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52 views2 pages

CAIELSENG_y8_u2_ws2.3

Uploaded by

get.gunavmalhotra24
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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2 Amazing arts Stage 8 Worksheet 2.3

The Old Man in the Bookshop


Reading
Read this text and answer the questions.
The narrator goes into an old bookshop on impulse one day.

Books. They were crammed into bookshelves, reaching up to the low, yellowing
ceilings; they were piled on the large mahogany desk; they lay in tottering
heaps round the edge of the shop floor – everywhere I looked there were books.

It was quiet, apart from a rhythmical ticking noise. I scanned the musty shop
5 to see where it was coming from when –

“Yeeessss?”

I jumped. A face peered out from behind the piles of books on the desk. An
elderly man. His bald head was a shiny globe, dotted with small brown stains
like islands. His nose was long, an overhanging rock perched on his furrowed
10 face. I couldn’t see his eyes – they were concealed behind large spectacles,
which were about to fall off at any moment – but his chin jutted out like a
sharp ledge. His face disappeared and an arm crept round the books, holding
out a small, dusty volume in a claw-like hand. Then I realised what the noise
was: the man was clicking his teeth like a rattlesnake.

15 “Is this what you’re looking for?”

Now answer the following questions.

1. Why do you think the writer chooses to start with a one-word sentence, ‘Books.’?

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

2. What is the first sign of the old man the narrator notices?

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

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© Oxford University Press 2022: this may be reproduced for class use solely for the purchaser’s institute.
3. Identify one simile and one metaphor used to describe the old man.

Simile: ………………………………………………………………………………………………...

Metaphor: …………………………………………………………………………………………...

4. What do you notice about these words and phrases used to describe the old man:
shiny, polished globe, islands, overhanging rock, sharp ledge?

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

5. Explain in your own words how the writer tries to make the old man seem sinister.

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……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

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6. Do you find this an effective description of a character? Refer to specific words and phrases
in your answer.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

7. What kind of story or book do you think this extract might come from?

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

8. Do you think you would want to read the whole story that this extract comes from, or not?
Give reasons for your answer.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

……………………………………………………………………………………………………...

2
© Oxford University Press 2022: this may be reproduced for class use solely for the purchaser’s institute.

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