ANALYSING BOYS AND GIRLS

 

ANALYSING "BOYS AND GIRLS" BY ALICE MUNRO

Alice Munro, “Boys and girls”

Characters

The girl

The boy

Father

Mother

Henry Bailey

Grandmother

Mack

Flora

Questions for understanding

1.-What did the girl’s father do?

2.-What did the Hudson's Bay Company or the Montreal Fur Traders give families to hang in the kitchen door?

3.-Where did her father skin the foxes?

4.-What was the cellar like?

5.-Who did the girl sit with to watch her father working?

6.-What did her father do with the foxes’ bodies after skinning them?

7.-Why did her mother dislike the pelting operation?

8.-Why did the narrator like the smell of the pelting operation?

9.-Who was Henry Bailey?

10.-What health problem did Henry Bailey have?

11.-What did the children admire about Henry Bailey?

12.-When the children went to bed, what were they afraid of?

13.-What did the girl tell her brother to scare him?

14.-What songs did the children sing in the dark?

15.-What kind of stories did the girl tell herself before falling asleep?

16.-What was her father’s favourite book and how had it influenced him?

17.-What was the girl’s job in the farm during the summer?

18.-What other jobs did she do to help her father?

19.-How did she feel when she was helping her father?

20.-Why was the girl’s mother so busy?

21.-How did the girl feel when she was helping her mother?

22.- “I wheeled the tank up to the barn, where it was kept, and I heard my mother saying, "Wait till Laird gets a little bigger, then you'll have a real help."

Can you comment on this paragraph?

23.-Why was her mother disappointed with the girl?

24.-Why did the girl have the feeling that her mother was her enemy?

25.-What were the foxes fed?

26.-How did her father find the horses?

27.-What did her father do with the horses when he had enough food for the foxes?

28.-What did they call the two horses they kept?

29.-What were the horses like?

30.- Comment on this paragraph: “The word girl had formerly seemed to me innocent and unburdened like the word child; now it appeared that it was no such thing. A girl was not, as I had supposed, simply what I was; it was what I had to become. It was a definition, always touched with emphasis, with reproach and disappointment. Also it was a joke on me”.

31.-Comment on this paragraph: “My grandmother came to stay with us for a few weeks and I heard other things. "Girls don't slam doors like that." "Girls keep their knees together when they sit down." And worse still, when I asked some questions, "That's none of girls’ business."

32.-What was the girl’s reaction to her grandmother’s commands?

33.-Why did Henry ask them to say goodbye to Mack?

34.-What did the girl do when Henry and her father were going to shoot the horse?

35.-After the horse was shot, how did the girl feel about her little brother? What did she do to help him forget what they had seen?

36.-How did the girl’s attitude toward her father change after Mack was shot?

37.-What did Flora do when Henry and the girl’s father took her to be shot?

38.-How could the girl have prevented Flora from running away?

39.-What did her father and Henry finally do?

40.-Comment on this paragraph: “…but even in these stories something different was happening, mysterious alterations took place. A story might start off in the old way, with a spectacular danger, a fire or wild animals, and for a while I might rescue people; then things would change around, and instead, somebody would be rescuing me. It might be a boy from our class at school, or even Mr. Campbell, our teacher, who tickled girls under the arms. And at this point the story concerned itself at great length with what I looked like – how long my hair was, and what kind of dress I had on…”

41.-Comment on this paragraph: "Never mind," my father said. He spoke with resignation, even good humour the words which absolved and dismissed me for good. "She's only a girl," he said.

42.-How has the girl changed at the end of the story?

Vocabulary

pens: jaulas

fall and winter: otoño e invierno

skin the foxes: despellejar los zorros

pelts: pieles

treacherous: traidor

plumed adventurers: aventureros con plumas

portage: transporte, acarreo

slippery bodies: cuerpos resbalosos

deprived of: privado de 

scrape: raspar

the little clotted webs of blood vessels: pequeñas redes de vasos capilares coagulados

reassuringly seasonal: reconfortantemente de temporada

derisive: burlón

clot: coagular, coágulo

whistlings and gurglings: silbidos y borboteos

stale cold air: aire rancio y frío

snowdrifts curled around our house: ventisca de nieve enroscada alrederdor de la casa

harass: acosar

frozen swamp: pantano helado

bugbear chorus: coro de bichos

stairwell: hueco de las escaleras

wicker: mimbre

fern: helecho

boldness: atrevimiento, valentía

saddle: silla, montura

padlocked: cerrado con candando

large, sturdy pens: jaulas grandes y robustas

canvas shoes: zapatillas de lona

scythe /saɪð/ guadaña 

lamb's quarter: cenizo (type of plant)

rake: amontonar con el rastrillo

pitchfork: horquilla para el heno

stiff bloody apron: delantal rígido y ensangrentado

bare lumpy legs: piernas desnudas y llenas de grumos

cheesecloth bag: bolsa de red

flypaper: papel matamoscas

shoot and butcher the horse: disparar y descuartizar al caballo

plow  /plaʊ/ arado

cutter: cortadora (para la nieve)

sorrel mare: yegua alazana

cozy: confortable

haunches /hɔːntʃiz/ ancas, cuartos traseros

clattering her hooves against the rails: haciendo ruido con sus pezuñas contra las barandas

rubbers: botas de goma

stump: pisotear

entrails: vísceras, tripas

the heavy shuffling steps: Henry caminaba arrastrando (shuffling) los pies

crisscrossed beams of sunlight: entrelazados rayos de sol

I boosted Laird up and hoisted myself: levanté a Laird y me elevé yo

halter: ramal

sway: balancearse

lurch: dar tumbos

wariness: cautela

holding-off: fresno, resistencia

she had broken away from him: ella se le había escapado

jumble: revoltijo

tarpaulin: lona

a streak of blood: mancha de sangre, con forma de mecha

my father said grace: mi padre bendijo la mesa

a curt sound of disgust: un sonido seco de enfado