(PP. 65-70) Literature Section III: Katherine Anne Porter: Biography and Background → Selected Work: "Rope" (ACADEC '25-'26)

What is the lifespan of Katherine Anne Porter?

1890-1980

Who was one of the most influential modernist writers of the 20th century, as well as one of the most celebrated?

Katherine Anne Porter

What did Katherine Anne Porter publish during her lifetime?

27 stories, one novel, a brief memoir, and a series of essays and critical pieces

What kind of production did Katherine Anne Porter have for his works?

Infrequent and limited production

What had Katherine Anne Porter ascended to, despite her infrequent and limited production of works?

To the highest echelons of literary fame by the end of her life

When was Collected Stories released?

1965

Who wrote Collected Stories?

Katherine Anne Porter

What book won both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award for fition?

Collected Stories

What did Collected Stories winning the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award for fiction make ti?

1 of 7 works of fiction to win both distinguished awards as well as one of the only 2 career-spanning collections of stories to win the Pulitzer Prize and 1 of 3 to win the National Book Award

What fellowship did Katherine Anne Porter receive?

A Guggenheim Fellowship

What collection has collected Katherine Anne Porter’s writing and writing awards?

The esteemed Library of America collection

Who was Katherine Anne Porter born as?

Callie Russell Porter

When was Katherine Anne Porter born?

1890

Where was Katherine Anne Porter born?

The small town of Indian Creek, Texas

Who was Katherine Anne Porter’s father?

A subsistence farmer who barely eked out a living before moving his family into his mother’s house in the wake of his wife’s death

Who was KAP’s grandmother?

Aunt Cat instilled in her an active sense of how “superior” social classes ought to behave, providing a detailed education in manners, behaviors, and comportment

When did KAP’s formal education end?

She was 14

What did KAP have a strong sense of?

Belonging to an elite social class

Why did KAP have a strong sense of belonging to an elite social class?

Her family was descended from wealthy landowners and farmers in Kentucky—but this sense was often contradicted by her actual upbringing

What was Aunt Cat’s home described as?

Cramped and modest

What did the Porter family rely on for clothes and supplies?

Neighborhood donations

How does Janis P. Stout explain KAP’s experiences as a child?

They meant that her fiction was often populated by characters who were consumed by a tension between an internal sense of self-worth and a radically different set of external realities, often in the form of a conflict between family pride and actual circumstances”

What were KAP’s characters often consumer by?

A tension between an internal sense of self-worth and a radically different set of external realities, often in the form of a conflict between family pride and actual circumstances”

What makes KAP’s fiction so unique?

Her inability to fully fit into any one category

What kind of reader was KAP?

Ravenous and astute

What role did KAP always want to play?

The role of a Southern “grand dame,” or social matriarch, but was frequently incapable of maintaining the calm, reliable demeanor required of such a figure

Who would KAP frequently advocate for?

Working class but tended to replicate old social biases in her personal beliefs

Who has echoes of influence on KAP’s work?

Willa Cather’s frontier realism

Who is KAP’s language in her works compared to?

Ernest Hemingway

Where was there an experimental streak in KAP’s creation?

Her use of language

What happens to KAP’s language in her stories?

It is compressed and taut

How are KAP and Ernest Hemingway similar?

She began her writing career as a newspaper journalist

What happens to KAP’s narration in her stories?

They are fluid and unconventional, often rapidly switching between perspectives

What was KAP’s fiction like, even with modernist tendencies?

Frequently regional and realistic, concerned with the unique social dynamics of the American South (especially her home state of Texas and bordering states) and focusing as much on the nuances of class and status as on the complexities of langauge and form that dominated the new waves of modernist writing in the 1920s

Who wrote “Rope”?

Katherine Anne Porter

When was “Rope” written?

1928

In “Rope,” what happened on the third day after they moved to the country?

He came walking back from the village carrying a basket of groceries and a 24 yard coil of rope

In “Rope,” what did the woman do as the man came back with 24 yards of rope?

She came out to meet him, wiping her hands on the green smock

In “Rope,” how is the woman’s appearance described as in the introduction?

Her hair was tumbled, her nose was scarlet with sunburn

In “Rope,” what did the man tell the woman in the introduction after he got back from the village?

She looked like a born country woman

In “Rope,” what stuck to the man at the introduction?

His gray flannel shirt, and his heavy shoes were dusty

In “Rope,” what did the woman assure the man of?

He looked like a rural character in a play

In “Rope,” what had the woman been waiting all day for?

Coffee; she wondered if the man brought it, since they forgot it when they ordered at the store the first day

In “Rope,” did the man forget the coffee?

Yes

In “Rope,” what did the woman say to the man to justify him forgetting the coffee?

He didn’t drink coffee himself

In “Rope,” what did the woman notice when the man came back?

She saw the rope, and wondered what it was for

In “Rope,” why did the man buy a 24 yard coil of rope?

He thought it might do to hang clothes on

In “Rope,” what had the man and woman already had that didn’t need a rope?

A 50 foot line hanging before their eyes

In “Rope,” what was the 50 foot line on the landscape to the woman?

A blot

What happened when the woman asked the man what things a rope might come in handy for?

He couldn’t think of anything, but they could wait and see

In “Rope,” what did the woman think was reason enough to the man buying rope?

He bought it because he wanted to

In “Rope,” according to the woman, how many things could a rope be used for?

Hundreds, but she couldn’t think of anything at the moment

In “Rope,” what happened to the eggs when the man got back?

They were running because he squeezed them by putting something on top of them

In “Rope,” who does the woman blame for the eggs running?

The grocer

In “Rope,” what does the woman blame the eggs running on?

The rope, because it was the heaviest thing in the pack

In “Rope,” what was illogical about the rope cracking the eggs?

The man had them in opposite hands

In “Rope,” what was one thing that the woman could see plain?

There wouldn’t be eggs for breakfast; they’d have to scramble them now, for supper

In “Rope,” what had the woman planned to have for supper?

Steak

In “Rope,” what did the man wonder about the eggs running?

Why the woman couldn’t crack them all and put them in a cool place

In “Rope,” what idea simply choked the woman?

That they should cook the meat at the same time they cooked the eggs and warm up the rest for tomorrow

In “Rope,” what would the couple do when they were playful?

He would rub her shoulder and she would arch and purr

In “Rope,” what happened the time the man brought up the idea of heating up 2 things at once and tried to rub the woman’s shoulder?

She hissed and almost clawed

In “Rope,” what would the woman do if the man told her they could somehow manage?

She would slap his face

In “Rope,” how was the man’s face described as he swallowed his words red hot?

His face burned

In “Rope,” where did the man put the rope?

The top shelf

In “Rope,” what did the woman protest to in putting the rope?

It couldn’t be on the top shelf, the jars and tins belonged there

In “Rope,” what did the man wonder when the woman said to not put the rope on the top shelf?

Why the hammer and nails were there, and why she had put them there when she knew very well he needed that hammer and those nails to fix the window sashes

In “Rope,” what did the woman do because of her insane habit of changing things around and hiding them?

She slowed down everything and made double work on the place

In “Rope,” why did the woman put the hammer and nails on the top shelf?

She didn’t think the man would work on the window sashes

In “Rope,” where were the hammer and nails located before being moved?

The middle of the bedroom floor where they could step on them in the dark

In “Rope,” where did the man suggest putting the rope after the top shelf?

The closet

In “Rope,” what was the reaction to attempting to put the rope in the closet?

Naturally not, there were brooms and mops and dustpans in the closet, and why couldn’t he find a place for his rope outside her kitchen

In “Rope,” how many rooms are in their house?

7, and only one kitchen

In “Rope,” what did the man think the woman took him for?

A 3-year-old idiot

In “Rope,” what was the whole trouble of the woman?

She needed something weaker than she was to heckle and tyrannize over

In “Rope,” what did the man wish he and the woman had so that she could heckle and tyrannize?

A couple children, maybe he’d get some rest

In “Rope,” what could the woman do when thinking of all the things they actually needed to make their house decently fit to live in

Cry; she looked so forlorn, so lost and despairing he couldn’t believe it was only a piece of rope that was causing all the racket

In “Rope,” how long did the woman tell the man to go away for?

5 minutes

In “Rope,” what was there nothing the man would like better than to do?

Clear out and never come back

In “Rope,” what was the woman stuck with?

Miles from a railroad, with a half-empty house on her hands, and not a penny in her pocket, and everything on earth to do

In “Rope,” what was the man’s usual trick?

He stayed in town as it was until she had come out and done the work and got things straightened out

In “Rope,” why had the mans stayed in town the summer before?

To do a half-dozen extra jobs to get the money he had sent her

In “Rope,” when was the only time the man left the woman that he had ever left her to do anything by herself?

When he did a half-dozen jobs to get the money he had sent her

In “Rope,” who could the man tell about the truth of what kept him in town?

His great-grandmother, she had her notion of what had kept him in town

In “Rope,” what was impossible to believe?

That the man’s great-grandmother would take the reason he stayed in town seriously

In “Rope,” what was sure to happen if the man was left by himself a minute?

Some woman was certain to kidnap him, and he couldn’t hurt her feelings by refusing

In “Rope,” what did the woman say in regards to the two weeks alone in the country?

They were the happiest she had known for 4 years

In “Rope,” what did the woman mean when she said she’d been the happiest in 4 years for 2 weeks alone?

She was happy getting the devilish house nice and ready for him

In “Rope,” what were the two things the woman wanted in the world during their argument?

She wanted him to get that rope from underfoot, and go back to the village and get her coffee, and if he could remember it, he might bring a metal mitt for the skillets, and 2 more curtain rods, and if there were any rubber gloves, and a bottle of milk of magnesia from the drugstore

In “Rope,” what did the man say in response to her asking for 2 things after their argument?

If only she could wait a minute for anything

In “Rope,” what did the woman do as the man went back to the village?

She was going to wash the windows

In “Rope,” when did the man leave for the village again?

Until he had said that if she wasn’t such a hopeless melancholiac she might see that this was only for a few days

In “Rope,” where did the man put the rope when he walked away with it?

Under his arm, somehow it had toppled off the table

In “Rope,” what did it sometimes seem like about the man to the woman?

Second sight about the precisely perfect moment to leave her ditched

In “Rope,” how many hours would the mattresses get out in the sun?

At least 3

In “Rope,” what did the woman suppose the man thought about the exercise?

It would do her good

In “Rope,” how many miles did the man travel to get 2 pound of coffee?

4 miles

In “Rope,” what did the woman think if the man thought it was coffee that was making a wreck of her?

She congratulated him: he must have a damned easy conscience

In “Rope,” what did the man see about the mattress, conscience or no conscience?

He didn’t see why they couldn’t wait till tomorrow; were they living in the house, or were they going to let the house ride them to death

In “Rope,” what did the woman remind the man of about housekeeping?

It was no more her work than it was his: she had other work to do as well, and when did he think she was going to find time to do it at this rate