Unit 2Unit 2Unit 2Unit 2

Marrakech

George Owell George Owell

Teaching ContentsⅠ. Additional background knowledge Ⅱ. Introduction to the passage Ⅲ. Detailed study of the text

Ⅰ . Additional Background Knowledge

1. George Orwell 2. Morocco 3. Marrakech

George Orwell

• George Orwell (pen name)• Eric Arthur Blair (1903 – 1950)• British novelist and essayist,born in India.• Orwell was famous for his political satires. • He was an uncompromising individualist a

nd political idealist.

• Orwell argued that writers have an obligation of fighting social injustice, oppression, and the power of totalitarian regimes

• Orwell is famous for his terse lucid prose style and good at the appropriate use of simple but forceful words to describe objectively the scenes before his eyes.

His works:• Animal Farm (1945)• Down and Out in Paris and London • Burmese Days• Coming up for Air • A Clergyman’s Daughter • Keep the Aspidistra Flying

His well-known essays:• Shooting an elephant • A Hanging• Marrakech• Politics and the English Language

Morocco• In North Africa, on the Mediterranean Sea a

nd the Atlantic Ocean, Morocco is the farthest west of all the Arab countries.

• Location: • Capital: Rabat • Population: about 18,000.000• Brief history: Morocoo was inhabited in

• the stone age by cave dwellers; about 2000B.C. it was settled by Berber tribes, who had formed the basis of the population ever since; The Arabs invaded Morocco in the 7th century,bringing with Islam; from the end of the 17th century

until the early 19th century Morocco was almost entirely free from foreign influence.

But in 1912, a Franco-Spanish agreement di

vided Morocco into 4 administrative zones. Morocco gained independence in 1956 and became a constitutional monarchy in 1957. Morocco is a member of the United Nations, the League of Arab States, and the Organization of African Unity. most of the people of Morocco are Muslims,Islamis the state religion and Arabic is the official language, but French and Spanish are also spoken.

Marrakech in Morocco

• Location:• In west central Morocco, at the Northern

foot of the high Atlas. 130 miles south of Casablanca, the chief seaport.

• It is the principal commercial centers of Morocco.

• It has extremely hot summers but mild winters.

• It was captured by the French in 1912. The city was formerly also called Morocco.

Ⅱ . Introduction to the Passage 1. Type of literature: --- a piece of exposition 2. The purpose of a piece of exposition: --- to inform or explain 3. Ways of developing the thesis of a piece of

exposition: --- comparison --- contrast --- analogy --- identification --- illustration --- analysis, definition, etc.

4.  The thesis:• Orwell denounces the evils of

colonialism or imperialism. • “ All colonial empires are in reality founded upon that fact.” (P.3)• Purposes of colonization • a) a desire for material gain • b) desire to spread religion • c) a desire to expand territory

Ⅲ. Detailed Study of the Text

▲ organization of the text ▲main idea of each part▲ questions to discuss▲ Key words, phrases and difficult

sentences

• Organization of the text:• Questions to discuss: 1. In order to show the poverty of the city, t

he writer chooses some typical scenes and pictures. What are they?

2.It seems that this essay consists of several separative pictures, then what gives the essay coherence?

Part 1: The burial of the poor inhabitants (Para 1-3)

The idea: Life is cheap. People are so poor that they can not afford proper burials.

Part 2: An employee’s begging for a piece of bread (Para 4-7)

The idea: Life is poor. People can’t afford proper food.

Part 3: Life of the Jews (Para 8-15) The idea: Jews live in great poverty and un

der prejudice.

Part 4: Cultivation of soil (Para 16-18) The idea: Hard way of making a living.Part 5: Life of old women (Para 19-21) The idea: Misery of old women, no better th

an a donkeyPart 6: the soldiers (Para 22-26) The idea: The negro’s attitude towards th

e whites

Part 1 (Para1-3): The burial of the poor inhabitants in Marrakech

▲Para 1: A dramatic one sentence opening

paragraph. Orwell is the master of a terse lucid prose style. In this opening sentence he uses very simple words to describe objectively the scene before his eyes.

Yet the choice of this scene and the words he uses implies much more than what appears on the surface. The people are very poor so the corpses are wrapped in a piece of rag and carried on a rough wooden bier. The cloud of flies flying to the corpse and then coming back to the restaurant table shows the unsanitary conditions of the city. “went past” is more vivid than “was carried past”

Para 2: This paragraph tells us how people are burie

d in marrakech. It gives a vivid picture of the poverty of the place. He does this with a few strokes of his masterpen—the crows of mourners wailing a chant, corpses wrapped in a piece of rag, carried on a rough wooden bier, friends hacking a shallow hole, dumping the body in it, flinging some dried-up earth over it, no grave stone…

Questions to think: 1.Among the mourners—all men and boys, n

o women. Why? 2. How is the dead buried ?(use some adjecti

ves to describe) simply, carelessly, unceremoniously

Notice Orwell’s choice of words:

• Hack, dump and flingPara 3: In this paragraph Orwell exposes the evils of

imperialism(colonialism). He does this in a cool objective manner and avoids a preachy and propagandistic style. Nevertheless the reader can see that Orwell is outraged at the spectacle of

misery and suffering. This technique is employed by Orwell throughout the essay.

Question: In this paragraph there is a sentence

showing the thesis of the essay, what is it?Sentences to appreciate: 1. …at least twenty thousand own literally

nothing except the rags they stand up in-

• When you see how the people live…2. Are they really the same flesh as your

self?... Or are they merely a kind of undifferentiated brown stuff, about as individual as bees or coral insects?

Rhetorical questions for much strong effect

flesh: synecdoche

• 3. They rise out of the earth, they sweat and starve for a few years, and then they sink back into the nameless mounds of the graveyard and nobody notices that they are gone.

• alliteration, showing the monotonous life. They are born. Then for a few years they work, toil and starve. Finally they die and are buried in graves without a name.

• Part 2 (Para 4-7): An Arab navy, an employee of municipality, begging for a piece of bread.

• Questions: 1. How do you know the Arab navy was

begging a piece of bread shyly? 2. What’s the function of the last

sentence in paragraph 7?

Words & Expressions: 1.nibble: to eat (food) with quick bites, takin

g only a small amount at at time, as a mouse does.

The fish were nibbling at the bait 2.butt: to strike or push with the head or hor

ns; ran with the head 3.navvy: (BrE) an unskilled laborer

4.sidle: to move sideways, esp. in a shy, fe

arful or stealthily manner5.stow: to pack or store away, esp. to pack i

n an orderly, compact manner6.municipality: a city, town, etc. having its ow

n incorporated government 自治市

Part 3 (Para 8-15): The miserable lives of the Jews in the ghettoes.

Question: From what aspects does the writer

describe the misery of the Jews? Para 8: the miserable living condition of

the Jews. (restricted living areas, narrow& dirty streets, windowless houses, )

• Para 9: poor working condition (dark fly-infested cave-like booths, prehistoric lathe, traditional way of work)

• Para 10: workers’ pityful but strong desire for a cigarette.

• Para 11-15: Accusation of Jews.

Words and Expressions 1.ghetto: n. (in certain European cities) a sect

ion to which Jews were formerly restricted; 2.cluster: to gather or grow in a cluster or clu

sters3.skull-cap: n. a light, closefitting, brimless ca

p, usually worn indoors.

4.infest: to overrun or inhabit in large numbers, usu. so as to be harmful or bothersome; swarm in or over. Fly-infested

5.warp: to become bent or twisted out of shape

6.frenzied: adj. full of uncontrolled excitement

7.clamour: v. n. (to) make a loud confused noise or shout; cry out

8.self-contained: adj. having within oneself or itself all that is necessary; self-sufficient, as a community

9.impossible--hard to deal with, sth. That cannot happen

e.g. It was not an impossible scheme. His bad temper makes life impossible for all the f

amily. He is an impossible person to work with.

10.grope: to feel or search about blindlye.g. In the darkness, I groped for the door han

dle. The lecturer paused, groping for the most

effective word to express his meaning.

• Sentences:1.Sore-eyed children cluster …, like clouds of

flies. A simile, comparing clusters of children to cl

ouds of flies. The repeated use of flies shows the unsanitary conditions and the prevalence of diseases in colonial countries

2. whichever way you look… a good job Hitler wasn’t here.

It was lucky for the Jews that Hilter had not come to this place. If he had, the Jews would have been exterminated as they were in Poland and other Europeans countries.

3.In just the same way, a couple of hundred years ago, poor old women used to be burned for witchcraft when they could not even work enough magic to get themselves a square meal.(para15)

a square meal: a decent substantial mealAnalogy is used here. It means that these peopl

e’s accusation of the Jews was as absurd and irrational as the accusation of the witchcraft.

Part 4 (Para16-18): cultivation of soil—hard way of making a living

Para 16-17: the invisibility of the people and their miserable life in colonial countries

Words & Expressionsconspicuous: adj. attracting attention by be

ing unexpected, unusual, outstandingChances are that : (oral) it is possible Chances are that he has heard the news.

ones’ eyes take in: see, look at I was too busy taking in the beautiful furniture t

o notice who was in the room. Her eyes were taking in nothing but the expensiv

e hats. It was amusing to see his surprise as he took in th

e new car.wring: v. to get or extract by force, threats, persist

ence, etc; extort wring money from sb. 勒索某人back-breaking: requiring great physical exertion; v

ery tiring; nerve-racking

• Sentences:1. (Para 16) a white skin is always fairly

conspicuous. synecdoche: a white-skinned European is

always fairly conspicuous.2. (Para 17)It is only because of this…tourist resorts. “This” here stands for the fact that people

always miss the peasants laboring in the fields because they have the color of the earth and are a lot less interesting to look at.

3. (Para 17) What does Morocco mean to a Frenchman?... Or to an Englishman?

Question and answer both elliptical. This paragraph means that this colonial country arouses people’s interest for various reasons except true concern for the people living in poverty

Question: What kind of people ,according to Orwell, are partly invi

sible? Why does he stress this point? What’s the tone of this two paragraphs?

• Instead of openly blaming the white colonialists who don’t pay the least attention to the people who suffer from poverty and hunger, he pretends that they have a sound reason to ignore such people just because they have the color of the earth. Orwell is very cleverly revealing the real inner working of the colonialists’ mentality. The author is extremely bitter and ironical.

• Para 18: the Primitive way of farming in marrakech—another picture of poverty and backwardness of the place

• Question: How does the writer show the poverty of thi

s place through the description of the primitive way of farming?

• Poor resources• Poor farming tool & traditional way of ploughing Difficult sentence:(Para 18) This is as much as the strength of the ani

mals is equal to. The animals yoked to the plough had just enough

strength to plough the soil to a depth of about four inches.

• Part 5 (Para 19-21):Life of old women Misery of old women, no better than a donkeyThe comparison of fate between the women and the donkey

•

Donkey Women• no bigger than a St. Bernard dog tiny, mummified• Overloaded vast of load of wood• A willing creature accepted status as a beast of burden• When dead, tipped into a buried simply, dumped in ditch,

thrown to dogs into a hole, no name, no graveyard People feel enraged at nobody feels sympathetic for them, unnoticed

By describing the fate of donkey the author’s purpose is to arouse the sympathy and anger of the readers for “people”, People are also cruelly treated but they are not noticed, simply invisible

Difficult sentences:1. (Para 19)All of them are mummified with age a

nd the sun, and all of them are tiny. Years of hard work and heat of the sun have drie

d up the old women. They look like mummies.

2.She accepted her status as an old woman, that is to say as a beast of burden.

She took it for granted that as an old woman she was the lowest in the community, she was only fit for doing heavy work like an animal.

3.(para 20) though they had registered themselves on my eyeballs I cannot truly say that I had seen them.

His eyes must have recorded the scene but he did not consciously observe what was happening (for he did not see the old woman carrying the heavy load of firewood)

4.It carries a load which…too much for a fifteen-hands mule.

fifteen-hands mule: a mule about 60 inches or f feet high.5.(para 21) This kind of things makes one’s blood boil. metonymy. The cruel treatment of the donkey makes one

very angry.6.People with brown skin are next door to invisible. People with brown skins are almost invisible. 7.It is generally owing to some kind of accident… If people ever notices the old women, it is a sheer chance

• Some effective words and expressions: mummify, crept, hobble, reduce to bones, crushing

weight, tip intoPart 6 (Para22-26): the soldiers The Negroes’ attitude towards the whites There are some comparisons in this part: 1)between the storks and the Negro soldiers the storks are flying in the sky freely while the

Negroes are marching in hot weather quite uncomfortably

2)between the Negroes and the whites the whites’ worry Vs the Negroes’ insensitivity

• Words & Expressions 1.reach-me down: adj. colloq. second- hand or rea

dy made 2. reverence: n. feeling or attitude of deep respect, l

ove and awe, as for sth. sacred; 3.Squash –vt. 压坏 , 捏坏， e.g. She sat on his hat and squashed it. He squashed the insect with his finger. This package was squashed in the mail.• Squash – vi. e.g. This hat squashes easily.

• e.g. She squashed into the crowded train.• Squash – vi. vt ( 使劲 ) 挤 Don’t all try to squash into the lift together. He squashed his clothes into a box.• Squash –vt. ( 使不说话 / 谈 ) e.g. When I tried to speak, he squashed me. He is trying to squash the story of the d

efeat.

4.Slump –vi. 沉重地倒下 [ 践踏 ]e.g. He slumped in his chair asleep. Tired from his walk, he slumped into a chair. The boy’s feet slumped repeatedly through the

corridor.• Slump –vi. ( 质量 , 价格等 ) 下降 , ( 买卖 ) 清淡起来 e.g. The company’s shares slumped last month.• Slump—n.e.g. The economy went into a severe slump.

Comment: Soldiers are to serve the government.The Senegalese soldiers are supporting thecolonial masters who are cruelly exploitingthe country. It sounds ironical. Yet theyoung man, instead of hating the white men, actually holds a deep respect for them. Thewhole situation gives a depressing future ofthe country.

Summary:The text is a piece of objective exposition of

the poverty, misery and degradation of the inhabitants in Marrakech. The ordinary local funeral, which treats the dead as animals, is merely one episode of the miserable lives of native people. However, this fact is the basis upon which all the imperialists build up their empires. The author illustrates the following facts to show the plight of the inhabitants.

An Arab navvy, an employee of the municipality, begs for a piece of bread which is formerly the food of the gazelles. In the unsanitary ghettoes which are crowded with Jews, people overwork in a wretched situation, but they cannot possibly afford a piece of cigarette. The brown laborers working in the barren fields in a backward way are partly invisible to the white colonists who are insensitive to the suffering all around them. The old women carrying firework

are more invisible for their skinny anddistorted figures. Ironically, oblivious tothe miseries of the human beings, thewhite express more sympathy to thedamnable fate of the donkeys. However,the colonized , such as one of theSenagalese soldiers, bear blind deeprespect for the white masters. Thisprovokes the white to reexaminethemselves as well as their ways oftreating the colonized people.

Stylistic features

• Generally speaking, Orwell describes objectively the suffering and misery of the colonial people in Marrakech, yet he manages to show that he is outraged at the spectacle of misery. He succeeds in imparting this feeling to his readers:

a) through the clever choice of the scenes he describes

b) through the appropriate use of words: concrete

c) through the tone in which he describes these scenes: objective, matter-of-factly, yet readers can see his anger beneath.

d) by contrasting the indignation at the cruel handling of the donkey with the unconcern towards the fate of the human beings.

e) figures of speech used: simile, metaphor, parallelism, repetition, rhetorical question, synecdoche, analogy, transferred-epithet