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    STD VII Class Note 12 English My Unknown Friend 2021 22

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    thoshinivedha4
    The document summarizes a short story called "My Unknown Friend" by Stephen Leacock. It describes a man on a train who is approached by a stranger claiming to be an old friend. However, the man cannot remember or identify the stranger. The stranger pretends to know many details about the man's life. In the end, the man realizes he has been deceived by the stranger, who took advantage of the situation to steal his money. The theme is about the dangers of trying to appear too clever when you don't actually recognize someone.

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    STD VII Class Note 12 English My Unknown Friend 2021 22

    Uploaded by

    thoshinivedha4
    3K views2 pages
    The document summarizes a short story called "My Unknown Friend" by Stephen Leacock. It describes a man on a train who is approached by a stranger claiming to be an old friend. However, the man cannot remember or identify the stranger. The stranger pretends to know many details about the man's life. In the end, the man realizes he has been deceived by the stranger, who took advantage of the situation to steal his money. The theme is about the dangers of trying to appear too clever when you don't actually recognize someone.

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    Std-VII-Class-Note-12-English-My-Unknown-Friend-2021-22

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    The document summarizes a short story called "My Unknown Friend" by Stephen Leacock. It describes a man on a train who is approached by a stranger claiming to be an old friend. However, the man cannot remember or identify the stranger. The stranger pretends to know many details about the man's life. In the end, the man realizes he has been deceived by the stranger, who took advantage of the situation to steal his money. The theme is about the dangers of trying to appear too clever when you don't actually recognize someone.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    3K views2 pages

    STD VII Class Note 12 English My Unknown Friend 2021 22

    Uploaded by

    thoshinivedha4
    The document summarizes a short story called "My Unknown Friend" by Stephen Leacock. It describes a man on a train who is approached by a stranger claiming to be an old friend. However, the man cannot remember or identify the stranger. The stranger pretends to know many details about the man's life. In the end, the man realizes he has been deceived by the stranger, who took advantage of the situation to steal his money. The theme is about the dangers of trying to appear too clever when you don't actually recognize someone.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    of 2

    STD 7,ENGLISH My Unknown Friend

    By Stephen Leacock

    Theme

    Unknown Friend’’, is a short story about a man who meets a stranger in a train. The stranger starts
    talking to the man as if he has known him since the good old days. They have a long conversation about
    their old gang and the loss that the man has suffered.
    The stranger pretended to know every detail about the man. The man tried to remember the stranger
    but couldn’t remember and identify who the stranger was.
    At last, the man comes to know that he was cheated by the stranger.

    The theme of the chapter is that trying to be oversmart can cause loss.

    Message

    Nobody should try to be oversmart. If he/she does not recognize someone, then they should admit that
    they could not recognize the person.

    Understanding the text.

    A. Answer these questions.


    Ans 1) The line in paragraph 6 ‘’ ‘Who, indeed,’ I thought to myself.’’ indicates that something may not
    be quite right. It suggests that the speaker may not be quite so pleased to see the other man or that he
    may not have recognised the other man.

    Ans 2) The speaker was talking about the situation where he could not recognise or remember the other
    person, although the latter claimed to be an old friend. He was going to deal with it by staying calm and
    acting confidently, as if he did know the other man. He was going to talk to the man and find out who he
    really was.
    Ans 3) In paragraphs 27 to 36, the speaker tries to ask questions to the other man instead of responding
    to his questions and comments. This was a bold plan as he could have asked something that would show
    that he could not recognise the man, but he felt confident that he could ask safe questions. With the
    help of this plan, he hoped to recall who the other man was. His plan did not work because although the
    other man answered his questions, the speaker still could not recognise him.

    Ans 4) The speaker is referring to his mistake in saying that the person who was supposed to have died
    used to smoke. It could be a stupid thing for him to say because he did not really know who the other
    man was referring to. He could have been referring to someone who would not smoke, like the
    speaker’s grandmother. By making such a mistake, the speaker almost revealed that he still could not
    recognise the other man.

    Ans 5) The stranger’s face was agitated because he said that he had missed his stop. The train had
    arrived at the junction and he was supposed to have got down at the previous station. He needed to get
    down and send a telegram to someone saying that he had missed his stop. Yet he could not seem to
    open his suitcase to bring out the money. The train stopped at the junction for a very short time so he
    was in a hurry. The speaker did not feel very sympathetic towards the other man. He wanted the other
    man to go away, so he offered him some money to get down and send the telegram. He called him an
    idiot for forgetting to take his suitcase.
    Ans 6) Yes, the speaker blames himself for his loss. He felt that since he had tried to be too clever and
    pretended to know the stranger instead of admitting that he could not recognise him, the stranger got
    the opportunity to take his money. The loss was of the money that the stranger took from him,
    pretending to be in a hurry to send a telegram.
    B. Mark these sentences as true (T) or not true (NT).
    1. Not true 4. Not true
    2. True 5. Not true
    3. True 6. True
    Appreciating the text.

    a. The speaker spoke here with a note of sadness because he wanted to show the other man that
    he too, had suffered from the long separation from his supposed friend.
    b. The speaker said ‘Never’ firmly and flatly because he did not want the discussion to move
    towards’ the old place’ till he could understand which place was being referred to.
    c. The speaker spoke gently here because the other man had said that he may not care to go back
    to the old place and from this the speaker guessed that there was some painful or delicate
    history attached to the place that the other man was talking about.
    d. The speaker struck in with great admiration when he planned to take a bold step and decided to
    ask questions himself to try and understand who the other person was. He was pretending to
    follow the conversation with interest.
    e. When the other man laughed and said that Pete was married, the speaker started to laugh as
    well. He was trying to show that if the other man found it funny that Pete had got married, then
    he too, understood why it was funny and was suitably amused.
    f. When the other man mentioned a loss, the speaker decided to remain quiet because he had no
    idea what it was that he was supposed to have lost.
    g. The speaker hiccoughed with joy when he understood that the other man was talking about
    someone’s death, because in his experience, talking about death in situations like this was very
    easy. If he waited a little, he could find out who had died and through that, who the other man
    was.
    Long question

    Why does the narrator describe his state in a single word ‘stung’? What does this word mean
    and how was the narrator stung?

    Ans:- The narrator describe his state in a single word ‘stung’ because here the single word is
    more appropriate and expressive than a lengthier description. It is more effective than
    providing an entire sentence or even a paragraph to describe the shock that the narrator felt.

    Here, the word ‘stung’ means cheated. We saw that since the beginning of the chapter the
    narrator could not recognize the stranger who introduced himself as an old friend of the
    narrator. As the narrator could not recognise him, he should have told him about it. But, the
    narrator tried to show his cleverness by pretending to recognize him. The stranger taking the
    advantage of the situation took away all the money the narrator had. In this way the narrator
    was stung or cheated by the stranger.

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