beside her.
Half asleep still, still with the butcher’s smile all about her it seemed, she
crept close to him, snuggled her head under his arm, held tightly to his shirt
and asked her to rub her feet against his to feel the warmth.
19) What realization
did Kezia have about her father while sleeping under his care and protection?
=
Kezia saw that in spite of being tired, her father slept beside her. A funny
feeling came over her. She thought of her poor Father, not so big, after all —
and with no one to look after him. He was harder than Grandmother, but it was a
nice hardness. And every day he had to work and was too tired to be a Mr
Macdonald. She had torn up all his beautiful writing. She stirred suddenly and
sighed.
8 MARKS
1) How does the story
reflect a father with various character traits?
=
The story “The little girl” reflects a father with various character traits. In
the beginning of the story, we find Kezia’s father to be a gentleman who goes
to work by bidding Kezia with a kiss on her cheeks. But nevertheless, he would
still stand as a fear to her. In the next part, we see him ask Kezia to pull
his boots off for him every day after returning from the office which indicates his
act of subjugation. In the later part, we find him not really communicating
with any of the members of the family and mostly dwelled his life on the sofa.
He was really annoyed when he found Kezia used his important papers as scraps.
Without listening to her explanation, he became arrogant and beat her as a punishment
to her pardonable act. At the end of the story, we find Kezia’s father
understands her child and helps her overcome her nightmare. He slept with her
and ask her to touch her feet with his as a sign of reconciliation of their
relationship. Unlike Mr Macdonald, her father was harsh but she realised
basically, that is due to his excessive work pressure at the office. Hence, we find
different shades of a father in this particular story.
2) Evaluate Kezia to be
a young girl with fear, anxiety and happiness?
=
Kezia was indeed a girl filled with mixed emotions. Initially, we find her to
be very afraid of her father. But gradually as we go through the story, we find
her passing through anxiety and happiness. In the story, we find her afraid of
her father. She was terrified to even talk with her father when he returned
from office. She stuttered in front of him because she got all nervous and
didn’t know what to say. Her father disliked this. Besides, she never forgot
the day her father beat her because she used his important papers as scraps and
after that incident, she always feared to go in front of her father. We find
her going through anxiety when she is afraid to sleep in the dark at night. She
feared the butcher with the knife which came in her nightmare every time. By
the end of the story, we find Kezia to be an understanding and a happy girl. When
her father wrapped her around his arms because she was afraid of the nightmare,
she got to see his soft side. She understood, somewhere due to immense work
pressure, her father has become harsh but beneath his harshness, he still loved
her and she was happy about that.
3) How does the
character of Kezia reflect the psychology of a pre-teen girl?
=
Kezia’s character reflects the perfect psychology of a pre-teen girl. We find
her going through a rollercoaster of emotions. She feels terrified at the
beginning of the story because of her father. But by the end of the story, we
find a totally different side of hers. To make her father happy, she decided to
make him a birthday present on her grandma’s suggestion. But when she was
punished, she was so terrified and couldn’t come out of the trauma. She never
showed her palms again to her father. We find her going through anxiety when
she talks about her nightmare. She couldn’t sleep in the dark at night because
of the nightmare of the butcher with a knife. We also find her asking her
grandma about the purpose of creation of fathers. She felt miserable sometimes
and thought the world on the other side was happier as she saw Macdonald
playing with his kids without being harsh. But at night, one day, when her
father came in and wrapped her around his arms to show comfort and love, she
understood her father. She
realized that her father was also very loving but as he worked hard every day,
he used to get tired. She realised the softer side beneath the annoyed
look.