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Haroun
and the Sea of Stories - Chapter 1
by Kenya Lyons & Ryan Troschel
::SUMMARY::
This
chapter begins with the description of the setting of the story. The story
begins in a sad city, in the country of Alifbay. This city is so sad that
all of it's people have forgotten the city's name. To the north of the
city, there are actually factories that manufacture sadness and send it
all over the world.
We
are introduced to the main character, Haroun, who is the only child of
the well-known storyteller Rashid Khalita. His stories brought stories
brought happiness to the very sad city. The wonderful stories led to Rashid's
two nicknames, Rashid the Ocean of Notions and the Shah of Blah.
Haroun
was always raised in an extremely happy environment. His father was always
bringing joy and happiness to the family through his many stories. His
mother always brought sweetness to the family through her songs. This
built an extremely close family. One day Haroun's mother, Soraya, stopped
singing, but Rashid never noticed it because he was so busy trying to
think of stories. Rashid was constantly on stage and rarely had time to
spend with his family.
To
Rashid's audience, it looked as though every time he opened his mouth
a story would just flow out. When Haroun asked his father where all of
the stories came from, he replied, "From the great Story Sea."
He said that he would drink that water and a story would pop right into
his head. He makes common reference to the Water Genies, but when Haroun
asks about them, Rashid replies that it is mush too complicated to explain.
The
Kalifa's lived in the downstairs portion of their small house. The upstairs
belonged to the Senguptas'. Mr. Sengupta's wife Oneeta always talked to
Haroun and treated him like the child that she never had. Mr. Sengupta
pretty much ignored Haroun, but was always hanging around Soraya. This
angered Haroun and made their feud grow even larger. Mr. Sengupta constantly
made fun of Rashid's stories and said that there was no sense in telling
stories that aren't even true.
This
day, everyone finds out that Soraya has run off with Mr. Sengupta. Soraya
tells Rashid to go find his socks, which he is constantly losing. When
he returns, he notices a letter that says all sorts of nasty things about
Rashid in it. He then hears the sound of a car driving off. When Rashid
notices this he smashes all of the clocks in the house.
After
hearing Rashid mourn over this, Haroun explodes and asks Rashid what the
point was of telling stories that weren't even true. Rashid went into
shock and when he goes up to speak in front of a large audience, for the
first time, he opened his mouth and nothing came out. After Haroun's mother
left him, he is no longer able to pay attention for longer than eleven
minutes. Miss Oneeta is able to make a conclusion, she suspects that it
is because his mother left at 11:00. She said that it is a phsycological
blockage that he can't get to twelve. The chapter ends with Haroun questioning
himself and repeating what he had said to his father to break his heart...
::ANALYSIS::
[NONE]
© Smelli Notes 2001
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