Class 12 English · Original EZT practice
Going Places - A. R. Barton (Class 12 English, Flamingo, Chapter 8)
Going Places is Chapter 8 of Class 12 Flamingo (Reprint 2026-27, pp. 75-86), A. R. Barton's story of Sophie, a schoolgirl 'earmarked for the biscuit factory' who dreams of boutiques, actresses and fashion designers - and tells her brother Geoff she has met Danny Casey, the young Irish football prodigy she worships from the stands. Between Jansie's warnings ('Takes money, Soaf'), her father's disdain and a lonely wait by the canal 'beneath a solitary elm', the story explores adolescent fantasising and hero worship. This page gives a full summary, characters, theme, word meanings and fresh practice questions. (Note: this is original practice, not a textbook exercise key.)
6 original worked examples, 6 fresh self-check questions and 4 mixed questions, with explained answers. These are not copied textbook exercises, an official chapter index or a full answer key. No affiliation with NCERT is claimed.
Official sources for topic and edition context, checked 24 October 2026:
1. Summary - the boutique dream, the Casey story, the canal bench
Walking home from school, Sophie announces, 'I'm going to have a boutique.' Jansie answers, 'Takes money, Soaf, something like that'; Sophie replies she will be a manager first, 'like Mary Quant' - 'I'll have the most amazing shop this city's ever seen.' At home, money talk meets her father's grimace: 'if you ever come into money you'll buy us a blessed decent house to live in.' Sophie watches her mother at the sink and 'wondered at the incongruity of the delicate bow which fastened her apron strings'. Sophie seeks out Geoff, tinkering with his motorcycle. She longs to enter his wider, silent world - she was 'conscious of a vast world out there' waiting for her - and imagines riding behind him, 'He wore new, shining black leathers and she a yellow dress with a kind of cape that flew out behind.' She tells Geoff, 'I met Danny Casey' - in the arcade outside Royce's window. Casey, she says, has 'green eyes. Gentle eyes'; he promised an autograph next week, though neither had 'any paper or a pen'. Geoff calls it 'the unlikeliest thing I ever heard.' On Saturday the family makes its 'weekly pilgrimage to watch United'. United win two-nil and 'Casey drove in the second goal, a blend of innocence and Irish genius', beating 'the hesitant goalkeeper from a dozen yards'. Sophie glows with pride. Next week Jansie confronts her: 'Your Geoff told our Frank you met Danny Casey.' Sophie is angry - 'Damn that Geoff' - then relieved: Jansie does not know about the date bit, so 'some things might be sacred'. After dark Sophie walks by the canal to 'a wooden bench beneath a solitary elm' and waits. She imagines his coming, then feels 'the pangs of doubt stirring inside me', and steels herself: 'we know how it was, Danny and me - that's the main thing.' The story closes inside her fantasy and her memory: the imagined second meeting in the arcade - 'The prodigy. The innocent genius. The great Danny Casey.' - and last Saturday at the ground, where she 'saw him ghost past the lumbering defenders' and heard 'the sudden thunderous eruption of exultant approbation'.
2. Characters
Sophie: a schoolgirl who lives in dreams - a boutique, then 'I'll be a manager then - yes, of course - to begin with', then an actress or fashion designer, 'something a bit sophisticated'; she invents, or believes, a meeting with Danny Casey and clings to it: 'But we know how it was, Danny and me.' Jansie: Sophie's classmate and friend, practical and 'nosey'; she knows they are both 'earmarked for the biscuit factory' and 'became melancholy' at Sophie's talk. Geoff: Sophie's older brother, three years out of school, an apprentice mechanic who travels to the far side of the city; he 'said little at all, ever, voluntarily. Words had to be prized out of him like stones out of the ground' - and Sophie 'was jealous of his silence'. Sophie's father: a heavy, grimy working man, 'scooping shepherd's pie into his mouth as hard as he could go'; his response to the Casey story is disdain - 'This another of your wild stories?' - though he speaks 'reverently' of once knowing 'a man who had known Tom Finney'. Sophie's mother: sighing over the sink, her 'delicate-seeming bow and the crooked back' marking the family's burdens. Little Derek: the younger brother, who hangs on his father's chair and announces, 'Ireland'll win the World Cup.' Danny Casey: the 'young Irish prodigy' of United's first team, with green 'gentle eyes' and a freckled, upturned nose - the hero of Sophie's fantasy and, on Saturdays, of the football ground.
3. Theme and word meanings
Adolescent fantasising: Sophie's boutique plans and the Casey romance are escapes built in the mind - the textbook names the theme 'adolescent hero-worship and fantasising'. Hero worship: Casey is worshipped from the stands and reinvented in the arcade; the 'weekly pilgrimage' shows hero worship shared by a whole family and city. Class and circumstance: the biscuit factory, the steamy cluttered room, the father's bicycle outside the pub - Sophie's dreams press against a life with no money in it. Family bonds: Sophie's longing to be 'admitted more deeply into her brother's affections' is as strong as her Casey dream; Geoff's half-belief ('he'd like to') is the story's tenderest thread. Textbook-flagged expressions, explained: incongruity - something out of place, not fitting (the delicate bow on her mother's worn apron); prodigy - a young person with exceptional talent (Danny Casey); chuffed - delighted, very pleased (Jansie thinks Sophie's dad would be 'chuffed as anything'); solitary elm - a single, lone elm tree (by the canal bench); arcade - a covered passage with shops (where Sophie says she met Casey); amber glow - a warm yellow-orange light (the table lamp in Geoff's room); wharf - a platform by the water for loading ships (its lamps light the canal path); pangs of doubt - sudden sharp feelings of uncertainty.
Choose, solve, check, then try a fresh question.
Before calculating, read the method prompt and name the condition that makes it useful. Write your own attempt. Open the steps only when you need them, and use the check to catch a wrong sign, unit or interpretation. Finish with the fresh question before reading its answer.
Hear the father's one story
Choose the method: Told reverently to the television.
EZT practice question
What story does Sophie's father tell 'reverently to the television'?
Show the worked solution
- The father has his own brush with football greatness: he 'once knew a man who had known Tom Finney'.
- He tells it 'reverently' - hero worship runs in the family, not only in Sophie.
- But he undercuts it himself: 'But that was a long time ago'.
Answer: He 'once knew a man who had known Tom Finney' - 'But that was a long time ago' - his own brush with football greatness, told 'reverently to the television'.
Check: The man who knew Tom Finney, the reverent telling, and the deflating coda.
Watch for this: Do not call the father immune to hero worship - his disdain for Sophie's Casey story sits beside his own reverence for a second-hand brush with Finney.
Now try it yourself
What is the father's response when Sophie tells the Casey story at home?
Check your answer
Disdain - 'This another of your wild stories?' - he files it with her boutique talk.
The parent who reveres his own legend dismisses his daughter's.
Relive the Saturday match
Choose the method: The weekly pilgrimage pays off.
EZT practice question
What happens during the family's Saturday 'weekly pilgrimage to watch United'?
Show the worked solution
- The whole family goes to the ground - the 'weekly pilgrimage' shows a city and family of worshippers, not Sophie alone.
- United win two-nil.
- Casey 'drove in the second goal, a blend of innocence and Irish genius', going round 'the two big defenders on the edge of the penalty area' and beating 'the hesitant goalkeeper from a dozen yards' - while her father screams for him to pass.
Answer: United win two-nil; Casey 'drove in the second goal, a blend of innocence and Irish genius', going round 'the two big defenders on the edge of the penalty area' and beating 'the hesitant goalkeeper from a dozen yards', while her father screams for him to pass.
Check: The two-nil win, the second goal's build-up, and the father's shouting.
Watch for this: Do not let Sophie narrate this neutrally - she glows with pride, as if Casey's brilliance were partly hers.
Now try it yourself
Why is the match visit called a 'pilgrimage'?
Check your answer
Because it is a weekly act of devotion shared by the family and the city - hero worship as ritual, which is exactly the story's named theme.
The word lifts a football trip into religion.
Weigh Jansie's question
Choose the method: What does Jansie actually know?
EZT practice question
During her talk with Jansie, what discovery makes Sophie breathe more easily?
Show the worked solution
- Jansie confronts her: 'Your Geoff told our Frank you met Danny Casey.'
- Sophie's first flash is anger - 'Damn that Geoff' - because her secret is travelling.
- Then the relief: Jansie does not know about the date bit - 'Geoff hadn't told about that' - so 'some things might be sacred' and Geoff 'hadn't let her down after all'.
Answer: That Jansie does not know about the date bit - 'Geoff hadn't told about that' - so 'some things might be sacred' and Geoff 'hadn't let her down after all'.
Check: The anger first, then the relief, and what exactly stayed secret.
Watch for this: Do not say Sophie is angry because the story is false - she is angry because the story is hers, and part of it stayed safe.
Now try it yourself
How does the text describe Jansie's nature?
Check your answer
She is practical and 'nosey' - she knows they are both 'earmarked for the biscuit factory' and 'became melancholy' at Sophie's talk.
Jansie's practicality is the ground against which Sophie's dreaming stands out.
Describe the waiting place
Choose the method: Chosen so as not to be seen.
EZT practice question
Describe the place where Sophie waits for Danny Casey.
Show the worked solution
- After dark she walks by the canal, along a sheltered path 'lighted only by the glare of the lamps from the wharf across the water'.
- There is 'a wooden bench beneath a solitary elm where lovers sometimes came'.
- It is 'the perfect place... For those who wished not to be observed' - the setting of a lovers' meeting she can only imagine.
Answer: A sheltered canal path 'lighted only by the glare of the lamps from the wharf across the water', with 'a wooden bench beneath a solitary elm where lovers sometimes came' - 'the perfect place... For those who wished not to be observed'.
Check: The wharf lamps, the bench beneath the solitary elm, and the wish-not-to-be-observed fitness.
Watch for this: Do not skip the lovers detail - the bench 'where lovers sometimes came' tells us what role Sophie has cast herself in.
Now try it yourself
What feeling stirs in Sophie as she waits, and how does she answer it?
Check your answer
'The pangs of doubt stirring inside me' - and she steels herself: 'we know how it was, Danny and me - that's the main thing.'
Doubt rises, and the fantasy is re-armed against it.
Stage the imagined second meeting
Choose the method: The autograph request, replayed.
EZT practice question
In Sophie's imagined second meeting in the arcade, how does the autograph request end?
Show the worked solution
- She approaches: 'Excuse me, but aren't you Danny Casey?'
- He turns, 'reddening slightly' - the fantasy keeps him shy and gentle.
- The request fails for want of tools: he does not seem to have a pen - and she realises she has none either.
Answer: She asks, 'Excuse me, but aren't you Danny Casey?'; he turns, 'reddening slightly', and answers that he does not seem to have a pen - and she realises she has none either.
Check: The approach line, the reddening turn, and the missing pens on both sides.
Watch for this: Do not treat the imagined meeting as a memory - the text keeps it inside fantasy, which is why the missing pen appears in both versions.
Now try it yourself
What titles does Sophie heap on Casey in this imagined meeting?
Check your answer
'The prodigy. The innocent genius. The great Danny Casey.'
The escalating names show worship doing the narrating.
Catch the closing sounds
Choose the method: The goal, remembered by the senses.
EZT practice question
What sensory details fill the story's closing memory of Casey's Saturday goal?
Show the worked solution
- Sight: she 'saw him ghost past the lumbering defenders'.
- Held breath: she heard 'the fifty thousand catch their breath as he hovered momentarily over the ball'.
- Sound: 'the explosion of sound as he struck it crisply into the goal' - 'the sudden thunderous eruption of exultant approbation'.
Answer: She 'saw him ghost past the lumbering defenders', heard 'the fifty thousand catch their breath as he hovered momentarily over the ball', then 'the explosion of sound as he struck it crisply into the goal' - 'the sudden thunderous eruption of exultant approbation'.
Check: The ghosting sight, the caught breath, and the thunderous eruption.
Watch for this: Do not read the close as a resolution - Sophie ends inside fantasy and memory, and the doubt by the canal is never answered by fact.
Now try it yourself
Where does the story leave Sophie's Casey story - proved, disproved, or held?
Check your answer
Held: nothing confirms or kills it; she keeps it by repetition - 'we know how it was, Danny and me'.
The story's theme is fantasising, not detection.
Try a mixed set
Choose a method or explanation before opening each answer.
1. Sophie's opening announcement?
Show answer and reason
'I'm going to have a boutique' - and Jansie's answer, 'Takes money, Soaf.'
Dream meets price tag in the first exchange.
2. Geoff's defining trait?
Show answer and reason
He 'said little at all, ever, voluntarily. Words had to be prized out of him like stones out of the ground.'
His silence is the wider world Sophie longs to enter.
3. The Saturday result?
Show answer and reason
United win two-nil; 'Casey drove in the second goal, a blend of innocence and Irish genius.'
The 'weekly pilgrimage' is the family's shared hero worship.
4. Where does Sophie wait for Casey?
Show answer and reason
'A wooden bench beneath a solitary elm' by the canal - 'the perfect place... For those who wished not to be observed.'
The lovers' bench shows the role she has cast herself in.
Try it yourself
Work these on paper before checking any notes. Answers are deliberately not shown here.
- In two sentences, show how the story pairs Sophie's fantasies with her family's circumstances.
- Contrast Geoff's silence with Sophie's talkativeness, quoting one phrase for each, and say what she wants from him.
- Explain in your own words why the canal-bench scene matters to the theme of adolescent fantasising.
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Questions about this practice page
- Who wrote Going Places and what is it about?
- A. R. Barton - the textbook describes him only as a modern writer who lives in Zurich and writes in English. The story follows Sophie, a schoolgirl whose dreams of a boutique and a meeting with footballer Danny Casey explore 'adolescent fantasising and hero worship'.
- Who is Danny Casey in Going Places?
- The 'young Irish prodigy' of United's first team squad, whose poster hangs in Geoff's room; Sophie tells her family she met him in the arcade, and watches him score 'a blend of innocence and Irish genius' at the Saturday match.
- What is the theme of Going Places by A. R. Barton?
- The textbook names it 'adolescent hero-worship and fantasising', with relationships - family and friends - as its sub-theme: Sophie's dreams of sophistication, her worship of Danny Casey, and her longing to enter Geoff's wider world.
- Who are the members of Sophie's family in Going Places?
- Her father, a heavy working man who dismisses her 'wild stories'; her sighing mother, bent over the sink; her older brother Geoff, a quiet apprentice mechanic she idolises; and little Derek.
- Where is Going Places in the Class 12 book?
- Chapter 8 of the Flamingo core-course textbook (Reprint 2026-27, pp. 75-86), by A. R. Barton.