episode 2

Episode 2 Tasks

Chapter 1
What is Anton’s attitude to the Assault in this chapter and why?
How does Anton remember the war?
What is his relationship like with his aunt and uncle?
How does he feel when the war is over and why?
What memories does he have of the events of that night?

Chapter 2
How does Anton feel about returning to Haarlem?
What is significant about the conversation between the students?

Chapter 3
In what ways does he compare the gap left by his home?
What is his reaction to his old neighbors and why?
What does he find out, and how does he react to each thing he learns?

Chapter 4
Write an analysis of the following passage, remembering your tips from last week:

‘For the first time he felt a kind of fear, something sucking him  in, a deep hole into which things fell without reaching the bottom, as when someone throws a stone into a well and never hears it land.   At a time when he still thought about such things, he had wondered what would happened if he drilled a tunnel right through the center of the earth and then jumped in, wearing a fireproof suit. After a certain amount of time that could be determined mathematically, he would arrive, feed first, at the antipode, though he would not quite reach the surface. He would come momentarily to a standstill. Then he would disappear once more, upside-down, into the depths. After many years, also mathematically calculable, he would at last stop and remain floating, weightless, at the center of the earth, where he would be able to reflect upon the state of things in eternity.’ (Mulisch 75-76)


Answers
Episode 2
Chapter 1
1. Anton’s attitude towards the assault in chapter 1 was not as I expected, he did not join his neighbors killing soldiers or going to communist parties. He also did not burst in tears when he knew that his parents are dead.

2. Anton remembers the war as if it is broken pieces from the past. He also remembers the blood, killing, shouting and the prison cells as a nightmare.

3. Anton’s uncle and aunt treat him like if he is one of their own children; they treat him with kindness and compassion. On the other hand Anton does not feel as if he is their child, but he enjoys staying with them.

4. After the war finished he was relieved and happy that everything will change even his life, and he does not want to remember anything which happened in his life while the war was still going.




Chapter 2
1. He was not sure if he will go but he went anyway, and he felt as a man making “his first visit to a whorehouse.”

2. The influence behind the conversation of the students is revealing the perspectives of the youth men who might have a war against Korea. They also have revealed their thoughts and perspectives about communism.

Chapter 3
1. The gap of the home he left 7 years ago is compared to that of a missing tooth.

2. When Anton saw his old neighbors he was not glad neither happy to see them, maybe it is because of the memories he had when the neighbors killed the soldier and moved the body and Anton’s family getting killed.

3. He finds a memorial of his parents, he knows that their names were engraved in the wall and bronze framed. It was his only memory of his parents along some pictures.