Presentation COMPLETE2

• Engels
• Middelbare school
• vwo
• Leerjaar 6

Theme: politics and history and their impact on life

Goals:

• The student can explain what is meant by "Partition" and the Naxalite movement 
• The student can show how politics and characters' lives are intertwined in the novel
• The student can express an opinion on characters' choices and support it with arguments and evidence from the novel

Activities:

• Background information: watch a film about 20th century history 
• Background information: read about Naxalbari and Naxalites
• Give your opinion: explain what you think of the brothers' response to the political events
• Tie it together: visualise the impact of political involvement on the lives of the characters 

VWO

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Naxalbari

Warm-Up

The Indian Part of the novel is set in
Tollygunge, an area in Calcutta (Kolkata),

West Bengal (see map), India, where the brothers grow up.

The recent past is visible in the neighbourhood. 

The next slide contains three quotes that show this. You will be asked to match each quote to the corresponding picture by dragging it to the correct yellow box.

They’d never set foot in the Tolly Club. Like most people in the vicinity, they’d passed by its wooden gate, its brick walls, hundreds of times. that closer to the clubhouse there was a swimming pool, stables, a tennis court. Restaurants where tea was poured from silver pots, special rooms for billiards and bridge. Gramophones playing music.

Though Partition had turned Muslims again into a minority, the names of so many streets were the legacy of Tipu’s displaced dynasty [...]

Still the mosque on the corner, a place of worship for those of a separate faith, oriented their daily comings and goings.

These days it was stagnant, lined with the settlements of Hindus who’d fled from Dhaka, from Rajshahi, from Chittagong. A displaced population that Calcutta accommodated but ignored. Since Partition, a decade ago, they had overwhelmed parts of Tollygunge, the way monsoon rain obscured the lowland.

Share your thoughts: do you know how these quotes are related to 20th century Indian history?

History - Background

• student watch and learn about colonialism, Partition, 1943 famine in Bengal, and  answer questions while watching.
  
• after watching they would have to explain : explain what is meant 
  what is meant by "Partition" in the 
  Bengal quote and "system replacement"
  in a quote from a conversation between
  Udayan and his father.

These days it was stagnant, lined with the settlements of Hindus who’d fled from Dhaka, from Rajshahi, from Chittagong. A displaced population that Calcutta accommodated but ignored. Since Partition, a decade ago, they had overwhelmed parts of Tollygunge, the way monsoon rain obscured the lowland.

"I’ve already lived through change in this country, their father said. I know what it takes for one system to replace another. Not you."

What do you know about Naxalbari, the peasants and what they were up against? And what were the Naxalites trying to achieve?

At night, after listening to the radio, Subhash and Udayan talked about what was unfolding. Secretly smoking after their parents had gone to bed, sitting at the study table, with an ashtray between them. Do you think it was worth it? Subhash asked. What the peasants did? Of course it was worth it. They rose up. They risked everything. People with nothing. People those in power do nothing to protect. But will it make a difference? What good are bows and arrows against a modern state? Udayan pressed his fingertips together, as if to clasp a few grains of rice. If you were born into that life, what would you do?

Read the fragment about Udayan and Subhash discussing events in far-away Naxalbari. What do YOU think?  Do you agree with Udayan or with Subhash? Was what the farmers did worth it? Explain your answer.

Share your answers in the Padlet. Click the link >

Link to the Padlet

Text

Udayan's involvement in the movement had enormous consequences. 

• He witnessed atrocities in the countryside. 
• He led a double life, hiding his political activities from his brother and parents, which led to his enstrangement from them. 
• He only trusted Gauri, but even towards her was not open.
• He was involved in preparations for a murder. 
• He lost his right hand, then he was killed.

What he did also had an enormous impact on his family and the consequences could be felt many years later. 

What were the consequences for Gauri, Shubhash and mother Mitra? What happened? How did this make them feel? 

You will be assigned a character. Consider: how did Udayan's death impact your character? Try to illustrate with examples from the novel.  Share your thoughts on the Padlet.

Link to the Padlet

END OF VWO PART

Theme: politics and secrecy and their impact on life

Goals:

• The student can explain what Durga Pujo is and relate it to a major event in the novel
• The student can explain whether and how the novel's structure influences its perception 
• The student can give examples of secrecy in the novel and how it affects the plot

Master

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Activities

• festival of Durga Pujo and death
  
• Naxalites - what do you recall?
• two brothers - different perspectives: compare
• secrecy and its consequences

Gauri's perspective

It was the week before Durga Pujo. The month of Ashvin, the first phase of the waxing moon [....]

They were arranged in a row. They stood close together, their shoulders touching. The gun was still trained on her father-in-law.

She heard a conch shell blowing, the ringing of a bell. The sounds carried in from another neighborhood. Somewhere, in some house or temple, someone was praying, giving offerings at the end of another day.

Subhash' perspective

He thought of Durga Pujo coming again to Calcutta. As he was first getting to know America, the absence of the holiday hadn’t mattered to him, but now he wanted to go home. The past two years, around this time, he’d received a battered parcel from his parents, containing gifts for him. Kurtas too thin to wear most of the time in Rhode Island, bars of sandalwood soap, some Darjeeling tea [....]

This year no parcel came from his family. Only a telegram. The message consisted of two sentences, lifeless, drifting at the top of a sea. Udayan killed. Come back if you can.

Why were Durga Pujo and Udayan's death linked?

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The Hindu festival of Durga Pujo is juxtaposed to Udayan's death. Is this significant for the story? If yes, why and how? Share your thoughts.

• documentary clip: director Mrinal Sen
• quotes from the book about the Naxalite movement
• share what you remember + opinion

What do you remember from what the novel says about the Naxalite movement?
What do you think of the Naxalite movement: what it wanted to achieve and how it tried to achieve it?

Link to Padlet - Group 1 (countryside)

Link to Padlet - Group 2 (Naxalites)

Link to Padlet

Link to the google document