Accidental Hero

The author

Zadie Smith

What type of passage is "Accidental Hero"?

essay

(Normandy=Narnia) This is a:

sybmol/similie because Narnia doesn't exist.

Why was Zadie's father, Harvey, "distraught, reduced to tears by watching the news"?

Her father has to deal with emotional experiences from the war.

Why does Zadie burst into tears?

She comes to a revelation about her father and the war.

Why does Zadie realize?

Her father could have died during the war, and she sees that what her father went through.

How old was he when he wanted to be drafted in the army?

17

What is "Saving Private Ryan" and "The Great Escape" ?

Two films about soldiers in WWII.

What was Harvey assigned to in the army?

A radio man for the commanding truck.

"British warship, a huge shadowed beast" is an example of what literary term?

metaphor

What happens when Harvey sees the warship?

He realizes that the war was serious.

When was more character value/emphasis/value showed for Harvey?

"Of course it wasn't. It was a mistake." "Yes, yes," said Harvey, humoring me, crying quietly, "if that's how you want to say it."

"I almost married a German girl, from the country, and in her house there was a photo of her brother, in a Nazi uniform"

An example of verbal irony in the essay, and how?

"But you must write that I had an easy day. I had absolutely an easy day". Its irony because it's war, of course it isn't easy.

Analyze the lines "The body was booby-trapped. Coiled within it, my future, and that of my brothers, and the future of our future children, and so on, into unthinkability" and how it could have affected Harvey.

The body was a was a booby-trapped and if things went wrong, he would have died and messed up the futures of his kids, and his kids' kids.

What was the three firsts for Harvey?

The first time he'd left England, been at sea, and seeing a dead body.

Why doesn't Harvey marry a German girl?

Her brother is a Nazi.

What words symbolize Harry when he says "It was my father who persuaded them to settle for a lesser punishment"; "ashamed to tell me that story. He feels he behaved cruelly".

Caring, sympathetic, and humble.

"Which is a special way of being brave, of being courageous, and a quality my father shares with millions of ordinary men and women who fought that miserable war" proves that:

Harry is an accidental hero and an ordinary person, just like me.

atrocity

An act of great cruelty and wickedness

debased

reduced in quality or value

vainglorious

excessively proud or boastful of accomplishments

catharsis

cleansing, purification

vanity

self centered, conceited

epiphanic

manifestation of Christ

shrapnel

fragments of a bomb, shell, or other object thrown out by an explosion.

CO

Commanding Officer

bloke

man, male, or boy

Bert Scaife

savage, brave legend

recoil

draw back

Dad's Army

1970s British television sitcom about older men who, ineligible for other military service, acted as a secondary defense force in England during World War II.

Dictaphone

machine for recording speech

Felixstowe

seaside town in Suffolk, England

pacifistic

opposed to war or use of force