Name of Student: Rey-Anne Camille S.

Rodriguez ENG 213 World Literature

Professor: Ma. Elizabeth Medina Date: December 15, 2019

Questions:

1. She is awakened by an unfamiliar sound thinking there must be an intruder but realizes that it
was just the sound of creaking in the house. While she cannot return to sleep, she starts to tell
herself a bed time story. Hence, the importance of the first part is that to be essential to the entire
story as it arouses the sense of suspension to the reader wandering what would happen next and to
understand the main theme of the story.

2. The most distinctive character and the major theme of Goldimer’s writing were about apartheid
and the segregation which black people agonized from her country in South Africa. She depicts
in her story the environment which people were living in and it distinctively presents the racial
segregation which the migrants suffered; however, the setting is not clearly mentioned in the story.
The atmosphere is stressing in which there is a continuous stream of pressure and fear can be found
during the two parts of the story as it could be defined as a fearful, gloomy, and stressing
atmosphere. The different characters have several ironies and motives displayed throughout the
duration of the story and it is to be considered satirical, as the author satirizes the white class
supremacy and warns the readers of the dangerous outcomes of it. In addition, it satirizes the
apartheid system of segregation that made the community of small groups divided upon racial
basis. Gordimer gives a powerful message to the reader by visualizing how the apartheid could be
a destructive power for both white and black people. Throughout the story the reader can cite irony
in many situations. The first irony depicted in the story is when the writer refuses to write a story
for the children but she writes on a way at the end, as well as the title of the story itself is used
ironically as the readers once reading it, start to picture a happy ending as in the stereotypical
fairy tales. Another distinctive irony in the short story is what the family considers to be the
source of their security and happiness like the alarm system and the razor wire which turn to
hurt them at the first place as it causes the little boy’s death.
3. No. The death of the little boy depicts the disastrous outcome of the apartheid even for the white
people and the author uses it as a hint to indicate to more widespread problems as being detached
from the outside world and live in a continuous state of fear and distress. The time, place or race
of the people who live in the suburb and those who are prevented to enter is not mentioned in the
story. But apparently it is South Africa since the major theme of Gordimer’s works embrace
apartheid as being anti-apartheid activist. Gordimer depicts apartheid as a damaging force for both
whites and blacks, for instance, in the short story, she indicates to the bad circumstances of the
black as they were in lack of food and woks. Even more, they have been prevented to live in the
same areas of white people, unless if they worked in the suburb and that after being highly
recommended as in the case of the gardener in the short story and the housemaid which is
frequently described as “trusted” and “trustworthy.

The sign “YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED” is meant to deter potential thieves. The family starts
to insulate themselves from the world because of their fear of it. They have built this large gate
meant to protect themselves from the "threats" in the outside world and, in the process, the placard
on the gates reminds the outsider of the warning issued. The repetition of the placard and the
manner in which the story develops might have the warning issued to the family. At each step,
the family escalates their own fear and it seems as if each time, they are being warned that
eventually, the real fear is not the outside world. Rather, the real fear that has to be confronted is
their own sense of fear which is unrestrained. In this, the sign operates not to warn the outside
world, but rather to warn the family that eventually what is happening will not and cannot have
a happy ending or something fortuitous. In this, the ending of the short story is a brutal one,
concluding with the ending of "You Have Been Warned" in terms of how the ending was almost
a self- fulfilling prophecy.

4. The family in the short story at the very first are described to be happy with their properties; living
in a lovely suburb, loving each other and having a dog and cat. But the story shifts to explain that
riots and burglary are frequent in the suburb, as a sequence, the parents, especially the mother, is
over paranoid to increase their security system. This part of the story depicts the family’s conflict
between themselves and the outside world. As the unemployment rises and people seek for works,
the family becomes highly concerned about their security system and they shield themselves
behind high walls with their tops covered by razor wires, the electronic gate and a plaque on the
door with words read “YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED”, all these physical entities represent the
family’s conflict with the outside world as well as their concern about racial and social class.
Ironically, what they strive for is to protect themselves from danger leads to the most disastrous
 consequence, their son’s death, as he pretends to cross thorough the wire but bleeds heavily.
Accordingly, Gordimer shows that how detaching from the outside world and the life which is
driven by fear and mistrust can lead to our downfall rather than keeping us safe.

5. Fairytales take place outside of historical time or place: "Little Red Riding Hood," for example,
walks through a forest, but we don't know which forest or when. Also, the main character is
identified not by her name but by what she is wearing, and the grandmother is only identified
as Grandmother. Gordimer follows these elements of the fairytale genre in her short story. While
it clearly alludes to the situation in South Africa at the time, the story is set in no particular country,
city, or specific time period. The characters are likewise unnamed except generically as the
husband and wife and little boy, and though there are clearly two castes of people, race is never
mentioned. Even the name of the company that puts up the razor wire has a fairytale sound. As in
a traditional fairy tale, this technique universalizes Gordimer's tale, making the situation broadly
applicable. After a few opening sentences, the narrator introduces the traditional fear of the
outside world and the "witch" that are often part of fairy tales. For when they began to live
happily ever after, they were warned by that wise old witch, the husband's mother, not to take
on anyone off the street. Thus, as in fairy tales, there is a problem to be solved. The problem for
the family in Gordimer's tale is about how to protect their home from outsiders whom they do not
want to enter their neighborhood. Elements of fairy-tale that you can identify in the story are
ironical and satirical, mocking the genre. (1) The family seems to live in a magical “happily
ever after” setting (but it is only an illusion); (2) The character of the husband’s mother is
turned into a witch character (but who is wise); (3) The security firm that installs the razor
blades is called Dragon’s teeth, reminding us of the dragon characters from fairy-tales.

6. In the first eight paragraphs, the narrator provides a frame from her real life that offers her
rationale for telling the "fairy tale" that follows. In this opening, she experiences the fear that
someone is breaking into her home when she hears a mysterious creaking sound. She experiences
such fear that her heart pounds—until she realizes the creaking is from the house itself settling,
not an intruder. Because she can't sleep after this incident, she tells herself a story, which becomes
the story that follows. Her experience is important because it shows she understands what the
family in her story is going though and why they would want to have a high wall around their
house and top it with razor wire. At the same time, it shows her wisely reasoning through her fear
to come to the understanding that building a wall doesn't guarantee safety: we can be badly harmed
by the very things we use to make ourselves feel secure. The latter part of the story was denying
the part that “fairy tales educate the children.” In Once Upon a Time, the couple built their wall
 higher and higher, and the protection became stricter as well, and eventually, those protections
caused their son’s death. The story contained all the themes to be a fairy tale; however, the ending
was twisted and unexpected. There is a tragically ironic twist to this fairy tale, which certainly
does not end with everyone living "happily ever after."

7. The author told a bedtime story to ease her nerve. She used it as a way to release the children’s
uneasiness during their sleep, and a way for parents to educate their children the good and evil in
the world. “I couldn’t find a position in which my mind would let go of my body—release me to
sleep again. So, I began to tell myself a story, a bedtime story.” From this quote, we can see that
the author mentioned the point how bedtime story releases the children into their sleep.

8. (1) And then last night I woke up or rather was awakened without knowing what had roused me.
(2) I couldn’t find a position in which my mind would let go of my body—let me go to sleep again.
So, I began to tell myself a story; a bedtime story. (3) Then people who were not trusted
housemaids and gardeners hung around the suburb because they were unemployed. (4) But every
week there were more reports of break-ins: in daylight and the middle of the night, in the early
hours of the morning, and even in the lovely summer twilight. (5) The next day, workmen came
and put razor-blade coils around the walls of the house. (6) One evening, the mother read the
little boy to sleep with a fairy story from the book the wise old witch had given him at Christmas.
The next day he pretended to be the Prince who braves the thorns to enter the palace and kiss
the Sleeping Beauty back to life.

9. The introduction. Because it provides a frame story that explains why the narrator wrote the
fairy story that follows. She states that she has been approached about authoring a children's story
but has so far resisted. However, as she is lying in bed one night, she believes she hears an intruder.
She thinks about people who have been murdered recently, such as an old widower who was
knifed. Although she comes to realize that her home has not been invaded, the fear of burglary or
personal harm keeps her from sleeping. She recognizes from her own reactions how real the fear
of intruders is, and this leads to her write the fairy tale that follows. In this story, a family
experiences fears similar to her own. In order to feel safe, they therefore decide to increase the
obstacles to gaining entry to their home. They have razor wire added to the top of the high wall
surrounding their house. However, rather than keeping them safe, the razor wire harms them: their
young son gets tangled up in it. The narrator knows how potent the fears are of being harmed by
outsiders. She uses the story to work through her own fears and discovers that putting up more
walls between herself and others will not really make her safer.
10. First, they install electronic gates, then burglar bars and an alarm system but this is not enough
because the cat triggers the alarm thereby rendering its purpose ineffective. Then they build the
wall higher because the "unemployed" people are loitering and may even be able to climb over the
wall. The last paragraph reinforces what happens when the family tops the wall around their house
with razor wire. The desire to keep the family safe had the opposite consequence. It endangered
their boy, the love of their lives because as he crawls inside the coiled barbed wire, he "screamed
and struggled deeper into its tangle." We can infer that the parents would have to reconsider their
fears of the outside world. Their fears have essentially killed their son. This can be an inference
based on what is offered at the end of "Once Upon a Time."

11. (1) The wise old witch” is just an allusion to the witches of the fairy tales that give presents with
hidden dangers in them. (2) The cat is highly figurative, representing numerous things
throughout the tale. The cat acts as a foreboding symbol or a symbol simply of their fear.
The implied conflict is the conflict between perception and reality. Often times, our perception of
a threat is more dangerous than a threat itself, which is clearly outlined in the story.

12. Irrational fear and prejudice during the apartheid regime in South Africa. The story can be seen
as an allegory of real social issues related to racism and discrimination in that period of South
African history. The apartheid system which the South African black people suffered from nearly
for five decades starting from 1949 to1994. Apartheid was a systematic racial segregation against
black citizens of South Africa which caused the class distinction between whites and blacks.

13. The closing paragraph is where everything comes into realization. It is at this point where we
see the family's desire for perfection in the form of absolute security turn into disaster on
massive levels. The wall built to keep the outside world out becomes the height that the child as
"Prince Valiant" must scale in order to rescue the princess. The barbed wire and jagged edges on
the top of the wall end up ensnaring the boy, cutting him each time he moves and piercing through
the life of his body. In the end, the family's inability to make out their own screams of horror with
the blaring alarms in their home going off simultaneously are another reminder of how the family's
desire for perfection ends up yielding personal destruction. In the end, this paragraph results in
the reader fully understanding and comprehending how the thematic development of the desire
for perfection and totality leads to destruction and fragmentation of hopes and dreams.

14. No. Because the social setting is equally important in the short story as the transformations in
the physical setting reflect important aspects about it. Although the narrator does not mention it
directly, she depicts society during the apartheid regime in South Africa. The apartheid regime was
a system of political, economic and social segregation which separated whites from blacks and
favored the white population.