Question

Answer briefly the questions that the passage follows:

Marchbanks:	[Convulsively] Onions!
Candida:	Yes, onions. Not even Spanish ones: nasty little red onions. You shall help me to slice them. Come along. [She catches him by the wrist and runs out, pulling him after her. Burgess rises in consternation, and stands aghast on the hearth-rug, staring after them.]
Burgess:	Candy didnt oughter andle a hearl’s nevvy like that. Its goin too fur with it.

1. Why is Marchbanks disgusted by the onions?     [1]
2. Why had he been similarly agitated a little earlier?     [2]
3. How had Candida responded then?     [2]
4. Why is Burgess shocked?     [2]
5. What does he get to know about Marchbanks soon?     [2]
6. Why does Morell appear disinterested?     [1]

Answer 1

1. As a sensitive, romantic poet, Marchbanks finds the mundane, pungent reality of peeling “nasty little red onions” to be a vulgar contrast to his idealized, poetic vision of Candida.
2. He was distressed by the sight of Candida engaging in other menial domestic chores, specifically scrubbing the floor and filling the lamps with paraffin oil, which he felt degraded her beauty.
3. Candida responded with amused practicality and motherly affection. She laughed at his romantic intensity and insisted that these chores were a necessary part of a happy, functioning home.
4. Burgess is a class-conscious man; he is “aghast” because he believes Candida is treating a member of the aristocracy, an “earl’s nephew,” with far too much familiarity and lack of respect by forcing him into kitchen work.
5. Burgess eventually learns that despite Marchbanks’ high social standing and “earl’s nephew” status, the young man is actually quite penniless and unconventional, which confuses Burgess’s materialistic worldview.
6. Morell is preoccupied and emotionally drained by the growing tension regarding his marriage. His “disinterest” is a mask for his inner anxiety and his attempt to maintain a position of intellectual superiority over the situation.