- Provide evidence from the first two paragraphs of the chapter that shows that Peekay is humble.
“I quickly earned a reputation, rather unjustly, for being clever.” I think this means he was humble because he didn’t think he was as smart as he thought he was and didn’t think he needed to be known as being smart and didn’t think he deserved it.
- Peekay describes Doc’s house – and, as always, his description gives away more than he realizes – Doc has a drinking problem. Find evidence to support this.
In the book Pekay packed a bottle of alcohol for Doc when he was going to jail. This is something that not many people would pack if they were only able to pack a few belongings out of their house. This shows that alcohol is important to Doc and that he most likely enjoys drinking it. He also wouldn’t drink the whisky out of the bottle when the cops were. This shows that he appreciates the taste of the whisky and he got annoyed when they left half a bottle lying on the ground and said to them “Hey, that’s good whisky.” He also only has three rooms in his house, one for reading, one for music and the other for drinking.
- Sometimes Doc would say ‘Peeky, the wolves were howling in my head last night’. What do you think this metaphor is referring to?
I think he said that his head was racing with thoughts and was never ‘quiet’ of a thought. He used this term to describe it because wolves owl all night and you can make them be quiet.
- What do you think is the significance of the headline in The Goldfields News ‘NO SPY BUT STILL A GERMAN’?
This is saying that it doesn’t matter whether he was a spy or not it mattered that he was a German and that that was a big enough crime in itself.