0

From God of small things,

When Estha and Rahel's mother got married, her father-in-law gifted the young couple a car as a present. Now the sentence is:

"He gave the young couple a custom-painted, powder-pink fiat as a present which after the wedding he drove off in himself, with all the jewelry and most of the other presents that they had been given."

So, does "drove off in himself with jewelry" part mean that he took the car back and used it and jewelry stuff by himself or he (father-in-law) drove them (new couple) from wedding place to their new home in the car with all other stuff. Or am I missing something? TIA

Improve this question
1
  • The father-in-law took back the car he had pretended to give, and stole all of the jewellery and most of the other presents.
    – Michael Harvey
    Commented Mar 10, 2019 at 9:02

3 Answers 3

Reset to default
1

The fact he drove off in it tends to imply that he went away, rather than that he was doing any sort of favour. With no more context, the implication is that he took back the car and stole their other presents. However, the text could later say he brought it all back, so one cannot draw final conclusions from this sentence.

Improve this answer
1

He gave the young couple a custom-painted, powder-pink fiat as a present which after the wedding he drove off in himself, with all the jewelry and most of the other presents that they had been given.

The part that puzzled you can be rephrased this way:

The father himself took back all the jewelry and most of the other presents and drove off with them in the gifted car.

The preposition "in" relates to the car, "himself" means that he was at the wheel driving off or at least in the car giving orders to the driver. The verb to drive off means to leave in a car.

Improve this answer
0

"He gave the young couple a custom-painted, powder-pink fiat as a present which, after the wedding, he drove off in himself, with all the jewelry and most of the other presents that they had been given."

Parse: the added commas make it comprehensible.

To drive off means to drive away or leave a place in a vehicle.

He drove off in the car himself. It is emphasized because if you give someone a car you don't usually drive off in it yourself.

Improve this answer

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .