Fiction
Essay
(Total
value: 150 points)
Due Date: 10/2/08
General
Guidelines:
Prompt:
Choose ONE of the following works of
fiction from our course book, The Norton
Introduction to Literature 9th ed., and answer ONE of the corresponding
questions:
Charlotte
Perkins Gilman�s �The Yellow Wallpaper�
1.
Various critics have read the ending of
this story as either a victory for the narrator or as a resounding defeat for
her. Which interpretation do you see as more compelling? Provide
plenty of textual evidence to support your reading.
2.
�The Yellow Wallpaper� is a 19th century
story that is concerned, among other things, with the institution of
marriage. Argue for what Gilman is saying about marriage in this
story. Analyze the nature of gender roles in 19th century American
marriages.
3.
The wallpaper becomes, obviously, the
most important symbol in the story. What does the wallpaper
symbolize? What does the narrator see in it, and how do you account for
her extreme responses to it?
Susan Glaspell�s �A Jury of Her Peers�
1.
The question of ethics arises in the "A Jury of Her
Peers" in regards to the way the men and the women approach the crime.
Compare the approach of the townsmen to Minnie Wright to that of the townswomen
who accompany the men on their search for evidence of the crime. What drives
the women to make the choice they make?
2.
What causes the men to overlook the evidence found by the women in
the story "A Jury of Her Peers"? Why would Glaspell set up the story
in this way? In other words, what is her point for having the men fail in their
task where the women succeed?
3.
Although "A Jury of Her Peers" was written almost one
hundred years ago, it possesses contemporary attitudes about women that has led
many people to refer to it as a feminist or pro-woman story. What elements or
occurrences in the story would produce this response in a reader?
Nathaniel Hawthorne�s �Young Goodman Brown�
1.
In the Puritan setting of Hawthorne's "Young Goodman
Brown," what do the woods symbolize? How does Hawthorne's use of this
symbol reflect Puritan mores? How does it reflect his knowledge of the culture
that he describes?
2.
Explain Young Goodman Brown's character development in the story.
What does he begin the story like? What is he like at the end of it? What
causes the change in him? What does this development represent for the reader?
Flannery O�Connor�s �A
Good Man is Hard to Find�
�
1.
How important is the southern setting for understanding the
characters and their motivations? How much are the grandmother's pretensions of
"being a lady" and her attachment to the past keys to the action?
Herman Melville�s �Bartleby
the Scrivener�
�
1.
The subtitle of Melville�s "Bartleby the Scrivener" is
"A Story of Wall-Street." Describe the various "walls" that
Bartleby may be trapped behind and what you think Melville might be saying
about mid-nineteenth-century life in America.
A.S. Byatt�s �The Thing in the Forest�
�
1.
The
story begins, "There were once two little girls who saw, or believed they
saw, a thing in the forest." Describe, in your own words, the
"thing." Do you believe what they saw was "real"? What
evidence is there in the story for that reality? Are there clues to suggest
that it might not be real? Does the fairy-tale quality of the first sentence
influence your reading of the story?
How to turn in this essay: a paper copy is due during class on
the due date. Additionally, an electronic copy is due, prior to the beginning of class, on the due date, and it must be
turned in to TurnItIn.com as a MS Word doc or docx file. Use the TurnItIn.com
�file upload� method on the submit screen. You will be instructed during class
about how to create a TurnItIn.com account, and how to turn in your work. Your
essays will be considered late until both the paper copy and the electronic
copies are turned in. All other rules for late work, as delineated in section
fifteen of the course syllabus, also apply. Moreover, your electronic turn-in must be an exact duplicate of the paper copy. In
other words, no further corrections or revisions will be accepted. Also, if the
electronic and paper copies do not match up it will have a negative impact on
the assignment�s grade.
Due Date: 10/2/08