Chapter 7 The Interview
Chapter 7 The Interview
GSEB Class 12 English The Interview Text Book Questions and Answers
Think as you Read (Textbook Page No. 69)
1. What are some of the positive views on interviews?
Answer:
Interview, in the 130 years of its existence, has become an inherent part of journalism. It is a useful means of communication that is, at times, considered to be an art, serving as a source of truth. Denis Brian has stated that in today’s world we get to know ‘our contemporaries’ through their interviews.
2.Why do most celebrity writers despise being interviewed?
Answer:
Celebrity writers believe that interviews unduly interfere in their private lives. They regard themselves as victims of interviews. They claim that the interview in some way ‘diminishes’ them, just like some ancient cultures believed that a portrait of a person takes away his soul. Certain celebrities like V. S. Naipaul have claimed that interviews leave them wounded, while others like Rudyard Kipling have referred to it as a crime and an immoral act.
3.What is the belief in some primitive cultures about being photographed?
Answer:
Some primitive cultures believed that photographing a person is no less than stealing his/her soul out of the body and rendering him incomplete and slighted.
4.What do you understand by the expression ‘thumbprints on his windpipe’?
Answer:
The expression means having been strangulated. The interview is an assault on a person as it makes him/her so tense that he/she feels as good as being choked.
5.Who, in today’s world, is our chief source of information about personalities?
Answer:
In modern times, the chief source of information on personalities is the interviewer who, through his power and influence, gathers information and provides us with the best possible information on the interviewees. He extracts everything significant through his questions for us.
Understanding the Text
1.Do you think Umberto Eco likes being interviewed? Give reasons for your opinion.
Answer:
Yes, Umberto Eco, in all possibilities, likes being interviewed. He felt just at ease with the interviewer and answered all the questions fully and patiently without showing any irritation or hurry. He stated his achievement in a very modest manner and explained his philosophical views and interest clearly. He let the interviewer enter the secret about his craft with a loud laugh. Also, he elaborated his approach which was unique. He was mannerly, warm and properly responsive as well.
2.How does Eco find the time to write so much?
Answer:
There are two factors that explain how Eco was able to write so much. In his own words, the life of every person has empty spaces-periods with no important jobs. He says that he did most of his writing during these free intervals. Second, he explains that people wondered that he (Eco) had written so much on various subjects. But the fact is that he was writing on the same lines and same interests – peace, non-violence, etc. All his works were linked with the thread of common interests. It saves his time and he could write a lot in a short period of time. That was the secret behind Eco’s prolific pen.
3.What was distinctive about Eco’s academic writing style?
Answer:
Umberto Eco’s academic writing style is quite distinctive. It has a certain playful and personal quality about it. It is a marked departure from a regular academic style, which is usually depersonalised and often dry and boring.
4.Did Umberto Eco consider himself a novelist first or an academic scholar?
Answer:
Umberto Eco considered himself an academic scholar first and a novelist later. He makes his preference clear by saying, “I consider myself a university professor who writes novels on Sundays”. On weekdays he attends academic conferences and does other scholarly, non-fictional work.
5.What is the reason for the huge success of the novel, ‘The Name of the Rose’ ?
Answer:
‘The Name of the Rose’ is different sort of novel. It is quite serious novel. It is a detective story at one level. But it also probes into metaphysics, theology and medieval history. The reasons for the success of the book, however, remain a mystery.
Talking about the Text
Discuss in pairs or small groups:
1.Talk about any interview that you have watched on television or read in a newspaper. How did it add to your understanding of the celebrity, the interviewer and the field of the celebrity? (Note: Students will write the answer to this question from their own experience.)
2.The medium you like best for an interview – print, radio or television.
Answer:
The medium I like best for an interview is the television. It has both audio and visual effects. It presents the interviewer and interviewee before the audience in their true colours. Usually, celebrities accuse the reporters of misquoting them or misreporting them in the print media or the radio. This is not possible when they are face-to-face on the television. Their lip movement and body movement while replying to probing questions are there for all to see.
The recording of various expressions coming on the face of the interviewee and his/her gestures and words are the additional advantages that television holds over the print media or the radio. The print media has dull, dry words alongside a picture whereas the radio tries to create the atmosphere by skilful variation of the sound. Both expect a lot of attention from the reader/audience.
3.Every famous person has a right to his or her privacy. Interviewers sometimes embarrass celebrities with very personal questions.
Answer:
Interviewers want to present exclusive and intimate details about the famous person they are interviewing. Some interviewers focus on the public life and achievements of the individual only. They try to be objective in their approach as well as assessment. However, there are others who want to make their interviews spicier and usually cross the thin limit of privacy of the individual.
In their zeal to present good copy, they embarrass the famous person with the personal questions. Sometimes impact of such questions on famous person reveals his / her aversion as well as irritation at the silliness of the person. If they shout, they are accused of being rude and proud and if they keep mum they are labelled as arrogant. In my opinion privacy of an individual must be respected.
Reading Comprehension (Textual)
Read the following passages and select the most appropriate options as answers to the questions given below them:
1.Since its invention a little over 130 years ago, the interview has become a commonplace of journalism. Today, almost everybody who is literate will have read an interview at some point in their lives, while from the other point of view; several thousand celebrities have been interviewed over the years, some of them repeatedly.
So it is hardly \surprising that opinions of the interview-of its functions, methods and merits – vary considerably. Some might make quite extravagant claims for it as being, in its highest form, a source of truth, and, in its practice, an art. Others, usually celebrities who see themselves as its victims, might despise the interview as an unwarranted intrusion into their lives, or feel that it somehow diminishes them, just as in some primitive cultures it is believed that if one takes a photographic portrait of somebody then one is stealing that person’s soul.
V S. Naipaul ‘feels that some people are wounded by interviews and lose a part of themselves,’ Lewis Carroll, the creator of Alice in Wonderland, was said to have had ‘a just horror of the interviewer’ and he never consented to be interviewed – It was his horror of being lionized which made him thus repel would-be acquaintances, interviewers, and the persistent petitioners for his autograph and he would afterwards relate the stories of his success in silencing all such people with much satisfaction and amusement.
Questions:
1. Another expression for ‘commonplace’ is ………………….. .
A. ‘Public Park’.
B. ‘Shopping Centre’
C. ‘Ordinary’
D. ‘Frequently’.
Answer:
C. ‘Ordinary’
2. Celebrities hate interviews because they feel that they …………………. .
A. are not advantageous to them.
B. are an unwarranted intrusion into their lives.
C. bring them dishonour.
D. spread wrong messages against them.
Answer:
B. are unwarranted intrusion into their lives.
3. In primitive culture it was believed that if one takes somebody’s photo, he ………………. .
A. blackmails him.
B. takes away his soul too.
C. helps him bring glory.
D. humiliates him.
Answer:
B. takes away his soul too.
4. One of the following had a fear of being interviewed :
A. Lewis Carroll
B. V. S. Naipaul
C. Celebrities
D. Petitioners
Answer:
A. Lewis Carroll
Read the following passages and select the most appropriate options as answers to the questions given below them:
Question 2.Umberto Eco: When I presented my first Doctoral dissertation in Italy, one of the Professors said, “Scholars learn a lot of a certain subject, then they make a lot of false hypotheses, then they correct them and at the end, they put the conclusions. You, on the contrary, told the story of your research. Even including your trials and errors.” At the same time, he recognised I was right and went on to publish my dissertation as a book, which meant he appreciated it.
At that point, at the age of 22, I understood scholarly books should be written the way I had done-by telling the story of the research. This is why my essays always have a narrative aspect. And this is why probably I started writing narratives [novels] so late at the age of 50, more or less.
I remember that my dear friend Roland Barthes was always frustrated that he was an essayist and not a novelist. He wanted to do creative writing one day or another but he died before he could do so. I never felt this kind of frustration. I started writing novels by accident. I had nothing to do one day and so I started. Novels probably satisfied my taste for narration.
Mukund: Talking about novels, from being a famous academic you went on to becoming spectacularly famous after the publication of ‘The Name of the Rose’. You’ve written five novels against many more scholarly works of non-fiction, at least more than 20 of them …………… .
Umberto Eco: Over 40.
Questions:
1. How was Umberto Eco different from other scholars in preparing his research paper?
A. He made a lot of false hypotheses.
B. He put the conclusions after certain corrections.
C. He told the story of research including his trials and errors.
D. He added others’ opinions.
Answer:
C. He told the story of research including his trials and errors.
2. What kind of essays and novels did Umberto Eco write?
A. Didactic
B. Narrative
C. Reflective
D. Argumentative
Answer:
B. Narrative
3. Roland Barthes had a strong feeling that he could ………………….. .
A. not write essays.
B. write essays.
C. not write novels.
D. Both ‘B’ and ‘C’
Answer:
D. Both ‘B’ and ‘C’
4. Umberto Eco became famous for his ……………………….. .
A. Non-fictional works.
B. Narrative novels.
C. Essays.
D. All of these three.
Answer:
D. All of these three.
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