Essay Questions

What deductions can you make about the Masseur’s mind-set from chapter one?

Naipaul writes, “LATER HE WAS TO BE famous and honoured throughout the South Caribbean; he was to be a hero of the people and, after that, a British representative at Lake Success. But when I first met him he was still a struggling masseur, at a time when masseurs were ten in a penny in Trinidad.” The masseur’s success is the upshot of his growth mind-set which empowers him to rise above his struggles as a masseur. Had he been resigned to his struggles, it would be impossible for him to achieve his heroic status.

Explain Ganesh’s reaction after viewing his father’s lifeless body using the psychoanalytic theory.

Naipaul elucidates, “He didn’t know what he thought or he felt but he didn’t want to cry and he left the room.” Although Ganesh is saddened by his father’s demise, he opts to suppress his anguish by holding his tears. The Repression makes him to contain the overwhelming agony he is weathering as a result of losing his father. Nonetheless, the lack of tears does not mean that Ganesh is not weeping internally.