The Dreamer Flashcards
by H.H. Munro (SAKI) — tap or click to flip
Flashcard Review
Flashcards: The Dreamer
Why does Adela Chemping invite her nephew Cyprian to the sale at Walpurgis and Nettlepink's?
She wants a male escort to accompany her on the shopping expedition and carry her parcels.
What items does Adela originally intend to buy at the sale?
She plans to look at napkins for herself and buy decanters for Millicent, plus a salad bowl.
What does Adela actually purchase instead of the decanters and salad bowl she went to find?
She buys seven chrysanthemum vases, two sunshades, and stacks of writing paper.
What colour writing paper does Adela ultimately choose for Ruth Colson?
She chooses blue, despite asking Cyprian (who said grey), checking for mauve, and being shown two shades of green and a darker grey.
What does Cyprian do with all of Adela's parcels after lunch?
He leaves them in the cloak-room rather than carrying them, saying they will collect them after finishing shopping.
What happens when a woman approaches Cyprian in the leather goods department?
She mistakes him for a shop assistant because he is bareheaded, and he confidently sells her a handbag at a made-up discount price of twenty-six shillings.
What is Cyprian doing at the very end of the story?
He is standing in the book department, having just sold two books of devotion to an elderly Canon, with the dream look deeper than ever in his eyes.
How old is Cyprian, and why is his age significant to Adela's plan?
He is not yet eighteen, and Adela hopes he has not reached the stage where young men find carrying parcels abhorrent.
What does Adela mean when she worries Cyprian might become "a Nut"?
A "Nut" was Edwardian slang for a fashionable young man-about-town, and Adela fears this would be both an extravagance and that such a person would refuse to carry parcels.
How does Saki describe Adela's attitude toward bargain sales?
She claims she is "not a bargain hunter" but "likes to go where bargains are," revealing a self-deception about her own susceptibility to sales.
What is the name of the department store where the story takes place?
Walpurgis and Nettlepink's, which has lowered its prices for an entire week as a concession to trade observances.
What happens to Adela when she witnesses Cyprian selling the handbag?
She faints or nearly collapses from shock, and several strangers help her into the open air, attributing her reaction to the crush and heat.
How does "The Dreamer" explore the theme of appearances versus reality?
Adela dismisses Cyprian as a passive dreamer, but he is actually a shrewd opportunist who deliberately left his hat off to be mistaken for staff and run a con.
What does the story suggest about adults underestimating young people?
Adela views Cyprian as a tractable boy useful for carrying parcels, completely failing to see that he is far more cunning and enterprising than she is.
How does Saki satirize consumerism and shopping culture in this story?
Adela's compulsive buying of items she does not need, her indecisive browsing, and her emotional attachment to parcels all mock the irrationality of sale-shopping behaviour.
What does the story imply about the relationship between passivity and cunning?
Cyprian's dreamy, passive exterior is itself a tool of deception; his seeming disengagement is what allows him to exploit the shopping chaos undetected.
What literary technique does the title "The Dreamer" employ?
It is ironic misdirection: the title suggests a passive fantasist, but the story reveals Cyprian is actually a calculating schemer whose "dreaming" is a deliberate facade.
Identify the simile Saki uses to describe Walpurgis and Nettlepink's price reduction.
He compares it to "an Arch-duchess might protestingly contract an attack of influenza for the unsatisfactory reason that influenza was locally prevalent," satirizing the store's reluctance.
What is the effect of Saki's narrator describing Cyprian's eyes as those of "a poet or a house agent"?
The unexpected pairing of a poet with a house agent (real estate agent) creates bathos, deflating the romantic description and hinting that Cyprian's dreaminess has a mercenary side.
How does Saki use dramatic irony in the handbag scene?
The reader and Adela both see the customer mistake Cyprian for staff, but only the reader grasps that Cyprian is deliberately exploiting the situation rather than innocently correcting it.
What does "sartorial" mean in the phrase "that sartorial quietude which frequently accompanies early adolescence"?
Relating to clothing or style of dress. Saki uses it to humorously elevate Cyprian's plain dressing into something more dignified.
What is a "portmanteau" as used in the leather goods department scene?
A large travelling bag or suitcase, typically made of stiff leather and opening into two equal halves.
What does "adamant" mean when Cyprian is described as "adamant in resisting his aunt's suggestion" to buy a hat?
Refusing to be persuaded or to change one's mind; utterly firm and unyielding.
Who says "I'm not a bargain hunter, but I like to go where bargains are," and what does it reveal?
Adela Chemping says this, revealing her self-deception: she considers herself above bargain hunting while eagerly participating in a sale.
What is the significance of Cyprian's explanation: "if one hasn't got a hat on one can't take it off"?
On the surface it seems like quirky logic about social etiquette, but it is actually his calculated excuse for going bareheaded so customers will mistake him for a shop assistant.
What do the bystanders mean when they say "It's the crush and the heat" after Adela collapses?
They attribute her fainting to the physical discomfort of the crowded store, completely unaware that the real cause is the shock of seeing her nephew running a confidence trick.