Unpacking the Questions

May 2001
a) Compare uses and/or abuses of power as a theme in novels or short stories you have read. Say what this theme and its presentation contribute to each work you discuss.

paraphrase: This question seems to be asking the reader to look back into the novels for times they have seen a character or group within the novel take over others or another group through power. The question wants the reader to recognize the different ways power are used within different novels to bring across a certain theme or aspect of life.

element of fiction: Theme

Two books I would use: The Bluest Eye, and As I Lay Dying

May 2002
a) In novels and short stories, characters tend to have both "an inner life" and a "public life." Both of these may be part of the fiction, if not equally so in every work. Choose examples from your reading to discuss how and how effectively these two aspects of human existence are presented.

paraphrase: This question is asking the reader to look into the characters of the novels closely and examine their lives. It wants the reader to see exactly how the outside, public and physical lives of the characters are presented as contrasted with their minds, thinking and views/opinions.

element of fiction: Characterization

Two books I would use: Metamorphosis and The Bluest Eye

Outline Commentary

Adolescence - II

1. Introduction
a. Beginning sentence: As our bodies grow physically, our minds slowly mature.
b. Thesis statement: In Adolescence - II, Rita Dove uses diction and metaphor to create the dominant effect of how the power of maturity affects the adolescent.
2. Body 1
a. Topic sentence: Throughout the entire poem, Dove uses diction to create detailed descriptions showing how the adolescent feels or reacts to the changes occuring with maturity.
b. Examples: "...sweat prickles behind my knees..."
"...the baby-breasts are alert..."
"I clutch at the ragged holes..."
3. Body 2
a. Topic sentence: Dove strengthens her dominant effect of the affects of maturity on the adolescent by using diction once again to describe maturity through the use of personification and simile.
b. Examples: "...the three seal men with eyes as round as dinner plates..."-simile
"...eyelashes like sharpened tines..."-simile
"...glittering like pools of ink under moonlinght..."
4. Body 3
a. Topic sentence: Through her entire poem, Dove uses an extended metaphor, conceit, to show the adolescent's reaction to the changes, and creative description of maturity as if it is three seal men.
b. Examples: "...three seal men..."
"One sits in the washbowl, one on the bathtub edge; one leans against the door."
"They leave behind, here at the edge of darkness."
5. Conclusion
a. Through the use of a conceit and diction throughout the entire poem Dove strengthens her main effect of the affects of maturity on the adolescent. She also uses personification and similie to play on these main literary devices and help bring out her creative description of maturity and reaction of the adolescent.

Vernon Tull is the kind of person you can always count on. He and his wife Cora Tull are farmers and the Bundren’s neighbors and though they are not rich they are slightly wealthier than the Bundrens. Though Vernon often becomes frustrated with Anse’s sluggish attitude towards work, he is always there helping the family out. Vernon gives Cash, Darl and Jewel jobs in order for the family to make extra money. He’s also in the family’s life throughout the entire book helping them prepare for Addie’s death, during their mourning and on their journey to Jefferson.
Through Vernon Tull’s monologues he reveals that he is a strong observer. He seems to view what other characters actions are and narrate them occasionally adding in his own thoughts or opinions. He also seems to have a respect for women given the time period he lives in. He often talks to Cora, his wife, about events which have taken place and listens to her ideas about them though also arguing his own.
It seems that Tull’s position in the book is to move it along. He is a secondary character who sort of continues to extend the plot through his observation and narration more than providing his own thoughts about life, or the events which occur as many of the other main characters do. Though he also provides a new perspective on the Bundren family different from the readers own thoughts of them based on their actions or actions of other characters outside of the family.
Some words which might describe Vernon Tull are an observer, a listener and one who acts not solely on his own wants and needs but what he knows he should do for the good of other people. These words best describe him in the way he narrates, as though he is just viewing what others are doing and saying thought not really interacting in the situations. He also seems like someone who despite his own personal opinions and feelings knows you must help your neighbors no matter who they are in their time of need.

Commentary on "A Sad Child"

In, "A Sad Child" Margret Atwood uses diction and cataloguing to support the struggles of womanhood. By using the word chocie, Atwood builds up two tones, a sarcastic forgetful one displayed in the beginning of the poem, and a compassionate wise one at the end. Throughout the entire poem Atwood supports what she is trying to say by repeating the word "sad" or "sadness" throughout the poem relating to the subject - women.
Atwood uses the diction to show that women are oppressed, as they have been throughout history. She shows that women bring this upon themselves and enforce the idea, as society has originally placed in their heads, when in stanza three she states, "[you] said to yourself in the bathroom, I am not the favorite child."
Atwood then uses diction and cataloguing to show what people generally feel or the way they act towards this emotional sadness women may generally express. She shows this in the beginning stanzas when she states, "Its psychic. It's the age. It's chemical, Go see a shrink or take a pill," and these happen to be man "cures" society may give for this emotional sadness women have brought upon them by society and history and then eventually, themselves. She also states, "but a hat. Buy a coat or pet. Take up dancing to forget," giving the idea that happiness can be brought and will easily make this sadness go away. She states these words to show how society doesn't take women seriously when they express this sadness which seems to be what Atwood is commenting on when she speaks of the subject, women, as a "child" or in general children when she states "all children are sad". When children are sad, they are usually not taken seriously because adults feel they might have actual serious problems.
In using diction and cataloguing, Atwood has been able to display a poem showing the difficulties women have had to face in their history, and what women have had to face in their individual lifetimes.

"Follower" Commentary

In the "Follower" Seamus Heaney uses imagery and structure to create a narrative, and reminicent tone. Heaney walks through images of his childhood and memories of his father working on the farm in this poem. In using imagery, he choses words to make the reader feel as though they are really there, making them feel closer to the stories he is telling, which helps to create the narrative reminicent tone. Structure also happens to be a very important part of the development of the tone in the poem. The specific punctuation and style of sentence and rhyme help Heaney also create this narrative tone.
Heaney uses specific words to create the imagery within the poem. In the first few stanzas he states, "shoulders globed", "strained", "sweating", "eye narrowed and angled", and "stumbled". All of these words create an idea of hard work, as though the reader is there on the farm with the speaker and his father. They give detail and strength to the foundation of the poem. One of the most important parts of good stories happen to be detail and a way of making the listener, or in this case the reader, feel as though they are there. In using this imagery Heaney does this, and gives the poem a narrative tone.
Structure is the second way Heaney is able to display a narrative and reminicent tone. He uses punctuation to create a very unique sense of structure. He uses a combination of long and short sentences and phrases as though he is adding more information and memories as they come to him. This helps to create a highly narrative tone in that this is what people do as they tell stories of events in their lives.
In the "Follower" Seamus Heaney uses imagery and structure to create a narrative, and reminicent tone. The combination of these two help to make the reader feel as though they are really there in the story the speaker is telling. Without the help of the unique structure and imagery Heaney uses, the poem would lose a great deal of what makes it interesting and unique to Heaney in style.

Commentary on Mid-Term Break

In "Mid-Term Break" Seamus Heaney uses structure and diction to create a bland, sad tone. Through the way Heaney structures his poem he is able to create a sort of narrative feeling, as though the speaker is telling a series of events from his life, with an absence of emotion. His word choice also aids to the narrative format of the poem and bland, sad tone relating to the content within the poem.

Heaney uses a unique structure to create the tone and narrative feeling. He breaks the poem up into 8 stanzas, each 3 lines long until the last line which is only one line. Heaney does this to break the poem up as though it is telling an ongoing story, just as chapters break up a novel into parts of an ongoing series of events. In the structure Heaney does not bring in rhyme scheme until the very last line that he makes rhyme, relating to the death of a young four year old boy to make a very strong impact, though the poem may not contain great description or emotion.

Heaney also uses diction to create a bland, sad tone. His absence of highly descriptive words and adjectives make the tone bland and aid to the narrative aspect of the poem. Though the poem is bland, it is also sad because of some specific words Heaney uses which relate to the actual content of the poem. He uses words such as, "sick", "crying", "funerals", "corpse" and "sighs". Though the poem as a whole is bland and more narrative than connected and full of emotion, these words all relate in some way to a sad, depressing emotion/feeling. In this, Heaney is able to relate the poem to the content, the death of the young boy, and give the poem a bit of a dramatic effect at the end.

In "Mid-Term Break" Seamus Heaney uses structure and diction to create a bland, sad tone. Donne uses unique structure of three line stanzas and specific nondescriptive creating the bland tone as well as words creating the sad tone. Through this, Heaney is able to effectively create a bland yet impactful narrative poem dealing with a tragic loss.

"The Flea" Commentary

In "The Flea" by John Donne, he uses symbolism and metaphor to show the speaker's lust and his longing for and effort to persuade the woman for her virginity. Donne does this in the structure of three stanzas with an AA, BB, CC, DDD rhyme sceme, to help reinforce the speaker's attempt to persuade the woman. In doing this Donne creates a pressuring and desperate tone as he uses the flea's body as a symbol for intimacy in an ongoing metaphor throughout the entire poem.
In the first stanza, the speaker introduces the idea of the flea as he begins to persuade the woman he has great lust for. He states, "And in this flea, our two bloods mingled be" as he brings in the flea as a symbol for sex. In this time period the people believed when a couple had sex their bloods became mixed, and in a flea this same occurence happens. Here, the speaker is saying to the woman that in the flea they have already technically had sex because their bloods have been mixed, so it would not really be that much of a sin if they had pre-marital sex. The speaker continues on with this flea symbol and ongoing metaphor as he attemts to still persuade her in stanza two though near the end brings up the idea of killing the flea. By killing the flea, he means the woman would kill the idea of having sex, deny and reject him. In the last line he states, "And sacrilege, three sins in killing three" meaning that if she were to kill the flea she would technically be killing him, herself and the flea, which happen to be three horrible sins and still in an effort to persuade her, he tries to show her that it would be much easier to just commit one sin and have sex with him.
Lastly in stanza three the Donne sort of switches the poem to an accusatory and ashamed one. The woman has now killed the flea, and in killing it denied the speaker in the act of sex. Donne shows this switch of tone when the speaker states, "Cruel and sudden, hast thou since, Purpled thy nail, in blood of innocence?" as if the speaker is trying to make the woman feel as though she has committed a horrible sin and she is in the wrong. He uses the words cruel and sudden to contribute to the tone and uses the words in blood of innocence when relating to her virginity and that she killed the "flea" or the idea of having pre-marital sex when it was innocent or not bad/something sinful.
In "The Flea" by John Donne, he uses symbolism and metaphor to show the speaker's lust and his longing for and effort to persuade the woman for her virginity. He uses the structure to contribute to the speakers attempted persuasion as if he were going through he were arguing with everything the woman is worried about. As the flea unravels as a symbol for the pre-marital sex the speaker wants from this woman, Donne creates a fluxuation of the tone as the speaker argues with the woman. Without these literary techniques, Donne would not have been able to get across the speaker's longing and the woman's defiance of pre-marital sex as well as he did.