Month: November 2019

Here is my analysis of chapter 13!

• What do you consider are your prized possessions?

My prize possessions would be if material-wise, it is my phone, laptop, and my computer. However, if we are talking about values, it would be myself.

• Who are the people you consider your family?

My father, mother, and brother. I also consider my relatives such as cousins, uncles, aunties, grandparents family, but I am not really close with them.

• What does “safe” look like to you?

Somewhere where I feel comfortable and easy to breath. Somewhere where there is no war, no hatred, no sufferings, and no conflicts. A peaceful, quiet and comfortable place is what safe looks like to me. Sometimes it can even be only my family. As long as I am with my family, I feel safe no matter where it may be.

• What image represents all your longing, desire, desperation, and hope?

A full family picture of my family – nicely framed to put up on a wall.

What prompts Roy to admit that he must ‘give up’ Norma? Why does he find it so hard to do?

Roy finds it so hard to give up on Norma because he felt guilty of Norma’s death. He believed that he was responsible of Norma’s death. 

• Page 264, “But it wasn’t about getting the timing right; it was about not being able to let go… He had not been able to let go all those years ago either when Mary had told him to take my clothes to the Salvation Army.”
• Page 266. “It is hard for any boy to shut the wardrobe door on his little sister” 

• Page 265 “She never said it was his fault, but he knew that was what she was thinking. 

When the accident happened, Mary fell in depression and stopped talking to Roy who was only eight years old. However, this made Roy believe that Mary’s lack of communication meant he was responsible for his sister’s death and this led to Roy feeling guilty.

• Page 265 “Part of her seemed to disappear without a trace, while the other part remained resolutely detached and uncommunicative.” 

From these evidences, he is a delicate, kind-hearted man. He doesn’t want to believe that his sister should be forgotten and that is why Roy finds it difficult to give up on Norma even though he knew what was the right thing to do ( giving out Norma’s clothes to the Salvation Army). However, he didn’t want to lose her so he tried to relive his sister by dressing up as her when he smells the ‘sister smell’ on Norma’s clothes. 

• Page 267, “So, one day he put the clothes on. Glancing at himself in the mirror, he could imagine me standing there” with Me highlighted in bold font. 

Focus on the passage where Norma explains the relationship between her and Roy. In your own words, explain how Roy’s ‘alter-ego’ came to be, and why Mary has tolerated it. Roy has dressed as Norma for many years, of his own volition. 

The whole story took place during World War. Mary had tolerated with Roy’s alter-ego because the house is a broken place. Her daughter died in a car accident, her husband was never revealed. We can assume that he either died in the war or they were divorced. For Mary, going through so much, she might not even want to mention why Roy kept Norma’s clothes in the wardrobe as she was going through so much herself.  

• Page 266-267, “Mary must have been aware of the clothes box, knowing what was inside it, but she never mentioned it. Nothing about the whole matter was ever properly discussed.”  
• Page 266, “It is hard for any boy to shut the wardrobe door on his little sister” 

Can you explain why this incident with the policemen is so traumatic?

He had to relive his trauma of Norma’s death when the policemen came to his house to announce Norma’s death.

Graham Rawle has been criticized for revealing the true identity of Norma so explicitly at this point in the novel. Do you think he was right to do so? 

He wanted the readers to explicitly get the message clearly. So, by including the horrible scene, the readers will imagine the scene and will empathize with what Roy is going through, especially when the whole story is narrated by the unreliable character — Norma.

• If the police are representative of law, order, and authority, what does their behavior suggest about society’s attitudes to gender? 

It can mean that the laws and authorities are strongly against men who cross-dress as women. They are humiliated by the society and their identities were pressed down. 

• Page 272, “He circled Roy’s mouth several times, like something in the classified section of the police gazette that had caught his attention” 
• Page 272, “The humiliation had forever stripped him of all dignity.” 

Discuss how the language features, both written and visual, aim to persuade readers of this advertisement to think and behave. 

This advertisement is published in a US newspaper around September 1996 to persuade male readers to buy books that will help them attract women and get their attention. The idea of the text is very clear as there is a huge title, “How to attract women without even trying!”, all written in capital letters and bold font. This text aims to target the male audience especially passive males who are afraid of talking to women and taking the initial steps to talk to women. However, as the advert is trying to persuade the readers, it also displayed the generalization of the women in the 90s and how they are being portrayed and described as in advertisements both though lexical and visual. 

The goal of the text is based on the impression that males seek attention from women, targeting a large amount males who do not have their significant others, and assuring that they will have them when they buy their book and attracting a women ‘has never been easier’. The advert narrowed the main targeted audience by dividing into two types of men — ‘aggressive’ and ‘passive’. Men, as we all know, are ‘aggressive’ by nature and they consider themselves to be ‘aggressive’, manly or full of confidence while ‘passive’ men are naturally due to a lack of confidence and insecurity within themselves. However, what this advert did was they played on the lack of self-confidence and gave off the idea that it is the ‘passive’ men who have the upper hand, as seen in the text, ‘aggressive men is simply a turn-off’. The text implied that the 90s women are ‘the most aggressive women ever’ and that is why ‘passive’ men are the best fit for them. Notice how they portrayed 90s women as ‘ballsy’, ‘assertive’ and ‘the most aggressive women ever’. Here, they are couraging ‘passive’ males to ‘be themselves’ and by buying their products and following their guidelines, they will succeed in seducing women without doing ‘absolutely nothing’. This not only attracts but also encourages the single passive male readers but on the other side, the ‘aggressive’ males began to worry about their behaviors because of that advertisement. 

The whole purpose of this advertisement is to persuade readers to buy the product they are trying to sell with convincing words such as the title. The entire text uses a convincing tone to the readers and trying to assure the readers about the benefits of buying their product. 

The title itself, ‘How to attract women without even trying’ — all in bold and capitalized, is made to catch the reader’s attention enough to skim through the article. In the text, the word ‘absolutely nothing’ is the only word that is written in all captions so that when the reader skim through the article, they will notice it clearly and quickly after the title. The purpose of the bullet points are to help the readers have a clear information about what one is trying to say in a short and clear way. Thus, on the right side of the page, there are short and succinct sentences with bullet points, giving the readers a glimpse of what the book might hold. The statements and questions starting ‘why’ and ‘how’ created a sense of order and make them appear more logical and rational. The whole body of the text is summarized with the slogan, ‘Order today — attract women tomorrow!’, promoting how fast it a male can attract girls if they order their product by putting ‘today’ and ‘tomorrow’ in parallel lines. However, at the bottom of the article, there is a sentence saying the order of the book will take ‘2-4 weeks for delivery’. 

There are other two adverts on the article as well, both written in bold and captions. Both of them are advertising books that have a similar purpose to serve — how to attract women. They started their headlines with ‘How to’ immediately catching the reader’s attention as soon as he or she picks up the text. The two texts use the name ‘Eric Weber’ along with the phrase ‘World famous author’ implying and convincing the reader that the book is written by a professional or an expert. At the end of the advert’s text, the price tag is revealed: ‘Only $23.95’. The adverb ‘only’ suggested that the reader is about to receive something great with only a little amount of money. However, it is also a strategy of the advertisement that the price is placed at the end of the text just to make the readers focus more on the context rather than the price. The idea of persuading the readers is also done through visual images in the advert as well. 

On the bottom of the text, there are two texts both talking about attracting women with an image attached to each of them. Both of the images portray a stereotypically attractive women, as considered in the 90s, with alluring eyes having eye contact with the camera and visually appealing bodies for the large amount of skin being exposed. This is to hopefully get the reader’s attention and to purchase their product. The same goes for the central image which uses both male and female. However, here, the male seems to be doing nothing while the female has her arms wrapped around the male with seductive eyes and attractive looks. 

The image perfectly aligns with the text written above the image, ‘Passive men’s guide to seduction’, where the man, who is doing nothing, is attracting the woman, who is attractive. This appeals to the readers and give them a sense of what it is going to be like when they buy the product. The lack of effort portrayed by the male also convinced that the book they are promoting is worth the cost. 

In conclusion, all the advertisements are released with a certain type of purpose and this one is no different.  The whole text has a nice conjunction between one another in convincing the readers to buy the products. Plus, it managed to do that in a single advertisement — short, simple and direct. The advertisement simply played on human insecurities and furthermore, It accomplished its goal by getting the readers’ attention.