CHRISTOPHER SILVESTER
Suggested answers
1. “The Name of the Rose” deals with medieval history. Was it responsible for the novel‟s success?
The success of the novel „The Name of the Rose‟ did not depend on merely one factor. Many other novels dealt with medieval history but did not achieve much success. Its success is more attributed to the timing of its publication, its narrative style and detective yarn and also the fact that it delves into metaphysics and theology along with medieval history.
2. What drawbacks of interviews have been pointed out by Lewis Carrol?
Lewis Carrol considers interviews as an „unwarranted intrusion‟ that is immoral and an offence his person. He shunned interviews for fear of being projected as larger than life. His vehement refusal for interviews enabled him to keep his fans as well as interviews at an arm‟s length.
3. Explain Eco‟s theory of interstices.
There is a lot of empty space between the nucleus and electrons in each atom and if that empty space is removed, the universe will be as small as a human fist. Even though this is a bit of exaggeration, Eco wants to say that similar empty spaces are in our lives too and if we remove them we can find out a lot of time to do more.
4. Did Umberto Eco consider himself a novelist first or an academic scholar?
Mukund said that Eco was a famous academician but he became even better renowned after the publication of The Name of the Rose. Although he had written only five novels, as against over 40 scholarly works of non-fiction, which included an influential piece of work on semiotics, yet he was better known as a novelist. Umberto Eco considered himself to be a university professor who wrote novels only on Sundays. He participated in academic conferences and identified with the academic community and not with the Pen Clubs and writers. However, he was aware that most people read novels. He could not expect everyone to be reading books on semiotics.
5. What are some of the positive views on interviews?
An interview is an immensely popular journalistic style. Several thousand celebrities have been interviewed over the years and some claim that it is in its highest form, a source of truth, and, in its practice, an art. We get most of our information through interviews. Hence, the interviewer, holds a position of extraordinary power and influence.
6. What make Rudyard Kipling condemn being interviewed?
Rudyard Kipling considered interviews to be immoral. He said it is a crime, just as much of a crime as an offence against the person interviewed, as an assault, and just as much merits punishment. He adds that it is cowardly and vile and therefore no respectable man would ask it, much less give it.
7. What is the irony in Eco‟s statement, „I am a professor who writes novels on Sundays?‟
A novelist can never say that he keeps a day for writing novels. Writers are always writers. Yet Umberto Eco is an exception. Though he is a world famous novelist, he primarily considers himself as a professor and an academic writer and hardly gets time for writing novels except on Sundays.
8. What does Saul Bellow mean by saying that „interviews were thumbprints on his windpipe?‟
Saul Bellow used to allow to be interviewed yet he used to comment that he used to have great trouble to be interviewed because it was an experience of his throat being thumbed by his interviewers.
9. How does Eco balance his botheration of being overshadowed by the fame of a novelist?
Though Umberto Eco feels that he could not make Semiotics famous or be famous as an academic writer, he balances that failure against the huge success that he achieved by his novel which in fact is all about semiotics and the rest of his favourite subjects.
10. Why does Eco admit that the reason behind the success of the Name of the Rose was a „mystery?‟
Though the novel, The Name of the Rose has been named as one of the legendary best seller, Umberto Eco admits that its success is a mystery because he believes that his novel won an unequal success considering that many novels had been written earlier and later than his novel.
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