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The Enemy
Why were the domestic servants reluctant to help Dr. Sadao and Hana ? Specify their reactions.
The family of Dr. Sadao was very well-off. They had servants to look after their children and to do the domestic chores. They had a fine cook and a garderner who had been with the family since Sadao was a child. All of them were sincere, faithful, honest and dedicated for the family. Side by side they were ardent Japanese and did not like Americans since at that time Japan and America were at war. Sadao had studied surgery in America and there he was trained to use his knife to save every life. But the servants could not understand this ideology and they viewed that Sadao and Hana liked the Americans because they had studied there. In brief they lacked both humanity and patriotism.
The gardener was of the opinion that Sadao should have allowed the soldier to die. Being a superstitious man, he believed that the fun and the sea were to kill the enemy. In case Sadao interfered, they would take the revenge. The cook too was full of all despise for the soldier. When Hana asked Yumi to wash the soldier, she looked at the white man in a great disgust and scorn. She refused to wash. After one week, all the servants decided to go away from the house of Sadao.
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How would you explain the reluctance of the soldier to leave the doctor’s house even when he knew as he could not stay there without risk to the doctor and himself?
What explains the attitude of the General in the matter of the enemy soldiers? Was it human consideration, lack of national loyalty, dediction of duty or simply-self-absorption?
While hatred against a member of the enemy race is justifiable specially during war time, what makes a human being rise above narrow prejudices?
Do you think the doctor’s final solution to the problem was the best possible one in the circumstances?
Does the story remind you of ‘Birth’ by A.J.Cronin that you have read in Snapshots last year. What are the similarities?
How were Sadao and Hana married?
What was the chief concern of Sadao’s father? How did Sadao come upto his expectation?
What did Sadao’s father expect from him?
Why was Dr. Sadao not sent abroad with the Japanese troops?
Or
Why was Dr. Sadao not sent to the battlefield?
What did Sadao and his wife glance through the mist?
Or
What did Dr. Sadao and his wife see when they stood out looking at the sea?
Or
How did Dr. Sadao and his wife know that the person was an American soldier?
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