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American Literature APPENDIX of Copy Ready Materials Designed to be a supplementary aid for teachers using the textbook: American Literature, by Ihor Matselyukh (published by ЛiбраТерра, 2006). These are not so much lesson plans as additional materials and suggested discussion points. Please note: much of the material in this aid have come from a variety of sources available on the internet. Indeed, much of the material can be found on http://www.shmoop.com/ - an excellent resource for studying and teaching English literature, among other topics. This supplementary aid is to be used solely in the classroom context and is not mean to be disseminated as anything other than an aid for TEFL teachers. Introductory lesson page 1 Benjamin Franklin …… 4 Thomas Paine …… 6 Thomas Jefferson …… 7 Indian Myths and Legends …… 9 Washington Irving, "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" …… 11 Edgar Allan Poe, "Annabel Lee" …… 13 Emily Dickenson, "Because I could not stop for death", "There is no frigate like a book" … 14 Abraham Lincoln, "Gettysburg Address" …… 15 Walt Whitman, "When I heard the learn'd astronomer", "I hear America singing" …… 16 Kate Chopin, "The Story of an Hour" …… 17 O. Henry, "The Gift of the Magi" …… 19 Mark Twain, …… 21 Extra lesson: Edgar Allan Poe, "The Tell-tale Heart" …… 22 Stephen Crane, "The Open Boat" …… 23 Jack London, "To Build A Fire" …… 27 F. Scott Fitzgerald, excerpt from The Great Gatsby …… 29 William Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily" …… 30 Ernest Hemingway, "Hills Like White Elephants" …… 31 John Steinbeck, "Breakfast" …… 33 Robert Frost, "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening", "The Road Not Taken" …… 34 Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings …… 36 William Saroyan, "The Hummingbird That Lived Through Winter" …… 37 Sylvia Plath, "Morningsong", "Mirror" …… 38 Alice Walker, "The Flowers" …… 39 Extra lesson: John Steinbeck, "The Pearl" …… 40 Extra lesson: Censorship, featuring Maya Angelou's "Those Who Ban Books" …… 41 End of Year Exam …… 42

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Page 1: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

American Literature APPENDIX of Copy Ready MaterialsDesigned to be a supplementary aid for teachers using the textbook: American Literature, by Ihor Matselyukh (published by ЛiбраТерра, 2006). These are not so much lesson plans as additional

materials and suggested discussion points.

Please note: much of the material in this aid have come from a variety of sources available on the internet. Indeed, much of the material can be found on http://www.shmoop.com/ - an excellent resource for studying and teaching English literature, among other topics. This

supplementary aid is to be used solely in the classroom context and is not mean to be disseminated as anything other than an aid for TEFL teachers.

Introductory lesson page 1Benjamin Franklin …… 4Thomas Paine …… 6Thomas Jefferson …… 7Indian Myths and Legends …… 9Washington Irving, "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" …… 11Edgar Allan Poe, "Annabel Lee" …… 13Emily Dickenson, "Because I could not stop for death", "There is no frigate like a book" … 14Abraham Lincoln, "Gettysburg Address" …… 15Walt Whitman, "When I heard the learn'd astronomer", "I hear America singing" …… 16Kate Chopin, "The Story of an Hour" …… 17O. Henry, "The Gift of the Magi" …… 19Mark Twain, …… 21Extra lesson: Edgar Allan Poe, "The Tell-tale Heart" …… 22Stephen Crane, "The Open Boat" …… 23Jack London, "To Build A Fire" …… 27F. Scott Fitzgerald, excerpt from The Great Gatsby …… 29William Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily" …… 30Ernest Hemingway, "Hills Like White Elephants" …… 31John Steinbeck, "Breakfast" …… 33Robert Frost, "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening", "The Road Not Taken" …… 34Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings …… 36William Saroyan, "The Hummingbird That Lived Through Winter" …… 37Sylvia Plath, "Morningsong", "Mirror" …… 38Alice Walker, "The Flowers" …… 39Extra lesson: John Steinbeck, "The Pearl" …… 40Extra lesson: Censorship, featuring Maya Angelou's "Those Who Ban Books" …… 41End of Year Exam …… 42

Page 2: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

British vs. Americanpram baby carriagefringe bangsbogey booger biscuits cookie fancy-dress party costume party nappy diaper chemist pharmacy or drugstore aubergine eggplant torch flashlight rubbish garbage ladybird ladybug maths mathcar park parking lot full-stop period railway railroad cling film saran wrap tissue Kleenex ticket tout scalpertrainer sneaker or tennis shoe jumper sweater boot trunk holiday vacationpost code ZIP code

British vs. Americanpram baby carriagefringe bangsbogey booger biscuits cookie fancy-dress party costume party nappy diaper chemist pharmacy or drugstore aubergine eggplant torch flashlight rubbish garbage ladybird ladybug maths mathcar park parking lot full-stop period railway railroad cling film saran wrap tissue Kleenex ticket tout scalpertrainer sneaker or tennis shoe jumper sweater boot trunk holiday vacationpost code ZIP code

British vs. Americanpram baby carriagefringe bangsbogey booger biscuits cookie fancy-dress party costume party nappy diaper chemist pharmacy or drugstore aubergine eggplant torch flashlight rubbish garbage ladybird ladybug maths mathcar park parking lot full-stop period railway railroad cling film saran wrap tissue Kleenex ticket tout scalpertrainer sneaker or tennis shoe jumper sweater boot trunk holiday vacationpost code ZIP code

British vs. Americanpram baby carriagefringe bangsbogey booger biscuits cookie fancy-dress party costume party nappy diaper chemist pharmacy or drugstore aubergine eggplant torch flashlight rubbish garbage ladybird ladybug maths mathcar park parking lot full-stop period railway railroad cling film saran wrap tissue Kleenex ticket tout scalpertrainer sneaker or tennis shoe jumper sweater boot trunk holiday vacationpost code ZIP code

Page 3: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

baby carriage

bangs

booger

cookie

costume party

diaper

pharmacy or drugstore

eggplant

flashlight

garbage

ladybug

math

parking lot

period

railroad

saran wrap

Kleenex

scalper

sneaker or tennis shoe

sweater

trunk

vacation

ZIP code

Page 4: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

BENJAMIN FRANKLINIn the great tradition of American humor, the title of "First American Humorist" rightfully belongs to Benjamin Franklin. He was the beginning of a long line of writers who created a uniquely American form of humor filled with clever wit, folksy wisdom, and a generous portion of irreverence. The tradition begun by Franklin was handed down to Mark Twain and, in modern times, to writers like Art Buchwald, Dave Barry and Garrison Keillor.

Franklin developed a satirical style of writing that examined the political, personal, and social issues of the time. Whether he was poking fun at conservative Bostonians or laughing at the battle of the sexes, Franklin's style was entertaining, but carried a message. His satirical pieces "made 'em laugh" but also "made 'em think."

Laughter was an effective way to reach the masses. Franklin scholar David Morgan points out that humor was important in much of Franklin's writing because he was "aiming at a popular audience. There weren't that many highly educated people in his [Franklin's] day. Most of the people were semi-literate at best. And so much of what they read had to be put in a popular form or they wouldn't understand it."

Franklin also approached personal problems with humor. Throughout his life, he suffered from gout, which caused tremendous pain in his legs and feet. During one particularly painful attack of gout, Franklin wrote a dialogue between himself and the gout. Even though he was seventy-four and in pain, he still found humor in the situation.

Franklin's best-remembered and most popular humor was found in the pages of Poor Richard's Almanac. Franklin first published it in December of 1732 and continued with one edition per year for the next 26 years. Many of the witty, clever sayings associated with Franklin come from the pages of Poor Richard's Almanac. Although many people think that Franklin wrote all the sayings, many of them were taken from other sources and reworked in his typically American style.

BENJAMIN FRANKLINIn the great tradition of American humor, the title of "First American Humorist" rightfully belongs to Benjamin Franklin. He was the beginning of a long line of writers who created a uniquely American form of humor filled with clever wit, folksy wisdom, and a generous portion of irreverence. The tradition begun by Franklin was handed down to Mark Twain and, in modern times, to writers like Art Buchwald, Dave Barry and Garrison Keillor.

Franklin developed a satirical style of writing that examined the political, personal, and social issues of the time. Whether he was poking fun at conservative Bostonians or laughing at the battle of the sexes, Franklin's style was entertaining, but carried a message. His satirical pieces "made 'em laugh" but also "made 'em think."

Laughter was an effective way to reach the masses. Franklin scholar David Morgan points out that humor was important in much of Franklin's writing because he was "aiming at a popular audience. There weren't that many highly educated people in his [Franklin's] day. Most of the people were semi-literate at best. And so much of what they read had to be put in a popular form or they wouldn't understand it."

Franklin also approached personal problems with humor. Throughout his life, he suffered from gout, which caused tremendous pain in his legs and feet. During one particularly painful attack of gout, Franklin wrote a dialogue between himself and the gout. Even though he was seventy-four and in pain, he still found humor in the situation.

Franklin's best-remembered and most popular humor was found in the pages of Poor Richard's Almanac. Franklin first published it in December of 1732 and continued with one edition per year for the next 26 years. Many of the witty, clever sayings associated with Franklin come from the pages of Poor Richard's Almanac. Although many people think that Franklin wrote all the sayings, many of them were taken from other sources and reworked in his typically American style.

Page 5: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

Fish and visitors smell after three days.

Well done is better than well said.

Beware of little expenses. A small leak will sink a great ship.

By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.

He does not possess wealth; it possesses him.

Many people die at twenty-five and aren't buried until they are seventy-five.

Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.

Three can keep a secret, if two of them are dead.

Time is money.

When you're finished changing, you're finished.

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Fish and visitors smell after three days.

Well done is better than well said.

Beware of little expenses. A small leak will sink a great ship.

By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.

He does not possess wealth; it possesses him.

Many people die at twenty-five and aren't buried until they are seventy-five.

Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.

Three can keep a secret, if two of them are dead.

Time is money.

When you're finished changing, you're finished.

Page 6: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

Thomas PaineEvery quiet method for peace hath been ineffectual. Our prayers have been rejected with disdain; and only tended to convince us, that nothing flatters vanity, or confirms obstinacy in Kings more than repeated petitioning — and nothing hath contributed more than that very measure to make the Kings of Europe absolute: Witness Denmark and Sweden. Wherefore, since nothing but blows will do, for God's sake, let us come to a final separation, and not leave the next generation to be cutting throats, under the violated unmeaning names of parent and child.

As to government matters, it is not in the power of Britain to do this continent justice: The business of it will soon be too weighty, and intricate, to be managed with any tolerable degree of convenience, by a power, so distant from us, and so very ignorant of us; for if they cannot conquer us, they cannot govern us. To be always running three or four thousand miles with a tale or a petition, waiting four or five months for an answer, which when obtained requires five or six more to explain it in, will in a few years be looked upon as folly and childishness — There was a time when it was proper, and there is a proper time for it to cease.

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Thomas PaineEvery quiet method for peace hath been ineffectual. Our prayers have been rejected with disdain; and only tended to convince us, that nothing flatters vanity, or confirms obstinacy in Kings more than repeated petitioning — and nothing hath contributed more than that very measure to make the Kings of Europe absolute: Witness Denmark and Sweden. Wherefore, since nothing but blows will do, for God's sake, let us come to a final separation, and not leave the next generation to be cutting throats, under the violated unmeaning names of parent and child.

As to government matters, it is not in the power of Britain to do this continent justice: The business of it will soon be too weighty, and intricate, to be managed with any tolerable degree of convenience, by a power, so distant from us, and so very ignorant of us; for if they cannot conquer us, they cannot govern us. To be always running three or four thousand miles with a tale or a petition, waiting four or five months for an answer, which when obtained requires five or six more to explain it in, will in a few years be looked upon as folly and childishness — There was a time when it was proper, and there is a proper time for it to cease.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thomas PaineEvery quiet method for peace hath been ineffectual. Our prayers have been rejected with disdain; and only tended to convince us, that nothing flatters vanity, or confirms obstinacy in Kings more than repeated petitioning — and nothing hath contributed more than that very measure to make the Kings of Europe absolute: Witness Denmark and Sweden. Wherefore, since nothing but blows will do, for God's sake, let us come to a final separation, and not leave the next generation to be cutting throats, under the violated unmeaning names of parent and child.

As to government matters, it is not in the power of Britain to do this continent justice: The business of it will soon be too weighty, and intricate, to be managed with any tolerable degree of convenience, by a power, so distant from us, and so very ignorant of us; for if they cannot conquer us, they cannot govern us. To be always running three or four thousand miles with a tale or a petition, waiting four or five months for an answer, which when obtained requires five or six more to explain it in, will in a few years be looked upon as folly and childishness — There was a time when it was proper, and there is a proper time for it to cease.

Page 7: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

Thomas JeffersonExcerpt from the Declaration of IndependenceWe hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their

Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--

That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the

consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is

the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on

such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their

Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be

changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more

disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they

are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object

evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such

Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Thomas JeffersonExcerpt from the Declaration of IndependenceWe hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their

Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--

That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the

consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is

the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on

such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their

Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be

changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more

disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they

are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object

evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such

Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Thomas JeffersonExcerpt from the Declaration of IndependenceWe hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their

Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--

That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the

consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is

the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on

such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their

Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be

changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more

disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they

are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object

evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such

Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Page 8: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

Thomas Jefferson – extract of grievances from Declaration of Independence

HE has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public Good.

HE has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly Firmness his Invasions on the Rights of the People.

HE has endeavoured to prevent the Population of these States; for that Purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their Migrations hither, and raising the Conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

HE has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

HE has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the Tenure of their Offices, and the Amount and Payment of their Salaries.

HE has kept among us, in Times of Peace, Standing Armies, without the consent of our Legislatures.

HE has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

FOR quartering large Bodies of Armed Troops among us;

FOR cutting off our Trade with all Parts of the World:

FOR imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

FOR depriving us, in many Cases, of the Benefits of Trial by Jury:

Page 9: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

Indian Myths/Legends

A Shoshone Legend – Wolf Tricks the Trickster

The Shoshoni people saw the Wolf as a creator God and they respected him greatly. Long ago, Wolf, and many other animals, walked and talked like man.

Coyote could talk, too, but the Shoshoni people kept far away from him because he was a Trickster, somebody who is always up to no good and out to double-cross you.

Coyote resented Wolf because he was respected by the Shoshoni. Being a devious Trickster, Coyote decided it was time to teach Wolf a lesson. He would make the Shoshoni people dislike Wolf, and he had the perfect plan. Or so he thought.

One day, Wolf and Coyote were discussing the people of the land. Wolf claimed that if somebody were to die, he could bring them back to life by shooting an arrow under them. Coyote had heard this boast before and decided to put his plan into action.

Wearing his most innocent smile he told Wolf that if he brought everyone back to life, there would soon be no room left on Earth. Once people die, said Coyote, they should remain dead.

If Wolf takes my advice, thought Coyote, then the Shoshoni people would hate Wolf, once and for all.

Wolf was getting tired of Coyote constantly questioning his wisdom and knew he was up to no good, but he didn't say anything. He just nodded wisely and decided it was time to teach Coyote a lesson.

A few days after their conversation, Coyote came running to Wolf. Coyote's fur was ruffled and his eyes were wide with panic.

Wolf already knew what was wrong: Coyote's son had been bitten by Rattlesnake and no animal can survive the snake's powerful venom.

Coyote pleaded with Wolf to bring his son back to life by shooting an arrow under him, as he claimed he could do.

Wolf reminded Coyote of his own remark that people should remain dead. He was no longer going to bring people back to life, as Coyote had suggested.

The Shoshoni people say that was the day Death came to the land and that, as a punishment for his mischievous ways, Coyote's son was the first to die.

No one else was ever raised from the dead by Wolf again, and the people came to know sadness when someone dies. Despite Coyote's efforts, however, the Shoshoni didn't hate Wolf. Instead, they admired his strength, wisdom and power, and they still do today.

Indian Myths/Legends

A Shoshone Legend – Wolf Tricks the Trickster

The Shoshoni people saw the Wolf as a creator God and they respected him greatly. Long ago, Wolf, and many other animals, walked and talked like man.

Coyote could talk, too, but the Shoshoni people kept far away from him because he was a Trickster, somebody who is always up to no good and out to double-cross you.

Coyote resented Wolf because he was respected by the Shoshoni. Being a devious Trickster, Coyote decided it was time to teach Wolf a lesson. He would make the Shoshoni people dislike Wolf, and he had the perfect plan. Or so he thought.

One day, Wolf and Coyote were discussing the people of the land. Wolf claimed that if somebody were to die, he could bring them back to life by shooting an arrow under them. Coyote had heard this boast before and decided to put his plan into action.

Wearing his most innocent smile he told Wolf that if he brought everyone back to life, there would soon be no room left on Earth. Once people die, said Coyote, they should remain dead.

If Wolf takes my advice, thought Coyote, then the Shoshoni people would hate Wolf, once and for all.

Wolf was getting tired of Coyote constantly questioning his wisdom and knew he was up to no good, but he didn't say anything. He just nodded wisely and decided it was time to teach Coyote a lesson.

A few days after their conversation, Coyote came running to Wolf. Coyote's fur was ruffled and his eyes were wide with panic.

Wolf already knew what was wrong: Coyote's son had been bitten by Rattlesnake and no animal can survive the snake's powerful venom.

Coyote pleaded with Wolf to bring his son back to life by shooting an arrow under him, as he claimed he could do.

Wolf reminded Coyote of his own remark that people should remain dead. He was no longer going to bring people back to life, as Coyote had suggested.

The Shoshoni people say that was the day Death came to the land and that, as a punishment for his mischievous ways, Coyote's son was the first to die.

No one else was ever raised from the dead by Wolf again, and the people came to know sadness when someone dies. Despite Coyote's efforts, however, the Shoshoni didn't hate Wolf. Instead, they admired his strength, wisdom and power, and they still do today.

Page 10: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

Indian Myths and LegendsA Costanoan (Ohlone) Legend – Coyote with a Thorn in his eyeCoyote came to some women and asked them to pull out a thorn from his eye. There was only a little stick which he held in place with his eyelid. At first they distrusted him. He selected the most beautiful; "You draw it out," he sang. When she was about to take it with her fingers, he said: "No, take hold of it with your teeth." He said this so that he might seize her. When she took hold of the little stick he seized her and ran off with her.

A Costanoan (Ohlone) Legend – Coyote and the HummingbirdCoyote thought he knew more than anyone; but the hummingbird knew more. Then Coyote wanted to kill him. He caught him, struck him, and mashed him entirely. Then he went off. The hummingbird came to life, flew up, and cried: "Lakun! (dead)" in mockery.

Coyote caught him, made a fire, and put him in. He and his people had gone only a little way when the hummingbird flew by crying: "Lakun!" Coyote said: "How shall I kill him?"

They told him: "The only way is for you to eat him." Then Coyote swallowed him. The hummingbird scratched him inside.

Coyote said: "What shall I do? I shall die."

They said: "You must let him out by defecating."

Then Coyote let him out and the hummingbird flew up crying: "Lakun!"

A Blackfoot Legend - The Lost Children There were once six young brothers who were orphans. They lived from handouts and wore castaway clothing. No one cared much about them except the camp's pack of dogs. They loved the dogs and played with them every day. People were unkind to the boys because of their ragged clothes and uncombed hair. The brothers were teased by the other children who wore fine buffalo robes.

The boys no longer wanted to be people. They considered becoming flowers but the buffalo might eat them. Stones? No, stones could be broken. Water could Indian Dog and Travois be drank, trees could be cut and burned. They decided they wanted to be stars. Stars are always beautiful and always safe. Up went the boys to the sky to become stars (Pleiades). The Sun welcomed the boys and the Moon called them her lost children. Then the Sun punished the people with a drought. Meanwhile the people heard the dogs howling at the sky. The dogs missed the boys. Finally the dog chief asked the Sun for pity because drought hurts all creatures. Then the rains came.

A Winnebago (Hotcâk) Legend – Skunk OriginIn a village long ago a woman gave birth to a girl with pure white hair. She grew up to be beautiful beyond compare, and because of her white hair, she was thought to be very holy. Men would often court her, but she showed no interest in them, preferring to gaze at her own reflection in still waters. She loved the smell of flowers and would rub their perfumed petals on her skin and hair.

One day a strange looking man showed up and was very keen to court her. She laughed at him, scolding him for his ugliness -- yet he was not a mere man, but one of the great spirits, Turtle. Turtle shed his wrinkled outer skin and appeared in all his glory. He decreed, "Since you rejected one of the great spirits, you shall be transformed into a lowly animal! When people see you, they will turn away from your repulsive odor." She began to shrink, and she became covered with little black hairs. The only trace left of

Page 11: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

her beautiful white hair was the furry white stripe down her back. She became the first of her race, the race of skunks (gûcge) who live to this day.

Page 12: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

Washington Irving The Legend of Sleepy HollowWhile you are reading:1. Look for adjectives and compare characters (example: who is young/old; who is pretty or handsome and who is plain; who is strong/weak, etc.)2. Underline words or phrases that are new or where you are not certain of the meaning.

The valley known as Sleepy Hollow hides from the world in the high hills of New York State. There are many stories told about the quiet valley, but the story that people believe most is about a man who rides a horse at night. The story says the man died many years ago during the American revolutionary war. His head was shot off. Every night he rises from his burial place, jumps on his horse and rides through the valley looking for his lost head.

Near Sleepy Hollow is a village called Tarry Town. It was settled many years ago by people from Holland. The village had a small school and one teacher, named Ichabod Crane. Ichabod Crane was tall and thin like a crane. His shoulders were small and joined two long arms. His head was small, too, and flat on top. He had big ears, large glassy green eyes and a long nose.

Ichabod did not make much money as a teacher. Although he was tall and thin, he ate like a fat man. To help him pay for his food he earned extra money teaching people to sing. Every Sunday after church Ichabod taught singing.

Among the ladies Ichabod taught was Katrina Van Tassel. She was the only daughter of a rich Dutch farmer. She was a girl in bloom…much like a round, rosy apple. Ichabod had a soft and foolish heart for the ladies, and soon found himself interested in Miss Van Tassel. Ichabod's eyes opened wide when he saw the riches of Katrina's farm: the miles of apple trees and wheat fields, and hundreds of fat farm animals. He saw himself as master of the Van Tassel farm with Katrina as his wife.

There were many problems blocking the road to Katrina's heart. One was a strong young man named Brom Van Brunt. Brom was a hero to all the young ladies. His shoulders were big. His back was wide and his hair was short and curly. He always won the horse races in Tarry Town and earned many prizes. Brom was never seen without a horse. Sometimes, late at night, Brom and his friends would rush through town shouting loudly from the backs of their horses. Tired old ladies would awaken from their sleep and say: "Why, there goes Brom Van Brunt leading his wild group again!" Such was the enemy Ichabod had to defeat for Katrina's heart.

Stronger and wiser men would not have tried. But Ichabod had a plan. He could not fight his enemy in the open. So he did it silently and secretly. He made many visits to Katrina's farm and made her think he was helping her to sing better. Time passed, and the town people thought Ichabod was winning young Katrina's heart. Brom's horse was never seen at her house on Sunday nights anymore.

One day in autumn Ichabod was asked to come to a big party at the Van Tassel home. He dressed in his best clothes. A farmer loaned him an old horse for the long trip to the party. The house was filled with farmers and their wives, red-faced daughters and clean, washed sons. The tables were filled with different things to eat. Wine filled many glasses. Brom Van Brunt rode to the party on his fastest horse, called Daredevil. All the young ladies smiled happily when they saw him.

Soon music filled the rooms and everyone began to dance and sing. Ichabod was happy dancing with Katrina as Brom glared at them with a jealous heart. The night passed, the music stopped, and the young people sat together to tell stories about the revolutionary war. Soon stories about Sleepy Hollow were told. The most feared story was about the rider looking for his lost head. One farmer told how he raced the headless man on a horse. The farmer ran his horse faster and faster. The horseman followed over bush and stone until they came to the end of the valley. There the headless horseman suddenly stopped. Gone were his clothes and his skin. All that was left was the skeleton of a man with white bones shining in the moonlight.

Page 13: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

The stories ended and time came to leave the party. Ichabod seemed very happy until he said goodnight to Katrina, she seemed distant. Was she ending their romance? He left feeling very sad. Had Katrina been seeing Ichabod just to make Brom Van Brunt jealous so he would marry her?

Ichabod began his long ride home through the hills that surround Tarry Town. He had never felt so lonely in his life. He began to whistle as he came close to the tree where a man had been killed years ago by rebels. He thought he saw something white move in the tree. But no, it was only the moonlight shining and moving on the tree. Then he heard a noise. His body shook. He kicked his horse to go faster. The old horse tried to run, but almost fell in the river, instead. Ichabod hit the horse again. The horse ran fast and then suddenly stopped, almost throwing Ichabod forward to the ground.

There, in the dark woods on the side of the river where the bushes grow low, stood an ugly thing. Big and black. It did not move, but seemed ready to jump like a giant monster. Ichabod's hair stood straight up. It was too late to run, and in his fear, he did the only thing he could. His shaking voice broke the silence of the valley.

"Who are you?" The thing did not answer. Ichabod asked again. Still no answer. Ichabod's old horse began to move forward. The black thing began to move alongside Ichabod's horse in the dark. Ichabod made his horse run faster. The black thing moved with them. Side by side they moved. Not a word was said.

Ichabod felt his heart sink. Up a hill they moved above the shadow of the trees. For a moment the moon shown down and to Ichabod's horror he saw it was a horse. It had a rider. But the rider's head was not on his body. It was in front of the rider, resting on the horse.

Ichabod kicked and hit his old horse with all his power. Away they rushed through bushes and trees across the valley of Sleepy Hollow. Up ahead was the old church bridge where the headless horseman stops and returns to his burial place.

"If only I can get there first, I am safe," thought Ichabod. He kicked his horse again. The horse jumped on to the bridge and raced over it like the sound of thunder. Ichabod looked back to see if the headless man had stopped. He saw the man pick up his head and throw it with a powerful force. The head hit Ichabod in the face and knocked him off his horse to the dirt below.

They found Ichabod's horse the next day peacefully eating grass. They could not find Ichabod.

They saw the foot marks of Ichabod's horse as it had raced through the valley. They even found Ichabod's old hat in the dust near the bridge, but they did not find Ichabod. The only other thing they found was lying near Ichabod's hat. It was the broken pieces of a round orange pumpkin.

The town people talked about Ichabod for many weeks. They remembered the frightening stories of the valley and finally they came to believe that the headless horseman had carried Ichabod away. Much later an old farmer returned from a visit to New York City. He said he was certain he saw Ichabod there. He thought Ichabod quietly left Sleepy Hollow because he had lost Katrina.

As for Katrina, her mother and father gave her a big wedding when she married Brom Van Brunt. Many people who went to the wedding saw that Brom smiled whenever Ichabod's name was mentioned. They wondered why he laughed out loud when anyone talked about the broken orange pumpkin found lying near Ichabod's old dusty hat.

Page 14: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

Annabel Leeby Edgar Allan Poe

It was many and many a year ago,In a kingdom by the sea,That a maiden there lived whom you may knowBy the name of ANNABEL LEE;And this maiden she lived with no other thoughtThan to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,In this kingdom by the sea;But we loved with a love that was more than love-I and my Annabel Lee;With a love that the winged seraphs of heavenCoveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,In this kingdom by the sea,A wind blew out of a cloud, chillingMy beautiful Annabel Lee;So that her highborn kinsman cameAnd bore her away from me,To shut her up in a sepulchreIn this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in heaven,Went envying her and me-Yes!- that was the reason (as all men know,In this kingdom by the sea)That the wind came out of the cloud by night,Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the loveOf those who were older than we-Of many far wiser than we-And neither the angels in heaven above,Nor the demons down under the sea,Can ever dissever my soul from the soulOf the beautiful Annabel Lee.

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreamsOf the beautiful Annabel Lee;And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyesOf the beautiful Annabel Lee;And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the sideOf my darling- my darling- my life and my bride,In the sepulchre there by the sea,In her tomb by the sounding sea.

Annabel Leeby Edgar Allan Poe

It was many and many a year ago,In a kingdom by the sea,That a maiden there lived whom you may knowBy the name of ANNABEL LEE;And this maiden she lived with no other thoughtThan to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,In this kingdom by the sea;But we loved with a love that was more than love-I and my Annabel Lee;With a love that the winged seraphs of heavenCoveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,In this kingdom by the sea,A wind blew out of a cloud, chillingMy beautiful Annabel Lee;So that her highborn kinsman cameAnd bore her away from me,To shut her up in a sepulchreIn this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in heaven,Went envying her and me-Yes!- that was the reason (as all men know,In this kingdom by the sea)That the wind came out of the cloud by night,Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the loveOf those who were older than we-Of many far wiser than we-And neither the angels in heaven above,Nor the demons down under the sea,Can ever dissever my soul from the soulOf the beautiful Annabel Lee.

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreamsOf the beautiful Annabel Lee;And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyesOf the beautiful Annabel Lee;And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the sideOf my darling- my darling- my life and my bride,In the sepulchre there by the sea,In her tomb by the sounding sea.

Page 15: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

Emily DickensonThere is no Frigate like a BookTo take us Lands awayNor any Coursers like a PageOf prancing Poetry—This Traverse may the poorest takeWithout oppress of Toll—How frugal is the ChariotThat bears the Human soul.

courser – high-spirited, light-footed horse (a knight's horse)prancing – when a horse is lightly, prettily walkingtraverse – journeyfrugal – inexpensive, affordablechariot - колесница

------------------------

Because I could not stop for Death –He kindly stopped for me –The Carriage held but just Ourselves –And Immortality.

We slowly drove – He knew no hasteAnd I had put awayMy labor and my leisure too,For His Civility –

We passed the School, where Children stroveAt Recess – in the Ring –We passed the Fields of Gazing Grain –We passed the Setting Sun –

Or rather – He passed us –The Dews drew quivering and chill –For only Gossamer, my Gown –My Tippet – only Tulle –

We paused before a House that seemedA Swelling of the Ground –The Roof was scarcely visible –The Cornice – in the Ground –

Since then – 'tis Centuries – and yetFeels shorter than the DayI first surmised the Horses' HeadsWere toward Eternity –

carriage каретаhaste – hurryleisure – free timecivility вежливостьstrove состязатьсяrecess – break during school daydews - росаquivering – shaking a little bit, дрожаgossamer – thin, delicate (think fairy wings)tippet – an old fashioned shawl or covertulle – a thin, delicate fabricswelling нарастатьcornice карнизsurmised -- to suppose, guess предполагать

Emily DickensonThere is no Frigate like a BookTo take us Lands awayNor any Coursers like a PageOf prancing Poetry—This Traverse may the poorest takeWithout oppress of Toll—How frugal is the ChariotThat bears the Human soul.

courser – high-spirited, light-footed horse (a knight's horse)prancing – when a horse is lightly, prettily walkingtraverse – journeyfrugal – inexpensive, affordablechariot - колесница

------------------------

Because I could not stop for Death –He kindly stopped for me –The Carriage held but just Ourselves –And Immortality.

We slowly drove – He knew no hasteAnd I had put awayMy labor and my leisure too,For His Civility –

We passed the School, where Children stroveAt Recess – in the Ring –We passed the Fields of Gazing Grain –We passed the Setting Sun –

Or rather – He passed us –The Dews drew quivering and chill –For only Gossamer, my Gown –My Tippet – only Tulle –

We paused before a House that seemedA Swelling of the Ground –The Roof was scarcely visible –The Cornice – in the Ground –

Since then – 'tis Centuries – and yetFeels shorter than the DayI first surmised the Horses' HeadsWere toward Eternity –

carriage каретаhaste – hurryleisure – free timecivility вежливостьstrove состязатьсяrecess – break during school daydews - росаquivering – shaking a little bit, дрожаgossamer – thin, delicate (think fairy wings)tippet – an old fashioned shawl or covertulle – a thin, delicate fabricswelling нарастатьcornice карнизsurmised -- to suppose, guess предполагать

Page 16: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

Abraham Lincoln's 'Gettysburg Address'Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

Abraham Lincoln's 'Gettysburg Address'Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

Abraham Lincoln's 'Gettysburg Address'Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

Page 17: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

I Hear America Singingby Walt WhitmanI hear America singing, the varied carols I hear,Those of mechanics, each one singing his as it should be blithe and strong,The carpenter singing his as he measures his plank or beam,The mason singing his as he makes ready for work, or leaves off work,The boatman singing what belongs to him in his boat, the deckhand singing on the steamboat deck,The shoemaker singing as he sits on his bench, the hatter singing as he stands,The wood-cutter's song, the ploughboy's on his way in the morning, or at noon intermission or at sundown,The delicious singing of the mother, or of the young wife at work, or of the girl sewing or washing,Each singing what belongs to him or her and to none else,The day what belongs to the day—at night the party of young fellows, robust, friendly,Singing with open mouths their strong melodious songs.

carols – celebratory songsblithe – happy, light-heartedplank – board, beam – thick board used for supportmason – stone workerploughboy – boy working a плугrobust – healthy and strong

When I heard the learn'd astronomerby Walt WhitmanWhen I heard the learn'd astronomer;When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me;When I was shown the charts and the diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them;When I, sitting, heard the astronomer, where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,How soon, unaccountable, I became tired and sick;Till rising and gliding out, I wander'd off by myself,In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,Look'd up in perfect silence at the stars.

I Hear America Singingby Walt WhitmanI hear America singing, the varied carols I hear,Those of mechanics, each one singing his as it should be blithe and strong,The carpenter singing his as he measures his plank or beam,The mason singing his as he makes ready for work, or leaves off work,The boatman singing what belongs to him in his boat, the deckhand singing on the steamboat deck,The shoemaker singing as he sits on his bench, the hatter singing as he stands,The wood-cutter's song, the ploughboy's on his way in the morning, or at noon intermission or at sundown,The delicious singing of the mother, or of the young wife at work, or of the girl sewing or washing,Each singing what belongs to him or her and to none else,The day what belongs to the day—at night the party of young fellows, robust, friendly,Singing with open mouths their strong melodious songs.

carols – celebratory songsblithe – happy, light-heartedplank – board, beam – thick board used for supportmason – stone workerploughboy – boy working a плугrobust – healthy and strong

When I heard the learn'd astronomerby Walt WhitmanWhen I heard the learn'd astronomer;When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me;When I was shown the charts and the diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them;When I, sitting, heard the astronomer, where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,How soon, unaccountable, I became tired and sick;Till rising and gliding out, I wander'd off by myself,In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,Look'd up in perfect silence at the stars.

Page 18: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

The Story of An Hour, Kate ChopinKnowing that Mrs. Mallard was afflicted with a heart trouble, great care was taken to break to her as gently as possible the news of her husband's death.

It was her sister Josephine who told her, in broken sentences; veiled hints that revealed in half concealing. Her husband's friend Richards was there, too, near her. It was he who had been in the newspaper office when intelligence of the railroad disaster was received, with Brently Mallard's name leading the list of "killed." He had only taken the time to assure himself of its truth by a second telegram, and had hastened to forestall any less careful, less tender friend in bearing the sad message.

She did not hear the story as many women have heard the same, with a paralyzed inability to accept its significance. She wept at once, with sudden, wild abandonment, in her sister's arms. When the storm of grief had spent itself she went away to her room alone. She would have no one follow her.

There stood, facing the open window, a comfortable, roomy armchair. Into this she sank, pressed down by a physical exhaustion that haunted her body and seemed to reach into her soul.

She could see in the open square before her house the tops of trees that were all aquiver with the new spring life. The delicious breath of rain was in the air. In the street below a peddler was crying his wares. The notes of a distant song which some one was singing reached her faintly, and countless sparrows were twittering in the eaves.

There were patches of blue sky showing here and there through the clouds that had met and piled one above the other in the west facing her window.

She sat with her head thrown back upon the cushion of the chair, quite motionless, except when a sob came up into her throat and shook her, as a child who has cried itself to sleep continues to sob in its dreams.

She was young, with a fair, calm face, whose lines bespoke repression and even a certain strength. But now there was a dull stare in her eyes, whose gaze was fixed away off yonder on one of those patches of blue sky. It was not a glance of reflection, but rather indicated a suspension of intelligent thought.

There was something coming to her and she was waiting for it, fearfully. What was it? She did not know; it was too subtle and elusive to name. But she felt it, creeping out of the sky, reaching toward her through the sounds, the scents, the color that filled the air.

Now her bosom rose and fell tumultuously. She was beginning to recognize this thing that was approaching to possess her, and she was striving to beat it back with her will--as powerless as her two white slender hands would have been. When she abandoned herself a little whispered word escaped her slightly parted lips. She said it over and over under the breath: "free, free, free!" The vacant stare and the look of terror that had followed it went

from her eyes. They stayed keen and bright. Her pulses beat fast, and the coursing blood warmed and relaxed every inch of her body.

She did not stop to ask if it were or were not a monstrous joy that held her. A clear and exalted perception enabled her to dismiss the suggestion as trivial. She knew that she would weep again when she saw the kind, tender hands folded in death; the face that had never looked save with love upon her, fixed and gray and dead. But she saw beyond that bitter moment a long procession of years to come that would belong to her absolutely. And she opened and spread her arms out to them in welcome.

There would be no one to live for during those coming years; she would live for herself. There would be no powerful will bending hers in that blind persistence with which men and women believe they have a right to impose a private will upon a fellow-creature. A kind intention or a cruel intention made the act seem no less a crime as she looked upon it in that brief moment of illumination.

And yet she had loved him--sometimes. Often she had not. What did it matter! What could love, the unsolved mystery, count for in the face of this possession of self-assertion which she suddenly recognized as the strongest impulse of her being!

"Free! Body and soul free!" she kept whispering.

Josephine was kneeling before the closed door with her lips to the keyhole, imploring for admission. "Louise, open the door! I beg; open the door--you will make yourself ill. What are you doing, Louise? For heaven's sake open the door."

"Go away. I am not making myself ill." No; she was drinking in a very elixir of life through that open window.

Her fancy was running riot along those days ahead of her. Spring days, and summer days, and all sorts of days that would be her own. She breathed a quick prayer that life might be long. It was only yesterday she had thought with a shudder that life might be long.

She arose at length and opened the door to her sister's importunities. There was a feverish triumph in her eyes, and she carried herself unwittingly like a goddess of Victory. She clasped her sister's waist, and together they descended the stairs. Richards stood waiting for them at the bottom.

Someone was opening the front door with a latchkey. It was Brently Mallard who entered, a little travel-stained, composedly carrying his grip-sack and umbrella. He had been far from the scene of the accident, and did not even know there had been one. He stood amazed at Josephine's piercing cry; at Richards' quick motion to screen him from the view of his wife.

When the doctors came they said she had died of heart disease--of the joy that kills.

Page 19: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

* Why does Mrs. Mallard really die?

* What kind of marriage do the Mallards have? Is Brently Mallard unkind to Louise Mallard, or is there some other reason for her saying "free, free, free!" when she hears of his death? How does she feel about him? How do you think Mr. Mallard would feel if he knew what his wife really felt?

* Do you believe Chopin is trying to make some grand assertion about fate or free will with the ending of the story? If so, what is it?

* Do you feel pity for any of the characters? Which ones, and why?

* When Mrs. Mallard is described as coming down the stairs "like a goddess of Victory", in what way does she feel victorious?

* Can a person really die of shock? Of happiness? Of grief?

* What view of marriage does the story present? It was published in 1894, does this view represent attitudes towards marriage today?

* If you were going to write some fan fiction inspired by "The Story of an Hour," how would you do it? Which characters would you explore? How would you imagine the personalities of Richards, Josephine, and Mr. Mallard? What would be the back-story behind Mr. and Mrs. Mallard's marriage?

* Why does Mrs. Mallard really die?

* What kind of marriage do the Mallards have? Is Brently Mallard unkind to Louise Mallard, or is there some other reason for her saying "free, free, free!" when she hears of his death? How does she feel about him? How do you think Mr. Mallard would feel if he knew what his wife really felt?

* Do you believe Chopin is trying to make some grand assertion about fate or free will with the ending of the story? If so, what is it?

* Do you feel pity for any of the characters? Which ones, and why?

* When Mrs. Mallard is described as coming down the stairs "like a goddess of Victory", in what way does she feel victorious?

* Can a person really die of shock? Of happiness? Of grief?

* What view of marriage does the story present? It was published in 1894, does this view represent attitudes towards marriage today?

* If you were going to write some fan fiction inspired by "The Story of an Hour," how would you do it? Which characters would you explore? How would you imagine the personalities of Richards, Josephine, and Mr. Mallard? What would be the back-story behind Mr. and Mrs. Mallard's marriage?

* Why does Mrs. Mallard really die?

* What kind of marriage do the Mallards have? Is Brently Mallard unkind to Louise Mallard, or is there some other reason for her saying "free, free, free!" when she hears of his death? How does she feel about him? How do you think Mr. Mallard would feel if he knew what his wife really felt?

* Do you believe Chopin is trying to make some grand assertion about fate or free will with the ending of the story? If so, what is it?

* Do you feel pity for any of the characters? Which ones, and why?

* When Mrs. Mallard is described as coming down the stairs "like a goddess of Victory", in what way does she feel victorious?

* Can a person really die of shock? Of happiness? Of grief?

* What view of marriage does the story present? It was published in 1894, does this view represent attitudes towards marriage today?

* If you were going to write some fan fiction inspired by "The Story of an Hour," how would you do it? Which characters would you explore? How would you imagine the personalities of Richards, Josephine, and Mr. Mallard? What would be the back-story behind Mr. and Mrs. Mallard's marriage?

* Why does Mrs. Mallard really die?

* What kind of marriage do the Mallards have? Is Brently Mallard unkind to Louise Mallard, or is there some other reason for her saying "free, free, free!" when she hears of his death? How does she feel about him? How do you think Mr. Mallard would feel if he knew what his wife really felt?

* Do you believe Chopin is trying to make some grand assertion about fate or free will with the ending of the story? If so, what is it?

* Do you feel pity for any of the characters? Which ones, and why?

* When Mrs. Mallard is described as coming down the stairs "like a goddess of Victory", in what way does she feel victorious?

* Can a person really die of shock? Of happiness? Of grief?

* What view of marriage does the story present? It was published in 1894, does this view represent attitudes towards marriage today?

* If you were going to write some fan fiction inspired by "The Story of an Hour," how would you do it? Which characters would you explore? How would you imagine the personalities of Richards, Josephine, and Mr. Mallard? What would be the back-story behind Mr. and Mrs. Mallard's marriage?

Page 20: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

O. Henry – The GiftOne dollar and eighty-seven cents. That was all. And sixty cents of it in the smallest pieces of money - pennies. Pennies saved one and two at a time by negotiating with the men at the market who sold vegetables and meat. Negotiating until ones face burned with the silent knowledge of being poor. Three times Della counted it. One dollar and eighty-seven cents. And the next day would be Christmas.

There was clearly nothing to do but sit down and cry. So Della cried. Which led to the thought that life is made up of little cries and smiles, with more little cries than smiles.

Della finished her crying and dried her face. She stood by the window and looked out unhappily at a gray cat walking along a gray fence in a gray back yard. Tomorrow would be Christmas Day, and she had only one dollar and eighty-seven cents to buy her husband Jim a gift. She had been saving every penny she could for months, with this result.

Jim earned twenty dollars a week, which does not go far. Expenses had been greater than she had expected. They always are. Many a happy hour she had spent planning to buy something nice for him. Something fine and rare -- something close to being worthy of the honor of belonging to Jim.

There was a tall glass mirror between the windows of the room. Suddenly Della turned from the window and stood before the glass mirror and looked at herself. Her eyes were shining, but her face had lost its color within twenty seconds. Quickly she pulled down her hair and let it fall to its full length.

Now, Mr. and Missus James Dillingham Young had two possessions which they valued. One was Jim's gold time piece, the watch that had been his fathers and his grandfathers. The other was Della's hair.

Had the Queen of Sheba lived in their building, Della would have let her hair hang out the window to dry just to reduce the value of the queen's jewels.

So now Della's beautiful hair fell about her, shining like a brown waterfall. It reached below her knees and made itself almost like a covering for her. And then quickly she put it up again. She stood still while a few tears fell on the floor.

She put on her coat and her old brown hat. With a quick motion and brightness still in her eyes, she danced out the door and down the street.

Where she stopped the sign read: "Madame Sofronie. Hair Goods of All Kinds." Della ran up the steps to the shop, out of breath.

"Will you buy my hair?" asked Della.

"I buy hair," said Madame. "Take your hat off and let us have a look at it."

Down came the beautiful brown waterfall of hair.

"Twenty dollars," said Madame, lifting the hair with an experienced hand.

"Give it to me quick," said Della.

The next two hours went by as if they had wings. Della looked in all the stores to choose a gift for Jim.

She found it at last. It surely had been made for Jim and no one else. It was a chain -- simple round rings of silver. It was perfect for Jim's gold watch. As soon as she saw it she knew that it must be for him. It was like him. Quiet and with great value. She gave the shopkeeper twenty-one dollars and she hurried home with the eighty-seven cents that was left.

When Della arrived home she began to repair what was left of her hair. The hair had been ruined by her love and her desire to give a special gift. Repairing the damage was a very big job.

Within forty minutes her head was covered with tiny round curls of hair that made her look wonderfully like a schoolboy. She looked at herself in the glass mirror long and carefully.

"If Jim does not kill me before he takes a second look at me," she said to herself, "hell say I look like a song girl. But what could I do--oh! what could I do with a dollar and eighty-seven cents?"

At seven o'clock that night the coffee was made and the pan on the back of the stove was hot and ready to cook the meat.

Page 21: American Literature Coursebook Supplement Appendix

Jim was never late coming home from work. Della held the silver chain in her hand and sat near the door. Then she heard his step and she turned white for just a minute. She had a way of saying a little silent prayer about the simplest everyday things, and now she whispered: "Please God, make him think I am still pretty."

The door opened and Jim stepped in. He looked thin and very serious. Poor man, he was only twenty-two and he had to care for a wife. He needed a new coat and gloves to keep his hands warm.

Jim stopped inside the door, as immovable as a dog smelling a bird. His eyes were fixed upon Della. There was an expression in them that she could not read, and it frightened her. It was not anger, nor surprise, nor fear, nor any of the feelings that she had been prepared for. He simply looked at her with a strange expression on his face. Della went to him.

"Jim, my love," she cried, "do not look at me that way. I had my hair cut and sold because I could not have lived through Christmas without giving you a gift. My hair will grow out again. I just had to do it. My hair grows very fast. Say 'Merry Christmas! Jim, and let us be happy. You do not know what a nice-- what a beautiful, nice gift I have for you."

"You have cut off your hair?" asked Jim, slowly, as if he had not accepted the information even after his mind worked very hard.

"Cut it off and sold it," said Della. "Do you not like me just as well? I am the same person without my hair, right?

Jim looked about the room as if he were looking for something.

"You say your hair is gone?" he asked.

"You need not look for it," said Della. "It is sold, I tell you--sold and gone, too. It is Christmas Eve, boy. Be good to me, for it was cut for you. Maybe the hairs of my head were numbered," she went on with sudden serious sweetness, "but nobody could ever count my love for you. Shall I put the meat on, Jim?"

Jim seemed to awaken quickly and put his arms around Della. Then he took a package from his coat and threw it on the table.

"Do not make any mistake about me, Dell," he said. "I do not think there is any haircut that could make me like my girl any less. But if you will open that package you may see why you had me frightened at first."

White fingers quickly tore at the string and paper. There was a scream of joy; and then, alas! a change to tears and cries, requiring the man of the house to use all his skill to calm his wife.

For there were The Combs -- the special set of objects to hold her hair that Della had wanted ever since she saw them in a shop window. Beautiful combs, made of shells, with jewels at the edge --just the color to wear in the beautiful hair that was no longer hers. They cost a lot of money, she knew, and her heart had wanted them without ever hoping to have them. And now, the beautiful combs were hers, but the hair that should have touched them was gone.

But she held the combs to herself, and soon she was able to look up with a smile and say, "My hair grows so fast, Jim!"

Then Della jumped up like a little burned cat and cried, "Oh, oh!"

Jim had not yet seen his beautiful gift. She happily held it out to him in her open hands. The silver chain seemed so bright.

"Isn't it wonderful, Jim? I looked all over town to find it. You will have to look at the time a hundred times a day now. Give me your watch. I want to see how it looks on it."

Instead of obeying, Jim fell on the couch and put his hands under the back of his head and smiled.

"Dell," said he, "let us put our Christmas gifts away and keep them a while. They are too nice to use just right now. I sold my gold watch to get the money to buy the set of combs for your hair. And now, why not put the meat on."

The magi were wise men--wonderfully wise men--who brought gifts to the Baby Jesus. They invented the art of giving Christmas gifts. Being wise, their gifts were wise ones. And here I have told you the story of two young people who most unwisely gave for each other the greatest treasures of their house. But in a last word to the wise of these days, let it be said that of all who give gifts, these two were the wisest. Everywhere they are wisest. They are the magi.

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Mark Twain quotes

Always acknowledge a fault. This will throw those in authority off their guard and give you an opportunity to commit more.

Be careful about reading health books. You may die of a misprint.

Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society.

A person with a new idea is a crank until the idea succeeds.

Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured.

But who prays for Satan? Who, in eighteen centuries, has had the common humanity to pray for the one sinner that needed it most?

Don't part with your illusions. When they are gone, you may still exist, but you have ceased to live.

I have never let my schooling interfere with my education.

It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt.

Get your facts first, then you can distort them as you please.

Patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it.

Don't go around saying the world owes you a living; the world owes you nothing; it was here first.

A person who won't read has no advantage over one who can't read.

Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great ones make you feel that you, too, can become great.

A man who carries a cat by the tail is getting experience that will always be helpful. He isn't likely to grow dim or doubtful. Chances are, he isn't likely to carry the cat that way again, either. But if he wants to, I say let him!

Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do…

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Tell-Tale Heart, Edgar Allan Poe (adapted)Mad? How can you say I am mad? Listen how calmly I tell you the story.I can't say how the idea first entered my brain, but once it was there, it haunted me day and night. There wasn't

any reason for it. I liked the old man. He never did anything to hurt me, and I wasn't after his money. I think it was his eye! Yes, that was it! One of his eyes looked like the eye of a vulture – pale blue with a film over it. Whenever it looked at me, my blood ran cold. I made up my mind to kill the old man and get rid of that eye forever.

I made my move slowly. Every night at midnight, I opened his door very gently, and slowly, slowly poked in my head and shined a lantern on his vulture eye. I did this for seven nights – every night just at midnight. But his eye was always closed, so I could not bring myself to do what I had to do. It was not the old man who bothered me. It was his evil eye.

On the eighth night, I was even more careful than usual. I thought about the fact that I was opening the door and that he wasn't even dreaming of my secret thought. I almost laughed. Perhaps he heard me. He moved suddenly. His room was dark, so I knew he couldn't see the door opening.

I had my head in and was about to turn the lantern on, but my thumb slipped on the switch. The old man sat up in bed, crying, "Who's there?"

I kept still, not moving an inch. For an hour I did not move a muscle and I did not hear him lie down. Finally, I heard a slight groan, and I knew it was not a groan of pain, but one of terror – terror in the face of death. I knew the terror the old man felt and I felt sorry for him, although I laughed inside. I knew he had been lying awake ever since the first slight noise. His fears had grown ever since. He tried to tell himself, "It is nothing but the wind in the chimney… It is only a mouse crossing the floor… It is just a cricket."

When I waited a long time, very patiently, I decided to open a small, a very, very small, opening in the lantern. I was careful. Only a single ray shot out and fell on his vulture eye.

The eye was wide open! I grew angry as I looked at it. I could see it perfectly – that pale blue eye with an ugly film over it chilled my bones. I could see nothing else of the old man's face or body – for I had directed the ray exactly on the spot!

Then I heard it, a low, dull, quick sound. It was like the sound a watch makes when it's wrapped in cotton. It was the beating of the old man's heart. It made my anger grow, but even then I kept still. I hardly breathed at all. I kept the ray of light shining on his eye. The beating of his heart grew quicker and quicker, and louder and louder.

In the dead hour of the night, in the awful silence of that old house, that noise terrified me. Yet for a few minutes longer, I stood still. The beating grew louder, louder! Then a new fear grabbed me. The sound was so loud that a neighbor might hear it! With a loud yell, I turned the lantern up and leaped into the room. He screamed once, only once, before I dragged him to the floor and pulled the heavy mattress over him. I smiled. The deed was almost done. For many minutes his heart beat on with a muffled sound. This didn't bother me. The sound would not be heard through the wall.

Finally, it stopped, and the old man was dead, stone dead. I removed the bed and looked at the body. I put my hand on his heart and held it there many minutes – no heartbeat. His eye would not trouble me ever again. I worked quickly but silently as I pulled up three boards from the floor. Then I slipped the old man's body into the space below and replaced the boards so cleverly that no human eye – not even his – could have found anything wrong. Ha! Ha!

When I had finished, it was four o'clock. As the clock sounded the hour, someone knocked on the door. It was three policemen who said that a neighbor had heard a scream. I smiled; what did I have to fear? I welcomed them. The scream, I said, was my own. I'd had a nightmare. I told them the old man was away in the country. I told them to search the house – search it well.

Finally, I took them into his room and asked them to sit down. I placed my chair on the floorboards above his body. The policemen were satisfied since I seemed very much at ease. Before long, however, I felt myself growing pale. My head hurt and I imagined a pounding in my ears, but the policemen just sat there, talking and talking. The pounding in my ears grew louder. I talked more freely to get rid of the feeling, but it continued. Finally, I found that the terrible noise was not in my head.

I tried talking more quickly and in a louder voice, but the sound got louder, too. What could I do? It was a low, dull, quick sound. It was like the sound a watch makes when it is wrapped in cotton. The police didn't seem to hear it, so I kept talking, even more quickly. The noise increased. It grew louder, louder, louder!

The men kept talking. Was it possible that they did not hear it? No, they heard and they knew! They were making fun of my terror. Anything was better than this. I couldn't stand their smiles any longer. I had to scream – or I'd die. The noise got louder, louder, louder!

"Enough!" I screamed. "I admit it! Tear up the floor! Here, here! It is the beating of his hideous heart."

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Stephen Crane, The Open Boat (adapted by Voice on America)

The small lifeboat bounced from wave to wave in the rough seas of the

Atlantic. The four men in the boat could not see the sky. The waves rose too high.

The waves with their white tops pushed at the open boat with angry

violence. Every man thought each wave would be his last. Surely, the boat would

sink and he would drown. The men thought that most adults would need a bathtub

larger than the boat they were sailing. The waves were huge, and each created a

problem in guiding the direction of the boat.

For two days, since the ship sank, the four men had been struggling to reach

land. But there was no land to be seen. All the men saw were violent waves which

rose and came fiercely down on them.

The men sat in the boat, wondering if there was any hope for them. The

ship’s cook sat in the bottom of the boat. He kept looking at the fifteen centimeters

which separated him from the ocean.

The boat had only two wooden oars. They were so thin – it seemed as if

they would break against the waves. The sailor, named Billie, directed the boat’s

movement with one of the oars. The newspaper reporter pulled the second oar. He

wondered why he was there in the boat.

The fourth man was the captain of the ship that had sunk. He lay in the

front of the small boat. His arm and leg were hurt when the ship sank. The

captain’s face was sad. He had lost his ship and many of his sailors. But he looked

carefully ahead, and he told Billie when to turn the boat.

“Keep her a little more south, Billie,” he said.

“A little more south, sir,” the sailor repeated.

Sitting in the boat was like sitting on a wild horse. As each wave came, the

boat rose and fell, like a horse starting toward a fence too high to jump. The

problem was that after successfully floating over one wave you find that there is

another one behind it just as strong and ready to flood your boat.

As each wall of water came in, it hid everything else that the men could see.

The waves came in silence; only their white tops made threatening noises.

In the weak light, the faces of the men must have looked gray. Their eyes

must have shone in strange ways as they looked out at the sea. The sun rose slowly

into the sky. The men knew it was the middle of the day because the color of the

sea changed from slate gray to emerald green, with gold lights. And the white foam

on the waves looked like falling snow.

As the lifeboat bounced from the top of each wave, the wind tore through

the hair of the men. As the boat dropped down again the water fell just past them.

The top of each wave was a hill, from which the men could see, for a brief period, a

wide area of shining sea.

The cook said the men were lucky because the wind was blowing toward the

shore. If it started blowing the other way, they would never reach land. The

reporter and the sailor agreed. But the captain laughed in a way that expressed

humor and tragedy all in one. He asked: “Do you think we’ve got much of a chance

now, boys?”

This made the others stop talking. To express any hope at this time they felt

to be childish and stupid. But they also did not want to suggest there was no hope.

So they were silent.

“Oh, well,” said the captain, “We’ll get ashore all right.”

But there was something in his voice that made them think, as the sailor

said: “Yes, if this wind holds!”

Seagulls flew near and far. Sometimes the birds sat down on the sea in

groups, near brown seaweed that rolled on the waves. The anger of the sea was no

more to them than it was to a group of chickens a thousand miles away on land.

Often the seagulls came very close and stared at the men with black bead-like eyes.

The men shouted angrily at them, telling them to be gone.

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The sailor and the reporter kept rowing with the thin wooden oars.

Sometimes they sat together, each using an oar. Sometimes one would pull on both

oars while the other rested. Brown pieces of seaweed appeared from time to time.

They were like islands, bits of earth that did not move. They showed the men in the

boat that it was slowly making progress toward land.

Hours passed. Then, as the boat was carried to the top of a great wave, the

captain looked across the water.

He said that he saw the lighthouse at Mosquito Inlet. The cook also said he

saw it. The reporter searched the western sky.

“See it?” said the captain.

“No,” said the reporter slowly, “I don’t see anything.”

“Look again,” said the captain. He pointed. “It’s exactly in that direction.”

This time the reporter saw a small thing on the edge of the moving horizon.

It was exactly like the point of a pin.

“Think we’ll make it, captain?” he asked.

“If this wind holds and the boat doesn’t flood, we can’t do much else,” said

the captain.

It would be difficult to describe the brotherhood of men that was here

established on the sea. Each man felt it warmed him. They were a captain, a sailor,

a cook and a reporter. And they were friends. The reporter knew even at the time

that this friendship was the best experience of his life.

All obeyed the captain. He was a good leader. He always spoke in a low

voice and calmly.

“I wish we had a sail,” he said, “to give you two boys a chance to rest.” So

they used his coat and one of the oars to make a sail and the boat moved much more

quickly.

The lighthouse had been slowly growing larger. At last, from the top of

each wave the men in the boat could see land. Slowly, the land seemed to rise from

the sea. Soon, the men could see two lines, one black and one white.

They knew that the black line was formed by trees, and the white line was

the sand. At last, the captain saw a house on the shore. And the lighthouse became

even larger.

“The keeper of the lighthouse should be able to see us now,” said the

captain. “He’ll notify the life-saving people.”

Slowly and beautifully, the land rose from the sea. The wind came again.

Finally, the men heard a new sound – the sound of waves breaking and crashing on

the shore.

“We’ll never be able to make the lighthouse now,” said the captain. “Swing

her head a little more north, Billie.”

“A little more north, sir,” said the sailor.

The men watched the shore grow larger. They became hopeful. In an hour,

perhaps, they would be on land. The men struggled to keep the boat from turning

over.

They were used to balancing in the boat. Now they rode this wild horse of

a boat like circus men. The water poured over them.

The reporter thought he was now wet to the skin. But he felt in the top

pocket of his coat and found eight cigars. Four were wet, but four were still dry.

One of the men found some dry matches. Each man lit a cigar. The four men sailed

in their boat with the belief of a rescue shining in their eyes. They smoked their big

cigars and took a drink of water.

A long stretch of coast lay before the eyes of the men. Slowly, the land rose

up out of the mountainous sea. The men could see a small house against the sky. To

the south, they could see a lighthouse. Tide, wind and waves were pushing the

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lifeboat northward. The men thought someone on land would have seen the boat by

now.

“Well,” said the captain, “I suppose we’ll have to attempt to reach the shore

ourselves. If we stay out here too long, none of us will have the strength left to swim

after the boat sinks.”

So Billie the sailor turned the boat straight for the shore.

“If we don’t all get ashore,” said the captain, “I suppose you fellows know

where to send news of my death?”

The men then exchanged some information. There was a great deal of anger

in them. They thought: “If I am going to be drowned, why, in the name of the seven

mad gods who rule the sea, was I permitted to come this far and think about sand

and trees?”

The waves grew stronger. They seemed always just about to break and roll

over the little boat. The coast was still far away. The sailor said: “Boys, the boat

won’t live three minutes more, and we’re too far out to swim. Shall I take her to sea

again, captain?”

“Yes! Go ahead!” said the captain. The sailor turned the boat and took her

safely out to sea again.

“It’s funny those life-saving people haven’t seen us,” one of the men said.

“Maybe they think we’re out here for sport! Maybe they think we’re fishing.

Maybe they think we’re fools.”

Once more, the sailor rowed the boat and then the reporter rowed. Suddenly,

they saw a man walking along the shore.

The man stopped walking. He moved his hand in the air to wave at them. He

saw them! Now he was running to the house.

The captain tied a cloth to a stick and waved it. Now there was another man

on the shore. The two men waved their hands in the air, as if they were saying hello

to the men in the boat.

Now, what was that moving on the shore? It was a bus – a hotel bus. A man

stood on the steps of the bus and waved his coat over his head. The men in the boat

wondered what he wanted to say. Was he attempting to tell them something? Should

they wait for help? Should they go north? Should they go south?

The men waited and waited but nothing happened. The sun began to go

down. It got dark and cold. They could no longer see anyone on the beach.

The sailor rowed, and then the reporter rowed, and then the sailor rowed

again. They rowed and rowed through the long night. The land had disappeared but

they could hear the low sound of the waves hitting the shore. This was surely a quiet

night.

The cook finally spoke: “Billie, what kind of pie do you like best?”

“Pie,” said the sailor and the reporter angrily. “Don’t talk about those

things!”

“Well,” said the cook, “I was just thinking about ham sandwiches, and …”

A night on the sea in an open boat is a long night. The sailor continued to

row until his head fell forward and sleep overpowered him. Then he asked the

reporter to row for a while. They exchanged places so the sailor could sleep in the

bottom of the boat with the cook and the captain.

The reporter thought that he was the one man afloat on all the oceans in the

world. The wind had a sad voice as it came over the waves.

Suddenly, there was a long, loud swishing sound behind the boat and a

shining trail of silvery blue. It might have been made by a huge knife. Then there

was another swish and another long flash of bluish light, this time alongside the

boat. The reporter saw a huge fin speed like a shadow through the water, leaving a

long glowing trail. The thing kept swimming near the boat. He noted its speed and

power. The reporter wished the men would wake up. He did not want to be alone

with the shark.

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The reporter thought as he rowed. He was angry that they had come so close

to land and yet might still die at sea. Then he remembered a poem that he had

learned as a child. It was a poem about a soldier of the French Foreign Legion. The

soldier lay dying in Algiers. Just before he died, he cried out: “I shall never see my

own, my native land.” And now, many years after he had learned this poem, the

reporter for the first time understood the sadness of the dying soldier.

Hours passed. The reporter asked the sailor to take the oars so that he could

rest. It seemed like only a brief period, but it was more than an hour later, when the

sailor returned the oars to the reporter. They both knew that only they could keep the

boat from sinking. And so they rowed, hour after hour, through the night.

When day came, the four men saw land again. But there were no people on

the shore. A conference was held on the boat.

“Well,” said the captain, “if no help is coming, we might better try to reach

the shore right away. If we stay out here much longer, we will be too weak to do

anything for ourselves at all.”

The others agreed. They began to turn the boat toward the beach. The

captain told them to be careful – that when the boat came near the beach, the waves

would sink it. Then everyone should jump out of the boat and swim to the shore.

As the boat came closer to land, the waves got bigger and more violent. At

last, a large wave climbed into the air and fell on the small boat with great force.

The boat turned over as the men jumped into the sea. The water was like ice.

The reporter was tired. But he swam toward the beach. He looked for his friends.

He saw Billie, the sailor, in front of him, swimming strongly and quickly.

The cook was near him. Behind, the captain held on to the overturned boat with his

one good hand. Soon, the reporter could swim no longer. A current was carrying

him back out to sea. He thought: “Am I going to drown? Can it be possible?”

But the current suddenly changed and he was able to swim toward the shore.

The captain called to him to swim to the boat and hold on. The reporter started to

swim toward the boat. Then he saw a man running along the shore. He was quickly

taking off his shoes and clothes.

As the reporter got close to the boat, a large wave hit him and threw him

into the air over the boat and far from it. When he tried to get up, he found that the

water was not over his head, only half way up his body. But he was so tired that he

could not stand up. Each wave threw him down, and the current kept pulling him

back to sea.

Then he saw the man again, jumping into the water. The man pulled the

cook to the shore. Then he ran back into the water for the captain. But the captain

waved him away and sent him to the reporter. The man seized the reporter’s hand

and pulled him to the beach. Then the man pointed to the water and cried: “What’s

that?”

In the shallow water, face down, lay Billie, the sailor.

The reporter did not know all that happened after that. He fell on the sand as

if dropped from a housetop. It seems that immediately the beach was filled with men

with blankets, clothes and whiskey. Women brought hot coffee. The people

welcomed the men from the sea to the land.

But a still and dripping shape was carried slowly up the beach. And the

land’s welcome for the sailor’s body could only be its final resting place. When

night came, the white waves moved in the moonlight. The wind brought the sound

of the great sea’s voice to the men on the shore.

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Jack London (1876-1916) was born in San Francisco, USA. He grew up poor in difficult conditions. When he

was young, London worked in various jobs; many were connected to the sea. Later, London decided to educate

himself and become a writer. His best novel, The Sea-Wolf (1904), was based on his experiences at sea. In

1897, London travelled to the Yukon Territory in northern Canada to look for gold. The trip there changed his

life. Searching for gold ____________________ his great novels: The Call of the Wild (1903) and White Fang

(1906). Jack London was ____________________ by the power of nature over people. His stories were about

men and animals against the ____________________ environment.

In The Call of the Wild, Buck is a strong dog who is stolen to pull sledges during the ____________________.

Thornton rescues Buck from his cruel ____________________. At this point in the novel, Thornton has

____________________ that buck can carry a very heavy ____________________. Buck wins the bet for his

master.

inspired Gold Rush fascinated harsh made a bet master sledge

Jack London (1876-1916) was born in San Francisco, USA. He grew up poor in difficult conditions. When he

was young, London worked in various jobs; many were connected to the sea. Later, London decided to educate

himself and become a writer. His best novel, The Sea-Wolf (1904), was based on his experiences at sea. In

1897, London travelled to the Yukon Territory in northern Canada to look for gold. The trip there changed his

life. Searching for gold ____________________ his great novels: The Call of the Wild (1903) and White Fang

(1906). Jack London was ____________________ by the power of nature over people. His stories were about

men and animals against the ____________________ environment.

In The Call of the Wild, Buck is a strong dog who is stolen to pull sledges during the ____________________.

Thornton rescues Buck from his cruel ____________________. At this point in the novel, Thornton has

____________________ that buck can carry a very heavy ____________________. Buck wins the bet for his

master.

inspired Gold Rush fascinated harsh made a bet master sledge

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Jack London, To Build A FireThe man walked down the trail on a cold, gray day. Pure white snow and ice

covered the Earth for as far as he could see. This was his first winter in Alaska. He was wearing heavy clothes and fur boots. But he still felt cold and uncomfortable.

The man was on his way to a camp near Henderson Creek. His friends were already there. He expected to reach Henderson Creek by six o'clock that evening. It would be dark by then. His friends would have a fire and hot food ready for him.

A dog walked behind the man. It was a big gray animal, half dog and half wolf. The dog did not like the extreme cold. It knew the weather was too cold to travel.

The man continued to walk down the trail. He came to a frozen stream called Indian Creek. He began to walk on the snow-covered ice. It was a trail that would lead him straight to Henderson Creek and his friends.

As he walked, he looked carefully at the ice in front of him. Once, he stopped suddenly, and then walked around a part of the frozen stream. He saw that an underground spring flowed under the ice at that spot. It made the ice thin. If he stepped there, he might break through the ice into a pool of water. To get his boots wet in such cold weather might kill him. His feet would turn to ice quickly. He could freeze to death.

At about twelve o'clock, the man decided to stop to eat his lunch. He took off the glove on his right hand. He opened his jacket and shirt, and pulled out his bread and meat. This took less than twenty seconds. Yet, his fingers began to freeze.

He hit his hand against his leg several times until he felt a sharp pain. Then he quickly put his glove on his hand. He made a fire, beginning with small pieces of wood and adding larger ones. He sat on a snow-covered log and ate his lunch. He enjoyed the warm fire for a few minutes. Then he stood up and started walking on the frozen stream again.

A half hour later, it happened. At a place where the snow seemed very solid, the ice broke. The man's feet sank into the water. It was not deep, but his legs got wet to the knees. The man was angry. The accident would delay his arrival at the camp. He would have to build a fire now to dry his clothes and boots.

He walked over to some small trees. They were covered with snow. In their branches were pieces of dry grass and wood left by flood waters earlier in the year. He put several large pieces of wood on the snow, under one of the trees. On top of the wood, he put some grass and dry branches. He pulled off his gloves, took out his matches, and lighted the fire. He fed the young flame with more wood. As the fire grew stronger, he gave it larger pieces of wood.

He worked slowly and carefully. At sixty degrees below zero, a man with wet feet must not fail in his first attempt to build a fire. While he was walking, his blood had kept all parts of his body warm. Now that he had stopped, cold was forcing his blood to withdraw deeper into his body. His wet feet had frozen. He could not feel his fingers. His nose was frozen, too. The skin all over his body felt cold.

Now, however, his fire was beginning to burn more strongly. He was safe. He sat under the tree and thought of the old men in Fairbanks. The old men had told him that no man should travel alone in the Yukon when the temperature is sixty degrees below zero. Yet here he was. He had had an accident. He was alone. And he had saved himself. He had built a fire.

Those old men were weak, he thought. A real man could travel alone. If a man stayed calm, he would be all right. The man's boots were covered with ice. The strings on his boots were as hard as steel. He would have to cut them with his knife.

He leaned back against the tree to take out his knife. Suddenly, without warning, a heavy mass of snow dropped down. His movement had shaken the young tree only a tiny bit. But it was enough to cause the branches of the tree to drop their heavy load. The man was shocked. He sat and looked at the place where the fire had been.

The old men had been right, he thought. If he had another man with him, he would not be in any danger now. The other man could build the fire. Well, it was up to him to build the fire again. This time, he must not fail.

The man collected more wood. He reached into his pocket for the matches. But his fingers were frozen. He could not hold them. He began to hit his hands with all his force against his legs.

After a while, feeling came back to his fingers. The man reached again into his pocket for the matches. But the tremendous cold quickly drove the life out of his fingers. All the matches fell onto the snow. He tried to pick one up, but failed.

The man pulled on his glove and again beat his hand against his leg. Then he took the gloves off both hands and picked up all the matches. He gathered them together. Holding them with both hands, he scratched the matches along his leg. They immediately caught fire.

He held the blazing matches to a piece of wood. After a while, he became aware that he could smell his hands burning. Then he began to feel the pain. He opened his hands, and the blazing matches fell on to the snow. The flame went out in a puff of gray smoke.

The man looked up. The dog was still watching him. The man got an idea. He would kill the dog and bury his hands inside its warm body. When the feeling came back to his fingers, he could build another fire. He called to the dog. The dog heard danger in the man's voice. It backed away.

The man called again. This time the dog came closer. The man reached for his knife. But he had forgotten that he could not bend his fingers. He could not kill the dog, because he could not hold his knife.

The fear of death came over the man. He jumped up and began to run. The running began to make him feel better. Maybe running would make his feet warm. If he ran far enough, he would reach his friends at Henderson Creek. They would take care of him.

It felt strange to run and not feel his feet when they hit the ground. He fell several times. He decided to rest a while. As he lay in the snow, he noticed that he was not shaking. He could not feel his nose or fingers or feet. Yet, he was feeling quite warm and comfortable. He realized he was going to die.

Well, he decided, he might as well take it like a man. There were worse ways to die.

The man closed his eyes and floated into the most comfortable sleep he had ever known.

The dog sat facing him, waiting. Finally, the dog moved closer to the man and caught the smell of death. The animal threw back its head. It let out a long, soft cry to the cold stars in the black sky.

And then it tuned and ran toward Henderson Creek…where it knew there was food and a fire.

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F. Scott Fitzgerald, extract from The Great Gatsby, Chapter III:I.

A stout, middle-aged man, with enormous owl-eyed spectacles, was sitting somewhat drunk on the edge of a great table, staring with unsteady concentration at the shelves of books. As we entered he wheeled excitedly around and examined Jordan from head to foot.

“What do you think?” he demanded impetuously.“About what?” He waved his hand toward the book-shelves.“About that. As a matter of fact you needn’t bother to ascertain. I

ascertained. They’re real.”“The books?”He nodded.“Absolutely real — have pages and everything. I thought they’d be a nice

durable cardboard. Matter of fact, they’re absolutely real. Pages and — Here! Lemme show you.”

Taking our skepticism for granted, he rushed to the bookcases and returned with Volume One of the “Stoddard Lectures.”

“See!” he cried triumphantly. “It’s a bona-fide piece of printed matter. It fooled me. This fella’s a regular Belasco. It’s a triumph. What thoroughness! What realism! Knew when to stop, too — didn’t cut the pages. But what do you want? What do you expect?”

He snatched the book from me and replaced it hastily on its shelf, muttering that if one brick was removed the whole library was liable to collapse.

“Who brought you?” he demanded. “Or did you just come? I was brought. Most people were brought.”

Jordan looked at him alertly, cheerfully, without answering.“I was brought by a woman named Roosevelt,” he continued. “Mrs. Claud

Roosevelt. Do you know her? I met her somewhere last night. I’ve been drunk for about a week now, and I thought it might sober me up to sit in a library.”

“Has it?”“A little bit, I think. I can’t tell yet. I’ve only been here an hour. Did I tell

you about the books? They’re real. They’re ——”“You told us.” We shook hands with him gravely and went back outdoors.

II.There was dancing now on the canvas in the garden; old men pushing young girls in

eternal graceless circles, superior couples holding each other tortuously, fashionably, and keeping in the corners—and a great number of single girls dancing individualistically or relieving the orchestra for a moment of the burden of the banjo or the traps. By midnight the hilarity had increased. A celebrated tenor had sung in Italian, and a notorious contralto had sung in jazz, and between the numbers people were doing “stunts” all over the garden, while happy, vacuous bursts of laughter rose toward the summer sky.

F. Scott Fitzgerald, extract from The Great Gatsby, Chapter III:I.

A stout, middle-aged man, with enormous owl-eyed spectacles, was sitting somewhat drunk on the edge of a great table, staring with unsteady concentration at the shelves of books. As we entered he wheeled excitedly around and examined Jordan from head to foot.

“What do you think?” he demanded impetuously.“About what?” He waved his hand toward the book-shelves.“About that. As a matter of fact you needn’t bother to ascertain. I

ascertained. They’re real.”“The books?”He nodded.“Absolutely real — have pages and everything. I thought they’d be a nice

durable cardboard. Matter of fact, they’re absolutely real. Pages and — Here! Lemme show you.”

Taking our skepticism for granted, he rushed to the bookcases and returned with Volume One of the “Stoddard Lectures.”

“See!” he cried triumphantly. “It’s a bona-fide piece of printed matter. It fooled me. This fella’s a regular Belasco. It’s a triumph. What thoroughness! What realism! Knew when to stop, too — didn’t cut the pages. But what do you want? What do you expect?”

He snatched the book from me and replaced it hastily on its shelf, muttering that if one brick was removed the whole library was liable to collapse.

“Who brought you?” he demanded. “Or did you just come? I was brought. Most people were brought.”

Jordan looked at him alertly, cheerfully, without answering.“I was brought by a woman named Roosevelt,” he continued. “Mrs. Claud

Roosevelt. Do you know her? I met her somewhere last night. I’ve been drunk for about a week now, and I thought it might sober me up to sit in a library.”

“Has it?”“A little bit, I think. I can’t tell yet. I’ve only been here an hour. Did I tell

you about the books? They’re real. They’re ——”“You told us.” We shook hands with him gravely and went back outdoors.

II.There was dancing now on the canvas in the garden; old men pushing young girls in

eternal graceless circles, superior couples holding each other tortuously, fashionably, and keeping in the corners—and a great number of single girls dancing individualistically or relieving the orchestra for a moment of the burden of the banjo or the traps. By midnight the hilarity had increased. A celebrated tenor had sung in Italian, and a notorious contralto had sung in jazz, and between the numbers people were doing “stunts” all over the garden, while happy, vacuous bursts of laughter rose toward the summer sky.

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A Rose For Emily, William Faulkner

The story is divided into five sections. In section I, the narrator recalls the time of Emily Grierson’s death and how the entire town attended her funeral in her home, which no stranger had entered for more than ten years. In a once-elegant, upscale neighborhood, Emily’s house is the last vestige of the grandeur of a lost era. Colonel Sartoris, the town’s previous mayor, had suspended Emily’s tax responsibilities to the town after her father’s death, justifying the action by claiming that Mr. Grierson had once lent the community a significant sum. As new town leaders take over, they make unsuccessful attempts to get Emily to resume payments. When members of the Board of Aldermen pay her a visit, in the dusty and antiquated parlor, Emily reasserts the fact that she is not required to pay taxes in Jefferson and that the officials should talk to Colonel Sartoris about the matter. However, at that point he has been dead for almost a decade. She asks her servant, Tobe, to show the men out.

In section II, the narrator describes a time thirty years earlier when Emily resists another official inquiry on behalf of the town leaders, when the townspeople detect a powerful odor emanating from her property. Her father has just died, and Emily has been abandoned by the man whom the townsfolk believed Emily was to marry. As complaints mount, Judge Stevens, the mayor at the time, decides to have lime sprinkled along the foundation of the Grierson home in the middle of the night. Within a couple of weeks, the odor subsides, but the townspeople begin to pity the increasingly reclusive Emily, remembering how her great aunt had succumbed to insanity. The townspeople have always believed that the Griersons thought too highly of themselves, with Emily’s father driving off the many suitors deemed not good enough to marry his daughter. With no offer of marriage in sight, Emily is still single by the time she turns thirty.

The day after Mr. Grierson’s death, the women of the town call on Emily to offer their condolences. Meeting them at the door, Emily states that her father is not dead, a charade that she keeps up for three days. She finally turns her father’s body over for burial.

In section III, the narrator describes a long illness that Emily suffers after this incident. The summer after her father’s death, the town contracts workers to pave the sidewalks, and a construction company, under the direction of northerner Homer Barron, is awarded the job. Homer soon becomes a popular figure in town and is seen taking Emily on buggy rides on Sunday afternoons, which scandalizes the town and increases the condescension and pity they have for Emily. They feel that she is forgetting her family pride and becoming involved with a man beneath her station.

As the affair continues and Emily’s reputation is further compromised, she goes to the drug store to purchase arsenic, a powerful poison. She is required by law to reveal how she will use the arsenic. She offers no explanation, and the package arrives at her house labeled “For rats.”

In section IV, the narrator describes the fear that some of the townspeople have that Emily will use the poison to kill herself. Her potential marriage to Homer seems increasingly

unlikely, despite their continued Sunday ritual. The more outraged women of the town insist that the Baptist minister talk with Emily. After his visit, he never speaks of what happened and swears that he’ll never go back. So the minister’s wife writes to Emily’s two cousins in Alabama, who arrive for an extended stay. Because Emily orders a silver toilet set monogrammed with Homer’s initials, talk of the couple’s marriage resumes. Homer, absent from town, is believed to be preparing for Emily’s move to the North or avoiding Emily’s intrusive relatives.

After the cousins’ departure, Homer enters the Grierson home one evening and then is never seen again. Holed up in the house, Emily grows plump and gray. Despite the occasional lesson she gives in china painting, her door remains closed to outsiders. In what becomes an annual ritual, Emily refuses to acknowledge the tax bill. She eventually closes up the top floor of the house. Except for the occasional glimpse of her in the window, nothing is heard from her until her death at age seventy-four. Only the servant is seen going in and out of the house.

In section V, the narrator describes what happens after Emily dies. Emily’s body is laid out in the parlor, and the women, town elders, and two cousins attend the service. After some time has passed, the door to a sealed upstairs room that had not been opened in forty years is broken down by the townspeople. The room is frozen in time, with the items for an upcoming wedding and a man’s suit laid out. Homer Barron’s body is stretched on the bed as well, in an advanced state of decay. The onlookers then notice the indentation of a head in the pillow beside Homer’s body and a long strand of Emily’s gray hair on the pillow.

Sequence the events in the story on the chart below:

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Order of events as they are given in the story…Order in which events actually occur (number 1-9)

Miss Emily dies.

The aldermen visit about the taxes.

Miss Emily gives painting lessons.

Her father dies.

Homer Barron disappears.

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The aldermen apply lime around her house.

Homer Barron arrives in town.

Miss Emily asks the druggist for poison.

Townspeople discover the bridal suite.

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“Hills Like White Elephants”By Ernest Hemingway (1927)

The hills across the valley of the Ebro were long and white. On this side there was no shade and no trees and the station was between two lines of rails in the sun. Close against the side of the station there was the warm shadow of the building and a curtain, made of strings of bamboo beads, hung across the open door into the bar, to keep out flies. The American and the girl with him sat at a table in the shade, outside the building. It was very hot and the express from Barcelona would come in forty minutes. It stopped at this junction for two minutes and went to Madrid.

'What should we drink?' the girl asked. She had taken off her hat and put it on the table.

'It's pretty hot,' the man said.

'Let's drink beer.'

'Dos cervezas,' the man said into the curtain.

'Big ones?' a woman asked from the doorway.

'Yes. Two big ones.'

The woman brought two glasses of beer and two felt pads. She put the felt pads and the beer glass on the table and looked at the man and the girl. The girl was looking off at the line of hills. They were white in the sun and the country was brown and dry.

'They look like white elephants,' she said.

'I've never seen one,' the man drank his beer.

'No, you wouldn't have.'

'I might have,' the man said. 'Just because you say I wouldn't have doesn't prove anything.'

The girl looked at the bead curtain. 'They've painted something on it,' she said. 'What does it say?'

'Anis del Toro. It's a drink.'

'Could we try it?'

The man called 'Listen' through the curtain. The woman came out from the bar.

'Four reales.' 'We want two Anis del Toro.'

'With water?'

'Do you want it with water?'

'I don't know,' the girl said. 'Is it good with water?'

'It's all right.'

'You want them with water?' asked the woman.

'Yes, with water.'

'It tastes like liquorice,' the girl said and put the glass down.

'That's the way with everything.''Yes,' said the girl. 'Everything tastes of liquorice. Especially all the things you've waited so long for, like absinthe.'

'Oh, cut it out.'

'You started it, ' the girl said. 'I was being amused. I was having a fine time.'

'Well, let's try and have a fine time.'

'Alright. I was trying. I said the mountains looked like white elephants. Wasn't that bright?'

'That was bright.'

'I wanted to try this new drink. That's all we do, isn't it - look at things and try new drinks?'

'I guess so.'

The girl looked across at the hills. 'They're lovely hills,' she said. 'They don't really look like white elephants. I just meant the colouring of their skin through the trees.'

'Should we have another drink?'

'All right.'

The warm wind blew the bead curtain against the table.

'The beer's nice and cool,' the man said.

'It's lovely,' the girl said.

'It's really an awfully simple operation, Jig,' the man said. 'It's not really an operation at all.'

The girl looked at the ground the table legs rested on.

'I know you wouldn't mind it, Jig. It's really not anything. It's just to let the air in.'

The girl did not say anything.

'I'll go with you and I'll stay with you all the time. They just let the air in and then it's all perfectly natural.'

'Then what will we do afterwards?'

'We'll be fine afterwards. Just like we were before.'

'What makes you think so?'

'That's the only thing that bothers us. It's the only thing that's made us unhappy.'

The girl looked at the bead curtain, put her hand out and took hold of two of the strings of beads. 'And you think then we'll be all right and be happy.'

'I know we will. You don't have to be afraid. I've known lots of people that have done it.'

'So have I,' said the girl. 'And afterwards they were all so happy.'

'Well,' the man said, 'if you don't want to you don't have to. I wouldn't have you do it if you didn't want to. But I know it's perfectly simple.'

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'And you really want to?'

'I think it's the best thing to do. But I don't want you to do it if you don't really want to.'

'And if I do it you'll be happy and things will be like they were and you'll love me?'

'I love you now. You know I love you.'

'I know. But if I do it, then it will be nice again if I say things are like white elephants, and you'll like it?'

'I'll love it. I love it now but I just can't think about it. You know how I get when I worry.'

'If I do it you won't ever worry?'

'I won't worry about that because it's perfectly simple.'

'Then I'll do it. Because I don't care about me.'

'What do you mean?'

'I don't care about me.'

'Well, I care about you.'

'Oh, yes. But I don't care about me. And I'll do it and then everything will be fine.''I don't want you to do it if you feel that way.'

The girl stood up and walked to the end of the station. Across, on the other side, were fields of grain and trees along the banks of the Ebro. Far away, beyond the river, were mountains. The shadow of a cloud moved across the field of grain and she saw the river through the trees. 'And we could have all this,' she said. 'And we could have everything and every day we make it more impossible.'

'What did you say?'

'I said we could have everything.'

'No, we can't.'

'We can have the whole world.'

'No, we can't.'

'We can go everywhere.'

'No, we can't. It isn't ours anymore.'

'It's ours.'

'No, it isn't. And once they take it away, you never get it back.'

'But they haven't taken it away.'

'We'll wait and see.'

'Come on back in the shade,' he said. 'You mustn't feel that way.'

'I don't feel any way,' the girl said. 'I just know things.'

'I don't want you to do anything that you don't want to do -'

'Nor that isn't good for me,' she said. 'I know. Could we have another beer?'

'All right. But you've got to realize - '

'I realize,' the girl said. 'Can't we maybe stop talking?'

They sat down at the table and the girl looked across at the hills on the dry side of the valley and the man looked at her and at the table.

'You've got to realize,' he said, ' that I don't want you to do it if you don't want to. I'm perfectly willing to go through with it if it means anything to you.'

'Doesn't it mean anything to you? We could get along.'

'Of course it does. But I don't want anybody but you. I don't want anyone else. And I know it's perfectly simple.'

'Yes, you know it's perfectly simple.''It's all right for you to say that, but I do know it.'

'Would you do something for me now?'

'I'd do anything for you.'

'Would you please please please please please please please stop talking?'

He did not say anything but looked at the bags against the wall of the station. There were labels on them from all the hotels where they had spent nights.

'But I don't want you to,' he said, 'I don't care anything about it.'

'I'll scream,' the girl said.

The woman came out through the curtains with two glasses of beer and put them down on the damp felt pads. 'The train comes in five minutes,' she said.

'What did she say?' asked the girl.

'That the train is coming in five minutes.'

The girl smiled brightly at the woman, to thank her.

'I'd better take the bags over to the other side of the station,' the man said. She smiled at him.

'All right. Then come back and we'll finish the beer.'

He picked up the two heavy bags and carried them around the station to the other tracks. He looked up the tracks but could not see the train.

Coming back, he walked through the bar-room, where people waiting for the train were drinking. He drank an Anis at the bar and looked at the people. They were all waiting reasonably for the train. He went out through the bead curtain. She was sitting at the table and smiled at him.

'Do you feel better?' he asked.

'I feel fine,' she said. 'There's nothing wrong with me. I feel fine.'

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“Breakfast” by John SteinbeckThis thing fills me with pleasure. I don’t know why, I can see it in the smallest

detail. I find myself recalling it again and again, each time bringing more detail out of a sunken memory, remembering brings the curious warm pleasure.

It was very early in the morning. The eastern mountains were blue-black, but behind them the light stood up faintly colored at the mountain rims with a washed red, growing colder, grayer and darker as it went up and overhead until, at a place near the west, it was merged with pure night.

And it was cold, not painfully so, but cold enough so that I rubbed my hands and shoved them deep into my pockets, and I hunched my shoulders up and scuffled my feet in the ground. Down in the valley where I was, the earth was that lavender gray of dawn. I walked along a country road and ahead of me I saw a tent that was only a little lighter gray than the ground. Beside the tent there was a flash of orange fire seeping out of the cracks of an old rusty iron stove. Gray smoke spurted up and out of the stubby stovepipe, spurted up a long way before it spread out and dispersed.

I saw a young woman beside the stove, really a girl. She was dressed in a faded cotton skirt and waist. As I came close I saw that she carried a baby in a crooked arm and the baby was nursing, its head under her waist out of the cold. The mother moved about, poking the fire, shifting the rusty lids of the stove to make a greater draft, opening the oven door; and all the time the baby was nursing, but that didn’t interfere with the mother’s work, not with the gracefulness of her movements. There was something very precise and practiced about her movements. The orange fire flicked out of the cracks in the stove and threw dancing reflections on the tent.

I was close now and I could smell frying bacon and baking bread, the warmest, pleasantest odors I know. From the east the light grew swiftly. I came near the stove and stretched my hands out to it and shivered all over when the warmth struck me. Then the tent flap jerked up and a young man came out and an older man followed him. They were dressed in new blue dungarees and in new dungaree coats with the brass buttons shining. They were sharp-faced men, and they looked much alike.

The younger had a dark stubble beard and the older had a gray stubble beard. Their heads and faces were wet, their hair dripped with water, and water stood on their stiff beards and their cheeks shone with water. Together they stood looking quietly at the lightening east; they yawned together and looked at the light on the fill rimes. They turned and saw me.

“Morning,” said the older man. His face was neither friendly nor unfriendly.“Morning, sir,” I said.“Morning,” said the young man.The water was slowly drying on their faces. They came to the stove and warmed

their hands at it.The girl kept to her work, her face averted and her eyes on what she was

doing. Her hair was tied back out of her eyes with a string and it hung down her back and swayed as she worked. She set tin cups on a big packing box, set tin plates and knives and forks out too. Then she scooped fried bacon out of the deep grease

and laid it on a big tin platter, and the bacon cricked and rustled as it grew crisp. She opened the rusty oven door and took out a square pan full of high bigbiscuits.

When the smell of that hot bread came out, both men inhaled deeply.The elder turned to me, “Had your breakfast?”“No.”“Well, sit down with us, then.”That was the signal. We went to the packing case and squatted on the

ground about it. The young man asked, “Picking cotton?” “No.”“We had twelve days’ work so far,” the young man said.The girl spoke from the stove. “They even got new clothes.”The two men looked down at their new dungarees and they both smiled a

little.The girl set out the platter of bacon, the brown high biscuits, a bowl of

bacon gravy and a pot of coffee, and then she squatted down by the box too. The baby was still nursing, its head up under her waist out of the cold. I could hear the sucking noises it made.

We filled our plates, poured bacon gravy over our biscuits and sugared our coffee. The older man filled his mouth full and he chewed and chewed and swallowed. The he said, “God Almighty, it’s good;” and he filled his mouth again.

The young man said, “We been eating good for twelve days.”We all ate quickly, frantically, and refilled our plated and are quickly again

until we were full and warm. The hot bitter coffee scalded our throats. We threw the last little bit with the grounds in it on the earth and refilled our cups.

There was color in the light now, a reddish gleam that made the air seem colder. The two men faced the east and their daces were lighted by the dawn, and I looked up for a moment and saw the image of the mountain and the light coming over it reflected in the older man’s eyes.

Then the two men threw the grounds from their cups in the earth and they stood up together. “Got to get going,” the older man said.

The younger man turned to me. “ ’Fyou want to pick cotton, we could maybe getyou on.”

“No. I got to go along. Thanks for the breakfast.”The older man waved his hand in a negative. “O.K. Glad to have you.” They

walked away together. The air was blazing with light at the eastern skyline. And I walked away down the country road.

That’s all. I know, of course, some of the reasons why it was pleasant. But there was some element of great beauty there that makes the rush of warmth when I think of it.

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Name: ___________________________________________________________

Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening by Robert FrostEvidence (доказательство) and Inference (вывод)

StatementsDirectly Supported by

the poem(прямоподдержанный)

Inference Based on

Evidence(вывод на основе

доказательства)

Not Supported(не

поддержанный)

It is winter.

The speaker has lost his way.

The speaker thinks that the

woods are beautiful.

The owner of the woods knows the

speaker is on his land.

The speaker is very far away

from any people.

At the end of the poem, the

speaker and his horse leave the woods and go

home.

The Road Not Taken by Robert FrostEvidence (доказательство) and Inference (вывод)

StatementsDirectly Supported by

the poem(прямоподдержанный)

Inference Based on

Evidence(вывод на основе

доказательства)

Not Supported(не

поддержанный)

It is morning.

The speaker is lost.

The speaker had a

decision to make.

Both roads were

equally worn.

The speaker feels regret about not

having taken both

roads.

At the end of the

poem, the speaker is satisfied with his decision.

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Stopping by Woods on a Snowy EveningRobert FrostWhose woods these are I think I know.His house is in the village though;He will not see me stopping hereTo watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queerTo stop without a farmhouse nearBetween the woods and frozen lakeThe darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shakeTo ask if there is some mistake.The only other sound’s the sweepOf easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.But I have promises to keep,And miles to go before I sleep,And miles to go before I sleep.

The Road Not Takenby Robert FrostTwo roads diverged in a yellow wood,And sorry I could not travel bothAnd be one traveler, long I stoodAnd looked down one as far as I couldTo where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,And having perhaps the better claim,Because it was grassy and wanted wear;Though as for that the passing thereHad worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally layIn leaves no step had trodden black.Oh, I kept the first for another day!Yet knowing how way leads on to way,I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sighSomewhere ages and ages hence:Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—I took the one less traveled by,And that has made all the difference.

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy EveningRobert FrostWhose woods these are I think I know.His house is in the village though;He will not see me stopping hereTo watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queerTo stop without a farmhouse nearBetween the woods and frozen lakeThe darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shakeTo ask if there is some mistake.The only other sound’s the sweepOf easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.But I have promises to keep,And miles to go before I sleep,And miles to go before I sleep.

The Road Not Takenby Robert FrostTwo roads diverged in a yellow wood,And sorry I could not travel bothAnd be one traveler, long I stoodAnd looked down one as far as I couldTo where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,And having perhaps the better claim,Because it was grassy and wanted wear;Though as for that the passing thereHad worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally layIn leaves no step had trodden black.Oh, I kept the first for another day!Yet knowing how way leads on to way,I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sighSomewhere ages and ages hence:Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—I took the one less traveled by,And that has made all the difference.

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Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings"When I was three and Bailey four, we had arrivedin the musty little town, wearing

tags on our wristswhich instructed – ‘To Whom It May Concern’ – thatwe were Marguerite and Bailey Johnson Jr., fromLong Beach, California, en route to Stamps,Arkansas, c/o Mrs. Annie Henderson.

Our parents had decided to put an end to theircalamitous marriage, and Father shipped us hometo his mother. A porter had been charged with ourwelfare – he got off the train the next day inArizona – and our tickets were pinned to mybrother’s inside coat pocket.

I don’t remember much of the trip, but after wereached the segregated southern part of the journey, things must have looked up. Negropassengers, who always travelled with loaded lunchboxes felt sorry for ‘the poor little motherlessdarlings’ and plied us with cold fried chicken andpotato salad.

Years later I discovered that the United States hadbeen crossed thousands of times by frightenedBlack children travelling alone to their newlyaffluent parents in Northern cities, or back tograndmothers in Southern towns when the urbanNorth reneged on its economic promises."

"The dress I wore was lavender taffeta, and each time I breathed it rustled, and now that I was sucking in air to breathe out shame, it sounded like crepe paper on the back of hearses.

As I'd watched Momma put ruffles on the hem and cute little tucks around the waist, I knew that once I put it on, I'd look like a movie star. (It was silk and that made up for the awful color.) I was going to look like oneofthesweet little white girls who were everybody's dream of what was right with the world. Hanging softly over the black Singer sewing machine, it looked like magic, and when people saw me wearing it they were going to run up to me and say, "Marguerite (sometimes it was 'dear Marguerite'), forgive us, please, we didn't know who you were," and I would answer generously, "No, you couldn't have known. Of course I forgive you."

Just thinking about it made me go around with angel's dust sprinkled over my face for days. But Easter's early morning sun had shown the dress to be a plain ugly cut-down forma white woman's once-was-purple throwaway. it was old-lady long, too, but it didn't hide my skinny legs, which had been greased with Blue Seal Vaseline and powdered with the Arkansas red clay. The age-faded color made my skin look dirty like mud, and everyone in church was looking at my skinny legs.

Wouldn't they be surprised when one day I woke out of my black ugly dream, and my real hair, which was long and blond, would take the place of the kinky mass that Momma wouldn't let me straighten? My light-blue eyes were going to hypnotize them, after all the things they'd said about 'my daddy must have been a Chinaman' (I though they meant made out of china, like cup) because my eyes were so small and squinty. Then they would understand why I had never picked up a Southern accent, or spoke the common slang, and why I had to be forced to eat pigs' tails and snouts. Because I was really white and because a cruel fairy stepmother, who was understandably jealous ofmy beauty, had turned me into a too-big Negro girl, with nappy black hair, brad feet and a space between her teeth that would hold a number-two pencil."

Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

"When I was three and Bailey four, we had arrived in the musty little town, wearing tags on our wrists which instructed – ‘To Whom It May Concern’ – that we were Marguerite and Bailey Johnson Jr., from Long Beach, California, en route to Stamps, Arkansas, c/o Mrs. Annie Henderson.

Our parents had decided to put an end to their calamitous marriage, and Father shipped us home to his mother. A porter had been charged with our welfare – he got off the train the next day in Arizona – and our tickets were pinned to my brother’s inside coat pocket.

I don’t remember much of the trip, but after we reached the segregated southern part of the journey, things must have looked up. Negro passengers, who always travelled with loaded lunchboxes felt sorry for ‘the poor little motherless darlings’ and plied us with cold fried chicken and potato salad.

Years later I discovered that the United States had been crossed thousands of times by frightened Black children travelling alone to their newly affluent parents in Northern cities, or back to grandmothers in Southern towns when the urban North reneged on its economic promises."

"The dress I wore was lavender taffeta, and each time I breathed it rustled, and now that I was sucking in air to breathe out shame, it sounded like crepe paper on the back of hearses.

As I'd watched Momma put ruffles on the hem and cute little tucks around the waist, I knew that once I put it on, I'd look like a movie star. (It was silk and that made up for the awful color.) I was going to look like one of the sweet little white girls who were everybody's dream of what was right with the world. Hanging softly over the black Singer sewing machine, it looked like magic, and when people saw me wearing it they were going to run up to me and say, "Marguerite (sometimes it was 'dear Marguerite'), forgive us, please, we didn't know who you were," and I would answer generously, "No, you couldn't have known. Of course I forgive you."

Just thinking about it made me go around with angel's dust sprinkled over my face for days. But Easter's early morning sun had shown the dress to be a plain ugly cut-down forma white woman's once-was-purple throwaway. it was old-lady long, too, but it didn't hide my skinny legs, which had been greased with Blue Seal Vaseline and powdered with the Arkansas red clay. The age-faded color made my skin look dirty like mud, and everyone in church was looking at my skinny legs.

Wouldn't they be surprised when one day I woke out of my black ugly dream, and my real hair, which was long and blond, would take the place of the kinky mass that Momma wouldn't let me straighten? My light-blue eyes were going to hypnotize them, after all the things they'd said about 'my daddy must have been a Chinaman' (I though they meant made out of china, like cup) because my eyes were so small and squinty. Then they would understand why I had never picked up a Southern accent, or spoke the common slang, and why I had to be forced to eat pigs' tails and snouts. Because I was really white and because a cruel fairy stepmother, who was understandably jealous of my beauty, had turned me into a too-big Negro girl, with nappy black hair, brad feet and a space between her teeth that would hold a number-two pencil."

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William Saroyan, The Hummingbird That Lived Through WinterThere was a hummingbird once which in the wintertime did not leave our neighborhood in Fresno,

California. I’ll tell you about it.Across the street lived old Dikran, who was almost blind. He was past eighty and his wife was only a few

years younger. They had a little house that was as neat inside as it was ordinary outside—except for old Dikran’s garden, which was the best thing of its kind in the world. Plants, bushes, trees—all strong, in sweet black moist earth whose guardian was old Dikran. All things from the sky loved this spot in our poor neighborhood, and old Dikran loved them.

One freezing Sunday, in the dead of winter, as I came home from Sunday School I saw old Dikran standing in the middle of the street trying to distinguish what was in his hand. Instead of going into our house to the fire, as I had wanted to do, I stood on the steps of the front porch and watched the old man. He would turn around and look upward at his trees and then back to the palm of his hand. He stood in the street at least two minutes and then at last he came to me. He held his hand out, and in Armenian he said, “What is this in my hand?”

I looked. “It is a hummingbird,” I said half in English and half in Armenian. Hummingbird I said in English because I didn’t know its name in Armenian.

“What is that?” old Dikran asked.“The little bird,” I said. “You know. The one that comes in the summer and stands in the air and then shoots

away. The one with the wings that beat so fast you can’t see them. It’s in your hand. It’s dying.”“Come with me,” the old man said. “I can’t see, and the wife’s at church. I can feel its heart beating. Is it in

a bad way? Look again, once.”I looked again. It was a sad thing to behold. This wonderful little creature of summertime in the big rough

hand of the old peasant. Here it was in the cold of winter, absolutely helpless and pathetic, not suspended in a shaft of summer light, not the most alive thing in the world, but the most helpless and heartbreaking. “It’s dying,” I said.

The old man lifted his hand to his mouth and blew warm breath on the little thing in his hand which he could not even see. “Stay now,” he said in Armenian. “It is not long till summer. Stay, swift and lovely.”

We went into the kitchen of his little house, and while he blew warm breath on the bird he told me what to do.

“Put a tablespoon of honey over the gas fire and pour it into my hand, but be sure it is not too hot.”This was done.

After a moment the hummingbird began to show signs of fresh life. The warmth of the room, the vapor of the warm honey—and, well, the will and love of the old man. Soon the old man could feel the change in his hand, and after a moment or two the hummingbird began to take little dabs of the honey.

“It will live,” the old man announced. “Stay and watch.”The transformation was incredible. The old man kept his hand generously open, and I expected the helpless

bird to shoot upward out of his hand, suspend itself in space, and scare the life out of me—which is exactly what happened. The new life of the little bird was magnificent. It spun about in the little kitchen, going to the window, coming back to the heat, suspending, circling as if it were summertime and it had never felt better in its whole life.

The old man sat on the plain chair, blind but attentive. He listened carefully and tried to see, but of course he couldn’t. He kept asking about the bird, how it seemed to be, whether it showed signs of weakening again, what its spirit was, and whether or not it appeared to be restless; and I kept describing the bird to him.

When the bird was restless and wanted to go, the old man said, “Open the window and let it go.”“Will it live?” I asked.“It is alive now and wants to go,” he said. “Open the window.”I opened the window, the hummingbird stirred about here and there, feeling the cold from the outside,

suspended itself in the area of the open window, stirring this way and that, and then it was gone. “Close the window,” the old man said. We talked a minute or two and then I went home.

The old man claimed the hummingbird lived through that winter, but I never knew for sure. I saw hummingbirds again when summer came, but I couldn’t tell one from the other.

One day in the summer I asked the old man.“Did it live?”“The little bird?” he said.“Yes,” I said. “That we gave the honey to. You remember. The little bird that was dying in the winter. Did

it live?”“Look about you,” the old man said. “Do you see the bird?”“I see hummingbirds,” I said.“Each of them is our bird,” the old man said. “Each of them, each of them,” he said swiftly and gently.

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Morning Song (by Sylvia Plath)

Love set you going like a fat gold watch.The midwife slapped your footsoles, and your bald cryTook its place among the elements.

Our voices echo, magnifying your arrival. New statue.In a drafty museum, your nakednessShadows our safety. We stand round blankly as walls.

I'm no more your motherThan the cloud that distills a mirror to reflect its own slowEffacement at the wind's hand.

All night your moth-breathFlickers among the flat pink roses. I wake to listen:A far sea moves in my ear.

One cry, and I stumble from bed, cow-heavy and floralIn my Victorian nightgown.Your mouth opens clean as a cat's. The window square

Whitens and swallows its dull stars. And now you tryYour handful of notes;The clear vowels rise like balloons.

Mirror (by Sylvia Plath)

I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.Whatever I see I swallow immediatelyJust as it is, unmisted by love or dislike.I am not cruel, only truthful --The eye of a little god, four-cornered.Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall.It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so longI think it is part of my heart. But it flickers.Faces and darkness separate us over and over.

Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me,Searching my reaches for what she really is.Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon.I see her back, and reflect it faithfully.She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands.I am important to her. She comes and goes.Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness.In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old womanRises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish.

Morning Song (by Sylvia Plath)

Love set you going like a fat gold watch.The midwife slapped your footsoles, and your bald cryTook its place among the elements.

Our voices echo, magnifying your arrival. New statue.In a drafty museum, your nakednessShadows our safety. We stand round blankly as walls.

I'm no more your motherThan the cloud that distills a mirror to reflect its own slowEffacement at the wind's hand.

All night your moth-breathFlickers among the flat pink roses. I wake to listen:A far sea moves in my ear.

One cry, and I stumble from bed, cow-heavy and floralIn my Victorian nightgown.Your mouth opens clean as a cat's. The window square

Whitens and swallows its dull stars. And now you tryYour handful of notes;The clear vowels rise like balloons.

Mirror (by Sylvia Plath)

I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.Whatever I see I swallow immediatelyJust as it is, unmisted by love or dislike.I am not cruel, only truthful --The eye of a little god, four-cornered.Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall.It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so longI think it is part of my heart. But it flickers.Faces and darkness separate us over and over.

Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me,Searching my reaches for what she really is.Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon.I see her back, and reflect it faithfully.She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands.I am important to her. She comes and goes.Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness.In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old womanRises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish.

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The Flowers, by Alice WalkerIt seemed to Myop as she skipped lightly from hen house to pigpen to smokehouse that the days had never been as beautiful as these. The air held a keenness that made her nose twitch. The harvesting of the corn and cotton, peanuts and squash, made each day a golden surprise that caused excited little tremors to run up her jaws.

Myop carried a short, knobby stick. She struck out at random at chickens she liked, and worked out the beat of a song on the fence around the pigpen. She felt light and good in the warm sun. She was ten, and nothing existed for her but her song, the stick clutched in her dark brown hand, and the tat-de-ta-ta-ta of accompaniment,

Turning her back on the rusty boards of her family's sharecropper cabin, Myop walked along the fence till it ran into the stream made by the spring. Around the spring, where the family got drinking water, silver ferns and wildflowers grew. Along the shallow banks pigs rooted. Myop watched the tiny white bubbles disrupt the thin black scale of soil and the water that silently rose and slid away down the stream.

She had explored the woods behind the house many times. Often, in late autumn, her mother took her to gather nuts among the fallen leaves. Today she made her own path, bouncing this way and that way, vaguely keeping an eye out for snakes. She found, in addition to various common but pretty ferns and leaves, an armful of strange blue flowers with velvety ridges and a sweet suds bush full of the brown, fragrant buds.

By twelve o'clock, her arms laden with sprigs of her findings, she was a mile or more from home. She had often been as far before, but the strangeness of the land made it not as pleasant as her usual haunts. It seemed gloomy in the little cove in which she found herself. The air was damp, the silence close and deep.

Myop began to circle back to the house, back to the peacefulness of the morning. It was then she stepped smack into his eyes. Her heel became lodged in the broken ridge between brow and nose, and she reached down quickly, unafraid, to free herself. It was only when she saw his naked grin that she gave a little yelp of surprise.

He had been a tall man. From feet to neck covered a long space. His head lay beside him. When she pushed back the leaves and layers of earth and debris Myop saw that he'd had large white teeth, all of them cracked or broken, long fingers, and very big bones. All his clothes had rotted away except some threads of blue denim from his overalls. The buckles of the overall had turned green.

Myop gazed around the spot with interest. Very near where she'd stepped into the head was a wild pink rose. As she picked it to add to her bundle she noticed a raised mound, a ring, around the rose's root. It was the rotted remains of a noose, a bit of shredding plowline, now blending benignly into the soil. Around an overhanging limb of a great spreading oak clung another piece. Frayed, rotted, bleached, and frazzled--barely there--but spinning restlessly in the breeze. Myop laid down her flowers.

And the summer was over.skip бежать вприпрыжкуkeenness интенсивность, яркостьtwitch подёргиватьсяtremors толчкиknobby узловатыйrandom случайныйfence заборrusty ржавыйboard доскаsharecropper испольщикexplore исследоватьgather накоплятьvaguely отчастиvelvetyridges бархатистыйladen гружёный

gloomy тёмный, мрачныйsilence безмолвиеstep smack into точно вridge гребень (not exactly… but close) grin оскалbuckles пряжкаbundle вязанка noose петляshred plowline канатbenignly - causing no harm (вред)spreading распространятьfrayed потрёпанныйrot гниение

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John Steinbeck, "The Pearl"The story is about the family of Kino, a poor Mexican fisherman, his mate Juana and their baby son, Coyotito. The family is living simply, in harmony with each other and with nature. One day, the baby is bitten by a scorpion; Kino reacts by smashing the creature and Juana by trying to suck the scorpion poison from Coyotito’s wound. When the baby falls ill, the parents take him to the only doctor in the neighboring town; the doctor, when seeing that they have no money, refuses to help them and tells his servant to say that he is gone. They wrap Coyotito in a blanket and take him in their canoe onto the water so Kino can dive for pearls.

While Kino is diving for pearls, Juana continues to treat the baby with traditional methods – sucking out the poison and putting on a poultice of seaweed. Eventually, Kino finds the “Pearl of the World,” and Coyotito rests more comfortably, the poison receding from his body. Kino believes the great pearl is his baby’s ticket to health, an education, and a better life. Juana looks forward to being able to be married in the church now that they can pay for the service.

The people in the village treat Kino and Juana differently now that they have the pearl. Especially, the priest, the doctor and the pearl sellers who make plans because of the pearl – they are motivated by greed. Juana soon begins to fear that the pearl is evil and will bring them grief. The parish priest who had never had time for Kino and Juana before comes to see the pearl and tells Kino, “I hope thou wilt remember to give thanks, my son, to Him who has given thee this treasure, and to pray for his guidance in the future.”

Juana’s fear of the pearl’s evil power is confirmed after the doctor learns of Kino’s good fortune and comes to treat the baby, giving him “medication” that makes him very ill. The doctor also tricks Kino into showing him the pearl and where it is kept. Kino begins to fear, hides the pearl again and readies his knife. That night, Kino stabs a man who attempts to enter his cabin. Juana begs Kino to throw the evil pearl away before it destroys them – he refuses, the pearl will bring them wealth and happiness. The next morning Kino, Juana, and Coyotito, followed by the villagers, go to La Paz to sell the pearl. Some in the village worry that the pearl will destroy Kino and his family. Juan Tomas, Kino’s brother, cautions him to be careful he is not cheated.

When Kino presents the pearl to a dealer, he is told that it is too large to sell; all of the other dealers tell Kino the same. Finally, one of the dealers offers Kino 100 pesos, Kino believes the pearl to be worth 50,000 pesos. Knowing he is being cheated, Kino takes his pearl, and with the procession, returns defeated to his village. The villagers debate about whether or not Kino should have taken the money. Kino is angry and afraid, so he buries the pearl to keep it from being stolen. Kino's brother, Juan Tomas, warns him that by refusing to sell the pearl, he is challenging the social structure, the men 'in control', and this could be dangerous. Juana, fearing the evil of the pearl, attempts to throw it away while Kino sleeps, but Kino chases her and beats her. As Kino walks away from Juana, he is attacked and kills a man attempting to steal the pearl. Juana knows “the old life is gone forever.”

They decide they must run away and plan to use Kino’s prized possession, the canoe, to begin their journey. When they reach the canoe, Kino finds that someone has put a hole in it. To Kino, this is worse than killing a man as a man has sons who can seek revenge; to take a man's canoe is to take his source of food and income. Juana returns to their house to get Coyotito and finds it in flames. Knowing he has killed a man, Kino takes Juana and Coyotito and hides in Juan Tomas’ house, asking him to tell the villagers they were killed in the fire and the pearl was stolen. Kino's brother says that he should have sold the pearl and fears that it will bring only evil to Kino and his family; Juana begins to see that Kino is obsessed with the pearl, willing to kill for it, and she fears it will destroy him. Kino and Juana flee the village “in the dark of the moon” relying on the wind to cover their tracks.

All night they walk; by day they hide in the shade of a tree. Juana does not sleep and Kino sleeps fitfully. Waking from a dream, he tells Juana to quiet the baby because he hears something. In the distance, he sees three men, two on foot and one on horseback. They pass by the family, but Kino knows the trackers will return. The family flees into the mountains, hoping they can lose them. Near a pool of water, Kino hides Juana and Coyotito in a cave. The trackers come and make camp near the pool; Kino knows he must get the trackers' rifle, even if it means killing for it. The baby whimpers, a match flares at the trackers’ campsite, the match dies, and Kino readies himself to steal the rifle. But, before he reaches the tracker the moon rises, casting too much light on the camp site. As Kino prepares to leap for the gun Coyotito whimpers in the distance. Kino quickly kills two of the trackers, but the gun goes off before he reaches the third tracker. When Kino hears Juana’s cry he knows it is the cry of death for her baby.

Kino carries the rifle and Juana carries the dead baby, wrapped in her shawl, back to La Paz. They walk through the city “as though it were not there.” They walk quietly to the sea; Kino offers the pearl to Juana, but she says, “No, you.” He flings it with all his might into the lovely green sea.

1. What is the irony of the story?2. What are the important themes in the story?3. What are examples of good and back luck from the story?4. Why is it important to Juana that Kino be the one to throw the pearl back into the sea?5. Why would Kino come to feel that he will lose his soul if he gives up the pearl?6. What is the significance of Juana and Kino's walking side by side when they return to the town?

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"Those Who Ban Books", Maya AngelouThey were scared of sexes and hexesand multi-colored sheets.And men and women doing evenconsensual things.

They banned a same-sex marriage roomand Judy BlumeCharles Dickens Chicken-Lickin andWhy the Caged Bird Sings

There is a poster which shows the likeness of Dickens, James Baldwin, Mark Twain, Kurt Vonnegut, Shakespeare, Judy Blume and Maya Angelou. I know that puts me into wonderful company, but I pity the young students who, because of someone else’s ignorance, and at someone else’s whim, are unable to read Twain, Baldwin, Shakespeare and Angelou. They will miss some delight. –Maya Angelou

"Those Who Ban Books", Maya AngelouThey were scared of sexes and hexesand multi-colored sheets.And men and women doing evenconsensual things.

They banned a same-sex marriage roomand Judy BlumeCharles Dickens Chicken-Lickin andWhy the Caged Bird Sings

There is a poster which shows the likeness of Dickens, James Baldwin, Mark Twain, Kurt Vonnegut, Shakespeare, Judy Blume and Maya Angelou. I know that puts me into wonderful company, but I pity the young students who, because of someone else’s ignorance, and at someone else’s whim, are unable to read Twain, Baldwin, Shakespeare and Angelou. They will miss some delight. –Maya Angelou

"Those Who Ban Books", Maya AngelouThey were scared of sexes and hexesand multi-colored sheets.And men and women doing evenconsensual things.

They banned a same-sex marriage roomand Judy BlumeCharles Dickens Chicken-Lickin andWhy the Caged Bird Sings

There is a poster which shows the likeness of Dickens, James Baldwin, Mark Twain, Kurt Vonnegut, Shakespeare, Judy Blume and Maya Angelou. I know that puts me into wonderful company, but I pity the young students who, because of someone else’s ignorance, and at someone else’s whim, are unable to read Twain, Baldwin, Shakespeare and Angelou. They will miss some delight. –Maya Angelou

"Those Who Ban Books", Maya AngelouThey were scared of sexes and hexesand multi-colored sheets.And men and women doing evenconsensual things.

They banned a same-sex marriage roomand Judy BlumeCharles Dickens Chicken-Lickin andWhy the Caged Bird Sings

There is a poster which shows the likeness of Dickens, James Baldwin, Mark Twain, Kurt Vonnegut, Shakespeare, Judy Blume and Maya Angelou. I know that puts me into wonderful company, but I pity the young students who, because of someone else’s ignorance, and at someone else’s whim, are unable to read Twain, Baldwin, Shakespeare and Angelou. They will miss some delight. –Maya Angelou

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Year-End Exam, American Literature, 11th Form Student Name: _______________________

I. Circle the letter of the correct answer.1. What did Thomas Paine write about?

a) religion b) science c) business d) government

2. The ____________________ were an Indian tribe whose legend about "Wolf Tricks the Trickster" we read.a) Shoshone b) Navajo c) Sioux d) Pima

3. Who wrote and delivered the Gettysburg Address?a) Franklin b) Jefferson c) Washington d) Lincoln

4. Which 19th century author and poet used the theme of death most frequently?a) Poe b) Irving c) O. Henry d) Dickenson

5. Why are the characters in "The Gift of the Magi" giving each other gifts?a) It's their anniversary. b)It's Christmas. c) It's New Year.

6. What type of person is Emily Grierson in "A Rose For Emily"?a) weak b) quiet c) proud d) artistic

7. Which of these was not one of the main characters in "The Open Boat"?a) sailor b) ship's captain c) reporter d) doctor

8. Hills Like White Elephants is set in ______________________.a) a train station café b) a restaurant c) Africa d) a hotel

9. In Walt Whitman's poem, "When I heard the learn'd astronomer", what is the narrator doing at the end?a) being sick b) looking at the stars c) sleeping d) listening to an astronomer

10. What is the setting for Emily Dickenson's "Because I could not stop for death"?a) cemetery b) bedroom c) car d) carriage

11. William Saroyan's family emigrated to the United States from _________________________.a) Armenia b) Hungary c) Austria d) Lithuania

12. In Saroyan's "The Hummingbird Who Lived Through Winter", the story is told through the point of view of ______________________.

a) the old blind man b) the hummingbird c) the young boy d) the young girl

13. ______________________ is the theme in Sylvia Plath's poem "The Mirror".a) Motherhood b) Growing older c) Sadness d) Death

14. What happens to the main character of Alice Walker's story "The Flowers"?a) she gets lost b) she finds a body c) she is afraid of a man in the woods e) she falls in the stream

15. What is a major theme in Kate Chopin's writing?a) money b) death c) children d) marriage

II Write the correct answer to each statement in the space beside it.

1. Who believed and wrote to encourage other people to believe that those governing, in authority, must be near to those being governed? ______________________________________________

2. What is a legend? _____________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________________________

3. Who was the primary audience for the Gettysburg address? ____________________________________________

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4. In Poe's poem "Annabel Lee", what happened to Annabel Lee? _________________________________________

5. What is a symbol? Give an example from one of the works you read this semester. __________________________

______________________________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________________________

6. In Kate Chopin's "The Story of An Hour", why does Mrs. Mallard feel free?

______________________________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________________________

7. What is the surprise ending in William Faulkner's "A Rose For Emily"? __________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________________________

8. What is the theme/idea/story of Robert Frost's poem "The Road Not Taken"? ______________________________

______________________________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________________________

9. What was the operation the female character going to have in Hemingway's Hills Like White Elephants? ___________________________________

10. What is the irony in John Steinbeck's story "The Pearl"? ______________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________________________

11. What is the theme of Sylvia Plath's poem "Morning Song"? ___________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________________________

12. Where did I Know Why A Caged Bird Sings take place? _______________________________

13. In the story "The Flowers", what does the final sentence "And summer was over." mean? How is it important and

symbolic? _____________________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________________________

Bonus questions. Give the American word for the given British word:

trainers: ____________________

boot: ____________________

ticket tout: ____________________

pram: ____________________

maths: ____________________

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