C4

Chapter 4: Tragedy Queen

1. Ram knew Neelima's lover face although he couldn't remember exactly where from. Who do you think it was? Where might he have seen him before?

The man probably was another famous actor, and Ram might have seen him before on TV.

2. Neelima says about her lover: "Sometimes I think that he loves me. Sometimes I think that he hates me". Why does she say this?

She may say this because sometimes the man acts as if he loved her, but other days he beats and hurts her, and that makes her think that he hates her.

3. In your opinion, why men mistreat women? Why is Neelima mistreated?

Men don't mistreat women because they are better, it's because they think they are better, and I believe that it's a problem of the past, because in other times it was thought that women were and deserved nothing because they didn't work, because they were less strong than men and because their only mission in life was to gave birth and take care of the children, the house and their husband. Luckily, nowadays the number of mistreated women is lower, but it is still high. Hopefully, this situation will change in a near future. And about Neelima, she is probably mistreated because of the mentality of those cultures in which women are seen like an object, and the first sign of it are their clothes. The fact that they must hide their faces is one of the signs of this foolish society.

4. What happened to Neelima in the end? Name three true celebrities who died the same way.

Neelima killed herself, like Vincent Van Gogh, Virginia Woolf and Ernest Hemingway did.

• Vincent Van Gogh: he killed himself the 27th of July of 1890, when he was only 37. He shot his chest with a revolver. A note found in his pocket said: "I risked my life for my job, and my reason always was diminished"

• Virginia Woolf: this writer suffered from bipolar disease, which made her kill herself on March the 28th, 1941. She threw herself into the Ouse river. She had stones on her pocket.

• Ernest Hemingway: this worldwide known writer (one of the most important writers of the history) died the 2nd of July, 1961 because of a shot. It's unknown why he killed himself, but it is said that he made that decision because he had a depressive personality and because doctors detected that he suffered from Alzheimer.