The rats door James Herbert

Onderdeel A
Zakelijke gegevens 1. auteur: James Herbert
2. titel: The rats
3. jaar van uitgave en druk: 1974
4. aantal bladzijden: 197 bladzijden
5. genre: fictie Onderdeel B
contents 6. describe the main characters: the main characters in this book are the rats and Harris. The rats are huge, black and very dangerous. They attack people and eat them alive. Harris is a teacher on st. micheals. He lives together with Judy. He tried to find out where the rats lived and to find a way to kill them. 7. Where is the story set: The story takes place in East-Londen - Poplar, but the important places are: The railway station, the school, the investigation-centre and the sewer.
8. Who is/are the narrator(s) The narrator is james Herbert. But sometimes the persons in the story tell things themselves. 9. Explain the title: The name of the book ‘’the rats’’ is self-evident, the whole book is about the rat plagues and what they do. 10. Summary: It starts with Henry Guilfoyle, a salesman who was in love with a much younger salesman Francis. The people at work didn’t respect it and painted with graffiti his and Francis name on the toilet doors. Henry started to drink and after a while he was always drunk. He slept in an abandoned house, at one day he was drunk and fell to sleep, but suddenly he felt a pain in his hand but had no idea what was happening. but when the biting and gnawing went further he realized some animal was eating him. He tried to pull the animal of him but it was to late, a group of rats jumped on him an ate him alive. Harris, an art-teacher in East-Londen, doesn’t like his pupils because they have no respect at all. They come from the suburbs. On a day Keogh, one of the pupils of Harris’s class came in while class was already started. Harris asked Keogh why he was to late and Keogh answered: I’ve been bitten by a bloody rat. Harris thought it was a lie but when Keogh had a fever the day after the bite he went to the hospital with him. Just no day later Keogh died. On day before Keogh was bitten there was a child named Karen Blakely who was playing with the dog, her mother went to the neighbour for a cup of sugar but when she came back it was a disaster in her house, everywhere was blood and what she saw much worse. She saw her dog totally ripped open an next to the dog her lifeless baby. When she was getting a cup of sugar rats came trough the cellar and attacked the dog. The dog tried to protect the little child but the rats where to strong. Karen’s mother ran to the hospital with the lifeless baby (who was already dead of course). Dave Moodie was heading for the station when he saw a few dark shapes, he began to ran before he realized it where rats, big rats. He run up the station stairs but the rats where much faster, they jumped on him and begun to eat, Dave screamed. A train came by and the driver saw what happened but he didn’t stop. When the stationmaster heard the boy screaming he went looking, but when he saw the huge rats he went back to his office to call the police. It was already to late a few rats had entered the office and they eaten the stationmaster. The pupils of Harris had to draw a animal. One of the pupils had drawn a huge rat because he had seen one outside on his way to school. While they where talking about it someone looked out the window and saw a large group of rats on the playground. Harris ran trough the whole school to close every window and door. When he came in the staff room he saw one of the windows open and a huge rat entered the room. The rat saw Harris and jumped towards his throat, but Harris was quicker and graphed a chair and slammed the rat against the wall. The rat was unconscious for a while so Harris could crash him to dead. Harris closed the window and went back to the headmaster, they realized that the basement was still open so they went to the basement. But before they where arrived they saw hundreds of huge rats coming into the basement. They blocked the door with anything they could find but one rat still had bitten the headmaster. The investigators tried to entice the animals with ultrasonic beams, but Foskins went after the rats, because it was not a good idea Harris followed him to stop him, but when he arrived at the abandoned home in the wood he saw the dead body of Foskins, he was torn to pieces. Foskins had an axe in his hand and Harris graphed it and killed the rats who where attacking him. When he entered a room he shocked, he had never seen such thing before. It was a huge rat, much larger than the other rats. And this rat had two heads, probably the mother rat of all the big rats. Harris crushed the rat with al his force and went home. He thought everything was over now. But……… Onderdeel C
Persoonlijke gegevens 12. Welke verhaalfragmenten hebben voor jou een positieve werking? Het fragment uit hoofdstuk 10 dat de trein werd overvallen door de enorme ratten vond ik wel spannend. 13. welke passage spreekt jou het meeste aan en waarom? De passage waarin de baby en de hond worden verscheurd door de ratten, dat is best wel aangrijpend. 14. welke verhaalfragmenten hebben voor jou een negatieve werking? Ook het fragment met de baby en de hond, het is best schokkend. 15. kun je dit boek met een ander boek/film vergelijken? Ja, een film waarin enorme spinnen een stad teisteren en mensen opeten.
16. wat is je oordeel over het thema van het boek. Ik vind het een minder leuk thema maar het is op een leuke manier in het boek gebracht (vindt ik dan) 17. wat vind je van het taalgebruik? Het taalgebruik vond ik op zich niet moeilijk maar sommige woorden snapte ik niet, die zocht ik dan op. Ik ging er vrij snel doorheen. 18. wat is je eindoordeel over dit boek? Ik vond het een leuk boek om te lezen, niet al te moeilijk. Soms was het wel even lastig omdat bijna elk hoofdstuk over een ander persoon gaat maar verder vond ik het een spannend boek. 19. op schaal van 1 tot 5 krijgt dit boek van mij een? Dit boek krijgt van mij een 4. 20. zou je iemand anders aanraden dit boek te lezen, waarom (niet) ik zou dit boek wel aanraden maar ik denk niet dat dit boek door iedereen leuk gevonden word omdat er best wel ranzige stukjes in voorkomen.