Holes Louis Sachar TEACHERS’ GUIDE In Brief Holes is the story of Stanley, who tries to set right both past and present wrongs and learns how much courage it takes to act fairly in an unfair world. Details When a pair of stolen sneakers falls from the sky on to serially unlucky Stanley Yelnats, he finds himself at the harshest correctional facility in Texas. Every day at Camp Green Lake, each boy is forced to dig a man-size hole in the scorching desert. The guards are bigger bullies than the inmates, quick to deny the prisoners their tiny ration of water, and to draw their guns at the first sign of trouble. The regime is supposed to be character- building, but Stanley soon discovers that there is more to the camp than hard labour. The boys are searching for something, and whatever it is, it means more to the Warden than any of their lives. What they find is a series of connections — between a century-old injustice, a family curse, and a few of the camp’s inhabitants — which transforms a story of hardship and friendship into a modern-day fairy tale. About Louis Sachar Louis Sachar lives in Austin, Texas. He was born on 20 March 1954, in East Meadow, New York. In 1976, he went to the University of California, where he studied economics. While at university he became a teacher's aide to gain extra credit; it turned out to be his favourite class and inspired him to write children's books. After graduation he worked in a sweater warehouse in Connecticut and wrote at night. He was fired from that job and moved on to law school. In his first week of study, Sideways Stories from Wayside was published. After completing his studies in 1980 he became a part-time lawyer but was compelled to concentrate on his writing full-time. First published in the USA in 1998, Holes has won major American literary prizes, including the Newberry Medal and the National Book Award. In 2004, a film adaptation was released, starring Sigourney Weaver as the Warden, and Jon Voight as Mr Sir. www.bloomsbury.com/louissachar Holes - Discussion 1. ‘If you take a bad boy and make him dig a hole every day in the hot sun, it will turn him into a good boy’ (page 5). Might there be any truth in this? How does the regime in Camp Green Lake affect each of the prisoners in Group D? Are there other situations in the novel where hardship plays a part in a character’s development — such as Elya’s attempts to woo Myra on pages 28—35, or the Warden remembering digging holes as a child on page 206. How do these compare with the regime at Camp Green Lake? 2. ‘He couldn’t for the life of him figure out why anyone would want to be called Armpit’ (page 20). Why do the boys have nicknames? Why do they refuse to answer to anything else? And what do you think of Pendanski’s insistence on using ‘the names society will recognize them by’? 3. ‘If it makes you feel better to call me Mom, Theodore, go ahead and call me Mom’, (page 19). Why do you think the boys call Pendanski ‘Mom’? How would you describe Mr Pendanski? Did some of his actions surprise you? What do you think motivates him? Why does he give Zero such a hard time? How did you feel when Zero hit him with the shovel? 4. How does Stanley differ from an archetypal hero? What is the effect of having a fat, bullied kid as the hero of a book like Holes? How does he change as the story progresses? 5. ‘“The Caveman’s cool,” said Armpit’ (page 44). Were you surprised that the boys treated Stanley well from the outset? Why do you think he wasn’t bullied the way he had been at school? Aside from Zero, does Stanley’s relationship with any of the boys stand out in any way? 6. ‘Stanley played the scene over and over again in his mind, each time watching another boy from Group D beat up Derrick Dunne’ (page 54). What do you think about Stanley’s fantasy? Does it make you sympathise with Stanley any less, or even more? How do you think Stanley would react to Derrick Dunne if he met him after the end of the story? 7. ‘This was the one place in the camp where the boys could enjoy themselves, and what’d they do? They wrecked it’ (page 46). What does the state of the ‘wreck room’ say about the camp and its inmates? Why do you think the room has been vandalised? 8. ‘It was a little surprising, he thought, that X-Ray was the leader of the group’ (page 53). Does it seem strange to you that X-Ray is the leader? How do you imagine the group’s dynamic was established? 9. ‘All of them had something else in common. Despite their awful luck, they always remained hopeful’ (page 9). What part does hope play in the novel? It seems to be an endearing quality in the Yelnats family, but are there also characters for whom hope is detrimental, or even damaging? Which characters seem to have given up hope altogether, and what do you think of them? 10. ‘For a second, he thought he saw a flash of defiance in Zero’s eyes’ (page 96). Why do you think Zero often looks angry, dislikes answering questions, and says he likes digging holes? All of these things get him into trouble and make his situation worse. Is there a kind of bitterness in his awkwardness? Or is his defiance a quality you admire? 11. When Stanley drops the sack of sunflower seeds on pages 85—7, he doesn’t hesitate to tell Mr Sir that he stole them himself. What would you have done in his position? How does his silence compare with the other boys’ telling the Warden about Stanley and Zero’s arrangement on pages 136—7? 12. ‘You’re not in the Girl Scouts any more.’ How would you describe Mr Sir? Is there anything that made you like him — his sense of humour, for instance, or his unexpected kindness to Zigzag on page 131? Why do you think he works at Camp Green Lake? How would you act if you were doing his job? After the Warden scratches him on page 91, he treats Stanley differently — presumably just as the Warden had planned. What do you think of the Warden’s tactics and Mr Sir’s response? Would anyone have done the same in Mr Sir’s position? 13. ‘What scared Stanley the most about dying wasn’t his actual death … for him, at least, it would be over. For his parents the pain would never end’ (page 163). Did this passage strike you in any way? How characteristic are Stanley’s thoughts here? Were there times when you worried that the novel might not have a happy ending? 14. ‘Stanley was thankful that there were no racial problems. X-Ray, Armpit, and Zero were black. He, Squid and Zigzag were white. Magnet was Hispanic’ (page 84). Did this information make any difference to your reading of the story? Did it help you to picture them in a way you hadn’t been able to before? Why do you think the author has chosen this way of grouping them, rather than mentioning race individually when he describes each character? And why do you think he waited so long to do so? Did you have any ideas before page 84 of the boys’ races? If so, on what were they based? What part does the issue of race play in the novel? Could the story of Stanley and Zero be read at an allegorical level? 15. ‘Same old story, ain’t it, Armpit … the white boy sits around while the black boy does all the work’ (page 117). Might there be some truth in X-Ray’s words? If not, why do you think he says them? Why are the boys so annoyed by Zero’s digging Stanley’s hole? Do you think Stanley should have let Zero dig part of his hole? If Stanley really did need the extra strength, why is he so angry with himself on page 141? 16. ‘I’ll make you a deal. One sweet kiss, and I won’t hang your boyfriend. I’ll just run him out of town’ (page 114). What do you think of Katherine Barlow’s reaction to the drunken sheriff? Why doesn’t she kiss him, if it will save Sam’s life? What would you have done in her position? 17. Stanley’s sentence is so severe because he was thought to have stolen the equivalent of ‘five thousand dollars … that would provide food and shelter for the homeless’ (page 25). Do you think the punishment would have been fair if Stanley had stolen the shoes? Zero’s crime was, in a sense, the opposite: he stole a new pair of sneakers because he was homeless. Yet Zero’s punishment is much the same as Stanley’s. Why do you think this is? How has the law (and the spirit of the law) changed in the 110 years since Sam was killed on the lake? 18. Compare Kissin’ Kate Barlow with the Warden. How do they differ, and what do they have in common? For whom are we expected to feel more sympathy? Whose crimes seems worse to you? Louis Sachar has said that he had intended the Warden to be Kate Barlow’s granddaughter, but that he wrote it differently because of how much he liked Kate.