Pappachi’s Moth Questions & Answers

Hi Everyone!! This article will share Pappachi’s Moth Questions & Answers.

In my previous posts, I have shared the questions and answers of An Excellent Father and A Spark Neglected Burns The House so, you can check these posts as well.

Pappachi’s Moth Questions & Answers

Word Galaxy

  • Ignominy – public shame or disgrace
  • Prime – of first importance
  • Slouched – stand, move or sit in a lazy, drooping way
  • Immaculately – in a perfectly clean, neat or tidy manner
  • Sullen – bad-tempered
  • Supervise – observe and direct the execution of a task or activity
  • Strode – walk with long, decisive steps in a specified direction
  • Sew – join, fasten or repair
  • Revenge – the action of hurting or harming someone
  • Anxiety – a feeling of nervousness
  • Intense – of extreme force, degree or strength
  • Pernicious – having a harmful effect
  • Abruptly – suddenly
  • Tormented – cause to experience severe mental or physical suffering

Question 1: What happened in the fair which was organized by the Kottayam Bible Society?

Answer: In the fair, Mammachi was asked to make her famous banana jam and tender mango pickle. It sold so quickly that she had more orders than she could cope up with.

Question 2: What decision did Mammachi take after her success?

Answer: Thrilled with her success, Mammachi decided to persist with making of the pickles and jams.

Question 3: Why did Pappachi not help his wife? Was he jealous of her?

Answer: Pappachi was seventeen years older to his wife Mammachi and he realized with a shock that he was old while his wife was still in her prime. He did not help his wife with the pickle-making because he didn’t consider this a suitable job for a high-ranking ex-government official.

He was very jealous of the attention that Mammachi was suddenly getting by everyone. He slouched around the compound watching her supervise the buying, weighing, salting and drying of limes and tender mangoes.

Question 4: What did Pappachi use to do every night?

Answer: Every night, Pappachi used to beat his wife Mammachi with a brass flower vase and the frequencies of this beating were getting more day by day.

Pappachi’s Moth Questions & Answers

Question 5: Who was Chacko? What did he do with Pappachi?

Answer: Chacko was the son of Pappachi and Mammachi who was studying in Oxford. He came home after summer vacation. A week after he arrived, he found Pappachi beating his mother in the study. He strode into the room, caught Pappachi’s vase-hand and twisted it around his back.

Question 6: What changes were observed in Pappachi’s behaviour after what Chacko did with him?

Answer: The day when Chacko asked Pappachi not to beat Mammachi again, it changed his behaviour. For the rest of that day, Pappachi sat in the verandah and stared stonily out at the ornamental garden and ignored the plates of food that Kochu Maria brought him. At night, he went into his study and brought his favourite mahogany rocking chair. He put it down in the middle of the driveway and smashed it into little bits. He left it there in the moonlight, a heap of varnished wicker and splintered wood. He never touched Mammachi again however, he never spoke to her either as long as he lived. When he needed anything, he used Kochu Maria or Baby Kochamma as intermediaries.

Question 7: What was Pappachi’s revenge?

Answer: The Plymouth was Pappachi’s revenge. He bought the sky-blue Plymouth from an old Englishman in Munnar. He became familiar sight in Ayemenem, coasting down the narrow road in his wide car, looking outwardly elegant but sweating freely inside his woollen suits. He wouldn’t allow Mammachi or anyone else in the family to use it or even to sit in it.

Question 8: What did Pappachi do before his retirement?

Answer: Pappachi had been an Imperial Entomologist at the Pusa Institute. After Independence, when the British left, his designation was changed from Imperial Entomologist to Joint Director, Entomology. The year he retired, he had risen to a rank equivalent to the Director.

Question 9: What did Pappachi notice unknowingly one evening?

Answer: One evening, while Pappachi was sitting in the verandah of a rest house, a moth fell into his drink. As he picked it out, he noticed its unusually dense dorsal tufts. He took a closer look and with the growing excitement, he mounted it and measured it. the next morning, he placed it in the sun for a few hours for the alcohol to evaporate. He caught the first train and went back to Delhi. After unbearable six months of anxiety, he was told that his moth had finally identified as an unusual race of well-known species that belonged to the tropical family, Lymantriidae.

Question 10: What happened after twelve years?

Answer: The real bow came after twelve years. As a consequence of a radical taxonomic reshuffle, lepidopterists decided that Pappachi’s moth was a separate species and genus hitherto unknown to Science. By then, Pappachi had retired and moved to Ayemenem. It was too late for him to assert his claim to that discovery. His moth was named after the Acting Director of the Department of Entomology, a junior officer whom Pappachi had always disliked the most.

Pappachi’s Moth Questions & Answers

Question 11: What was Pappachi’s moth held responsible for?

Answer: Pappachi’s moth was held responsible for his black moods and sudden bouts of temper that he had in himself. It tormented him and his children as well.

Question 12: What was Pappachi’s routine till he died?

Answer: Pappachi wore a well-pressed three-piece suit and his gold pocket watch even in the stifling Ayemenem heat until the day he died. On his dressing table, next to his cologne and silver hair brush, he kept a picture of himself as a young man, with his hair slicked down, taken in a photographer’s studio in Vienna where he had done the six-month diploma course that had qualified him to apply for the post of Imperial Entomologist. This was his routine.

Question 13: Why were the lessons of Mammachi discontinued?

Answer: In the few months of living in Vienna, Mammachi took her first music lessons on the violin. The lessons were abruptly discontinued when her teacher Launsky-Tieddenthal made the mistake of telling Pappachi that his wife was exceptionally talented and, in his opinion, potentially concert class.

Question 14: What was the reason for Pappachi’s death?

Answer: Pappachi had developed chest pains and suffered a massive heart attack. He passed away at Kottayam General Hospital.

Question 15: Why was Mammachi crying even more at Pappachi’s funeral?

Answer: Mammachi was crying even more at Pappachi’s funeral as she was used to him more than she loved him. She was used to have him slouching around the pickle factory.

Question 16: Write the character sketch of Pappachi.

Answer: Pappachi, Mammachi’s husband and the father of Ammu and Chacko, is a retired Entomologist. He is an unemotional and jealous person who is quite indifferent towards his family especially his wife, Mammachi. He beats Mammachi regularly and does not like her work of making pickles. He thinks that this menial job is against the dignity of a high-ranking ex-government official. He is highly displeased by the success of his wife.

His biggest triumph in life becomes his biggest failure when he discovers a rare breed of moth, but he does not get credit or even naming rights for his discovery. Later, when he comes to know that his discovery has been recognized but named after the acting director of the department, he is shocked. This event is held responsible for his black mood and temper.

Pappachi is a rude and snobbish person. He buys a car and does not allow anybody to sit inside it. In order to hide his age and infirmity, he wears beautiful dresses and pretends to be a royal person. 

Question 17: Write the character sketch of Mammachi.

Answer: Mammachi is the wife of Pappachi and has twin children namely Chacko and Ammu. She is an elderly lady but is seventeen years younger to her husband. She is a hard worker and is very good at making pickles and jams, which sell very quickly at a particular fair. She gets more orders and thus becomes employed particularly after her husband’s retirement. Moreover, she is very good at playing violin. She has a lot of patience and is a victim of male dominance. She tolerates the beatings of her husband but doesn’t disclose it to anyone. Though, she didn’t get any support from her husband but she is loyal to him and cries at his funeral.

So, these were Pappachi’s Moth Questions & Answers.

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