Questions for your assignment (choose one from the following questions and answer it with 250-300 words):
1. The subtitle of this story is "A Tale for Children." Why and how does this seem like an apt description? an inapt or ironic one?
2. How do the various characters interpret the winged man? How do they arrive at their interpretations? What might their interpretations reveal about them? about people and/or the process of interpretation in general?
3. Why do so many people at first come to see the winged man and later stop doing so? Why is Elisenda so relieved when he finally flies away? What insights into human behavior might be revealed here?
42 comments:
In my opinion, a number of people would like to support the new things. People were accustomed to accept new thing. As a proverb goes, you can’t teach the old dog new tricks. Many people went to see the winged man. At first, they get interested in that man, wondering how terrible he is and what is he looks like. Father Gonzaga, the local priest, tells the people that the old man is probably not an angel because he’s shabby and doesn’t speak Latin. Father Gonzaga decides to ask his bishop for guidance. Pilgrims come from all over to seek advice and healing from him.
The crowd was growing up at yard since “the angel” was placed at Elisenda’s home. Elisenda began to get tired of the sightseeing and she hope that he can disappeared by himself. At last, the angel was flying away. We are able to see human behavior revealed as the development of the story. First, you can observe that people will curious about the new thing, and you would like to discover it. That is the same thing about the entertainment news. We have read all newspaper that a number of gossips happened every day. Because the existent of the paparazzi can fulfills the desire of peep among mankind. Human beings would like to know everyone’s mystery; however, this curiosity hurts one’s image. At the last paragraph of the story, the winged man faded away alone, and Elisenda watches him disappear over the horizon. Flying in the air represents the disappointment.
I answered question no.3,thanks!
Answer to question 1:
During class you asked one of my classmates whether he thinks the old man with enormous wings is actually an angel or not. He answered no, explaining that angels don’t eat eggplant mush, something the old man seems to only accept as food; so, in conclusion, the old man is simply that, an old man. Upon hearing this, I thought “Huh? How would you know what an angel eats or doesn’t eat, when no living human-being has ever seen a real live angel before?” Because no one knows what an angel really is like, there is still possibility that the old man really is an angel. And maybe eggplants were originally from the sky, fallen on Earth because some angel-farmer dropped its seeds by accident. The author writes that the story is a tale for children meaning he wants us to read it in a child’s point of view－without bias or any stereotypes.
I think the title is a suitable description for us to remember not to be bound by what we know (or what we thought we know) and be open-minded to the things around us; just because we know about something doesn’t mean we understand everything about it. It is actually a bit ironic because the author is secretly telling us that we have lost our innocence, the ability to imagine and be curious about everything around us. The author suggests from the story that we should maintain the sense of learning new things, obtaining new knowledge.
Answer question 3:
The old man with enormous wings in people’s sight is just a special and strange creature. Facing a new thing, everyone usually express the curiosity on it. But later, their passions decrease gradually, they will not concern about it. In the story, the old man was put in the chicken coop to show to the neighbors. The character, Pelayo, was very poor, so he earned money by the old man. Someone who wanted to see the old man, and he or she should pay some fees. In my opinion, the behavior was very bad and shameful. He didn’t respect the old man at all. Although the old man was distinctive and said the words he couldn’t understand, he was a vivid life. The neighbors always gossiped about it, instead of stopping Pelayo to do this and help the old man. They just said some unsuitable reasons to explain the situation of the old man. From this, we could know that people was selfish and unfriendly. After, they let the old man inter their home. But the Pelayo’s wife, Elisenda, didn’t like the old man who in her house. She felt someone would invade in her home and lacked the safety of feeling. So, when the old man flied away, she relieved her heart.
People always see the surface of the event and satisfy their selfish and curiosity. We have to realized anyone’s situation and help them. Not just like watch a performance and applause. The behaviors are rude and impolite. Every creature which has a vivid life should be respected by people. No one can invade or exploit the right of exsistance.
My answer to question 3
At first, many people come to see the old man with enormous wings out of their curiosity, but the phenomenon quenches soon when the woman who has been changed into a spider comes to the town. The crowd is searching for something to entertain themselves, and they see the woman as a new kind of entertainment so they stop caring about the old man.
I think Elisenda relieves from the old man’s leaving because she is tired of seeing the dirty man and looking after him. Maybe she is happy that she can get money from the old man in the beginning. However, the people in the town are no longer interested in him; she can’t make money like she did before. She’s delighted with the result that she doesn’t need to worry about how to get rid of him. But in another way to view her relief, she may not be so bad like I thought. In the end of the story, Elisenda lets out a sigh of relief for herself and for him. Although she seems not sympathetic over the old man, is that possible she feels relieved because he is finally freed from the imprisonment? I think it’s possible and it reveals some human behavior here. The old man with enormous wings is just like our old family. We want to take care of them, but sometimes we may be sick of it. If we look after them, it will spend our time and money very much. Nevertheless, we can’t just ignore and abandon them because they are our family. Here, I can understand why Elisenda feels relieved for the old man. He doesn’t need to care about others’ dislike anymore, because he flies away, he escapes from everything disgusting.
1.The subtitle of this story is “A Tale for Children.” It means that this story would be like a fairy tale or a fable which is suitable for children. However, the story shows the bad side of human. I consider that is an ironic one.
In order to show the satire of the story, the author used the subtitle to present. In the story, Pelayo and Elisenda totally showed the cruelty of human. When they found the winged man, they felt curious and tried to realize what happen. So did the villagers. However, because of the gain of showing old man, they became rich and bored to the old man. It told readers that human would get rid of useless people. Although the author did not tell it directly, human’s reaction showed it. Besides, when there is no one would like to see the old man, the family felt relieved that the old man was no longer an annoyance in her life. This shows that the old man’s value is the difference of winged man and human.
In conclusion, the author narrated the story without any emotion but readers can realize what the author wants to say. The family which the old man stayed and the villagers represented the human nature. So the author tried to make some warnings for human.
1.The subtitle of this story is “A Tale for Children.” It means that this story would be like a fairy tale or a fable which is suitable for children. However, the story shows the bad side of human. I consider that is an ironic one.
In order to show the satire of the story, the author used the subtitle to present. In the story, Pelayo and Elisenda totally showed the cruelty of human. When they found the winged man, they felt curious and tried to realize what happen. So did the villagers. However, because of the gain of showing old man, they became rich and bored to the old man. It told readers that human would get rid of useless people. Although the author did not tell it directly, human’s reaction showed it. Besides, when there is no one would like to see the old man, the family felt relieved that the old man was no longer an annoyance in her life. This shows that the old man’s value is the difference of winged man and human.
In conclusion, the author narrated the story without any emotion but readers can realize what the author wants to say. The family which the old man stayed and the villagers represented the human nature. So the author tried to make some warnings for human.
My answer to question 3:
A. Because many people are curious about what a true angel would be like. They conjecture he is powerful and he must be different from others. Angel, like the envoy of god, he has a magic power, and so everybody thinks he could cure. But afterwards, nothing works. Children get better by themselves. And later people don’t like to see him is because: First, people are not easy to get admission to see him. Second, we could not learn anything from him, he is hard to understand. People like us, want to understand easy things rather than hard and complicated things, it’s human nature. And we can ask the spider woman question, so that we can learn her more. Third, we can examine the spider girl, which makes us think that her background is true and so vivid. Forth, she can tell others her story, and makes us feel it is so fantastic. And could also spur up our curiosity to know people that is different from us.
B. She thinks he is an eyesore, annoyed, and wants him to get away. Because she thinks she has earned enough money, also she can’t get any benefit from him. She is jest a selfish woman, she would , of course, feel relieved when a useless angle flies away.
C. Because people are sometimes realistic, we get benefit from others, but we would not thank for others. We take it for granted. Sometimes human is cruel, we just care about ourselves, we would seldom like to give a hand for people who we don’t know.
It is indeed special that this story has a subtitle. The writings we read the past few weeks, such as ‘the Jewelry,’ ’Roman Fever, ’Araby, ’Eveline, ‘Flowering Judas’ and etc., not only have no subtitle but the titles are short also. So is this a redundant or inapt description? What would be the implication the author put the subtitle there?
To the readers who are adults the subtitle "A Tale for Children" more or less makes people feel frivolous, and therefore inapt. But it would be an apt addition since the content is really a fairy tale; the author just describes the truth. Besides, the author may expect his readers to use a childlike attitude to enjoy reading the fictional story, having fun and feeling relaxed and cheerful with it.
But there may be other implication for this subtitle. Though it claims that it is a tale for children, the main readers will be adults. And actually most of the characters in the story are adults. These various characters try to interpret one phenomenon-- a very old man with enormous wings. Their different interpretations reveal different personalities, and some of the responses are even childish or maladroit, the priest for instance.
It seems we people are no different with the characters in the story while dealing with daily matters. At first people are curious about the winged man and later lose interest and distract attentions to other new events. And finally Elisenda even hates the winged man and feels relieved when he finally flies away. This variety and vicissitude of human mind seems no different with children. The author may hope to use the story to let adults to know human behaviors and learn a lesson. So there may be ironic implication with the subtitle of "A Tale for Children."
By Kent Lin
3.
Why people come to see the winged man but later they feel bored about him? We know people like the spider woman a lot. But, is the winged man so complicated that they can’t understand? I think “yes”. So the reason is clear. People want to know him very well. In other word, they are very curious about this monster. But as long as he can’t fulfill their wants, they treat him cruelly and badly. So I can say these people are totally blind to handle this supernatural event. What on earth does make them become so damn stupid? I think the Roman Catholic Church is responsible for these very indulgent people. I always hate the Roman Catholic Church because it let many believers commit a sin of fornication. These idol worshipers let people to worship Maria and the Saints. They hide the truth from the Bible and they distort the original facts of God, they adulterate Christianity with many pagan forms of ceremonies. They are antichrists, Satanists, and they are very selfish and snobbish. So the author has expressed this message.
Then, why Eli feels so relaxed instead of surprised when she just sees a very miracle happened? Well, it is easy to find the reason: for herself and for him. The guilty feeling! She has got much benefit from him, causes his suffering. And as long as she can’t handle him anymore, he has become the most fear in her mind. How merciful! The winged man goes without revenge on those people which the inside is more demonic than their real looks.
Finally, the subtitle “A Tale for Children” means that children are more lovely and innocent than grown-ups, except the ones of Taipei and the ones who watch garbage cartoons on the TV all day long.
I choose question 1:
Why the author gave the subtitle “A tale for children”? I think he is going to tell us that all the mankind just like the child, no matter how old we are. The child give us the impression about purity and unenlightened. On the secret side, the author satirizes the human being are ignorant and benighted.
All people in the tale thought that the old man was an angel because of one reason－he had the wings. The angel has the wings too. This given impression made them blind. And their neighbor who was thought as intellectual in their whole village, gave the affirmation that the old man was exact an angel. This makes people more approve it. But it is ‘’follow blindly’’. People all think that the expert said is all right and never suspect it. The old man only have the pair of wings, there are not another reason to prove that he is an angel.
I think the author gives this subtitle is ironic. He is telling us that we are arrogant about our knowledge. The stereotype make we get ignorant. Something we suppose that is right it may probably be wrong. Everything we have learned maybe is incorrect. (time passed by or space changed) All we should do is to keep purity like kids for everything.
I want to answer the question 3.
First, because of the woman who has been changed into a spider for having disobeyed her parents. The admission is less than that old man and you can ask her almost everything about herself. So people begin to loss interest in that old man.
Second, Elisenda thinks that she is finally to get rid of him, to put down a burden and she just like to be free. But I think she also please that old man finally can fly away and goes back to the place where he comes from.
Third, Elisenda, this person reveals the real face of human beings. When people meet this kind of thing (like this old man), at the beginning, they will shock and want to get rid of it. But sometimes they will sympathize with it. What a conflicting psychology! On the other hand, as soon as people find something to be profitable, just want to use it to satisfy their desire. When it doesn’t have any worth, they will start to think this thing just a burden that want to get rid of it as soon as possible, and regard it as an obstacle that shouldn’t appear in his/her life. This is deep heart of human’s greedy psychology, in another word, is selfish. The character, Elisenda, just reflects the human nature.
COMMENT BY AMY SUN
Answer to the question 3:
At first, people are all curious about the old man, wondering who he is and where he’s from. Unlike the typical image of an angel, the old man is old and dirty. Actually, He is more like a bagger. Some make a guess that he comes for children. Some just think he is an angel who is punished but luckily runs away. It is too many mysteries upon the old man that people want to have a glimpse of him. To satisfy curiosity, people therefore come to see him. However, people gradually feel nothing fresh about the old winged man because they can learn or know nothing about him. And then there is something more interesting than him showing up. The spider woman catches everyone’s eyes because she’s good at speaking and she has moral lesson for those people. The above is the reason why I think people at first come to see the man but later stop doing so.
For Elisenda, the winged man is just a means to earn money. When people show no interest in the old man, she has no more reason to keep him stay in her house. She wants to get rid of him but how? Throw him away? I think that’s why Elisenda feels so relieved when the winged man flys away. She doesn’t have to worry about him anymore.
In the story, we can see many dark sides of human heart. People are selfish, greed and vulgar. They deny the winged man because of his outer appearance. To make money, people do anything without caring about other’s feeling. Once there is something useless, they cast it away. And, people like to cater to vulgar things. At the end of the story, the winged man flys away. He might probably go searching for another new world instead the one makes him disappointed.
At first, people are curious but afraid of the winged man who is different from them.
After a while, they find it boring about the man. And a spider girl comes to the village , she brings a more dramatic story than the winged man does. People are attractive by the spider girl’s story because it has a moral warming. They show no interest at the winged man, who speaks a foreign language and just does nothing but walking around in the house.
Elisenda feel so relieved when the winged man finally flies from her house. At first, they use the winged man for earning money. But, after the winged man is not popular at all, it is uncomfortable to live with someone she does not know anything about, even just a normal person. And then it tortures them. The winged man becomes a burden to them. They may want to just send him away but do not know how to do exactly and most important of all, they are still afraid of this winged man, a man full of riddle. So, when the winged man flies away, she just feels relieved for ridding of a burden.
The behavior in the article reveals humens’ reflect of seeing a new thing. Some think they can benefit from him, some think he is the angle, and others are curious about him. It also shows people’s greed. They want to get some advantages from the winged man, but after no one wants to see him, they think he is a trouble and want to get rid of him.
Answer to question 3:People are always curious about everything, so they will want to see when they hear of angels. At the beginning, the neighbor just knew that a flesh-and-blood angel was held captive in Pelayo’s house. After Father Gonzaga came, the news was spread rapidly. They wanted to take a glance to the angel and hope the angel could cure their diseases. But they got the strange consequences. And Father Gonzaga had said that the angel maybe be a devil although he has wings. Generally, people didn’t want to came here to see him. Elisenda felt relieved because she sew the angel can manage to gain altitude. In addition, the angel went dragging when kid went to school and he seemed to show a lot of places at the same time. This made Elisenda
felt unhinged and exasperated. In winter, the couple were afraid of seeing the angel dead. They were alarmed because they didn’t know how to do if the angel were dead in their home. They didn’t want to live in a nervous life because of him. That is why Elisenda felt relieved. When the couple’s house were famous for the angel, the couple used that to make money by paying feet for admission. This revealed them were scrooge. And people used a lot of ways to make him rise, liking throwing stones, and burning his side with an iron. It revealed they were selfish. They hurt him just for wanting to see him standing. In the end, Elisenda watched no longer possible for her to see the angel because he was no longer an annoyance in her life. It also revealed she had a sense of being lost and lonely. After all, they had lived together in a period of time.
People come curious about the old man. They think he is an angel who can heal them. Some of them come to get some help; some of them just come to see the old man and have fun. They all want to know what this strange creature exactly is. Unfortunately, the old man doesn’t react much. He actually tends to ignore people. Even if people pluck his feathers and throw stones at him, he just moves a little and then does no more action. People feel like bored and confused. They stop to visit the old man as soon as a more interesting person (spider woman) comes. The woman speaks. She talks about her miserable story which grabs people’s attention.
Elisenda thinks the old man as an annoying burden although the old man let her make some money owing to the large amount of visitors. She leaves the old man at home, but doesn’t take good care of him. When the old man flies away, Elisenda feels relieved. It’s like a bothering thing forever disappears.
I think that the insights into human behavior are like something which seems usual in life suddenly be gone forever. It might make you relieved because lesser things are around you. You might don’t have too much feeling as a result of the thing isn’t too important to you. But a kind of inanity will emerge. You’ll miss what you lose. You’ll finally be a little bit sad, and maybe want to get back the thing you lose. You’ll find out that it’s hardly possible. And you may have regrets after seeing through the whole incident.
I'd like to answer question 1.
I think that the subtitle of this story, A Tale for Children, is an ironic description. Children always dare to try new things due to their curiosity and innocence. They don’t know what is dangerous before they have tried or been told. In the contrast, grow-ups have more experience, so they would be more careful to protect themselves against danger. Strange things usually make people scare, and I think there are two reactions when people scare. One is that people would just run away. The other is that people would get rid of or start to attack that because they are afraid that it might harm them. The old man with enormous wings is so weird that people are afraid of it and thus treat him as a circus animal. As a result, I think that the subtitle of this story, A Tale for Children, is an ironic description. Maybe the author wants to remind us that we all grew up from children. We all have the naïve thoughts, but we tend to ignore that. That is because we would like to protect ourselves first. Children are kind and they would be interested to listen to the story from the old man. If everyone in the world is willing to take off their guard, to be like child, to embrace but not deny new things, the world would be better.
In the beginning, everyone was curious about the winged man. We always are curious about the new things. When we heard something new, we may want to go to see whether it is true. But when the new things appear that we want to know what happen. In the story, people were curious about whether the winged man is angel or not. Until the woman who has changed into spider comes the town. People start to shift their attention from the winged man to the woman who has changed into spider. So when the woman who had changed into spider appears that people started lose their interesting of the winged man.
I thought that Elisenda thinks that finally get rid of the trouble. When the winged man lives in Elisenda’s house, he can earn some money for Elisenda. I thought that the reason why Elisenda is relieved when the winged man is flying away is that the winged man had earned enough money for Elisenda. And the winged man has no value of exploitation. I thought that Elisenda just a selfish woman. When she get the value of exploitation that she can get rid of the trouble.
People are realistic. When we want to do something, we always hope that we can get some benefit from it. We always hope that we can get benefits and help from others. I thought that we all like Elisenda. The story revealed the true insight of our life. Realistic, greedy both are human behavior be revealed in the story. It is the story, but sometimes it is also describe our life.
1.I think it is because that a lot of stories describe an angel in almost the same way that an angel is a person has a warm smile, a pair of wings, and always wears completely white clothes. As a result, this kind of stereotype has been formed deeply in our hearts since we were the children. Therefore, when the author describes the “angel” is an old man and even dresses like a rag picker in the story, I know that the subtitle is an apt description in the ironic way. I think the reason that he writes the subtitle is to have impact on and to challenge what the children think of the angels for a long time.
I think that he also wants to tell the children that not everyone who has wings is an angel; he or she may just the different spies from human. Therefore, there are many things unknown in this world and many different opinions from you even you are looking at the same thing just like the people in the story. As for the spider girl in the story, I think that the author just wants to warn the children that they should listen to what their parents say, or they might become the spider children. Because he wants to make the children easily understand the story, he writes this story with the simple words. To sum up, I like this story for this story is easy to know and I think it’s a cute story.
3.I think the subtitle of this story is ironic. Children are always associated with pure, innocence, imaginative, creative and open-minded. In the contrast, adults have been socialized for a period of time. As we know, there are many evil things in our society. You have to be crafty in dealing with someone or something you meet because the society is full of danger. For children, everything is wonderful. They are pure and innocent so that they consider everything they saw as simple. They can’t understand anything complicated. However, in this story, it contains violence and symbolism that children can’t understand. It’s clear that the author used the subtitle “A Tale for Children” as a kind of satire. There is a lot of symbolism used in the story which is too complicated for a child to grasp and comprehend. Children may consider this story as a mysterious story about an old man, who was simply an angel, and they won’t understand the real ironic meaning behind the story, but adults will.
To sum up, I think the reason García Márquez used the subtitle is that he wanted to teach children a lesson with simple and straightforward storytelling. At the same time, it’s also a kind of satire that only adults can understand the real meaning behind the story.
Question No.3:
I think the reason why people abandoned the old man and turned to the spider woman are because people are always interested in news things and the differences between these two characters. At first, Pelayo and Elisenda use the old man to earn their fortunes; lots of people came to see him because he is new and mysterious to the crowd. Their attention has been distracted to the spider woman who tells her sorrowful and morally story to others. People no longer care about the old man, and now, they all like the spider woman. Spider woman tells great stories and teaches people lessons, but the old man is opposite form her. He speaks a different language that they can interpret, he doesn’t do anything just sits there all day long, and at last they have found out that he is just a boring old man. (Despite the fact that no one knows what is his true identity) I think it’s quite a sad thing that people were enchanted over you at first and throw you aside at last.
Elisenda was relieved because to her, the old man is a burden for their family. She has been annoyed by the old man day by day, although she thinks that killing him is not a good idea, but kept him in the house was intolerable, too. She is glad that the old man had finally gone away so that she doesn’t have to worry about him anymore. In my opinion, I think that reveals what human are like when they meet people, stuff, or an event when they don’t want to. Take me for example, if I were the couple, I would send the old man away (I won’t kill him or make money out of him, it’s immoral to do) they tried to get advantage for it at first, and then throw them away after.
Linda Hsu 410002019
Answer to question 3:
At first, people were interested in the old man. They wanted to figure out what angel look like and where did he come from. However, this old man looked very shabby and did not look like an angel. He even could not speak their language. People tried to talk to him and threw something to him. The old man seldom had any reaction to people. Obviously, this old man could not entertain those people. By contrast, the spider girl was more attractive than the old man. She not only changed into a spider, but also she could talk to people. She even could tell her sad story to people by herself. People liked these kinds of strange things. So, they would rather to see the spider girl. At least, she could entertain them.
In the beginning, Pelayo and Elisanda were scared by the old man. They used him to make money. However, many people came to see him, it caused a lot of troubles to them. They began to get tired to live with the old man, especially Elisenda. She thought the old man always appear in so many place in a same time, it drove her crazy. So, she was so relieved when the old man finally flies away.
People are interested in new things; they do not care about the truth. If they do not interest in this thing, they would not try hard to figure it out. If I were Elisenda or Pelayo, I would treat the old man well. I will try hard to understand his story.
I think that in the beginning people went to see the winged man is because of curiosity and the winged man seemed patient and not lively; however, one day someone bullied him with a brutal way and he finally resisted and had an emotion so the crowded dissolved, I considered that maybe because they were scared him and they ran out of the sense of novelty. And why Elisenda is so relieved? I n my opinion, perhaps Elisenda thought that she uploaded the burden and she would not be worried about worried about dealing with his corpse. From the morality aspect, maybe Elisenda took pity on the winged man and she hoped that he had a freedom life. In here, I think that even if the human being sometimes is very evil, it still has the human nature. According to this topic, I think of the Les Misérables which leading role was a bad guy at first, but after he received the pastor’s move, he is not only a successful philanthropist but also he forgave his enemy. Another example is recently we discuss warmly that whether should we abolish the death penalty because some people consider that the one who had committed crimes, and they know they will die after the trial, it is said that they often have made a self-examination and they wish to have another chance to turn over a new leaf. Everyone has evil thoughts because we are often influenced by our surroundings so we probably hurt someone intentionally. If you had such experience, not to repeat a previous mistake and think twice before doing everything.
People are attracted by the winged man at first. It is curiosity that gathered so many people there. What a strange thing about a man with wings! It makes people come up with lots of guesses, having different feelings and do their explanations about the old man. Yet, the woman who had been changed into a spider is much weirder than the man with wings. Because of interactions that she would do with the crowd and the lesson also stimulating people to deep thought , she quickly won their attention.
The leave of the winged man made Elisenda relieved. Since the old man appears, she has viewed the old man as a monster and even a troublesome thing for a long time. Gradually, he became a heavy burden for the family. No one treats him as an angel or shows any respect on an old man. When he flies away, it means she can get rid of this uncomfortable creature. Her “rich life” can be seemed perfect!
The crowd just come to the courtyard and search for something interesting. Though, Elisenda is sick of it, she still obtains benefits from it. So we can find the lack of sympathy and indifference among those people. Humans only get the thing what they look for. One day, when it becomes useless which means it is time for abandon it!
Answer for question number three:
There are so many people come to see the old man because the wise neighbor woman said that he is an angel. As she is the one who knew everything about life and death in the town, the people would think that she is right and without suspicion. The news about this winged man spread so quickly. People want to get the idea of how an angel lives, and some want to heal from their disease. Although the old man’s wings may be dirty, bedraggled, and bare, they are still magical enough to attract crowds of pilgrims and sightseers, motivated partly by faith but also to see him perform miracles, those physical evidence that their faith is justified. However, people later stop doing so because there is a traveling show arrived. The spider girl provides attention to each and every person that wants it; she talks and eats, she gives lessons to those who need it that contrasts sharply with the obscurity of the old man’s existence and purpose. The spider woman is easier to understand and even pity. At the end, Elisenda is so relieved when he finally flew away. She thought that the old man is a burden, and at last became very awful. She is more focused on keeping her kitchen and living room angel-free than on considering the odd beauty of her unwelcome guest. The story examines the human response to those who are weak, dependent, and different. There are moments of striking cruelty and callousness throughout the story.
Kendrick:
I would like to talk about question NO.3.
I think people usually get interested in new things. When they first see the old winged man, they all want to know who he is or even what it is. People all have never seen an angel, so they really want to know what it is like. But later, they realize the old man is just “an old man”, and they cannot understand want the old man is talking about. People gradually feel nothing fresh about the old man because they cannot learn or know anything about him. Different from the old man, the spider woman catches everyone’s eyes because she’s good at speaking and she has moral lesson for those people. People are attractive by the spider woman’s story, and they gradually forget the old man.
For Elisenda, at first, she thinks that she can earn a lot of money from the old man. But after she finds out that the old man just cannot do anything, he just becomes total garbage to her. She gradually feels tired to take care of him and wants to get rid of him. So when the old man finally flies away, she feels relieved. She thinks that she no longer has to take care of him. It is human natural, we always what to can get some benefits when we do something. We always hope that we can get benefits and help from other people, and if someone cannot fill our want, we may gradually dislike him or her and want to get rid of him or her.
The story revealed that people are usually realistic and selfish. This is an important thing we should take in our mind.
Answer to question NO.3:
At first, people were surprised to the image of this angel. Due to curiosity people are willing to line up to see him. After a while, the spider shows up and replaces the old man. Compare to haughty angel, spider girl has more interactive with audience, and her story also has positive influences on people. I think it is human nature that people apt to prefer new things to old ones.
Pelayo and Elisenda view old man as cash cow and make a huge profit from him. Once townspeople are not interested in old man anymore, that is, he loses his function of making money. Actually, he not only becomes a burden but also cause mental torture to Pelayo’s family. Even though, we all know that they can’t improve their lifestyle without the old man. Of course, when Elisenda sees old man flying away, which means she finally get rid of this nightmare.
In this story. We can easily tell from people’s narrow-mindedness and greed. When people are face something different from us, we always concern with ourselves and then come up with prejudices and suspicion. For example, townspeople treats old man as circus animal, some people even ask him to cure their disease. Father Gonzaga tests his angel identity in various ways. The wise neighbor always provides useless suggestions. This show that people fail to look though something’s cover and into what it really is. I think this society should respect individual diversity instead of requiring everyone to meet social expectation. Otherwise, there is no one like Steve Jobs, such an awesome and extraordinary person.
Answer to question one.
Children are totally different from adults. They don’t have stereotype to others, and always keep imagination to the colorful world. When they contact new things or new people, they would be curious of them and want to understand them. However, people in this story have stereotype and use a narrow view to see the old man. Most of them think angle is a person with beautiful and white wings, even if they never see the real angle. Moreover, we can see many vulgarians in this story. They are arrogant and have ridiculous criticism to the old man. When they found the old man is boring and don’t have any special capability, they bully him and finally ignore him.
I think the reason that author writes the subtitle is to tell children what the real society looks like.
Of course the subtitle of this story is an ironic one. The author wants to remind us that we should have sympathetic understanding to things and people which surround us. After reading this story, I have a notion. In the real life, as we grow up, we would gradually become vulgar unconsciously. When somebody conscious the fact and don’t sink into the trend, he or she would be very lonely and lack strength. Through the literary, we can reflect on ourselves and improve our attitude to the world.
Answer to question No.3: I. As far as I am concerned, I think people will choose the simple and absolute things than something which is complicated and mysterious. In the story, the spider woman symbolized the new and simple thing while the old man with enormous wings symbolize the old and complicated thing. At first, the old man attracted a lot of people to see and express the curiousity on him. But later, since the old man conldn't have some conversations with the crowds because their languages are relatively different. The old man lost the attention from the crowds while the spider woman gradually accepted by the crowds sonce the old man was hard to approach and understand but the spider woman wasn't. II. I think Elisenda feel relieved from the old man's leaving because she is tired of seeing the dirty man and looking after him. In the beginning, she might think that the old man could earn a large amount of fortunes for them. But later. things go a big change, the old just like a guest in their house withont need to pay anything but they should provide him with food and the place to live. III. Human is greedy, taking some benefits from others without any appreciations. We take it for granted. We always consider the old things as our burden. On TV news, we can easy to see people abandon thier elder parents. Just because their costs are expensive? We always care about ourselves but seldom think others' feeling.
Nick:
Answer to question 3,
At first, people came to see the winged man because of their curiosity. They haven’t seen a so-called angel in person, so they rushed and flocked to Pelayo’s house. However, to their disappointment, the winged man didn’t meet their expectation to the image of angel. Meanwhile, here came a much more weird creature spider woman, who told a vivid and blood and flesh story of her own and warned people to be obedient; otherwise, they would be punished and become like her. Compared to the winged man, the spider woman was able to speak, to tell her story so that people gradually lost the curiosity toward him and stopped coming to see him.
Initially, Elisenda and Pelayo wanted to let go of him because of their child’s recovery. Once they found they can exploit him to make money, they locked him up. Latter, they lived with the winged man, and he used to goof around in their house, which made Elisenda annoying, for it seems that the winged man copied himself so many ones that stalked in their house at the same time. As the case stands, Elisenda felt relieved when the winged man flied away.
As Gabriel García Márquez wrote at the very beginning of the story, this is a tale for children; the story of course has meaningful way. Children are pure and naïve, so they are extremely different from socialized human beings. Socialized people always viewed others with their own narrow minded thoughts, as characters in the story. The way they checked whether the winged man was an angel or not is by speaking Latin to him and other fixed ways. Human beings always imposed their ideas and thoughts upon other people. Gabriel García Márquez wrote in this way because he wanted to manifest the contrast on purpose. All in all, this is a educational and inspiring story.
Shawn said...
I choose to answer the question number 3.
In my opinion, I think when people first see the old man, they feel shock and think him as a strange creature with the broken body and the huge wings, however, the people soon not be afraid of him but to tease him as a circus animal, and they start to make fun of him, throw food to him but the old man does nothing and sit quietly inside his cage just like a dead thing, and finally the old man express his anger with waving his wings and this action makes strong wind and shocks the people away, and after this, people no longer come close to him and go to see another creature, which its ticket is cheaper than him, the girl with spider shape body
The story goes on, the weather changes into cold in the winter, and the old man acts as if he is going to die, sitting lonely in the yard and doing nothing. Finally, the winter passes by and the weather turns warmer and warmer and the old man amazingly recovers his vitality. After this, the old man waves his wings and starts to fly into the sky, finally, he flies away.
Answer for question 3:
The old man with enormous wings fell down on Pelayo and Elisenda’s yard. In the beginning, they considered that was a bad omen, although their neighborhood said that the old man is an angel, they still put him in the chicken cage, and treated him like an animal. Then, Pelayo and Elisenda found that the old man could make money for them, because all people are curious to new things. But, people found that the old man just a human with enormous wings, and he could not do anything special. Later, there appeared a woman that became a huge spider because of doing bad things, “she” could told her own experience.
Elisenda watched no longer possible for her to see the angel because he was no longer an annoyance in her life. It also revealed she had a sense of being lost and lonely. After all, they had lived together in a period of time.
The crowd just come to the courtyard and search for something interesting. Though, Elisenda is sick of it, she still obtains benefits from it. So we can find the lack of sympathy and indifference among those people. Humans only get the thing what they look for.
As far as most of people concerned, the new one is the better one, still less the really new and strange things. When people heard that there was a winged man fell down from somewhere, it is really an unusual event. To satisfy their sense of curiosity , coming to see the man is consequential for those “common people”. However, as soon as another strange event showed up, the spider woman who could communicate with people, the winged man was forgotten by people in a few days. Although I don’t think the spider woman is more special than the old man, I still can understand why people preferred to see the woman. If I were one of them, I must have a lot of questions wanted to ask the exotic person. Yet, according to the context, I realized that the old man couldn’t talk to other people, because his speaking is out of the contemporary. People couldn’t find the answer from this guy, so they changed their mind to talk to another who can really give them a “normal” answer. We can know people in this story didn’t want to close the man who completely different from them. Just like people in our world can’t accept a new thing or item which is personal independence of conduct. Everyone wants to be same with others. Copying the dressing way from popular magazine, cutting the same style of hair from TV programs and changing the appearance by operation just because everyone thinks the double-fold eyelid is beautiful. How fool and boring this situation is.
1. The subtitle of this story is "A Tale for Children." Why and how does this seem like an apt description? an inapt or ironic one?
2. How do the various characters interpret the winged man? How do they arrive at their interpretations? What might their interpretations reveal about them? about people and/or the process of interpretation in general?
3. Why do so many people at first come to see the winged man and later stop doing so? Why is Elisenda so relieved when he finally flies away? What insights into human behavior might be revealed here?
Answer the first question. In my opinion, this story full of ironic. Although angels live in the tale, the angel in this story is a dying old man. Angel is a kind of holly massager, but the old man was treated as a circus lion, even worse than a lion. Few food and water, terrible staying and bad attitude from audience, these kind of awful environments make the reader feel more sympathy for the old man.
First is the attitude from Pelayo. When he saw the old man at first sight, he has showed his impatient and without sympathy. This is one kind of human’s reverse side. Then, he put the old man in a hen house. Was this a good way to treat an old, bloody, and looked without dangerous old man? Less food and water, the old man was getting weak and terrible. Was this a well treat to a weak man? After this, he sold the ticket to the audiences. This showed the greedy from the humanity. After all, when the old man flied out, he looked unconcerned even with a little joy.
Second, the wise neighbor woman and the father Gonzaga showed the ignorance from the humanity. They didn’t know the truth, but they judge “What’s the old man?” by their thought. These seemed ridiculous.
Third, the blind crowd always followed the new things. No one take a little pity on the old man. Someone throw the little stone, someone trick him as an funny animal. When the spider women appeared, the crowd quickly change their curious to the new one. The new toy was here, why don’t we play it?
The story show many ugly side from humanity, and this is my opinion.
People are very curious about unknown things they don’t realize such as alien and phantom. The old man with strange wings can’t communicate with these people so they think he is not a normal creature thus they want to figure out what he is. Their behaviors are similar to ours that we also want to know about mystical aliens and phantoms. There’s another reason why so many people go to see this old man. Because Pelayo’s neighbor says that the old man with wings is an angel from heaven for helping child. As the neighbor woman said, Pelayo’s child recovered from a fever on the second day after the old man came. They might think that the old man probably is an angel that he could rescue any disease. So those pilgrims also include many people who have strange disease. However, many people just tricked with this old poor angel even tossed to him. When the spider woman appears, people disregard the old man and go to see her because the fee to see the spider woman is lower than the fee to see old man. And people can communicate with this spider woman so they can satisfy their curiosity. In here, we can see human’s curiosity and how they treat a different creature. Usually, we may reject what is different to us and I think maybe it is because we afraid of it.
In my opinion, although Elisenda take care of this old man, she is still selfish. At first, she didn’t want to help the old man even wants to kill him. Pelayo and Elisenda became very rich through getting the fee from people. However, finally they don’t want to take care of him and want to get rid of the old man. The old man flies in her house and mess up everything. Elisenda became a rich woman so she thinks the old man is useless to her. Therefore, when the old man leaves, Elisenda feel relieved. From here, we can also see human’s selfish and how they get benefits from something they actually dislike.
I answered question 3, thanks.
In “A good man is hard to find”, paragraph 82. The old grandma screamed, ”you’re the misfit!” After she screamed, the Misfit would murder them.
In my opinion, the misfit appearing is a message from god. He is Hermes, who delivered the message from the god. The interaction between grandma and Misfit.. For Misfit, maybe grandma was the angel from the heaven. When Misfit killed grandma, I think there was something changed in his mind. If I was Misfit, I would shock by old grand ma. I believe that he was only shocked by grandma and shot her by his instinct. He was not seriously wanted to kill her. For grandma, she was afraid and wanted to survive. She may be out of her mind, so she recognized that Misfit was her son. This is my opinion.
It is quite motivated post for the readers. Applaud your work and keep sharing your information.
Assignment help
Post a Comment