BY ROSHAN MELWANI

SIGNIFICANCE OF LITERATURE:
1. Allows the narrator to gain self-confidence 2. Allows the narrator to open up emotionally 3. Discovery of knowledge 4. Form of Escape from the harshness of reeducation

THE NARRATORS SELF-CONFIDENCE

Forgive me comrade, I said, embarrassed, but Im not that good. (Pg. 5)

I falteredI replied evasivelyI muttered (Pg. 5)

I was overcome by stagefright and was reduced to mechanical recitation of the setting of each scene. (Pg. 19)

THE NARRATORS SELF-CONFIDENCE (2)

I leaped to my feet and lunged at himYou look like a hero in a war movie (Pg. 74)

I dreamed that Luo had entrusted the masterkey to me. (Pg. 85)
The instrument was mine, and I was the player (Pg. 165)

EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT
Without doubt the loveliest pair of eyes in the district of Yong Jing (Pg. 20) Her face possessed an impressive, sensual beauty, which aroused an irresistible desire (Pg. 23)

EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT (2)

Picture if you will, a boy of 19, still slumbering about in the limbo of adolescence, having heard nothing but revolutionary blather about patriotism, Communism, ideology and propaganda all his life, falling headlong into a story of awakening desire, passion, impulsive action, love, of all subjects that had, until then, been hidden from me. (Pg. 53)

Suddenly I felt a stab of jealousy, a bitter wrenching emotion I had never felt before. (Pg. 54)
I was ready to spend the rest of my life taking care of her, content even to die a bachelor if that would help (Pg. 148)

DISCOVERY OF KNOWLEDGE
Book titles poured from our lips, the mysterious and exotic names evoking unknown words ( Pg. 46) Luo lit a cigarette and smoked quietly I saw Luo still in the same place, his silhouette swaying gently in the wind. (Pg. 6 and 105) My poor educated and re-educated brains had been incapable of grasping the notion of one man standing up against the world (Pg. 102)

FORM OF ESCAPE
In spite of my complete ignorance of that distant land called FranceI was feeling quite at home in Nemours (Pg. 53) Ursules story rang as true as if it had been my neighbors. (Pg. 54)

The artistry of the great Dumas was so compelling that I forgot all about our guestI lost all sense of time. (Pg. 116)

THE END.