Claudine at School is a 1900 novel by Colette, originally written in French. The narrator is a fifteen-year-old girl living in a small, rural town. She presents herself as having a strong emotional attachment to the surrounding forests: ____
Which quotation from a translation of Claudine at School most effectively illustrates the claim?
Explanation
Context: A claim states that the fifteen-year-old narrator of Colette's Claudine at School presents herself as having a strong emotional attachment to the forests around her town. Pick the quotation that best illustrates that claim.
Answer: B) "And then there are my favourites, the great woods that are sixteen and twenty years old. It makes my heart bleed to see one of those cut down."
Why? The quotation is about the woods and about her own feeling toward them: "my favourites" claims them personally, and "makes my heart bleed" registers real pain at their loss. That pairing is the emotional attachment the claim describes.
Traps:
- A) Reports the physical facts of the woods (beaten earth, rabbits, "timid deer") with no first-person feeling attached.
- C) Admires the scenery ("magnificent woods," "velvety green") but describes how the region looks to any observer, not what the narrator feels.
- D) Concerns her family, a missing Mamma and an inattentive Papa, and never mentions the forests at all.