STAGE
This ungraded summary is for the teacher’s use only
and should not be given to students.
The stories
Sredni Vashtar. Conradin is ten years old. His parents
are dead, and he lives with an aunt who dislikes him.
He lives a dull life, enriched by his imagination. At the
bottom of the garden of his aunt’s house, there is a
shed, in which Conradin secretly keeps two animals
– a chicken, and, in a large box, a ferret.
Conradin calls the ferret Sredni Vashtar and it
becomes his god.
One day, his aunt discovers the chicken, and
sells it. She also finds the ferret’s box, and searches
Conradin’s room until she finds the key. While she
goes down the garden to investigate, Conradin prays
to his god.
His aunt does not come out of the shed, but
Sredni Vashtar does, with blood on its neck and
mouth. Conradin listens calmly, while the cook and
housekeeper discover his aunt’s body.
The Story-Teller. Three small children and their aunt
are travelling in a train. Sitting near them is a bachelor,
who is travelling alone. The children are getting bored,
and although the aunt tries telling them a story, it is a
boring story about a well-behaved little girl.
The bachelor is getting tired of the children’s
behaviour, so he offers to tell them a story. It is about a
horribly good little girl, Bertha, who is so good that she
has won three medals; the ‘Never Late’ medal, the
‘Politeness’ medal and the ‘Best Child in the World’
medal. The medals are enormous and clink when she
walks.
Because she is such a good girl, the king allows
her to walk in his palace gardens. Unfortunately, one
day, a wolf comes into the gardens. Bertha manages
to hide, but the clinking of the medals gives her away,
and the wolf eats her.
The three children, of course, love this story.
Gabriel-Ernest. Van Cheele lives in the country,
and one day he goes for a walk in the woods near his
house. He meets a boy of about sixteen, naked beside
a pool. The boy tells him he lives in the woods, eating
rabbits, birds, chickens and – children.
147
The nextt day
day, Van Cheele finds the boy in his
sitting-room. Van Cheele’s aunt wants to help the boy,
and gives him the name Gabriel-Ernest. Van Cheele
is going to London for the day, and his aunt is giving
a children’s party. Gabriel-Ernest will help her. But
when Van Cheele gets back home, his aunt tells him
that Gabriel-Ernest is taking one of the children home
after the party. Neither Gabriel-Ernest nor the boy are
ever seen again, and Van Cheele realises that Gabriel-
Ernest must be a werewolf.
Tobermory. Cornelius Appin manages to teach a
cat, Tobermory, how to speak. But the experiment
is not a success, as the cat listens to everybody’s
conversations and reports them to other people. And
what will happen if Tobermory teaches other cats to
speak? Finally, Tobermory, and one other cat who he
has taught have to be killed.
A few weeks after that, Appin is killed by an
elephant at Dresden Zoo. Perhaps he was trying to
teach it to speak.
The She-Wolf.
f Leonard Bilsiter bores his friends
with his stories of Siberian Magic, and his ability to
turn people into animals. One day, Clovis Sangrail has
had enough, and decides to trick Leonard. He borrows
a very quiet, friendly wolf from a friend who has a
private zoo, and arranges with Mrs Hampton that she
will walk into the conservatory after dinner – and the
wolf will appear.
Everybody is tricked, including poor Leonard
Bilsiter, who the others think is responsible. Then
Clovis reveals that he, too, can perform Siberian Magic
– and Mrs Hampton reappears.
© OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS PHOTOCOPIABLE
 STAGE
Tooth and Claw – Short Stories
3 Pre-reading activity

Word search

M A C A W W P C B U S H R M A G I C G Y
E A L V V U P Z G L H C S I U X Y I R T

M R A Q U X O O H J E C L I N K W I O M

O W W E R E W O L F D P I G T Q U I W I

R A B B I T E B K E L E P H A N T B L L

I Z C F K T R U U R P O I S O N O K T L

A I M P R O P E R R P G J M C J O K E E

L W M N R M N G U E S T W V D H T I J R

M I F F D E V Z T T G O D L B M H N X S

F O R B I D D E N W L A K O F R Y G F S

K G J O O A Y J C O N S E R V A T O R Y
B A C H E L O R H U N T Q D G S T A I N

To the teacher

Aim: To familiarize students with some of the key
vocabulary and introduce the story
Time: 10–15 minutes
Organization: Give one copy of the wordsearch to
each of the students (or each group of students)
and ask them to try and identify some of the words.
When they have found all, or most of the words
check that they understand the meaning. Then ask
what sort of stories might contain these words (they
also appear in the glossary).
Key: aunt, bachelor, bush, claw, clink, conservatory,
elephant, ferret, forbidden, god, growl, guest, hunt,
improper, joke, king, lord, macaw, magic, medal,
memorial, miller, pig, poison, power, rabbit, shed,
slip, stain, toast, tooth, werewolf, zoo.

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 STAGE
Tooth and Claw – Short Stories
3 While reading activity

What will happen next?

Which of these things do you think will happen in the story? At the end of page 5.

WiLL MAY WON’T YOur OWN COMMENTS

HAPPEN HAPPEN HAPPEN
Conradin’s aunt will kill Sredni
Vashtar.

Sredni Vashtar will escape.

Sredni Vashtar will kill Conradin’s

aunt.

Sredni Vashtar has disappeared.

Sredni Vashtar will bite Conradin’s

aunt.

(Your own idea)

At the end of page 39.

WiLL MAY WON’T YOur OWN COMMENTS

HAPPEN HAPPEN HAPPEN
They discover that it is Mr Appin
who is talking, not Tobermory.

Tobermory teaches other cats to talk.

They decide to kill Tobermory.

Tobermory becomes the owner of the

house.

Mr Appin is killed.

(Your own idea)

To the teacher

Where: At the end of page 5 and at the end of
page 39
Aim: To encourage students to predict the
development of the story
Time: 5–10 minutes on two different occasions
Organization: Give each student, or group of
students, a copy of the worksheet. Ask them to
discuss in groups and decide, without looking beyond
the end of page 5, what will happen to each of the
three main characters. It is not important whether
their predictions are correct, although it may be
interesting for students to keep their worksheets and
see whether or not they were right.

149 © OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS PHOTOCOPIABLE

 STAGE
Tooth and Claw – Short Stories
3 After reading activity

Spot the mistakes

Sredni Vashtar

Conradin was a happy cat and asked it to make his aunt ill. She was
boy who loved to run ill for five days, and Conradin believed the cat
and play football. He had made her ill.
lived with his mother The next day, his aunt killed the cat. Then
in a big, comfortable she asked Conradin for the key to the ferret’s
house with a garden. box, and Conradin gave it to her. She went
In the garden was a big down the garden and into the shed. When
shed, and Conradin she opened the box, the ferret jumped out
had two animals in and killed her. Then it went back into its box.
it – a black cat and a Conradin was having his tea. He looked out
ferret. The ferret lived in a box, and Conradin of the window and saw his aunt die. Then he
brought it food every day. He prayed to the went back inside the house and made himself
another cup of tea.

Now write your summary here. Include at least ten mistakes.

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To the teacher

Aim: To help students with summary writing correct the summary to Sredni Vashtar. The students
Time: 20–30 minutes should then write an erroneous summary of another
Organization: Give each student, or group of story in the collection for another student, or group
students, a copy of the worksheet. Ask them to of students, to correct.

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