Oscar Wilde's story of a firework who never once suspects that nobody is looking.
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Ten words unlock the story. Work through the four activities — say your answer out loud before you reveal it.
Three words from the story: oblivious · delusion · condescending. Say the right word, then reveal.
Read each part. After it, there's a quick comprehension check (try the questions from memory first), then one thing to discuss.
The King's son was to be married, and the country had been celebrating for a week. The bride had travelled from Finland in a sledge drawn by six reindeer; the wedding breakfast had lasted five hours; and the whole business was to conclude with a display of fireworks in the palace garden at nine o'clock precisely.
The fireworks, laid out on a long table, discussed the occasion among themselves. The little Squib admired the gardens. The Roman Candle preferred the moon. The Catherine Wheel, who had loved and lost, sighed at the mention of romance. And then a tall Rocket at the end of the table cleared his throat and explained that they were all extraordinarily fortunate, since it was perfectly evident that the Prince and Princess had arranged to be married on the very day that he was to be let off.
He went on. He came, he said, of a distinguished family; his mother had been the most celebrated Catherine Wheel of her generation; and when he rose into the sky he confidently expected to create a great sensation. The other fireworks attempted to change the subject to the weather, which the Rocket identified as proof of their poor breeding: not one of them had asked him a further question about himself. He was, he added, a firework of unusually sensitive feelings — and by way of demonstration he began to weep at the thought of a misfortune that might one day befall the Prince's as yet unborn son. The tears rolled down his stick like drops of rain.
1. What is the occasion, and how does the Rocket account for the date?
2. How does he demonstrate his sensitivity, and what is the physical consequence?
1. A royal wedding concluding with a firework display. He concludes that the royal couple must have chosen the date to coincide with his own performance.
2. He weeps over an imaginary future tragedy involving a child who does not exist. The result is that he soaks himself.
At nine o'clock precisely the display began. The Catherine Wheel turned; the Roman Candle threw up its gold stars; the Squib danced; the crowd shouted; the Princess laughed; and the sky above the palace filled with light and noise until the garden was as bright as noon.
One firework alone failed to go off. The Rocket was too thoroughly wet with his own tears to take a light. He lay on the table, damp and silent, while the event he had been designed for occurred without him and concluded without him, and nobody, at any point in the evening, noticed that he was missing. In the morning the gardeners came out, found a stick lying among the burnt paper, remarked that it was clearly a bad rocket, and threw it over the wall into a ditch.
He landed in the mud and lay on his back looking at the sky. This, he decided, was evidently a fashionable watering-place; he had been sent here to recover his health, being of a delicate constitution, and no doubt the court was already gravely concerned about him. A Frog swam past and talked about rain. A Dragon-fly hovered and enquired who he was. A Duck came by and offered practical advice about the value of making oneself useful. To each of them in turn he explained, at length, that he was a Remarkable Rocket. Each of them, in turn, departed in the middle of the explanation.
1. Why does the Rocket miss the display, and how is his absence received?
2. How does he interpret being thrown into a ditch?
1. He is too wet with his own tears to light. Nobody notices his absence at all; the gardeners later dismiss him as a bad rocket.
2. As evidence of his importance: a fashionable place, sent to recover his delicate health, with the court anxiously enquiring after him.
Some days later two small boys came down to the ditch to light a fire and cook something over it. They wanted dry material, and one of them noticed the stick lying in the mud. "This will do," he said, and threw it on the flames. "What an excellent stick."
The Rocket was delighted. Plainly he was to be let off in broad daylight, before an enormous audience, precisely as he had always deserved. He resolved to go higher than any rocket in history, so high that people would speak of the occasion for the rest of their lives, and would name their children after it.
The fire warmed him through, and at last the powder inside him caught. He went off with a magnificent bang. But it was the middle of the day, so the flash was invisible; the two boys had fallen asleep beside the fire, so the bang was unheard; and the only part of him that came down landed on a goose walking near the ditch, who observed that it was raining and made for the water. The last thing the Rocket said, as he shot into the wide empty daylight, was that he had known all along that he would create a great sensation. And then nothing whatever happened, anywhere at all.
1. How is the Rocket finally set off, and what does he expect to happen?
2. Account for each of the three reasons his moment fails.
1. Two boys use him as firewood. He believes he is being launched before a vast audience and will be remembered for generations.
2. It is daylight, so nothing is seen; the boys are asleep, so nothing is heard; and the only fragment that lands falls on a goose, who assumes it is rain.
The Rocket puts himself at the centre of every sentence he utters. English has precise machinery for deciding what goes at the centre — and it is one of the clearest markers of an advanced speaker.
Rewrite each flat sentence using the structure given. Write only the missing words.
1. His tears ruined the whole evening. → It ruined the whole evening. (it-cleft)
2. He wanted an audience more than anything. → What an audience. (wh-cleft)
3. A goose noticed the explosion, and nobody else did. → It noticed the explosion. (it-cleft)
1. was his tears that (or "were his tears that" — both are heard; "was" is standard with a cleft)
2. he wanted was 3. was a goose who / that
Complete each sentence so that it carries the weight described in brackets.
1. he wanted was somebody to listen to him. (and nothing else)
2. he failed was that he had soaked himself in his own tears. (state the cause formally)
3. Not only the flash invisible, but the bang went unheard as well. (inversion after "not only")
1. All 2. The reason 3. was
After "not only" at the start of a clause, the auxiliary comes before the subject — the same inversion as in a question.
Fill each gap so that the paragraph emphasises what it should. Read it aloud when you finish.
made the Rocket ridiculous was not his ambition but his certainty. he ever wanted was to be looked at. was his own performance of feeling made him too wet to light. Not only he miss the display, but he never learned that he had missed it. And reason we remember him at all is that Wilde refused to give him a single moment of self-knowledge.
What · All · It · that · did · the
Read the paragraph again without the clefts and notice how much flatter it is. That difference is the whole point of the structure.
Hold on to these — in the Speak tab, one well-placed cleft is worth three ordinary sentences.
Wilde published this in 1888 in The Happy Prince and Other Tales, a collection written for his two small sons and read chiefly by adults ever since. The stories take the form of fairy tales and behave like satire. It is worth remembering that Wilde was himself the most celebrated talker of his age, which makes this portrait of a compulsive self-publicist rather more interesting than a simple joke at someone else's expense.
This is the heart of the lesson — do all of it out loud. The timer is there to keep you going: fill the time with detail rather than racing through it.
Tell The Remarkable Rocket as if to someone who has never read it. Move through the arc: the royal wedding → the fireworks in conversation → the Rocket's family and his sensitive nature → the tears → nine o'clock, and the display he misses → the gardeners and the ditch → the Frog, the Dragon-fly and the Duck → the two boys and the fire → the goose.
Use at least two cleft sentences and at least five key words (vanity, self-indulgent, unimpressed, delusion, condescending, oblivious, ill-mannered, anticlimax, boastful, remarkable).
Build an argument. One position: you must advertise yourself to get anything — a job, a place, an audience — and modesty is simply losing quietly. The other: the Rocket is precisely what that logic produces, and the story is a warning. Take a side, give three reasons, deal with the strongest objection, and finish with concrete advice for someone your age about talking up their own achievements.
Then argue the opposite for one minute, using at least one cleft sentence.
Take the story's subject outward.
Stuck for an idea? Pick one of these and run with it: