FireNick starts to sniff at the air. Can you smell... sniff sniff... smoke? he asks her. I'm so
cold I can't smell or feel anything she tells him. And then in a while Nick yelps. Wow, look at that! he points into the sky behind the ridge of houses ahead of them. Billowing smoke boiling into the night, glowing orange dark and angry as if, while they sat in (5) oblivion by the empty pool, the city has been erupting into chaos, into riots, into anarchy. Nick grabs her hand and they hurry in the direction of the blaze. Shadowy figures appear from houses, leaning from windows and collecting on porches. Two men run to a car parked in the street, driving away with a door winging open and the passenger still hopping a leg along the road. And then the high wail of fire engines, and she feels (10) that the night has suddenly flipped from ordinariness into wonderful bloodcurdling disorder. The sky is alive and seething, swallowing the moon. They head towards the ridge into a smokey haze. Small dull explosions thump at the air and there is a strange fizzy taste of steam on her tongue. Other people are scurrying along with them now - shrieking boys and family groups with kids in pyjamas and dressing gowns prancing around their parents. (15) It's the church, someone says, just as they turn the corner into a smoke-filled street bustling with firemen, reporters with cellphones and tussled people wrapped in blankets. The city has not erupted into a battlefield of civil war; it is one building only, the corner church and hall, which is feeding this inferno. It seems that the fire, like some furious parasitic beast, has taken up residence here, every crack and fissure flaring against the night, windows exploding and belching, the roof (20) raging with darting tongues of flame and occasionally great jets of water shooting from within. Another engine arrives and more firemen in silver suits and oxygen tanks tumble out, unraveling straps of hose across the road. The crowd is dazed and curious now, with faces flashing red from the fire engines, flickering orange from the blaze. Groups merge and disperse in the quest for information. It's a relief to (25) discover that the church was empty when the fire started. No one has been hurt, so it can be watched as a spectacle. Thank goodness for that, she says to Nick, and he says yeah, and pulls her close to him [Source: adapted from 'Fire', by Judith White, in Falling in Love, ed Tessa Duder, Puffin, 1995] 1. Explain in your own words the personification 'swallowing the moon' (line 1) 2. Explain what the metaphor 'winging' (line 8) is suggesting 3. Explain how the writing in the second paragraph (lines 6 - 10) makes the reader feel the excitement of the fire 4. Explain why the writer has used the underlined words in lines 18 - 20 to describe the fire. Quote from these lines to support your ideas. ANSWERS (NCEA Level 1 English revision guide. 2007 edition, Really Useful Resources, pg. 34) (NCEA Level 1 English revision guide. 2009 edition, Really Useful Resources, pg. 40) (NCEA Level 1 English revision guide. 2011 edition, Really Useful Resources, pg. 22) |