English Review Questions 2 - AmLit

Part 1

Intro:

Why is 1865 important? It’s the halfway point and transitory time for literature

Longfellow:

Psalm of life:

What is the speaker talking about? Wanting to live life to the fullest
What is the overall message? Living in the moment

Snowflakes:

What’s important here? Connects snow to an idea of baring your truth
What’s the difference between Prose and Poetry? Prose is made up of paragraphs, Sentences, and words. Poetry is made up of Lines and Foots
What are foots? Most basic unit of poetry, made up of 2-3 syllables. Iamb is most comment ( U / )

Walt Whitman:

Why is he an important figure? He leads the shift into free verse and into realism
What is Free Verse? A poem without conventional forms, but there are sill parameters, as “No verse is truly free”
What are characteristics of Free Verse? It has no regular Rhyme Scheme, Meter, or Uniform Stanzas
What is When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d an Elegy to? Abraham Lincoln. He’s coping with grief and sorrow and the smell is triggering his memories since they were in full bloom when Lincoln died.

Freeman and Jewett:

What happens in Jewett’s The White Heron? The girl doesn’t reveal where the white heron is staying to the man that comes to visit
What happens in Freeman’s A New England Nun? She breaks off a long engagement to her fiance, because she likes the routine of her life and he’s an outsider to that.
What’s the importance of the two? Highlights regionalism and the independent role of women

Ambrose Bierce:

Who was Bierce? A Union soldier who saw fighting firsthand, and he was the only author to do so.
What was the importance of the Civil War? It changed everything. It caused so many deaths without machinery and infections/disease were rampant. This is why it was so gruesome for Bierce to witness and it shows up in his work.
What happened to Bierce? He supposedly died in 1914, but we aren’t sure what happens to him. He ran away to Mexico, perhaps killing himself, being killed by Pancho Villa’s men, or just dying of sickness.
What is similar to him and Stephen Crane? Both utilize unreliable narrators in their work to highlight destitute living
What’s the importance of Owl Creek? Time is important here. He goes through all of that in his mind in just a couple of seconds while the reader thinks it’s been a lot longer.
What’s the importance of Chickamauga? The boy doesn’t understand what’s going on because he’s deaf and mute. The narrator is more aware of what is happening and explains how Mom was violated.

Henry James:

Who was James? He was born into a prominent family who valued education and had the means to travel. Eventually, he gains British citizenship
What did James start to do in terms of the novel? James starts to change how novels are perceived. Talented writers did poetry while women were reduced to writing novels
What is the importance of Daisy Miller? The roles of women are changing from the notion of “true” womanhood until a more modernized one.
What is realism? A very detailed style that focuses on everything, including the mundane. Since it highlights observations, the plot can feel as though it’s moving at a glacial pace.
What does Daisy fail to do? Daisy fails to read the social codes in Europe. She doesn’t do anything wrong per se, but there others characters let her make a fool of herself.
What is an Expatriate? Someone who is living in a country that they are not originally from.
What is the difference between regionalism and domestic regionalism?

Charlotte Perkins Gilman:

What are the tenants of “true” womanhood? Purity, Domesticity, Submissiveness, and Piety
What was Hysteria? Anything that went against “true” womanhood. Motherhood IS Womanhood, so feeling anything else (Not interested, Queer, Infertile, simply want other things, etc.) meant that something was wrong with you. People believed that the Uterus could move around, causing different symptoms
What was Rest Cure? This was one of the treatments for Hysteria, followed by Pregnancy, Gynecological Massage, or Hysterectomy. Rest Cure isolated you. No books, little human contact, and lying in bed for 6-8 weeks while eating a high calories diet was said to cure you. Gilman went through this herself.
What is the importance of The Yellow Wallpaper? It shows how the understanding of women is still behind, especially because her husband (also a physician) does not listen to her and ends up making her descent to madness worse.
What happens at the end of the story? Her husband faints after seeing her crawl around on the floor like a child. This reversion to childhood is the logical conclusion for “true” womanhood, as she is being dumbed down since the only thing she can do in her isolation is imagine the wallpaper.

Booker T. Washington:

Who was Washington? He was born enslaved but later freed after the civil war. He ends up going to the Hampton Institute which taught Practical Skills and Vocational studies. This background helps shape his career, as he just wanted his community to be in a better position.
What did he help found? The Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, which also teaches Vocational studies.
What did he talk about in Up From Slavery? He highlights the importances of education, but knows that being able to do labor is setting yourself up for success.
What is a biography, and what is the difference with an AUTObiography? A biography is a story about someone’s life, written by someone else. An Autobiography is a life story written by the person who lived it themselves. Autobiographies have a greater sense of authenticity.
What happened at the Atlanta Exposition? To try and uplift the black community and gain more resources for the south as he gained more of a White Audience, Washington wanted gradual progress, so he was okay with accepting segregation and not voting/pushing for suffrage while white people supported vocational education for black people. DuBois especially thought that this was too compromising and not enough for the black community.
What was he mainly advocating for, and why? He wanted increased Vocational Education, as this enabled economic progress and allows people to “Cast down [their bucket] where you are.” It allowed people to slowly gain more resources for children, he thought.

Stephen Crane:

What is Naturalism? A subset of realism. It describes everything, even the small details, in a very factual way. Naturalism takes this a step further and includes the scientific ideas of Darwin and Spencer. It’s a bleak, pessimistic view on life, where individuals are at the mercy of larger forces, whether that’s nature, heredity, capitalism, or poverty
Who was Herbert Spencer? He was the one who applied Darwin’s ideas to human society, coining the phrase Social Darwninism (Natural Selection + Survival of the Fittest); essentially, it justifies imperialism, capitalism, and eugenics
What’s important about the title? “A” implies that she’s one of many to become a prostitute because of how bad conditions are in this area of New York City.
What happens as Maggie hangs out with Pete more? The spaces start to deteriorate in quality. It goes from a high end place to a rowdy obnoxious ones. But even in the fancy place there are warning signs based on the description.

Edith Wharton:

Who was Wharton? From the upper-crust of society, coming from old money. She was not encouraged to pursue intellectual activity, so Wharton did that on her own. To her society, women were expected and needed to make a good marriage in order to be successful, so there was lots of expectations placed upon her. She was pressured to marry Teddy Wharton, but this was not a good match as they had nothing in common, she was unhappy, and his mental health issues got worse. They divorced in 1913.
What was the thing about Divorces back then? It was quite uncommon and hard to get one. There was no such thing as “no fault divorces,” and a lot of churches wouldn’t do wedding ceremonies if one of the partners was divorced.
What is The Other Two about? Divorce! The woman is on marriage #3. Waythorn had a very sentimental idea of marriage, and deceives himself to think that he’s okay with this when in reality he doesn’t like the situation at all.
What’s the importance of Roman Fever? It critiques the social rules which restrict women’s opportunities. They are forced to compete with each other as a result, on who’s the more successful “woman.” Mrs. Slade perception is also wrong—she doesn’t understand what actually happens with Mrs. Ansley.

W.E.B. DuBois:

Who was DuBoi? Black activist, who grew up in Massachusetts, a fairly tolerant location compared to Washington. He also was the first black man to receive a PhD from Harvard. He was a sociologist and a co-found of the NAACP.
What was the Niagara movement? People who advocated for black equality and naturally really critical of the Atlanta Compromise, which was okay with giving up voting and tolerating segregation for job training and education.
What was the talented tenth? It was the idea that 1 in 10 black men were capable of intellectual ability and deserved access to elite schools too. This meant that the classical liberal arts educations was the foundation for public intellectualism and needed for leadership skills. (This is different from agricultural training!)
What is an Epigraph, and why is it important in The Souls of Black Folk? Quote at the front of work, meant to set the tone of the text that will follow; it sets the vibe. In this text, there are two. Poems from white authorities, and Songs in music form created by African Americans. It’s a statement of equality putting them side by side because neither one are better than the other.
What was Double-Consciousness? Looking at yourself from the eyes of others and have two competing perspectives of yourself: the white american and a black person. White man is the default, so it’s an internal conflict for not just POC, but other marginalized groups. You struggle with perceiving your OWN self because you try and also look at yourself through the lens of a dominant ideal.
What is Pan-Africanism? Independence from European colonial presence. These people still identify with Africa as their homeland and refutes any African American inferiority. Especially since 90% of Africa was in control by European powers, the great war was hoped to have helped lead to liberation from imperialism. Overall, it wanted to build solidarity with people of African Descent.

Part 2

Langston Hughes:

1) What was the significance of A Negro Speaks of Rivers? fdjskldfkdjslkdfjkdls

2) What is Free Verse? fdjskldfkdjslkdfjkdls

3) What’s the significance of using “I” and “A”? fdjskldfkdjslkdfjkdls

4) What was the Renaissance?f !!!!!!!! ⬅

Claude McKay:

1) What is the relationship between him and Hughes? fdjskldfkdjslkdfjkdls

2) What is a shakespearean sonnet and why is it important here? fdjskldfkdjslkdfjkdls

3) What is the relationship between the Harlem Dancer and the Weary Blues? fdjskldfkdjslkdfjkdls

T.S. Elliot (The Waste Land): (reread appropriate parts)

1) What is his backstory?

Winds up in England during WW1

2) What is literary Modernism?

Associated with Eliot and Ezra Pound. He involves Experimentation (Alienation is by design) And highlights how society is broken/demolished with all of the social changeing breaking things up (like the changing gender roles, for ex) With increased globalization, travel and communication is easier but the world gets darker as we find out the harsher realities

3) What is the significance of the epigraph?

It’s in Latin and Greek as a gatekeeping mechanism. Sybil was forced to live forever basically. People went and visited her and she “wanted to die.” Elliot wanted to serve but married a British woman, making him an intelligence liability

4) What is Heteroglossia?

Different languages. The story has seven different languages

5) What is the importance of the Burial of the Dead?

It’s multiple voices, so a tapestry. Death is very present, such as April being associated with death

6) What is A Game of Chess about?

Women sexuality (Cleopatra, My nerves are bad, and Lil & my friend) First, it’s a woman surrounded by sterile, over feminine space of wealth and privilege. In the background is a painting of Philomel. (raped and turned into a nightingale) Second, this might be a conversation between Elliot and His wife. It becomes unsettling as what’s being spoken in on the telepathic level. Third, focusing on the lower end of the socioeconomic spectrum with two women having a conversation about her husband (who has 5 kids)

7) What is The Fire Sermon about? Eastern Philosophical references and another problematic sexual encounter (Tyrisis encounters a bad sexual encounter) The Sonnet form is also used here but it’s purposely stilted at the end, showcasing how unromantic this encounter is

8) What is Negative Capability?

Being okay with sitting with ambiguity.

9) What is Death by Water about?

We finally get water but this time it’s the ocean—but salt water won’t work and Phelbas’ body decomposes

10) What is What the Thunder Said about? Says “DA” to three different groups: Angels/Gods, Demons & Men. It tells us to give, sympathize, and have self-control. These eastern texts shown throughout the poem were new to the west. Dada-ism Art movement forms as a result.

11) Who was Elliot’s Wife?

Elliot married Vivienne Haigh-wood, who he met in April of 1915 and married within 3 months. This was not a happy union as she suffered from migraines, and abdominal pains resulting as her being diagnosed as hysterical. He wanted an allowance from her family but wasn’t granted one, forcing him to work at a bank

F. Scott Fitzgerald (The Great Gatsby):

1) What’s Fitzgerald’s backstory?

Enlists as an officer but doesn’t see any action. Meets Zelda in Alabama

2) What’s going on in April 1925, at the time that this book is published?

Post war has boomed economy. Prohibition: ban on alcohol sale and distribution. Results in organized crime and speakeasies The Stock Market: Nick is a bond man and the market is very successful. Jazz Age: Culture that surrounds music as Jazz was controversial at the time because origins in black culture. Dancing changes (people touch each other and dresses get shorter w/ the emergence of the flapper along with changing ideas of women’s sexuality)

3) What is a Frame Narrative?

A story within a deeper story, such as Nick retelling the events of Gatsby and Daisy and reflecting on the past events.

4) What is the significance of the difference between Daisy Buchanan and Myrtle Wilson?

Daisy is also just in white like Daisy Miller. However, she is described in a dreamlike, angelic and enchanted still unlike James’ realism. She’s a woman on a pedestal. Wilson is earthly—myrtles are ground-covering plants unlike a showcasing flower of a daisy. Again, not a whole lot of realistic escrition but has an electricity about her. There is more physicality with her as she’s about sex.

5) What’s in the valley of ashes?

It separates the Eggs from NYC. It’s made up of industrial/factory ash. It’s grey, and not living or dead so a place of transition.

6) What is the significance of the Eyes of TJ Eckleburg?

Also in the valley of ashes. Its eyes overlook everything even though the sign was is disrepair and the practice no longer exists; it’s a lost deity as capitalism reigns and religion falters especially as it is in a hellish atmosphere of the valley.

7) What is the American Dream and how it is flawed here?

It’s working your way up the ladder and being successful so you and your future children can thrive. There is aspiration here but we see how a successful man like Gatsby had to gain money via crime, and wanted his true love via adultery. Additionally, parties are made up of illegal booze, brawls, and car crashes. The dream is supposed to be idealistic and beneficial but isn’t.

8) What’s the struggle that both Tom and Jay face?

They see daisy as an object to acquire and not an autonomous being. It’s only nick that’s a middle ground, neither rich nor poor, both and insider and an outsider.

William Faulkner (A Rose for Emily):

1) What’s the difference between him and Hemingway?

Hemingway is a minimalist who leaves things unsaid but Faulkner is more descriptive

2) What is Yoknapatawpha County?

(Jefferson) It’s a fictional town that Faulkner created where a lot of his stories are set. It means “split-land” in Chickasaw

3) What is Southern Gothic?

A thematic movement that uses lonely plantations, aging Southern Belles, dusty downtowns, dilapidated slave quarters, and Southern Charm.

4) What is regular gothic?

Was an 18th century romantic movement included castles/estates in ruin, darkness, terror, death, and romance. There’s supernatural presence and ancestral curses

5) What is the significance of the house?

This was once a lively plantations which has fallen into decline. It’s a symbol of southern aristocracy whose power has begun to decline

6) What happens in the story?

It’s a retrospective journey about Emily, a former southern belle turned old woman who died. The narrator (combo of voices/collective) describes her life which included a romance with a Yankee, who she ends up killing so that he doesn’t run away.

Richard Wright (The Man Who Was Almost a Man):

1) How did Jim Crow influence Richard’s upbringing?

Since he was self-educated, he loved to read but couldn’t get a library card. This was a legacy from the fact that teaching the enslaved gave them power that they shouldn’t have. Now it’s legal to be educated and black but not encouraged

2) Why was Communism so appealing to Richard Wright, and why did he later fall out with it?

Wright lost his job in Chicago during the Great Depression. The communist ideal was a utopian aspiration as everyone would have access to the same resources and no one would starve. Artists can create art instead of just bending to the market. Additionally, racial equality is supported under communism. The Party had rules/protocols, a restraint that Wright didn’t like

3) What was the Federal Writers’ Project?

It was created under the New Deal program, hiring an army of writings including Wright as a means to make some money. They wrote guides, histories, slave narratives, children’s books, etc.

4) What is the significance of Native Son?

It’s his best known work. It’s a challenged novel as it justifies the anger of a black man

5) What is a Bildungsroman?

Literally means novel of education. It tells the transition from childhood to adulthood; coming of age novel with the intellectual and psychological growth of a person (TMWWAAM is an example)

6) What was the significance of the gun in The Man who was Almost a Man?

The gun is the object of power in the novel. It gives him the respect and “masculinity” he craves as he doesn’t really have any good role-models. He is treated just like the female mule.

7) What was the significance of Jim Hawkin’s house?

He lives in a big white house, symbolizing wealth especially compared to where Dave lives.

Ernest Hemingway (Hills like White Elephants)

1) What was the importance of Paris?

Hemingway was sent there to report on the expatriate scene as a foreign correspondent. After the war, many Americans moved and stayed in france. Paris was the “it” city for creatives and was the place of importance. While america was conservative (Prohibition and Jim Crow) one could drink cheap, racism was less, and people were more accepting of queer people

2) What did Gertrude Stein do to help Hemingway?

Takes him under her wing, where he eventually gets published. She helps develop the term “Lost Generation.” which has a literal layer (~40 million people died) and figuratively (sense of disillusion and aimlessness that people felt)

3) What is the theory of Omission/The Iceberg Principle?

If the writer knows enough about what he is writing, he may omit things and the reader should be able to understand if it’s done well,

4) What is the significance of Hills like White Elephants?

It’s centered on something that is never actually revealed. The intimacy is defined by the exclusion. Since the characters have all of the information, we are not in the inner circle.

5) What is the story actually about?

It’s about abortion. She doesn’t want to do it but he talks her into it. Abortions are illegal and very dangerous for women at the time. Also writers are not supposed to name it. Literary Crossroads

Part 3

Need Bishop and Plath notes

Tennesse Williams - A Streetcar Named Desire

What was Williams’ background and how did it influence the story? He was openly gay in a time of discrimination. He was an alcoholic, had mental health struggles, and sister had a lobotomy—which explains his sympathy for Blanche who also has mental health struggles along with alcoholism.
How is regionalism utilised here? There’s a focus on the south in this play and it showscases increased industrialism (there’s a different class of workers, such as Stanley, that are new here)
What’s the importance of the Epigraph? It was by T.S. Eliot, his contemporary and he describes how the world is broken. Even glimmers of love don’t last and we can’t hold on to it
Who is Stanley and what does he do? He is Stella’s wife and the “alpha” on his friend group. He’s primitive and critical of Blanche—even going as far as telling Mitch about her backstory.
Who is Blanche and what does she do, and what’s her tragic backstory? Blanche comes to NOLA to be with Stanley and Stella after she looses her house. She was married young to a closeted gay man (Allan Gray) who ends up shooting himself after Blanche gets angry at him at him at a dance.
What does Belle Reve mean and what is the significance of losing their home? Beautiful dream. Their land had to be sold bit by bit which reflects her own downfall.
What is the importance of Mitch and what does he do when he finds out Blanche’s backstory? Mitch is in the middle with Masculine, since Stanley is the alpha. Blanche clings to him to try and recreate the affection she had of Allan and actually love her back, but he leaves her.

James Baldwin - Sonny’s Blues

What was Baldwin known as? The Henry James of Harlem. He was a black expatriate who lived in Paris.
What are the two brothers’ jobs? The narrator is a math teacher which always has a right answer, but Sonny is a jazz musician which is always changing/improvising so there’s already a conflict
What does the title suggest? Has two different meanings. He plays the Blues and it is also a reference to his hardships in life (estrangement and struggles with art)
What happens in the story? Narrator and Brother start to reconnect after his daughter, Grace, dies. Sonny writes a letter explaining everything while in Prison for heroin crime and they begin to reconcile, and the narrator gets to see him perform at a jazz club
What was the significance of the cup of trembling? It’s an allusion to the Bible, where trembling may mean things are shaky but perhaps stabilising and avoiding future conflict

Flannery O’Connor - Good Country People and The Life you Save May Be Your Own

What was her idea of Grace? It violently transformed characters (there’s a cost)
What is Good Country People about? Religion, as Hulga is an atheist and has a PhD is Philosophy who rejects the name Joy. Manly Pointer, a man posing as a bible-salesman, manipulates her into think that she’s manipulating him.
What was Hulga like? Very educated but book smart, not people smart
What was Manly Pointer like? People smart. Flips the script on Hulga in the Hayloft. She is left vulnerable as he removes her fake leg and leaving her alone, along with showing her condoms and porn.
What is Nihilism? Latin for Nothingness, everything is a construct/something we created. Hulga believing in nothing doesn’t help when evil, malicious nihilism comes knocking at her door.
What is the parallel between Manly Pointer and Tom Shiftlet? Both take advantage of women who are social outcasts and are selfish themselves.
Who was Lucynell? A deaf, mute, and mentally disabled women living with a tired, old mother. Shiftlet comes into their home and the mom takes advantage of it.
What is the wanting in both characters? A husband for her daughter, and a car. Tom fixes the car to gain the mom’s trust. They make a deal: Marry Lucynell and get the car.
What happens at the end of 2nd story? They both get what the want, but Tom abandons Lucynell at a Diner. On the road, he passes a street sign saying “The Life You Save May Be Your Own”

Ralph Ellison - Invisible Man (Battle Royal)

Who is he named after? Ralph Waldo Emerson, as dad wanted him to be a poet and mom wanted him to read. He wanted to be a musician but ended up in NY where Wright encouraged him to write under the FWP
Why was he interest in communism? It was an idealistic, social utopia and a lot of prominent Black Americans like the idea (already without rights and wanted social equality) and the Great Depression showed how capitalism failed them
Why did the book have controversy when it was published? It focuses on one person instead of the collective, and was also experimental (so influenced by White Culture) so members of the black community wondered why he wasn’t helping.
What happens in the Prologue? We learn of an unnamed narrator who claims people refuse to see him. He lives in an underground room filled with lots of lights.
What happens during the Battle Royal section? He begins by saying that he was the valedictorian and thought he was going to give a speech for progress in front of a white audience. Instead, he is put into an arena and where everyone is forced to beat everyone up. Then, they are told to collect coins on an electrified rug of sorts.

Toni Morrison - Recitatif

What type of writing style does she employ? “Stream of Consciousness” where the reader gets all the thoughts of the characters.
What did she do as a publisher? Pushed for diversity in writing, especially advocating for black women to be published
What is the Oprah Effect? If she chooses her book for her book club, it guarantees 1 million copies sold and Hollywood will option the book.
What dis a Recitatif? Talk-singing that happen in between arias. This story is all about the in-betweenness and ambiguity
What happens in the story? Two girls, Twyla and Roberta, room together at an orphanage. They have five different encounters of the course of their lives, but their races are never revealed.
Who were the gaw-girls? A mispronunciation of gargoyles. They were mean older girls who pick on them and Maggie
Who was Maggie and what is her importance? She was a bowed-legged mute but also “old” and “sandy-colored.” She embodies the in-betweenness as she neither both black and white or neither but not neatly a specific race

Louise Eldritch - Fleur

Why does Native American culture have another layer of distribution? Their languages were spoken, not written.
Why is Eldritch compared to Faulkner? She has a lot of novels written like him and it’s set in the same fictional universe with the same, recurring characters and their families
Who is Fleur and why is she important to the story? Fleur is an elusive character whose contact with men ends in their demise, because people think that the lake god has taken a claim to her. She is only seen through the eyes of other characters, such as the narrator is this chapter, Pauline.
What is magical realism and how does it relate to the story? Realism + Magic (some element of supernatural or mythological apart of the realist story, such as the belief in the lake god and Fleur having some sort of power over men.

Art Spiegelman - Maus

What do most people associate comics with and what does Spiegelman do to the comic? They think of cute animals or superheroes. Comics were considered low-brow/cheaper entertainment that doesn’t require a lot of thought for the masses.
What is the Graphic Novel? A book-length narrative told in sequential art.
What is a 2nd generation narrative about immigration? Preservation v. Assimilation, or the old world connections to our past such as language, music food, etc versus wanting to fit in with new society. Usually parents want to Preserve and Children who want to assimiliate
What is a 2nd generation narrative about the holocaust? Stories told by children of survivors. Jewish tradition is telling histories, or bearing-witness, which must be held by those willing to stand in front of it; actively listening as to not repeat history
How does Spiegelman tell the story? He weaves together two timelines: Present day NYC and time during Holocaust leading up to his parents’ time is Auschwitz
What does the lack of color to do the story? It brings a sense of starkness and drawing are simplistic to show the bleakness in the story