Read the following extracts and answer the questions for ANY ONE of the given two (A) or (B):
(A) [Memories of Childhood] 'I cried aloud, shaking my head all the while until I felt the cold blades of the scissors against my neck, and heard them gnaw off one of my thick braids. Then I lost my spirit. Since the day I was taken from my mother, I had suffered extreme indignities. People had stared at me. I had been tossed about in the air like a wooden puppet. And now my long hair was shingled like a coward's! In my anguish, I moaned for my mother, but no one came to comfort me. Not a soul reasoned quietly with me, as my own mother used to do; for now I was only one of many little animals driven by a herder.'
(i) Complete the following suitably: 'Then I lost my spirit', indicates that the speaker _.
(ii) What does Zit Kala-Sa imply about the prejudice prevailing in society when she talks of having 'suffered extreme indignities'?
(iii) Why did Zit Kala-Sa yearn to be with her mother in her moment of anguish?
(iv) The tone of the narrator in the extract can be best described as (A) bitter and strong willed (B) detached and impersonal (C) pained and despairing (D) grateful and reflective.
OR
(B) [On the Face of It] Derry: But I'm not.... I'm not afraid [pause] people are afraid of me. Mr. Lamb: Why should that be? Derry: Everyone is. It doesn't matter who they are, or what they say, or how they look. How they pretend. I know. I can see. Mr. Lamb: See what? Derry: What they think? Mr. Lamb: What do they think, then? Derry: You think.... 'Here's a boy'. You look at me... and then you see my face and you think. That's bad. That's a terrible thing. 'That's the ugliest thing I ever saw.' You think, 'poor boy'. But I'm not. Not poor. Underneath, you are afraid. Anybody would be - I am. When I look in the mirror, and see it, I'm afraid of me. Mr. Lamb: No, not the whole of you. Not of you. Derry: Yes!
(i) Which emotion dominates Derry's dialogue in this extract? (A) superiority (B) shrewdness (C) vulnerability (D) indifference.
(ii) Complete the following suitably: According to Derry, the people put up a pretence when they see him because _.
(iii) Complete the following suitably: When Mr. Lamb says, 'No, not the whole of you. Not of you.' He means _. (A) Your face will get healed and your ideas about your appearance will change. (B) You are not just your face or your injury. That is not the sum total of who you are. (C) I am afraid of your face and your appearance. (D) You shouldn't look into the mirror so that you don't get the feeling of dejection.
(iv) State in one sentence: What advice will you give to the people who pretend to look away when they see Derry's face?
Read the following extracts and answer the questions for ANY ONE of the given two (A) or (B):
(A) [Memories of Childhood] 'I cried aloud, shaking my head all the while until I felt the cold blades of the scissors against my neck, and heard them gnaw off one of my thick braids. Then I lost my spirit. Since the day I was taken from my mother, I had suffered extreme indignities. People had stared at me. I had been tossed about in the air like a wooden puppet. And now my long hair was shingled like a coward's! In my anguish, I moaned for my mother, but no one came to comfort me. Not a soul reasoned quietly with me, as my own mother used to do; for now I was only one of many little animals driven by a herder.'
(i) Complete the following suitably: 'Then I lost my spirit', indicates that the speaker _.
(ii) What does Zit Kala-Sa imply about the prejudice prevailing in society when she talks of having 'suffered extreme indignities'?
(iii) Why did Zit Kala-Sa yearn to be with her mother in her moment of anguish?
(iv) The tone of the narrator in the extract can be best described as (A) bitter and strong willed (B) detached and impersonal (C) pained and despairing (D) grateful and reflective.
OR
(B) [On the Face of It] Derry: But I'm not.... I'm not afraid [pause] people are afraid of me. Mr. Lamb: Why should that be? Derry: Everyone is. It doesn't matter who they are, or what they say, or how they look. How they pretend. I know. I can see. Mr. Lamb: See what? Derry: What they think? Mr. Lamb: What do they think, then? Derry: You think.... 'Here's a boy'. You look at me... and then you see my face and you think. That's bad. That's a terrible thing. 'That's the ugliest thing I ever saw.' You think, 'poor boy'. But I'm not. Not poor. Underneath, you are afraid. Anybody would be - I am. When I look in the mirror, and see it, I'm afraid of me. Mr. Lamb: No, not the whole of you. Not of you. Derry: Yes!
(i) Which emotion dominates Derry's dialogue in this extract? (A) superiority (B) shrewdness (C) vulnerability (D) indifference.
(ii) Complete the following suitably: According to Derry, the people put up a pretence when they see him because _.
(iii) Complete the following suitably: When Mr. Lamb says, 'No, not the whole of you. Not of you.' He means _. (A) Your face will get healed and your ideas about your appearance will change. (B) You are not just your face or your injury. That is not the sum total of who you are. (C) I am afraid of your face and your appearance. (D) You shouldn't look into the mirror so that you don't get the feeling of dejection.
(iv) State in one sentence: What advice will you give to the people who pretend to look away when they see Derry's face?
Option (A) — Memories of Childhood by Zitkala-Sa
(i) 'Then I lost my spirit' indicates that the speaker stopped resisting and gave up her fight against having her hair forcibly cut, feeling completely broken, defeated and stripped of her identity and will to resist.
(ii) Through 'suffered extreme indignities', Zitkala-Sa implies that Native American children at the boarding school were treated with deep-rooted racial prejudice — stared at, handled roughly like objects, and denied basic dignity and individuality, revealing a systemic cultural bias that viewed them as inferior and in need of forced 'civilizing'.
(iii) Zitkala-Sa yearned for her mother because only her mother offered gentle, reasoned comfort and genuine emotional understanding; surrounded by strangers who reduced her to 'one of many little animals driven by a herder', she desperately needed the familiar tenderness and quiet reasoning her mother alone could provide.
(iv) Correct: (C) — pained and despairing; the extract conveys deep emotional suffering, helplessness and loss (crying, moaning, no comfort), not defiant bitterness, detachment, or gratitude.
Option (B) — On the Face of It by Susan Hill
(i) Correct: (C) — vulnerability; beneath Derry's claim of not being afraid lies deep insecurity and fear about how his disfigured face is perceived, and even fear of his own reflection.
(ii) According to Derry, people put up a pretence when they see him because they are secretly afraid and uncomfortable at the sight of his disfigured face, and their forced politeness/pity ('poor boy') is a mask for their own fear and discomfort rather than genuine acceptance.
(iii) Correct: (B) — 'You are not just your face or your injury. That is not the sum total of who you are'; Mr. Lamb reassures Derry that his identity and worth extend far beyond his physical appearance.
(iv) Advice to people who pretend to look away: they should interact with Derry naturally and openly, treating him as a complete individual rather than reducing him to his appearance, since genuine acceptance — not pity or avoidance — is what truly helps.
Marking Scheme
- 11 mark each for sub-parts (i)-(iv), totalling 4 marks for the chosen option (A) or (B) only.
- 2MCQ-style sub-parts ((iv) in option A; (i), (iii) in option B): full mark for the correct option letter only.
- 3Completion/short-answer sub-parts: full mark for a textually-grounded, interpretive answer that explains the underlying idea, not a verbatim repetition of the extract.
Hint
For Memories of Childhood, track the shift from resistance to broken submission and the dehumanising treatment described; for On the Face of It, track how Derry's bravado about 'not being afraid' actually masks deep vulnerability.
Quick Oral Answer
Memories of Childhood shows a child's despair and loss of will as she is stripped of her identity through forced haircutting at a boarding school, while On the Face of It reveals Derry's hidden vulnerability beneath his claim of fearlessness, which Mr. Lamb gently counters by reminding him that he is more than his face.
Analysis & Explanation
This case-based question tests close reading of an autobiographical prose extract or a play extract, examining tone, implied meaning and moral inference — students attempt only ONE of the two.
Context — Memories of Childhood (Zitkala-Sa): The essay recounts the forced assimilation of Native American children at American boarding schools, where cultural markers like long hair (a symbol of the child's identity and mourning tradition) were forcibly erased.
Context — On the Face of It (Susan Hill): The play follows Derry, a teenager with a disfigured face, and Mr. Lamb, an elderly man with an artificial leg, whose conversations challenge Derry's internalised belief that his appearance defines and isolates him.
Why the distractors fail (Memories of Childhood, iv): 'bitter and strong-willed' (A) contradicts 'I lost my spirit' (loss of will, not resolve); 'detached and impersonal' (B) misreads the deeply emotional, first-person anguish; 'grateful and reflective' (D) has no basis in a scene of trauma and abandonment.
Why the distractors fail (On the Face of It, i): superiority (A) and indifference (D) are the opposite of Derry's insecurity; shrewdness (B) misreads his emotional honesty as calculation.
Why the distractors fail (On the Face of It, iii): (A), (C), (D) all misinterpret Mr. Lamb's reassurance as being about physical healing, his own fear, or avoidance — whereas his actual point is philosophical: identity is not reducible to appearance.
Exam trap: for completion-type sub-parts, students often quote the extract verbatim instead of explaining the underlying emotion or implication, which does not satisfy the inferential demand of these questions.
Common Mistakes
- 1Attempting sub-parts from BOTH (A) and (B) instead of only the chosen option, which wastes time since only one is evaluated.
- 2Reading Zitkala-Sa's tone as simply 'angry/bitter' instead of recognising the specific despair and helplessness of 'losing her spirit'.
- 3Interpreting Derry's opening claim ('I'm not afraid') literally, missing that the extract's real point is that this denial itself reveals his underlying vulnerability.
Interesting Facts
Zitkala-Sa (also known as Gertrude Simmons Bonnin) later became a prominent Native American rights activist and co-founded the National Council of American Indians in 1926.
The forced haircutting of Native American children at boarding schools was a deliberate policy tool, since long hair held deep spiritual and cultural significance in many Native traditions, often linked to mourning or identity.
Susan Hill's 'On the Face of It' is frequently staged in schools specifically because both principal characters — Derry (facial disfigurement) and Mr. Lamb (an artificial leg) — model overcoming self-image issues tied to physical difference.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Why is the tone in Memories of Childhood 'pained and despairing' rather than 'bitter and strong-willed'?
Because the line 'Then I lost my spirit' explicitly signals defeat and loss of resolve, not strength of will; combined with her crying, moaning and receiving no comfort, the passage's emotional register is one of helpless anguish, making 'pained and despairing' the accurate description.
What is the central message of the On the Face of It extract?
That true acceptance of a person with a disfigurement or disability comes from recognising their whole identity beyond their appearance, as Mr. Lamb tells Derry — and that the fear and pretence others show is really about their own discomfort, not an objective truth about Derry's worth.