NCERT Solutions for Class 12 English (Vistas) Chapter 5 Should Wizard Hit Mommy?

Ans : JO is the shortened form Of Joanne. She is the four year Old daughter Of lack and Clare. For the last two years. her father, Jack, has been telling her bed-time stories. Since these stories are woven around the same basic tale,they have the same characters and turn of events. She was an intelligent and inquisitive child. Her mind was bubbling with queries regarding whatever she heard or saw. Her responses to the stories were a curious mixture of emotions caught in recognition Of the known-She is also Very much eager to explore the unknown aspects woven in the basic tale by her father. An impatient Jo wanted the story to move with a fast pace -However,she could not proceed with conflicting ideas or unresolved queries in her mind, She was also a very observant listener .She also used to correct her father wherever she felt he faltered. The intensity of her engagement with the story was apparent from her body language and racial expressions. She empathized with the protagonist and rejected whatever did not fit in her own narrow world. The eagerness to understand and the restlessness to assert her point of view kept her awake. She was even willing to fight with her rather and to coax him to end the Story according to her Standpoint. Her indicate that she had started developing a personality of her own. 

Ans : From the perspective of Jo, the story should have ended with a happy note of Roger Skunk getting rid of the foul smell forever and being able to play with all other children, However. from the perspective of Jack, the story may not have such an innocent fairy tale ending. In the process of story telling, it was evident that Jack got nostalgic about his own childhood and his mother- Thus, he brought in his own perspective. His sense of belongingness to his mother and his experience of dealing with reality resulted in a mature and compromising end where the reality limited the scope of fiction. As he associated himself With Roger Skunk Of his Story, he avoided getting into the problematic situation Of identity crisis and of blaming his mother. 

Ans : Little JO had been accustomed to the happy ending Of the stories Of Roger, where the wizard was helpful to him in fulfilling his wish. At the request or Roger Skunk. the wizard had changed his awful smell to that Of the roses. Other small animals liked it and played With Roger Skunk happily. She could not digest the ending of the extended story where Roger Skunk's mother hit the wizard on the head and forced him to change Skunk's smell to the earlier foul one, JO could not accept the mothers stubbornness by hitting the well wisher Of her Min, Roger Skunk. Jo insisted that her father should ten her the same story again the next day with changed ending. The wizard should hit that unreasonable mummy on the head and leave Roger Skunk emitting the pleasant smell of roses. In the beautiful world of a child's imagination, fairies and wizards are more real than reality itself. She could not digest the harsh realities of life. She did not like the unfeeling mother who hit the benefactor of her son. 

Ans : The story examines moral issues dependent on different levels of maturity. There is a sharp contrast between an adult's perspective of life and the worldview of a little child. Children represent innocence. Hatred and injustice have no place in the their world. In the story. the baby skunk was able to make friends only after he smelled of roses. In Jo's perspective, the happiness of being able to make friends surpassed any other thing. As a result. she is unable to assess the reason why the mother skunk pressurized her child to get his original foul body odour restored. On the contrary, jack tried to justify the skunk's mother and wanted Roger to listen to his mother even if it means smelling bad again. Jack, a typical father, wanted his daughter to believe that parents are always correct and they know what is best for their children. Thus, the story raises the question of whether parents should always be followed blindly. 

Ans : Jo was not convinced with the ending of the story and coaxed her father to retell the story the next day giving the story a predetermined path that she had set. According to her, neither Roger Skunk nor the wizard was wrong in the story. Jo refused to accept the end where Roger Skunk's mother hit the wizard and that too Without being hit back. She wanted the story to end with the wizard hitting back the mother skunk with his magic wand on her head.