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· What are the names the archenemies call each other and who does this characterise?

Ice Maiden, and Crone Bitch. Ice maiden is referring to the coldness of one’s heart, perhaps used to describe Marie, while Crone Bitch is referring to the age and attitude of the other, perhaps Anthony’s mother.

· How does the list of secret weapons on page 222 characterise Anthony’s mother?

It displays her as someone who argues and causes drama for no apparent reason. Her “secret weapons” being: “contempt, accusation, disdain, puzzled faux-innocence, the works.” The words point to Anthony’s mother being very opinionated.

· Consider the words used to describe Marie in the kitchen on 224 and 225. And the words used by Marie in this same passage. How do they characterise her and what she is doing?

Doctor completing an internal exam. She is being precise and careful and making sure she does the job right and to get every little bit of the fat out of the chicken. Marie also uses language to show that she is also tired and angry of doing this “I'm not going to die of cholesterol even if that’s what everyone wants.” This indicates the level of anger in her rising. Later on she breaks down and is told to relax.

· How does Marie’s smile on 226 characterise her? Which words in particular form your perception of her character? Describe.

She isn’t so uptight all of the time, or at least she wasn’t always. She has a side of her, her personal and real side, that she keeps hidden most of the time, appearing to be a sophisticated and level-headed person. This is further explained when Anthony remembers her smile after he took her snorkel off when they were at the Great Barrier Reef. “Unconscious”, as in she wasn’t thinking in her professional way at the time.

· On page 226 Anthony describes Marie at the doctor’s surgery. Consider the language used and how this adds to the characterisation of Marie. Also consider how this theme is continued on with the cherry-pipping.

That she is precise and does things by the book and that there should be no mistakes. Like the cherry picking she says “if you father gets a chipped tooth I will never here the end of it.” This shows her wanting it to be done correctly so then she doesn’t have to face the consequences. This shows us that she likes everything done one way and that she has learnt tricks of the trade.

· What does the word ‘maudlin’ on 230 mean?

Sentimental, or emotional, due to the fact that she is inebriated, which is evident by her slurring of words, her maudlin behaviour and the fact that Anthony notes she has had three white wines.

· What could the cactus be representing at the end of the story? Why does he want to see blood?

Its symbolic of his attempt to remain static in the environment that he is in. He wants to see blood to prove that it is real, and that it itself can remain static, as he is trying to do.

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How are the characters and events in this story connected with others in the collection?
While the stories in Like a House on Fire are entirely different stories without direct connections, the absence of recurring characters or settings doesn't leave the story disconnected or out of place among the other short stories in the collection. In fact, while the characters may not recur, their names are present throughout the stories. Marie, Anthony's wife, shares a name with the head cleaner in Laminex and Mirrors and Anthony's father shares the name Frank with Frank Slovak from Flexion. While this may suggest a link between the characters, their personalities are like polar opposites, Laminex and Mirrors's Marie has a seriously lacking work ethic, slacking off in a 'storeroom'. In comparison to the Marie in Static, who 'annotate[s] painstakingly' and fervently scrutinizes every aspect of the Christmas luncheon, there is a clear and blatant contrast between the characters with equal names. A less literal connection can be seen between Anthony and Chris from Ashes. Both characters share awkward family relations, with both of them attempting to interact with their families whilst avoiding unnecessary conflicts. Anthony, balancing his wife's emotions with his family, and Chris balancing his own with his family.
How are they relevant to us and the world?
Ironically, in a discussion of connection, Static intends to remind us that our connections between both family and others can be hard to maintain and require great effort to sustain. This doesn't mean one should stop attempting to strengthen these connections otherwise they will be replaced by static. Static alludes that interpersonal bonds are vital to your sense of self, and tenacity and perseverance may be necessary to avoid the disruption of the connection, namely static.

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Images:-	“the glossy magazine bristled with post-it notes, annotated by Marie with dozens of clever and simple Christmas lunch suggestions….”-	“…his mother prods a perfectly spherical melon ball into her drink”-	“Anthony listens to the asthmatic wheeze of the leather chair his father just vacated, sucking back air into itself as if desperate for breath.”-	“you could bounce a coin off her calf muscles, if you were game to try”-	“on the screen the tiny bright figures move as if they’re underwater”-	“…going to Safeway just the night before, running up and down the aisles searching for cranberries in syrup. The person ahead of him at the check outs was buying four BBQ chickens, salad mix and a big tub of choc-chip ice-cream.” -	“listless applause sounds from the TV as someone finally hits something, and the lounge chair exhales a gust of weary depression”-	“Marie’s face, as she glances up, is murderous”-	“in every one of their wedding photos, stored over there in the hand-tooled leather albums, she has on the other smile, the trained one-lips closed, and chin raised like a model of cool serenity, a perfected study of herself”-	“thunk, thunk, go the cherry stones, sliding obediently from the dripping flesh.”-	“looking down as the warm solution sloshed around inside is ear, he saw a hard ball of wax just the size and shape of one of these cherry stones lying there”-	“his signature slumping below the dotted line like a failing ECG”-	“the front doorbell rings its two-gong Tibetan chime, and he jumps up”-	“he looks at the group of them reproduced in pixels, their movements at the table making the image shift and shimmer like a 3D postcard”-	“Anthony stands tilting the camera a few millimetres back and forth, mesmerised, as the group arranges itself before him”-	“in the guest bedroom gathering dust…”-	“bed of stones…Anthony’s feet crunch on it now making him stagger slightly”-	“he can see her through the kitchen from here: Marie at the granite bench straightening mince pies on a platter…. Marie takes the sifter and starts dusting the pies with icing sugar.-	“Marie turns and turns the sifters handle, the muscle twitching in her face”-	“Anthony puts the handset down onto the stones and gazes at the plants…he reaches out with a fascinated finger to press a curved spike, hard, against the cushion of skin.”-	“his mother prods a perfectly spherical melon ball in her drink, and looks at him as if it was a floating dead mouse”-	“...both of them, his mother and Marie, turning the evil rays on him” Cate Kennedy has used imagery to show the conflicting expectations, lack of compassion and dehumanisation that is present in ‘Static”. The character Anthony is found to be seeking a normal, ordinary life, through the feeling of failing to live up to his mothers and his wife’s expectations. His wife Marie is a perfectionist, this is shown though the imagery used “Marie at the granite bench straightening mince pies on a platter.” This amount of pressure that is on Anthony to always have everything perfect, clashes his ideal life. This is shown in Kennedys imagery used “…going to Safeway just the night before, running up and down the aisles searching for cranberries in syrup. The person ahead of him at the check outs was buying four BBQ chickens, salad mix and a big tub of choc-chip ice-cream”. This imagery that Kennedy has used, shows the reader how Anthony is fixated on having a normal life without these adult expectations that are presented to him by his mother and Marie, instead of searching all through the supermarket to find the right cranberries, he wishes to have a simple Christmas lunch, as the person ahead of him in the checkouts, this is not where he thought he would be at this time in his life. The image of Anthony pricking his finger on the cacti “Anthony puts the handset down onto the stones and gazes at the plants…he reaches out with a fascinated finger to press a curved spike, hard, against the cushion of skin.” Shows the reader how dehumanising he feels, as he feels he can’t live up to his family’s expectations. Showing the image of characters feeling disconnected from those around them, miscommunication, Anthony wants a sense of belonging but is unable to act upon this desire, as he is trying to live up to his wife and his mother’s expectations. This is shown using Kennedy’s sense of imagery in her writing “his mother prods a perfectly spherical melon ball in her drink, and looks at him as if it was a floating dead mouse” “..both of them, his mother and Marie, turning the evil rays on him”.  Showing the reader that Anthony’s wife and mother expect more of him, wanting him to be someone he’s not, leaving Anthony feeling disconnected from his family around him.

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Images:-	“the glossy magazine bristled with post-it notes, annotated by Marie with dozens of clever and simple Christmas lunch suggestions….”-	“…his mother prods a perfectly spherical melon ball into her drink”-	“Anthony listens to the asthmatic wheeze of the leather chair his father just vacated, sucking back air into itself as if desperate for breath.”-	“you could bounce a coin off her calf muscles, if you were game to try”-	“on the screen the tiny bright figures move as if they’re underwater”-	“…going to Safeway just the night before, running up and down the aisles searching for cranberries in syrup. The person ahead of him at the check outs was buying four BBQ chickens, salad mix and a big tub of choc-chip ice-cream.” -	“listless applause sounds from the TV as someone finally hits something, and the lounge chair exhales a gust of weary depression”-	“Marie’s face, as she glances up, is murderous”-	“in every one of their wedding photos, stored over there in the hand-tooled leather albums, she has on the other smile, the trained one-lips closed, and chin raised like a model of cool serenity, a perfected study of herself”-	“thunk, thunk, go the cherry stones, sliding obediently from the dripping flesh.”-	“looking down as the warm solution sloshed around inside is ear, he saw a hard ball of wax just the size and shape of one of these cherry stones lying there”-	“his signature slumping below the dotted line like a failing ECG”-	“the front doorbell rings its two-gong Tibetan chime, and he jumps up”-	“he looks at the group of them reproduced in pixels, their movements at the table making the image shift and shimmer like a 3D postcard”-	“Anthony stands tilting the camera a few millimetres back and forth, mesmerised, as the group arranges itself before him”-	“in the guest bedroom gathering dust…”-	“bed of stones…Anthony’s feet crunch on it now making him stagger slightly”-	“he can see her through the kitchen from here: Marie at the granite bench straightening mince pies on a platter…. Marie takes the sifter and starts dusting the pies with icing sugar.-	“Marie turns and turns the sifters handle, the muscle twitching in her face”-	“Anthony puts the handset down onto the stones and gazes at the plants…he reaches out with a fascinated finger to press a curved spike, hard, against the cushion of skin.”-	“his mother prods a perfectly spherical melon ball in her drink, and looks at him as if it was a floating dead mouse”-	“...both of them, his mother and Marie, turning the evil rays on him” Cate Kennedy has used imagery to show the conflicting expectations, lack of compassion and dehumanisation that is present in ‘Static”. The character Anthony is found to be seeking a normal, ordinary life, through the feeling of failing to live up to his mothers and his wife’s expectations. His wife Marie is a perfectionist, this is shown though the imagery used “Marie at the granite bench straightening mince pies on a platter.” This amount of pressure that is on Anthony to always have everything perfect, clashes his ideal life. This is shown in Kennedys imagery used “…going to Safeway just the night before, running up and down the aisles searching for cranberries in syrup. The person ahead of him at the check outs was buying four BBQ chickens, salad mix and a big tub of choc-chip ice-cream”. This imagery that Kennedy has used, shows the reader how Anthony is fixated on having a normal life without these adult expectations that are presented to him by his mother and Marie, instead of searching all through the supermarket to find the right cranberries, he wishes to have a simple Christmas lunch, as the person ahead of him in the checkouts, this is not where he thought he would be at this time in his life. The image of Anthony pricking his finger on the cacti “Anthony puts the handset down onto the stones and gazes at the plants…he reaches out with a fascinated finger to press a curved spike, hard, against the cushion of skin.” Shows the reader how dehumanising he feels, as he feels he can’t live up to his family’s expectations. Showing the image of characters feeling disconnected from those around them, miscommunication, Anthony wants a sense of belonging but is unable to act upon this desire, as he is trying to live up to his wife and his mother’s expectations. This is shown using Kennedy’s sense of imagery in her writing “his mother prods a perfectly spherical melon ball in her drink, and looks at him as if it was a floating dead mouse” “..both of them, his mother and Marie, turning the evil rays on him”.  Showing the reader that Anthony’s wife and mother expect more of him, wanting him to be someone he’s not, leaving Anthony feeling disconnected from his family around him.

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Theme #2- Static-Structure Kennedy has a variety of sentence structures in her story ‘Static’. Shorter ones have been used to show the awkward tension that is there between Anthony, his mother and Marie. Whereas longer sentences with commas allow readers to get a feel for the setting and know what the narrator is thinking. Generally, the paragraphs have been broken up with dialogue. This is to reiterate who is talking and when they have ended. In other cases a new paragraph has begun with a new thought, idea or conversation.In media res- it starts in the middle of the action, the action being his mother has started to complain about the beverages as he had predicted. Kennedy then moves freely backwards and forward between the past and the present, connecting the dots of the story and spilling the details as she goes. This keeps the audience hooked on the plot of the story.Anthony and Marie’s fertility problems are revealed after a paragraph where Anthony is reminiscing on Marie’s old smile, how she doesn’t smile properly anymore because she thinks her teeth are crooked. This is done to disclose to the audience the effect on what these problems are having on their marriage, how its making them change and also to convey a connection to the reader as it is a personal and private consciousness of his life.‘Static’ is written from a third person subjective, offering Anthony’s point of view. This helps to reveal to the readers/audience the relationships the characters have with one another in the story. With Anthony’s point of view it influences us to feel an amount of dislike towards his mother, as well as noticing the disconnection between him and his wife.

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Theme #2- Static-Structure Kennedy has a variety of sentence structures in her story ‘Static’. Shorter ones have been used to show the awkward tension that is there between Anthony, his mother and Marie. Whereas longer sentences with commas allow readers to get a feel for the setting and know what the narrator is thinking. Generally, the paragraphs have been broken up with dialogue. This is to reiterate who is talking and when they have ended. In other cases a new paragraph has begun with a new thought, idea or conversation.In media res- it starts in the middle of the action, the action being his mother has started to complain about the beverages as he had predicted. Kennedy then moves freely backwards and forward between the past and the present, connecting the dots of the story and spilling the details as she goes. This keeps the audience hooked on the plot of the story.Anthony and Marie’s fertility problems are revealed after a paragraph where Anthony is reminiscing on Marie’s old smile, how she doesn’t smile properly anymore because she thinks her teeth are crooked. This is done to disclose to the audience the effect on what these problems are having on their marriage, how its making them change and also to convey a connection to the reader as it is a personal and private consciousness of his life.‘Static’ is written from a third person subjective, offering Anthony’s point of view. This helps to reveal to the readers/audience the relationships the characters have with one another in the story. With Anthony’s point of view it influences us to feel an amount of dislike towards his mother, as well as noticing the disconnection between him and his wife.