Questions About The Land of Green Plums

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Answered Questions (1)

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Sara 1) What do you think about it?
2) Romania in the 70s and 80s is a state of fear, much like Indonesia in the time of Soeharto. People watch their neigh…more1) What do you think about it?
2) Romania in the 70s and 80s is a state of fear, much like Indonesia in the time of Soeharto. People watch their neighbors, people watch their tongue. The walls have ears, the ceiling have ears, the open sky have ears. All that you have are friends that you trust, but for how long? How much? How many seasons, how many hardships until they turn themselves into accomplices?
3) When a poem is feared by authorities to incite rebellion, then you know it is time to leave. But, if the authorities think that leaving the country is treason, does that prevent someone from leaving or does it hasten the departure date of that person?
4) The narrator fears she will loose her mind, and the readers fears for her too: how can she face what is happening around her?
5) What is it like when your every move is under scrutiny?
6) Is friendship really possible in a dictatorship?
7) Have you ever tried having a diary while you were younger?
8) The narrator and her friends seem to be trying to flee Romania. People they know are frequently shot for trying to escape the country. However, it seems that it’s perfectly feasible to go down to an office and request a passport for emigration. If this is the case, why are all these people trying to flee illegally and risking their lives?
9) There is a beautiful old bit of folk wisdom that states in 'these times', one can't afford friends, which seems reasonable enough because who knows when they might turn on you, but if that is the case, why do you have them?
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Unanswered Questions (1)

The main female character's relationships with her male friends is suggested as partly sexual by Frau Magrit who also reports this to her mother. Is this 'factual' or scurrilous? I tend to think the later as sex seems to be only represented as prostitution for food or by marriage under what is frequently viewed as oppressive. An open sexual relationship or physical friendship wouldn't be likely where renunciation?

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