Excerpt 10 Teacher’s version

problem

How to make Tom face reality?

Or the world’s a stage: stage directions defined by the negative to emphasize what is supposed to be omitted. (metatextuality)

The individual on the stage

Problem: between dream and reality.

2 parts

opposition between the author’s intervention materialized by italics (stage directions) .

and the dialogue below.

idea: looks like a play.

situation

a date

a place

characters presented as for a play

Characters

Naiveté or ingenuousness

Harry Brightman: formerly known as Dunkel... instable personality. funny, even tries to show Tom the bright side of life.(no physical disease, Harry introduces the Hotel Existence. we happen to know how Harry was physically.74

short sentences, and questions.

Tom Wood: and Nathan Glass Despite names referring to solid elements, let’s examine their personalities. Tom wants to know the end of the story.70

evolution of Nathan’s feelings Harry first suspicious even if he finds him funny. surprised at his telling the truth.

Tom is depressed,

emphasis on their different tastes, drinks and food, and finally they get on well.
In fact function: to emphasize their similarities instead.

narrator/ author

interesting confrontation a clean break with what has been done so far. The author is made visible by someone who speaks on his behalf, whose part is to report the author’s stage directions. He claims: “it is the author’s opinion” “ for that reason there will be no...”

vocab: “the above-mentioned” very administrative tone.

narrator/

puns/ wordplays

on the names: Poor Tom All alone 35 (making fun of him)

comic effects

even from first: Nathan’s clumsiness (spills the wine) instability of the characters despite their names.

irony

Tom is disgusted by our present society. hatred is around/ Politics Economics, greed, the maniacs of the Christian Right, the internet businessmen, capitalism. no alternative offered and indifference from the rich one towards the other half.

comparatives and superlatives

to show Tom he is rather lucky

the best 14, the youngest 15, as far as.. 16, the happiest 14

intertextuality

the Little Prince.

courage

function :

the courage to reject society..

where to go to?

“a place to live life on your own terms” 38 “ the inner refuge” 46 “ a place where a man goes to when life in the real world is no longer possible” 46 “introduction of the “Hotel Existence”.

childhood memories

where Harry was when he first thought of the Hotel Existence. passage from dream to reality... infusing some parts of dreams into reality.

the importance of the words on the radio.. the words his ears selected..

the effect of words, how they are transformed in a child’s mind: existence bigger than life. 63

Lexical field of disruption

lexical field of the military

what for?

during the war/ 51/ the American troops 52/ fortresses/ protect 54 blue uniforms brass doorknobs (title of the hotel: Remington Arms; the doors are revolving ones 55) looking for protection against unsafe times. refuge , retreat 68/ Escape 69

hotel: the promise of a better world 58/ opportunity/ chance “to live inside your dreams” why? no longer in a familiar place. (to evade the present world you need defamiliarization).

Harry dreamt of becoming a soldier when he was ten 74

existence

nearly antithetic because hotel is different from permanence and responsibility

- the phrase: hotel Existence

- the laws of existence (the words reverberated in his mind; existence bigger than life.

- existence does not belong to an individual, so even if you are not rich you have a share of it. 65

- Harry analysing his first Hotel existence: sentimentality, description of how he saw hotel existence at that time.

extrait 10 p 99-103 a night of eating and drinking

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