REE HAMLIT Crowdsource Final Exam Study Guide

HAMLIT Crowdsource Final Exam Study Guide

Part One: Multiple Choice (two from each book)

Beloved

1. Who emerged from the water before Sethe? (60)

   1. A slave woman

   2. A ghost

   3. Beloved

   4. Sethe’s mother

2. Which character says, “Beloved is my sister. I swallowed her blood right along with my mother’s milk”? (242)

   1. Halle

   2. Baby Suggs

   3. Denver

   4. Sethe

Parable of the Sower

1. Which of the following in not an Earthseed quote:

   1. “In order to rise from its own ashes a phoenix first must burn”

   2. “When civilization fails to serve, it must disintegrate unless it is acted upon by unifying internal or external forces”

   3. “Drowning people sometimes die fighting their rescuers”

   4. “A Gathering of Earthseed is a good and necessary thing. It vents the agony of the mind. It focuses attention, strengthens purpose, and unifies people”

2. On what date does Lauren begin her journal entries? (3)

   1. July 20, 2024

   2. July 30, 2025

   3. July 20, 2025

   4. August 1, 2024

The Things They Carried

1. Why does O’Brien go to war? (57)

   1. Because of his parents

   2. Because he was embarrassed not to

   3. For the sake of America

   4. To escape the job he worked

2. Along with Kiowa, what did the mud field swallow?

   1. O’brien’s boot

   2. O’brien’s dignity and courage

   3. O’brien’s pain

   4. O’briens belief in America

3. In Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried, who does Timmy dream of in his sleep because she died after being sick?

1. Lauren

2. Linda

3. Dr. Rosenwong

4. Lydia

The Great Gatsby

1. What symbol does Fitzgerald use to represent Gatsby’s fantasies and dreams?

   1. The gold car

   2. The billboard

   3. The green light

   4. Daisy herself

2. What does Gatsby say to impress Nick?

   1. He grew up in poverty but worked hard to become wealthy

   2. He was raised in France

   3. He is a war hero and an Oxford man

   4. He comes from a long line of Blacksmiths 

A Man of Two Faces

1. Whose perspective does Nguyen primarily write from?

   1. A dual identity

   2. A Vietnamese refugee

   3. An ex-Catholic

   4. A young boy

2. What does immigrating do to oneself?

   1. Creates greater cultural awareness

   2. Hatred for both sides of one’s identity

   3. Disremembering pieces of each identity

   4. Confusion

3.  In Viet Thanh Nguyen’s A Man of Two Faces, complete the following quote: “To be alive, to him, is to be made of memory—to him if a man’s not made of memory, he’s made of _______.”

1. Rememory

2. Life

3. Re memory

4. Nothing

4. In Viet Thanh Nguyen’s A Man of Two Faces, when does Nguyen declare “This is, perhaps, the end of me as a writer”:

1. With his children , with Lan, in his house

2. In Vietnam after meeting his sister

3. In the first chapter of the book

4. After the SàiGòn Mới gets replaced by an apartment complex

  The Great Gatsby: 

When Nick Carraway meets Jay Gatsby at his party for the first time, what surprised him the most? 

1. He is nicer than expected, and called him “old sport” 

2. He was rude and standoffish, and called him “old sport” 

3. Gatsby hides away from his guests and doesn’t talk to anyone 

4. He doesn’t know because he's never been seen 

What is Gatsby’s real name?

1. James Gatsby 

2. James Gatz 

3. Jay Gatsby 

4. Jimmy Gatsby 

Beloved: 

What is true about Beloved?

1. She was a ghost that haunted the family 

2. She was Sethe’s 3rd daughter but was killed by getting hit by a car

3. Beloved was the third child and was killed by Sethe

4. She was their neighbor 

Parable of the sower: 

What is Lauren’s belief of Earthseed? 

1. God Controls human fate 

2. Change is the only constant, shaping change is the path to grow

3. Technology is going to save humanity in the future

4. There is no message to earthseed 

The Things They Carried: 

What does the physical weight of the things they carried represent? 

1. Lack of proper training 

2. The Cultural burden of the Vietnam War 

3. The government failing to support the troops during the war 

4. The emotional and physical burdens of the war 

A man of two faces: 

Who’s name continues to be redacted throughout the story? 

1. Hillary Clinton

2. Donald Trump 

3. Barack Obama  

4. Geoage Bush 

1. Which of the following characters killed Myrtle Wilson?

   1. Tom Buchanan 

   2. Gatsby

   3. Daisy

   4. Nick Carraway

2. Which of the following metaphors best foreshadows Gatsby’s obsession with the American dream?

   1. T. J. Eckelberg’s eyes

   2. A green light flashing

   3. Giant eggs

   4. Boats against the current

1. Which of the following poems did Denver sing to Sethe as she was giving birth?

   1. Because I could not stop for Death

   2. Jaundice eyes (An Essay on Criticism)

   3. Lady Button Eyes

   4. Chamomile Sap

2. Which of the following phrases does Paul D exclaim while he “touches Beloved on the inside”. 

   1. Blue heart 

   2. Red Heart

   3. Green Heart

   4. EEEEEEEEEEEEEEE Heart

1. Who is the first to die in POTS?

   1. Cory 

   2. Keith

   3. Jill

   4. Lauren’s mom

2. What is the title of Earthseed based off of?

   1. The Bible

   2. Quora 

   3. Gospels of Matthew 

   4. Egyptian Book of the Dead

1. What is the name of the unit that Tim O’Brien is a part of in Vietnam?

   1. Beta Company

   2. Omega Company

   3. Alpha Company

   4. Sigma Company

2. Which of the following characters does not blame themselves for the death of Kiowa?

   1. Mitchel Sanders

   2. Lieutenant Cross

   3.  Tim O’Brien

   4. Norman Bowker

The Great Gatsby:

1. What was Jay Gatsby’s original name?

   1. James Gaines

   2. John Gates

   3. James Gatz

   4. John Gats

2. Where is Jay Gatsby from?

   1. North Dakota

   2. South Dakota

   3. North Carolina

   4. South Carolina

Beloved:

1. What were Sixo’s last words?

   1. Seven-O! Seven-O!

   2. Six-O! Six-O!

   3. Oh no! Oh no!

   4. No! No-

2. Who were the four horsemen who came to take Sethe back to Sweet Home?

   1. Schoolteacher, two slave catchers, and a sheriff

   2. Schoolteacher, one nephew, one slave catcher, and a sheriff

   3. A sheriff, Mr. Garner, Schoolteacher, one nephew

   4. One slave catcher, Schoolteacher, a sheriff, Mr. Garner

Parable of the Sower:

1. What is the name of the toddler that Bankole rescued after his mother died in a gunfight?

   1. Justin Roy

   2. Justin Rohr

   3. Justyn Rohr

   4. Justyn Roy

2. How did Lauren’s mother die?

   1. In a fire

   2. Was shot

   3. Childbirth

   4. Illness

The Things They Carried:

1. What is the name of the woman who wrote the letters that Jimmy Cross would carry around?

   1. Marry

   2. Maria

   3. Maddie

   4. Martha

  The Things They Carried - Tim O’Brien

1. What does the weight of the items carried by the American soldiers symbolize

   1. Patriotism

   2. The military superiority of the United States

   3. The psychological trauma and stress of the U.S. soldiers

   4. The death of Vietnamese soldiers

2. What item does First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross carry that symbolizes his emotional attachment to Martha?

1. Bible

2. A pocketwatch

3. A pebble

4. A photograph

 Beloved - Tony Morrison

1. What does the character Beloved most symbolically represent?

   1. The physical embodiment of repressed trauma and memory

   2. Sethe’s long-lost sister

   3. A guardian angel sent to help Sethe

   4. Hope for a better future for Black-Americans

2. Why did Sethe kill inception Beloved

   1. Escape insurance

   2. Escape slavery and the capturing of white plantation owners

   3. Escape taxes

   4. Doesn’t want children cuz she want that freedom

Parable of the Sowers

1. What kind of power does Lauren have

   1. She’s a firebender

   2. She’s a earthbender

   3. She’s a waterbender

   4. She’s a airbender

   5. She’s has hyperempathy

2. What prompts Lauren to leave her walled community and begin her journey north?

   1. She is chosen as a religious prophet

   2. The government forces her to leave

   3. A fire and attack destroyed her neighborhood

   4. She wants to find her lost father

 The Great Gatsby

1. What school did Gatsby tell Tom he attended

   1. UTD

   2. UT El Paso

   3. Harvard

   4. University of Göttingen

   5. Oxford University

Where does Sethe first see Beloved as a rememory?

• In the shed behind 124

• In the field where Baby Suggs hosted her sermons

• In her hallucinations of their voyage on a slave ship

• In the stream near 124

What symbol does Paul D. use to suppress his emotions and endure his trauma?

• His “inside parts”

• Tobacco tin

• The cold shed in the back

• Denver’s vanity kit

 What is the ultimate goal of Earthseed?

• To rise from the ashes

• To start their new life in Bankole’s home in Mendocino

• To find pastor Olamina

• To take root among the stars

What is Lauren’s rationale for not wanting to move to Olivar

• They’d be debt slaves

• The people of Olivar are racist

• Since Olivar is on the coast, global warming makes it more prone to flooding

• There are pig fetuses in the Olivar bathrooms

How does Curt Lemon die

• He drowns in the shit fied trying to save Kiowa

• He commits suicide after the war

• He steps on a booby trap

• He dies of untreated sepsis

How does O’Brien define a “true war story?” Mark all that apply

• Without a clear resolution

• Clear trauma reflected in the storytelling

• Death. A lot of death.

• Absent of virtue

• A vivid rememory of the soldiers’ experiences and sentiments

• Factually false

• Factually true

• All of none of the above

Part Two: Fill in the Blank—Quotes. Provide a one to two sentence quote and remove a keyword from the quote. Provide that keyword after the quote. (two from each book)

“I am not separate form her   there is no place where I stop   her face is my own and I want to be there in the place where her face is and to be looking at it too   a  ______ thing”
hot

“It makes me sad because I’ve never seen such—such beautiful ______ before”

shits

​​

“The universe is Godseed. Only we are Earthseed. And the _________ of Earthseed is to take root among the stars.”
Destiny

Part Three: Short Answer Questions. This will be like the quote of the day. Provide a quote with a question that can be answered in 5-10 sentences. (one from each book)

The Great Gatsby:

“This is a valley of ashes—a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens; where ashes take the forms of houses and chimneys and rising smoke and, finally, with a transcendent effort, of men who move dimly and crumbling through the powdery air. Occasionally a line of gray cars crawls along an invisible track, gives out a ghastly creak, and comes to rest, and immediately the ash-gray men swarm up with leaden spades and stir up an impenetrable cloud, which screens their obscure operations from your sight.” (23)

How does this passage connect to the American dream, and the reality of it?

Beloved:

“‘God damn it! Hush up!’ Paul D was shouting, falling, reaching for anchor. ‘Leave the place alone! Get the hell out!’ A table rushed toward him and he grabbed its leg. Somehow he managed to stand at an angle and, holding the table by two legs, he bashed it about, wrecking everything, screaming back at the screaming house. ‘You want to fight, come on! God damn it ! She got enough without you. She got enough!’” (22)

How does Paul D getting rid of the ghost in 124 connect to the idea of disremember and rememory that Toni Morrison has set up in the novel?

Parable of the Sower:

“‘No. No, Donner’s just a kind of human banister.’ ‘A what?’ ‘I mean he’s like…like a symbol of the past for us to hold on to as we’re pushed into the future. He’s nothing. No substance. But having him there, the latest in a two-and-a-half-century-long line of American Presidents make people feel that the country, the culture that they grew up with is still here—that we’ll get through these bad times and back to normal.’” (56)

How does the passage relate to Earthseed, and the book’s idea of change?

The Things They Carried:

“

A Man of Two Faces:

 TGG:

• “He [Gatsby] stretched out his arms toward the dark water in a curious way, and, far as I was from him, I could have sworn he was trembling. Involuntarily I glanced seaward–and distinguished nothing except a single green light, minute and far away, that might have been at the end of a dock. When I looked once more for Gatsby he has vanished, and I was alone again in the unquiet darkness.” (pg. 20-21)

Beloved: 

• “When the four horsemen came– schoolteacher, one nephew, one slave catcher and a sheriff– the house on Bluestone Road was so quiet they thought they were too late. Three of them dismounted, one stayed in the saddle, his rifle ready, his eyes trained away from the house to the left and to the right, because likely as not the fugitive would make a dash for it. Although sometimes, you could never tell, you’d find them folded up tight somewhere: beneath the floorboards, in a pantry–once in a chimney. (pg. 174)

POTS:

• “I did some shooting today, and I was leaning against a boulder watching others shoot, when I realized there was a dog nearby watching me. Just one dog–male, yellow-brown, sharp-eared, short-haired. He wasn’t big enough to make a meal of me, and I still had the Smith & Wesson, so while he was looking me over, I took a good look at him. He was lean, but he didn’t look starved. He looked alert and curious. He sniffed the air, and I remembered that dogs were supposed to be oriented more toward scent than sight.” (pg. 40)

TTWC:

• “But the story did not end there. If you believed the Greenies, Rat said, Mary Anne was still somewhere out there in the dark. Odd movements, odd shapes. Late at night, when the Greenies were out on ambush, the whole rain forest seemed to stare in at them–a watched feeling–and a couple of times they almost saw her sliding through the shadows. Not quite, but almost. She has crossed to the other side. She was part of the land. She was wearing her culottes, her pink sweater, and a necklace of human tongues. She was dangerous. She was ready for the kill.” pg 110

AMOTF:

• E 

Part Four: In-Class Essay. This will be an in-class essay based on comparing quotes and answering a question based on those quotes. Provide the two quotes and a question. (two total questions)  Page 34 of Tim O'brien - What sticks to memory, often, are those odd little fragments that have no beginning and no end

Page 140 of Toni Morrison - “You disremember everything? I never knew my mother neither, but I saw her a couple of times. Did you never see yours? What kind of whites was they? You don’t remember none?”

In what ways does disremembering allow individuals with trauma to live their lives in the present?

In Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried and Viet Thanh Nguyen’s A Man of Two Faces, life experiences shape the way that stories are told. Write an essay that incorporates and analyses the following passages to answer the question: how do emotions dictate the perspective of a story. 

The Things They Carried Quote

“And then it becomes 1990. I’m forty-three years old, and a writer now, still dreaming Linda alive in exactly the same way. She’s not the embodied Linda; she’s mostly made up, with a new identity and a new name, like the man who never was. Her real name doesn’t matter. She was nine years old. I loved her and then she died. And yet right here, in the spell of memory and imagination, I can still see her as if through ice, as if I’m gazing into some other world, a place where there are no brain tumors and no funeral homes, where there are no bodies at all. I can see Kiowa, too, and Ted Lavender and Curt Lemon, and sometimes I can even see Timmy skating with Linda under the yellow floodlights. I’m young and happy. I’ll never die. I’m skimming across the surface of my own history, moving fast, riding the melt beneath the blades, doing loops and spins, and when I take a high leap into the dark and come down thirty years later, I realize it as Tim trying to save Timmy’s life with a story” (O’Brien 232).

A Man of Two Faces Quote

“Or this is the beginning of me as a different kind of writer. Fatherhood, I think, has made me a better writer. Opened me to the care of others, to the study of my own emotions. Made me someone who knows how to love and to give of myself to Lan and the children. Made me someone who could write this book, which I never wanted to write” (Viet Thanh Nguyen 339-340).

HAMLIT Crowdsource Final Exam Study Guide

Part One: Multiple Choice

 correct answers are bolded

1. What did Beloved do to Sethe in the clearing?

   1. High-five her

   2. Tell her a story

   3. Strangle her

   4. Beat her

2. Which soldier gets blown up into a tree in The Things They Carried?

   1. Rat Kiley

   2. Curt Lemon

   3. Kiowa

   4. Henry Dobbins

3. What is Daisy’s relation to the narrator in The Great Gatsby?

   1. Siblings

   2. Exes

   3. Childhood friends

   4. Cousins

4. What is the name of the white man Lauren and Zhara travel with after their neighborhood is burned down? (Parable of the Sower)

   1. Harry

   2. Henry

   3. David

   4. Bankole

   5. Magic Johnson

   6. Jack Levy

5. What do the soldiers not carry in The Things They Carried? (pgs 1-3)

   1. The land

   2. Premium dope

   3. Carabiners

   4. Pocket knives

   5. Can openers

6. Which alternative spellings of his last name does Nguyen provide in A Man of Two Faces? List all that apply:

   1. Wynn

   2. Wen

   3. Win

   4. Goo-yen

   5. Noo-win

7. In the clearing, who witnessed Beloved choking Sethe? (Beloved P119)

1. Paul D.

2. Baby Suggs

3. Denver

4. No one

8. Which of the following characters from Parable of the Sower is not a sharer? (Parable of the Sower)

5. Emery

6. Zahra

7. Grayson

8. Mora

9. What does Nick Caraway suddenly realize when Gatsby and Daisy depart from Tom’s rented room in the city?

1. He forgot to go to work

2. It's his birthday

3. He hadn’t said a word during the whole ordeal 

4. Magic Johnson was supposed to arrive

10. Where does Paul D. say his heart is?

1. Within Sethe

2. Buried in a ditch

3. Back at his old plantation

4. In a rusted tin

11. What name does Nguyen have redacted (ddddddd) throughout the book?

1. Obama

2. George W. Bush

3. Trump

4. Tung

12. Where did the first Earthseed colony end up being established?

1. Hoover Dam

2. New Robledo

3. Bankoles family ranch

4. Yellowstone

13. The Great Gatsby:

1. What does the Valley of Ashes symbolize in the novel?

- The failure of the American Dream.

- The corruption of New York politics.

- The boundary between rich and poor neighborhoods.

- The industrial success of the 1920s.

(Correct answer: A)

14. What is the main cause of Gatsby’s downfall?

- His dishonest business practices.

- His blind obsession with the past and Daisy.

- His inability to manage his wealth.

- His arrogance and mistreatment of his guests.

(Correct answer: B)

Beloved:

15. Why does Sethe kill her own daughter?

- She believes it is the only way to protect her from slavery.

- She is overcome by madness after escaping Sweet Home.

- She believes the child is a reincarnation of a past tormentor.

- She is manipulated by Paul D into committing the act.

(Correct answer: A)

16. What does the character Beloved symbolize?

- The dangers of love and obsession.

- The psychological weight of slavery’s past.

- The failures of motherhood in dire circumstances.

- The economic struggles of former slaves.

(Correct answer: B)

Parable of the Sower:

17. How does Lauren’s journey shape her vision for Earthseed?

- She realizes the importance of shared survival and building a new community

- She abandons Earthseed in favor of more immediate concerns

- She decides that faith alone is not enough and seeks military strength

- She concludes that change is too dangerous and tries to restore her past life

(Correct answer: A)

18. What is Lauren Olamina’s unique ability?

- She can predict the future with absolute certainty

- She has a photographic memory, allowing her to recall every detail she encounters

- She experiences hyperempathy, feeling others’ pain and pleasure as if they were her own

- She can manipulate elements in her environment through meditation

(Correct answer: C)

19. In TTTC, how does the weight of physical items in the novel extend beyond literal weight?

1. It forces soldiers to confront the emotional toll of war and the burden of survival.

2. It serves just as symbolism without deeper psychological impact..

3. It reflects the government's control over individual soldiers.

4. It helps to organise the novel into structured chapters. 

20. In Parable of the Sower, which best describes the relationship between Bankole and Lauren? 

1. Mutualistic

2. Parasitic

3. Commensalism

4. Predation

5. Competition

21. In A Man of Two Faces, what role does humor play in Nguyen’s exploration of trauma and displacement?

1. It serves as a coping mechanism that allows sharper social critique.

2. It distracts from the seriousness of historical oppression.

3. It reinforces stereotypes rather than challenging them. 

4. It limits the depth of emotional reflection in the memoir.

22. What is Gatsby’s first name?

1. Jeorge

2. James

3. Jay

4. Joy

23. Who is Beloved?

1. Sethe’s neighborhood.

2. Denver’s child.

3. A traveling mourner.

4. A ghostly figure connected to Sethe’s past.

Part Two: Fill in the Blank—Quotes. Provide a one to two sentence quote and remove a keyword from the quote. Provide that keyword after the quote.

1. “I want you to touch me on the ______ part and call me my name” - Beloved 137

   1.  Word: inside

2. “The Chinese virus, or the _______, takes aim at the Chinese, but to some, all Asians look the same.” - A Man of Two Faces 119

   1. Word: Kung Flu

3. “ So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the ____” - The Great Gatsby, final sentence

   1. Word: past

4. This is a valley of _____—a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens…” - The Great Gatsby 23

   1. Word: ashes

5. “Daddy is coming for us. / A hot thing.” (Morrison 255) gross

6. “All that you touch You Change. All that you Change Changes you. The only lasting truth Is Change.”(Butler)

7. “They carried the sky. The whole atmosphere, they carried it, the humidity, the monsoons, the stink of fungus and decay, all of it, they carried gravity”(O’Brien)

8. “Story-truth is truer sometimes than happening-truth”(O’Brien)

9. "I was a coward. I went to the war."(O’Brien)

10. “The writer’s dilemma: be scarred enough to be a good writer, but not so scarred as to be truly fucked up. You have achieved the magic balance! Congratulations!!!”(Nguyen)

11.  Beloved: “Obviously the hand-holding shadows she had seen on the road were not Paul D, Denver, and herself, but “us three.” (Beloved 214)

    1. Balloons

    2. Chalk drawings

    3. Hand-holding shadows

    4. Ice skates

12. “Embrace diversity. / Unite – / or be divided, / robbed, / ruled, / killed / by those who see you as prey. / Embrace diversity / or be destroyed.” (diversity) (Parable of the Sower P196)

13. Changes, the galaxies move through space. The stats ignite, burn, age, cool, evolving, God is ____. God prevails. (change) 

14.  I am beloved and she is ____. (mine)

MoTF

“I reject ____. I accept my amnesia. Because–fact–the Asian Pacific Psychiatric Ward is the most terrifying place I have ever been.”  (memory)

“Forgotten, seen and unseen, you are remembered and dismembered, you are ___________.” (disremembered)

TTTC

“For Rat Kiley, I think, ___ were formed by sensation, not the other way around” (85). (facts)

We then left 101 and took our small hilly road, our short cut to San Juan Bautista. 

POTS, (248) 

“He believed to this day that the “Hiiii!” at dawn and the “Hoooo!” when evening came were the responsibility Hi man assumed.”

Beloved 127

“I am Beloved and Beloved is _____.” (Me)

 “God is _____.” (Change)

“A true war story, if truly told, makes the stomach _____.” (Believe)

Part Three: Short Answer Questions. This will be like quote of the day. Provide a quote with a question that can be answered in 5-10 sentences.

1.  How does the fragmented nature of memory and identity in this statement reflect broader themes of self-perception and human relationships?

“And now it is difficult, having forgotten so many parts of yourself and those you love, to re member your many disremembered pieces.” (Nguyen)

In order to rise

From its own ashes

A phoenix

First

Must

Burn. (Parable of the Sower P153)

Explain with context the meaning behind this prose.

“Stories are for joining the past to the future.” What is the significance of this quote in the book TTTC? How does this book help O’Brien process his thoughts about the war and what is the value of his reflection?

A man of two faces- “Forgetting the painful things is necessary for some of us. As long was we eventually simmer that bone that we cannot cut through. Have I simmered the bone enough? Can I taste that marrow of memory?”

• What is the significance and symbolism of bone, and marrow when he is referring to his and Ma’s memories? 

 “A ration of grief keeps the less powerful alive but weak, divided from each other, blaming each other, more easily conquered.” (Nguyen 331)

What examples from A Man of Two Faces  or others books in the course show examples of this?

Part Four: In-Class Essay. This will be an in-class essay based on comparing quotes and answering a question based on those quotes. Provide the two quotes and a question.

How do these quotes explore the theme of memory and its relationship to identity? What role does forgetting or "disremembering" play in shaping self-perception and historical awareness?

"You disremember everything? I never knew my mother neither, but I saw her a couple of times. Did you never see yours? What kind of whites was they? You don't remember none?"(Butler)

“And now it is difficult, having forgotten so many parts of yourself and those you love, to re member your many disremembered pieces.” (Nguyen)

1. Compare the following quotes from Beloved and Parable of the Sower.  Then answer the question: “Using Beloved and Lauren Olamina’s interpretation of God as an example, how does identifying a person, place, or thing claim it?”

   1. “Everybody knew what she was called, but nobody anywhere knew her name. Disremembered and unaccounted for, she cannot be lost because nobody is looking for her… although she has claim, she is not claimed.” (Beloved 323)

   2. “Create no images of God.

Accept the images

That God has provided…

the universe 

is God’s self portrait” (Butler 315)

1. Compare the following quotes from The Great Gatsby and Parable of the Sower.  Then answer the question: “How does the quote from Parable of the Sower factor into the societal decline we see in Scott Fitzgerald’s novel?”

   1. “Embrace diversity. Unite – or be divided, robbed, ruled, killed by those who see you as prey. Embrace diversity or be destroyed.” (Butler 196)

   2. “Have you read ‘The Rise of the Coloured Empire’... everybody ought to read it. The idea is if we don’t look out the white race will be—will  be utterly submerged.” (Fitzgerald 12)

2. Beloved:

“Some things you forget. Other things you never do. But it's not. Places, places are still there. If a house burns down, it's gone, but the place--the picture of it--stays, and not just in my rememory, but out there, in the world. What I remember is a picture floating around out there outside my head. I mean, even if I don't think if, even if I die, the picture of what I did, or knew, or saw is still out there. Right in the place where it happened.”

“They all carried ghosts.”

Write about how these two quotes from two completely separate books connect to the dead and how it is carried with us for the rest of our lives.

How does Viet Thanh Nguyen and Tim O'Brien define a war story, and what does it mean in the context of their perspectives of the Vietnam war?

“Perhaps all survivors feel haunted, by the absent presence, by the alternate universe where they did not make it ou. What if you were the one left behind? What if you were the negative space in someone else’s life and memory? And if you feel this way, with no memory of this sister or the country back there, what must she feel? And what must Ba Ma feel? This is a war story. (a man of two faces)

“In many cases a true war story cannot be believed. If you believe it, be skeptical. It's a question of credibility. Often the crazy stuff is true and the normal stuff isn't, because the normal stuff is necessary to make you believe the truly incredible craziness. In other cases you can't even tell a true war story. Sometimes it's just beyond telling.” (the things they carried) 

How does the idea of rememory compare and contrast between O’Brien and Morrison’s writings?

“What I remember is a picture floating around out there outside my head. I mean, even if I don't think it, even if I die, the picture of what I did, or knew, or saw is still out there. Right in the place where it happened" (Morrison 43).

“I want you to feel what I felt. I want you to know why story-truth is truer sometimes than happening-truth” (O’Brien 171).