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Short Stories for Students: Presenting Analysis, Context and Criticism on Commonly Studied Short Stories (Short Stories for Students, Vol 12) PDF

359 Pages·2001·11.27 MB·English
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Short Stories for Students National Advisory Board Jennifer Hood: Young Adult/Reference Librarian, Patricia Sarles: Library Media Specialist, Canarsie Cumberland Public Library, Cumberland, High School, Brooklyn, New York. Expert Rhode Island. Certified teacher, Rhode Island. Guide in Biography/Memoir for the website About.com (http.Abiography.about.com). Member of the New England Library Asso- Author of short stories and book reviews. ciation, Rhode Island Library Association, Received B.A., M.A. (anthropology), and and the Rhode Island Educational Media M.L.S. from Rutgers University. Association. Heidi Stohs: Instructor in Language Arts, grades Christopher Maloney: Head Reference Librarian, 10-12, Solomon High School, Solomon, Kan- Ocean City Free Public Library, Ocean City, sas. Received B.S. from Kansas State Univer- New Jersey. Member of the American Library sity; M.A. from Fort Hays State University. Association and the New Jersey Library Asso- Barbara Wencl: Library Media Specialist, Como ciation. Board member of the South Jersey High School, St. Paul, Minnesota. Teacher of Library Cooperative. secondary social studies and history, St. Paul, Minnesota. Received B.S. and M.Ed, from Kathleen Preston: Head of Reference, New City University of Minnesota; received media cer- Library, New City, New York. Member of the tification from University of Wisconsin. Edu- American Library Association. Received B.A. cator and media specialist with over 30 years and M.L.S. from University of Albany. experience. ;' i Short Stories for Students Presenting Analysis, Context, and Criticism on Commonly Studied Short Stories Volume 12 Jennifer Smith, Editor GALE GROUP Detroit New York Son Francisco London Boston Woodbridge, CT Short Stories for Students Staff Copyright Notice Editor: Jennifer Smith. Since this page cannot legibly accommodate all copyright notices, the acknowledgments constitute an extension of the copyright Contributing Editors: Anne Marie Hacht, Michael L. LaBlanc, notice. Ira Mark Milne, Elizabeth Thomason. Managing Editor, Literature Content: Dwayne D. Hayes. While every effort has been made to secure permission to reprint material and to ensure the reliability of the information presented Managing Editor, Literature Product: David Galens. in this publication, Gale neither guarantees the accuracy of the data contained herein nor assumes any responsibility for errors, Publisher, Literature Product: Mark Scott. omissions, or discrepancies. Gale accepts no payment for listing; Content Capture: Joyce Nakamura, Managing Editor. Michelle and inclusion in the publication of any organization, agency, Poole, Associate Editor. institution, publication, service, or individual does not imply endorsement of the editors or publisher. Errors brought to the Research: Victoria B. Cariappa, Research Manager. Cheryl attention of the publisher and verified to the satisfaction of the Warnock, Research Specialist. Tamara Nott, Trade A. Richardson, publisher will be corrected in future editions. Research Associates. Nicodemus Ford, Sarah Genik, Timothy Lehnerer, Ron Morelli, Research Assistants. This publication is a creative work fully protected by all applicable Permissions: Maria Franklin, Permissions Manager. Jacqueline copyright laws, as well as by misappropriation, trade secret, Jones, Julie Juengling, Permissions Assistants. unfair competition, and other applicable laws. The authors and editors of this work have added value to the underlying factual Manufacturing: Mary Beth Trimper, Manager, Composition material herein through one or more of the following: unique and and Electronic Prepress. Evi Seoud, Assistant Manager, original selection, coordination, expression, arrangement, and Composition Purchasing and Electronic Prepress. Stacy classification of the information. Melson, Buyer. All rights to this publication will be vigorously defended. Imaging and Multimedia Content Team: Barbara Yarrow, Manager. Randy Bassett, Imaging Supervisor. Robert Duncan, Dan Newell, Imaging Specialists. Pamela A. Reed, Imaging Copyright © 2001 Coordinator . Leitha Etheridge-Sims, Mary Grimes, David G. The Gale Group Oblender, Image Catalogers. Robyn V. Young, Project Manager. 27500 Drake Road Dean Dauphinais, Senior Image Editor. Kelly A. Quin, Image Farmington Hills, MI 48331-3535 Editor. All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or Product Design Team: Kenn Zorn, Product Design Manager. in part in any form. Pamela A. E. Galbreath, Senior Art Director. Michael Logusz, Graphic Artist. ISBN 0-7876-4264-9 ISSN 1092-7735 Printed in the United States of America. 10987654321 iV Table of Contents Quest Foreword "Why Study Literature At All?" Thomas E. Harden vii Introduction ix Literary Chronology xiii Acknowledgments xv Contributors xvii The Beginning of Homewood John Edgar Wideman 1 Debbie and Julie Doris Lessing 17 The Erlking Angela Carter 33 The Feathered Ogre Italo Calvino 49 Fountains in the Rain Yukio Mishima 68 Goodbye, Columbus Philip Roth 84 Heart of Darkness Joseph Conrad Ill Kew Gardens Virginia Woolf 133 V T a b le of C o n t e n ts Leaving the Yellow House The Spinoza of Market Street Saul Bellow 155 Isaac Bashevis Singer 239 Suspicion The Lesson Dorothy L. Sayers... 258 Toni Cade Bambara. 171 That Evening Sun The Metamorphosis William Faulkner ... 273 Franz Kafka 188 What We Talk About When We Talk The Pagan Sabbi About Love Cynthia Ozick 213 Raymond Carver 296 Glossary of Literary Terms 313 Cumulative Author/Title Index ... 325 Nationality/Ethnicity Index 331 Subject/Theme Index 335 v i S h o rt S t o r i es f or S t u d e n ts Why Study Literature At All? Short Stories for Students is designed to pro- wonders what will happen to us after we die. Litera- vide readers with information and discussion about ture admits that we get our hearts broken, that a wide range of important contemporary and histori- people sometimes cheat and get away with it, that cal works of short fiction, and it does that job very the world is a strange and probably incomprehensi- well. However, I want to use this guest foreword to ble place. Literature, in other words, takes on all the address a question that it does not take up. It is a big and small issues of what it means to be human. fundamental question that is often ignored in high So my first answer is that of the humanist—we school and college English classes as well as re- should read literature and study it and take it seri- search texts, and one that causes frustration among ously because it enriches us as human beings. We students at all levels, namely—why study literature develop our moral imagination, our capacity to at all? Isn't it enough to read a story, enjoy it, and go sympathize with other people, and our ability to about one's business? My answer (to be expected understand our existence through the experience from a literary professional, I suppose) is no. It is of fiction. not enough. It is a start; but it is not enough. Here's why. My second answer is more practical. By study- ing literature we can learn how to explore and First, literature is the only part of the educational analyze texts. Fiction may be about die Lebenswelt, curriculum that deals directly with the actual world but it is a construct of words put together in a certain of lived experience. The philosopher Edmund Husserl order by an artist using the medium of language. By used the apt German term die Lebenswelt, "the examining and studying those constructions, we can living world," to denote this realm. All the other learn about language as a medium. We can become content areas of the modern American educational more sophisticated about word associations and system avoid the subjective, present reality of eve- ryday life. Science (both the natural and the social connotations, about the manipulation of symbols, varieties) objectifies, the fine arts create and/or and about style and atmosphere. We can grasp how perform, history reconstructs. Only literary study ambiguous language is and how important context persists in posing those questions we all asked and texture is to meaning. In our first encounter with before our schooling taught us to give up on them. a work of literature, of course, we are not supposed Only literature gives credibility to personal percep- to catch all of these things. We are spellbound, just tions, feelings, dreams, and the "stream of con- as the writer wanted us to be. It is as serious students sciousness" that is our inner voice. Literature won- of the writer's art that we begin to see how the tricks ders about infinity, wonders why God permits evil, are done. v i i Why Study Literature At All? Seeing the tricks, which is another way of Studying short stories, then, can help students saying "developing analytical and close reading become better readers, better writers, and even skills," is important above and beyond its intrinsic better human beings. But I want to close with a literary educational value. These skills transfer to warning. If your study and exploration of the craft, other fields and enhance critical thinking of any history, context, symbolism, or anything else about kind. Understanding how language is used to con- a story starts to rob it of the magic you felt when you struct texts is powerful knowledge. It makes engi- first read it, it is time to stop. Take a break, study neers better problem solvers, lawyers better advo- another subject, shoot some hoops, or go for a run. cates and courtroom practitioners, politicians better Love of reading is too important to be ruined by rhetoricians, marketing and advertising agents bet- school. The early twentieth century writer Willa ter sellers, and citizens more aware consumers as Gather, in her novel My Antonia, has her narrator well as better participants in democracy. This last Jack Burden tell a story that he and Antonia heard point is especially important, because rhetorical from two old Russian immigrants when they were skill works both ways—when we learn how lan- teenagers. These immigrants, Pavel and Peter, told guage is manipulated in the making of texts the about an incident from their youth back in Russia result is that we become less susceptible when that the narrator could recall in vivid detail thirty language is used to manipulate us. years later. It was a harrowing story of a wedding party starting home in sleds and being chased by My third reason is related to the second. When starving wolves. Hundreds of wolves attacked the we begin to see literature as created artifacts of group's sleds one by one as they sped across the language, we become more sensitive to good writ- snow trying to reach their village. In a horrible ing in general. We get a stronger sense of the revelation, the old Russians revealed that the groom importance of individual words, even the sounds of eventually threw his own bride to the wolves to save words and word combinations. We begin to under- himself. There was even a hint that one of the old stand Mark Twain's delicious proverb—"The dif- immigrants might have been the groom mentioned ference between the right word and the almost right in the story. Gather has her narrator conclude with word is the difference between lightning and a his feelings about the story. "We did not tell Pavel's lightning bug." Getting beyond the "enjoyment secret to anyone, but guarded it jealously—as if the only" stage of literature gets us closer to becoming wolves of the Ukraine had gathered that night long makers of word art ourselves. I am not saying that ago, and the wedding party had been sacrificed, just studying fiction will turn every student into a Faulkner to give us a painful and peculiar pleasure." That or a Shakespeare. But it will make us more adapt- feeling, that painful and peculiar pleasure, is the able and effective writers, even if our art form ends most important thing about literature. Study and up being the office memo or the corporate annual research should enhance that feeling and never be report. allowed to overwhelm it. Thomas E. Burden Professor of English and Director of Graduate English Studies The University of Toledo v i i i S h o rt S t o r i es f or S t u d e n ts Introduction Purpose of the Book This includes a historical context essay, a box The purpose of Short Stories for Students (SSfS) comparing the time or place the story was written to is to provide readers with a guide to understanding, modern Western culture, a critical overview essay, enjoying, and studying short stories by giving them and excerpts from critical essays on the story or easy access to information about the work. Part of author (if available). A unique feature of SSfS is a Gale's "For Students" Literature line, SSfS is spe- specially commissioned overview essay on each cifically designed to meet the curricular needs of story, targeted toward the student reader. high school and undergraduate college students and To further aid the student in studying and their teachers, as well as the interests of general enjoying each story, information on media adapta- readers and researchers considering specific short tions is provided, as well as reading suggestions for fiction. While each volume contains entries on works of fiction and nonfiction on similar themes "classic" stories frequently studied in classrooms, and topics. Classroom aids include ideas for re- there are also entries containing hard-to-find infor- search papers and lists of critical sources that pro- mation on contemporary stories, including works vide additional material on the work. by multicultural, international, and women writers. The information covered in each entry includes Selection Criteria an introduction to the story and the story's author; a The titles for each volume of SSfS were select- plot summary, to help readers unravel and under- ed by surveying numerous sources on teaching stand the events in the work; descriptions of impor- literature and analyzing course curricula for various tant characters, including explanation of a given school districts. Some of the sources surveyed in- character's role in the narrative as well as discussion clude: literature anthologies, Reading Lists for Col- about that character's relationship to other charac- lege-Bound Students: The Books Most Recommend- ters in the story; analysis of important themes in the ed by America's Top Colleges', Teaching the Short story; and an explanation of important literary tech- Story: A Guide to Using Stories from Around the World, by the National Council of Teachers of niques and movements as they are demonstrated in English (NCTE); and "A Study of High School the work. Literature Anthologies," conducted by Arthur In addition to this material, which helps the Applebee at the Center for the Learning and Teach- readers analyze the story itself, students are also ing of Literature and sponsored by the National provided with important information on the literary Endowment for the Arts and the Office of Educa- and historical background informing each work. tional Research and Improvement. I X

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