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Literary passages · Question 275 of 305

What is the narrator's attitude to the speaker?

Question 275

HardOriginal question

‘Now, what I want is, Facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but Facts. Facts alone are wanted in life. Plant nothing else, and root out everything else. You can only form the minds of reasoning animals upon Facts: nothing else will ever be of any service to them. This is the principle on which I bring up my own children, and this is the principle on which I bring up these children. Stick to Facts, sir!’

The scene was a plain, bare, vault of a school-room, and the speaker’s square forefinger emphasized his observations by underscoring every sentence with a line on the schoolmaster’s sleeve. The emphasis was helped by the speaker’s square wall of a forehead, which had his eyebrows for its base. The emphasis was helped by the speaker’s voice, which was , dry, and . The emphasis was helped by the speaker’s hair, which bristled on the skirts of his bald head, a plantation of firs to keep the wind from its shining surface, all covered with knobs, like the crust of a plum pie, as if the head had scarcely warehouse-room for the hard facts stored inside. The speaker’s carriage, square coat, square legs, square shoulders,—nay, his very neckcloth, trained to take him by the throat with an unaccommodating grasp, like a stubborn fact, as it was,—all helped the emphasis.

‘In this life, we want nothing but Facts, sir; nothing but Facts!’

The speaker, and the schoolmaster, and the third grown person present, all backed a little, and swept with their eyes the inclined plane of little then and there arranged in order, ready to have imperial gallons of facts poured into them until they were full to the brim.

What is the narrator's attitude to the speaker?

Options for question 275

Show the answer and explanation
CorrectNot quiteAnswer B

Correct answer: B

Explanation

  1. The narrator repeats "The emphasis was helped by" five times and piles up comic details: a head with "scarcely warehouse-room for the hard facts stored inside".

  2. The exaggeration makes the speaker and his ideas look ridiculous.

Worth noting

The narrator is not afraid of him; the tone is amused and critical, not frightened.

Concept
Recognising satire
Typical time
50 s
Your time
—
The rule this testsThe writer's tone and purpose
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Ten questions from Literary passages, at your own pace.

Practise this chapter →

Ten questions from Literary passages, at your own pace.