Staying On (Scott)

Discussion Questions
Use our LitLovers Book Club Resources; they can help with discussions for any book:

• How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips)
• Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction
• Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart)

Also consider these LitLovers talking points to help get a discussion started for Staying On:

1. Why do the Smalleys not return to England after Indian independence? Might their decision have been different in the England that is today?

2. As Tusker says, "I still think we were right to stay on, though I don't think of it any longer as staying on, but just as hanging on." What does he mean...and do you think he was "right to stay on"? Does staying on suggest passivity and weakness...or strength and endurance...or what?

3. What effect does Tusker's death at the onset of the book have on the way you read the work? Why would Scott have started the novel with his death? When you revisit his death at the end of the book, has your perspective changed?

4. Talk about the irony of the Smalleys' stature in the newly independent India—their place in the economic-social hierarchy Lucy, for instance, feels she has become "a black sheep in reverse exposure"—what does she mean? For the Smalleys and others who stayed on, are they receiving their "just deserts"? Or not.

5. Discuss how Scott limns the portraits of his characters, particularly Tusker and Lucy. Do his portrayals capture their emotional and psychological complexity? In other words, does he create real people?

6. How would you describe the Smalleys' relationship? What is it (or who is it) that makes the marriage so difficult? In what way did they sacrifice their happiness—was it circumstance... or habit...or what? Is one more to blame than the other—do you sympathize with one more than the other?

6. Talk about how Lucy views her situation? What makes her plight so precarious?

7. Scott uses varying perspectives—Smalleys, Ibrahim, and Mr. Bhoolabhoy—to tell his story. How does each of the characters' reflections reveal the fading days of the Raj and the new society which took its place?

8. Talk about Mr. Bhoolabhoy and his wife. Funny or maddening? In what way was Frank Bhoolabhoy shaped by the Raj—and perhaps left stranded, as much as the Smalleys? What does that say about the effects of colonialism?

9. Talk about Mr. Bhoolabhoy's reaction to the arrival of the new Anglican priest, from south India. How does the priest revitalize the community—and what might this suggest about the possibility of blending cultures?

9. Have you read any novel of the "Raj Quartet," perhaps The Jewel in the Crown (or seen the 1984 BBC series)? If so, in what way might Staying On be considered an epilogue to the Quartet?

10. What is the thematic significance of The newer Shiraz overshadowing Smith's Hotel...and Tusker's dying hand clutching the notice of Mrs. Bhoolabhoy's sale of Smith's?

11. Consider watching Granada TV's 1980 adaptation of Staying On with Trevor Howard and Celia Johnson. Does the film reveal new insights? Is it a faithful adaptation?

(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)

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