The God of Small Things

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• Note the setting.

• Note the return of the phrase “No Locusts Stand I.” Who does it refer to now?

• What is Rahel thinking about the “silver bowl” on the roof on p. 179? What is she daydreaming about as she looks at it?

• Rahel has a flashback to a memory with Sophie Mol and Estha on p. 180. Track how the twins’ feelings about her have developed in this memory and why. What does this change in feeling reveal about the twins’ fears and their hopes?

• Who are Mrs. Pillai, Mrs. Eapen, and Mrs. Rajagopalan? How did Velutha treat them? Why is his treatment significant according to Rahel? What does the author’s choice of chapter title convey?

• What is “The Terror”?

• The novel has been told in a nonlinear way to this point. Where are we in time in this particular scene? 

• Note the change in setting on p. 181.

• The narrator suggests that Estha and Rahel would be better off if they could recognize that they, too, are victims. But to them, who is the “victim” in this “play”?

• The final paragraph in this chapter reminds us that we do not know where Estha was during the events described on pp. 173–177. What can we infer about what he was doing based on the author’s repeated use of the color red (scarlet) in the final sentences?