Writing Persuasive Essays for Timed Prompts
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William Shakespeare
Hamlet gives us seven soliloquies, all centered on the most important existential themes: the emptiness of existence, suicide, death, suffering, action, a fear of death which puts off the most momentous decisions, the fear of the beyond, the degradation of the flesh, the triumph of vice over virtue, the pride and hypocrisy of human beings, and the difficulty of acting under the weight of a thought ‘which makes cowards of us all’. He offers us also, in the last act, some remarks made in conversation with Horatio in the cemetery which it is suitable to place in the same context as the soliloquies because the themes of life and death in general and his attitude when confronted by his own death have been with him constantly. Four of his seven soliloquies deserve our special attention: ‘O that this too sullied flesh would melt’, ‘O what a rogue and peasant slave am I!’, ‘To be, or not to be, that is the question’, and ‘How all occasions do inform against me’.
Readings of these soliloquies are varied and diverse. However, three remarks are in order:
1. The density of Hamlet’s thought is extraordinary. Not a word is wasted; every syllable and each sound expresses the depth of his reflection and the intensity of his emotion. The spectator cannot but be hypnotized.
2. The language is extremely beautiful. Shakespeare was in love with words. His soliloquies are pieces of pure poetry, written in blank verse, sustained by a rhythm now smooth, now rugged, by a fast or a slow pace, offering us surprises in every line.
3. The soliloquies are in effect the hidden plot of the play because, if one puts them side by side, one notices that the character of Hamlet goes through a development which, in substance, is nothing other than the history of human thinking from the Renaissance to the existentialism of the twentieth century.
1. ‘O that this too sullied flesh would melt’ (Act One, Scene Two)
The Hamlet of the first soliloquy is an outraged man who, disgusted by his ‘sullied flesh’, can see no outcome to his disgust other than death. To free himself from the grip of his flesh he must put an end to his life. But there is the rub: God, the Everlasting, he tells us, does not allow one to act in this way. God still rules the universe and Hamlet must obey his strictures.
2. ‘O all you host of heaven’ (Act One, Scene Five)
3. ‘O what a rogue and peasant slave am I!’ (Act Two, Scene Two)
Some actors, including the very best, believe that the most beautiful soliloquy is that which comes at the end of Act Two, immediately after the first discussion between Hamlet and the travelling players. Here Hamlet is enraged, furious and rude. He lays himself, we feel, totally bare. He is no fool however. Recovering his spirits he devises a plan which will lead the king to betray himself. This is Shakespeare at the height of his theatrical prowess, stamping Hamlet’s language with relentless changes in tone, the peaks of rage inter-cut with short moments of profound depression or of incredulous questioning.
4. ‘To be, or not to be, that is the question’ (Act Three, Scene One)
In the first soliloquy Hamlet submits to rules and prohibitions; in the second he imagines and rationalises and decides to remain in the world, for the moment at least. But he goes much further. Throughout the final act he pictures the final scene. There, where another dramatist would have given the dying Hamlet a long discourse on death, Shakespeare has Hamlet say just a few words of disconcerting simplicity, ‘the rest is silence’, precisely because Hamlet has already said everything before.
5. ‘Tis now the very witching time of night’ (Act Three, Scene Three)
6. ‘And so a goes to heaven’ (Act Three, Scene 3)
7. ‘How all occasions do inform against me’ (Act Four, Scene Four)
The other two soliloquies are memorable because they reveal all the passionate nature of Hamlet’s personality. Observing young Fortinbras and his army on their way to conquer Poland-’an eggshell’, ‘a wisp of straw’-Hamlet, on the edge of despair, asks himself why he, when he has so many reasons, cannot stir himself to action, why he cannot carry out the necessary act of vengeance. Why? Why? The last lines of Act Four are very revealing:
D'Arcy McNickle
Reading Schedule
Jan 14 Chap 1-2 (1-25)
Jan 15 Chap 3-4 (26-39)
Jan 18 Chap 5-6 (40-52)
Jan 19 Chap 7-8 (53-65)
Jan 20 Chap 9-10 (66-85)
Jan 21 Chap 11-12 (86-100)
Jan 22 Chap 13-14 (101-111)
Jan 25 Chap 15-16 (112 - 128)
Jan 26 Chap 17-18 (129-151)
Jan 27 Chap 18-20 (152-173)
Jan 28 Chap 21-22 (174-187)
Jan 29 Chap 23-24 (188-198)
Feb 1 Chap 25-26 (199-215)
Feb 2 Chap 27-28 (216-226)
Feb 3 Chap 29-30 (227-241)
Feb 4 Chap 31-32 (242-258)
Basic Chronology for Flathead Reservation
1812: Canadian trapper David Thompson reaches Flathead Lake
1841: Jesuits (blackrobes) establish mission in this region
1846: Fort Connah (Hudson Bay Company) established
1855: Hellgate Treaty
1882: Railroad right-of-way agreement for Northern Pacific
1891: Removal of Charlo and his Salish band from the Bitterroot
1910: Opening of the Reservation to homesteaders
Flier published by Great Northern Railroad advertising the opening of the Reservation
Local Historical Background
1. First whites in area were fur traders and trappers. Angus McDonald built Fort Conah. This was part of the Hudson Bay Company, which was a Canadian company.The fort, which can be seen to the east of Highway 93 on Post Creek Hill, was closed after the northern border of the U.S.A. was established.
Angus was married to Catherine, a Nez Perce woman. Many fur traders and trappers married Indian women, for the usual reasons of companionship but also for business reasons.
2. The Blackfeet in mid-19th century were powerful and had access to rifles from traders in Canada. They worked at suppressing access to trade among the Flatheads. The Flatheads had heard of the Jesuits whom they called “Blackrobes” and they wanted their power. So they sent two delegations to St. Louis to ask the Blackrobes to come. This led to Father DeSmet coming west and establishing a mission at St. Mary’s in the Bitterroot.
3. The discovery of gold at Alder Gulch in Montana in the 1860s triggered a burst of whites entering the state. The presence of gold camps created a market for agriculture.
4. The Treaty of 1855 at Council Grove west of Missoula established the Flathead Reservation. It was one of several “Stevens” treaties negotiated at about the same time in the Pacific Northwest. Governor Isaac Stevens was sent to this area to establish peace between various tribes and the increasing numbers of settlers by formalizing the territory of each tribe.
5. For decades after the 1855 treaty, the Salish continued living in the Bitterroot. James Garfield came and negotiated an agreement that the Reservation would be established in the Flathead, but Chief Charlo claimed his “mark” had been forged on that negotiation and he continued living in the Bitterroot with his followers, until near starvation forced him to move. His rival was Chief Arlee, who forged better relations with the U.S. Government.
6. The Dawes Act of 1887 allowed reservations to be divided into individual alotments and the surplus land to be opened to nontribal homesteaders. This took affect on the Flathead Reservation in 1910. Before that happened, the free roaming herds of cattle, bison, and horses needed to be rounded up.
Rep. Joseph Dixon (Missoula attorney and owner of the Missoulian) argued in Congress that Article 6 of the 1855 Hellgate Treaty allowed dividing the Flathead Reservation. This is the language of the treaty: “The President may from time to time, at his discretion, cause the whole or such portion of such reservation as he may thing proper to be surveyed into lots, and assign the same to such individuals or families of the said confederated tribes as are willing to avail themselves of the privilege and will locate on the same permanent home.”
Dixon had relatives and business associates on the Reservation. Hundreds of letters of support from Montana businessmen were received. Tribal leaders fought the allotment policy every way they could.
A new roll of the confederated Flatheads was completed in anticipation of Allotment. It listed 2,133 persons entitled to allotments, including 640 Pend O’reilles (242 full bloods, 387 mixed, 7 adopted Indians, and 4 adopted whites); 557 Flatheads (233 fullbloods, 305 mixed, 16 adopted Indians, and 3 adopted whites); 556 Kutenais (210 fullbloods, 342 mixed, 2 adopted Indians, and 2 adopted whites); 197 Lower Pend Oreilles (161 fullbloods, 35 mixed, and 1 adopted white); 135 Spokanes (55 fullbloods, 80 mixed); and 48 other tribes (14 fullbloods and 34 mixed). Based on the enrollment, Indians were allowed allotments of 80 acres of farmland or 160 acres of grazing land. Except for further reserves for such things as townsites, a bison range, and power installations, the remaining lands were to be sold with the money to be used for the benefit of the tribes.
The Place of Falling Waters
Notes, part 1
Notes, part 2
Notes, part 3
The Author
D’Arcy McNickle, an enrolled Salish Kootenai on the Flathead Reservation, became one of the most prominent twentieth-century American Indian activists. He was born on January 14, 1904, to an Irish father, William McNickle, and a one-quarter Cree Métis mother, Philomene Parenteau. He grew up on the Flathead Reservation in St. Ignatius and went to mission and non-reservation boarding schools. In 1925 McNickle sold his land allotment on the Flathead Reservation so that he could raise the money necessary to study abroad at Oxford University. After returning to the United States, McNickle lived in New York City until he was hired by the Bureau of Indian Affairs in 1936.
McNickle’s narrative is set in the fictionalized territory of the Little Elk Indians, presumably modelled after his own experiences on the Salish-Kootenai (Flathead) reservation in Mission Valley, Montana. As an adopted member of this tribe, with a Metis or mixed-blood Cree ancestry, McNickle moved easily between New York City and the Flathead reservation. Passing as white in New York City, McNickle provided a unique perspective on Western culture as well as a complex, or hybrid, vision of life with the Salish-Kootenai.
Set in the early 1900s, the novel represents the struggle over the construction of a dam on the Little Elk reservation as an allegorical--or dehistoricized--struggle between colonizer and colonized. Just as the names in the novel are fictionalized, so the time period is hard to determine, though certain cultural signifiers (like the emergence of the automobile) help the reader to loosely place the narrative in time. Overall, however, there is a certain timeless feel to the narrative, depicting a seemingly eternal struggle between two antagonists.
D’Arcy McNickle worked under Commissioner of Indian Affairs John Collier during the 1930s and 1940s. The Bureau of Indian Affairs first hired him as an administrative assistant, but by 1950 he had been appointed chief of the tribal relations branch, and he soon became an expert on Native American issues.
Study Guide
Chapter 1
1. What is Bull’s reaction to hearing that a dam has been built across the river?
2. From the side of the mountain, Bull gets a view of the valley, which is now “a white man’s world.” He says it is “a world he sometimes passed through but never visited.” What is the difference between “passing through” and “visiting”?
3. Where has Antoine been and what was his experience like?
4. Understanding the ideas of sacred and profane is important to understanding this story. The place where the dam has been built is sacred to Bull’s people. This means the building of the dam was profane.
It had been a holy place, this mountain-locked meadow. “Be careful what you do here,” the boy had been told by his relatives. “This is a place of power. Be careful of what you think. Keep your thoughts good.... Don’t have angry thoughts here,” he was told....
“How can a man do this?” He raised his head and stared at the far-away ribbon of white water leaping down the high rock from its glacial bed. That had not disappeared. The water tumbled its way over stony passages to the head of the forested basin--but the basin was no more. The place where anger was to be left out of men’s thoughts was drowned (5-6).
What do you imagine the dam meant to those who built it?
5. What does Bull do when he sees the dam? What effect does this have?
6. How does his reaction affect Antoine?
7. Compare what Bull believes his grandson is thinking at the dam with what Antoine was really thinking. What does this suggest about their relationship?
8. What detail about Bull do you remember most vividly from this chapter?
Chapter 2
1. How and where did the government men want Bull to live? Why do you think they wanted this?
2. Find at least one detail about both Basil and Louis. Explain how the men are related to Antoine, in both the white and tribal relationship.
3. Who is Two Sleeps and where did he come from?
4. Who is the man who comes into the camp at night singing? How do the other men feel toward him? Why has he come?
5. It has been 30 years since Bull and his brother have talked. Why? How has the land changed since the men’s earlier years when they got along?
6. What is Henry Jim’s plan, and how does Bull feel about it?
Chapter 3
1. Contrast the way Bull and Henry Jim relate to white men.
2. Who is Toby Rafferty and why has Henry Jim come to see him?
3. What are four of the things the “men from afar countries, from somewhere east of the mountains” tell the Indians to do? What effect did these things have on the Indian families?
Chapter 4
1. How would you rate Toby Raferty’s effectiveness on the Little Elk Reservation? Explain.
2. How does the Indian tradition of the “midsummer dances"affect their farming? What would you do about this dilemma if you worked for the BIA?
3. Who is Edwards and what kind of person is he?
4. What is Raferty’s opinion of the training Washington DC gives the people they send to work with the Indians?
5. Compare Raferty’s description of Henry Jim with the earlier description about him from the book? What is similar? Different? What do you think accounts for the variance?
Chapter 5
1. How are Pock Face and Theobold described? After being introduced, do you like these men or not? Explain.
2. What do Pock Face and Theobold do in this chapter, and how do they pull Bull into their actions? Do you think their actions are justifiable?
Chapter 6
1. How is Wells involved with the medicine bundle and how does he think the Little Elk people would have acted differently if they had never lost the bundle? Do you agree with his speculation? Why or why not?
2. What involvement did Henry Jim have with the bundle 30 years ago?
3. Why won’t Wells help Raferty get the bundle back? What is the right thing to do?
Chapter 7
1. Where is Henry Jim going on Red Son at the beginning of the chapter? Why?
2. How do all Henry Jim’s kinsmen react to the message he is bringing them?
3. Why is Henry Jimand--then everyone else--singing?
4. Why won’t the US Marshall let the group of Indians inside the agency?
5. Who is already inside the agency?
Chapter 8
1. What does Two Sleeps tell the women when he’s ask to decide what should be done about Pock Face and Theobold? How do the women react to his answer?
2. What happens with the whiskey? Why do you think this section is included in the book?
3. What did Bull do to fool Antoine as Antoine was trying to find him? According to Veronica, why does he do this?
4. How does Bull react when Pock Face tells him what he has done? How does this compare with what you would expect?
Chapter 9
1. After they find the body, what is the tension between Rafferty and Grant? How are they approaching the crime differently?
2. What do we learn about the man who was killed?
3. What seems to be Sid Grant’s opinion of the Indian community? Find specific examples to back up your opinion.
4. What does Antoine do as he translates?
Chapter 10
1. Who is The Boy? What do you think are the most important pieces of information we get about him in this chapter?
2. What is confusing to Rafferty about the situation with the murder and how Bull and his people are involved?
3. Who is singing in this chapter and what is the significance of that singing?
Chapter 11
1. Where are Bull and his men kept and why is this location chosen instead of the jail?
2. What does The Boy think working for the government does to an Indian man’s relationship with his own people? Why do you think he continues his job if he believes this?
3. What problem does Bull have with the white man’s law that is keeping him at the agency?
4. What does Pock Face tell his people when he decides to speak?
5. How does Pock Face’s dad, Louis, react to his son’s announcement?
6. How does Bull react?
Chapter 12
1. What do Catherine and Lucille have in common?
2. What are all the women in camp doing or getting ready for?
3. What is Marie Louise’s predicament and how does it turn out?
4. If you were a woman in camp, whose actions would probably most closely resemble your own? Why?
Chapter 13
1. Who arrives on the train?
2. Who is Adam Pell?
Chapter 14
1. Where does Antoine plan to go after leaving the women at his Uncle Jerome’s camp?
2. What plan for the Indians does the Long Armed man explain to Antoine at the boarding school?
3. Describe Antoine’s experience at boarding school.
4. What brings Antoine back to the Little Elk Reservation?
Chapter 15
1. What disturbs Antoine about Henry Jim’s place, and what does he see once he gets there that makes him feel better?
2. What is strange about Henry Jim lying on the ground? Why has Henry Jim moved out of his house? Does this make sense to you? Why or why not?
3. What did the government man tell Henry Jim that turned out not to be true?
4. How does Henry Jim seem to feel now about the decisions he’s made in his life?
Chapter 16
1. What is Edward’s evaluation of Henry Jim’s health?
2. What is Rafferty concerned about? What is the Boy’s advice when Rafferty questions him about how to proceed with the murder investigation?
3. What conclusion has Henry Jim come to about why his tribe just left him behind? Assuming his conclusion is correct, do you think they did the right thing?
4. How does Rafferty decide to handle the situation with Bull and the murder accusations as well the fact that Henry Jim needs his family near him as he is growing weaker?
Chapter 17
1. What happened many years ago that first caused Bull to become angry? What changed? How?
2. What types of things were the settlers doing at first that just made the natives laugh?
3. Initially, what did natives think would eventually happen to the settlers? How did things actually progress? What does Bull think his people’s mistake was in dealing with the settlers?
4. Explain Bull’s experience with the white school.
Chapter 18
1. What is the relationship between Adam Pell and Gen (or Ms. Thomas Hendricks Cook) and how is the boy who was murdered related to them?
2. What did Adam’s friend Carlos do with his family’s land, and how did people react?
3. What was Adam Pell’s promise to Carlos that caused him to miss his sister’s Christmas gathering to go to Cuno, Peru? What did living in Cuno make Adam begin to think about?
4. What decision does Thomas Cooke make after listening to Adam and how does Gen react?
Chapter 19
1. Why is the design of the dam impressive to the engineer? He uses the word “beautiful” in his description. What adjective would you use?
2. How did the US Marshal and his men find the gun? What two questions are still left unanswered even after the gun is discovered?
Chapter 20
1. What is the first thing Bull says to the group when he arrives at the agency? How is this received?
2. How are the settler’s laws and native ways of handling crimes different? What are the benefits and drawbacks of each system?
3. Why is Bull afraid of Sid Grant?
4. What are the contents of the two packages from Bull’s camp?
5. What two reasons does the Marshall give for his belief that Bull is not the murderer?
6. Who interrupts the meeting at the agency, and what is his message?
7. What stops Bull from rising to confront Adam Pell when he realizes he was the one responsible for the dam?
8. How does Thomas Cooke react to Pock Face’s declaration, and what does he recommend?
9. What realization has shocked Adam Pell? In what way, besides the trouble over the dam, is Adam Pell involved in the trouble on the Little Elk Reservation? After the discussion, what does he want to do and why?
Chapter 21
1. What story did Rafferty and Doc Edwards make up to explain to the government men at Henry Jim’s funeral who asked why his body was taken from a teepee and not his “elegant house,” and why they were taking his horse along to the burial?
2. What did Henry Jim’s burial service entail?
3. How long was Rafferty on the Little Elk Reservation before any natives actually started taking to him? Does this seem a long or short amount of time? Explain.
4. What does Henry Two Bits come to ask Rafferty? What does he have that surprises Rafferty?
5. How have things changed between The Boy and the rest of the Little Elk people?
6. What does Bull ask The Boy to do for him?
Chapter 22
1. How does it seem things are going to turn out for Pock Face? What leads you to this conclusion?
2. What behavior of Bull’s, in his younger days when he was still drinking, sometimes scared others? What ended Bull’s drinking days?
Chapter 23
1. What does Adam Pell realize American laws made legal that he feels is wrong (though none of his important friends seem to agree)? What did the law allow that Rafferty considered “thievery”? How does he think the white men who came to the reservation were also “exhorted”?
2. What two things resulted from the dam?
3. How does Adam react to the judge’s claim that these exploits against the Indians were “hasty and not well considered”?
Chapter 24
1. What happens to Two Sleeps?
Chapter 25
1. The Little Elk people always get together for storytelling and remembering in the winter, but there are some things different this winter from the last. What are they?
2. Describe the circumstances that led to Antoine going to a boarding school.
3. Describe how Celeste, Antoine, Veronica and Bull are related and how their relationships have changed over the years.
4. Why does Bull want to tell old stories “those his father knew” instead of telling stories from his own life? Do you think anything similar happens in today’s society?
5. Who is Featherboy really? What does he bring the Little Elk people and why is the bundle important, or why do the people need to protect it?
Chapter 26
1. Why does Adam Pell want to bring the Little Elk people a gift? What does he plan to give them? Where did this come from and why does he think it is a good gift? Do you think his gesture is appropriate? Explain.
Chapter 27
1. What messages does The Boy bring to Bull’s camp?
2. How does Louis feel about the current situation they are all in? What does he think they should do? What is Bull’s reply?
Chapter 28
1. How has the Little Elk Valley changed over the last few years? Which changes are positive? Which are negative?
2. What does Pock Face think they should do about the requests they receive? What does Louis think? What does he want to do?
Chapter 29
1. What problem does Adam Rafferty think would arise if all 2,000 Indians actually decided they wanted to farm, as the government wants them to?
2. How does Adam Pell feel about the government’s Indian policy now he is aware of it?
3. What do Doc Edwards and Rafferty want Pell to do instead of telling Bull what actually happened to the bundle? Why? Do you think their plan is wise? Explain.
4. Why does Adam think his object is a good substitute for the bundle?
Chapter 30
1. Where are Bull and his group going, and what makes Bull suspicious?
Chapter 31
1. Where is Veronica going?
2. What do Veronica and Two Sleeps end up doing?
3. What does Veronica see that Two Sleeps seems to miss?
4. What does Two Sleeps see and understand?
Chapter 32
1. What does Rafferty think of The Boy? Of Bull?
2. What does Rafferty confront Adam about, then then warn him about again a few pages later?
3. What chance does Rafferty think they’ve missed by telling the Little Elk people their sacred object is gone?
4. Why has Adam Pell brought Mr. Davis?
5. What does Adam Pell tell Bull and his men? How do Bull’s men react?
6. What does Louis do that effectively ends the meeting?
7. Whose acts would you say are noble in the end? How do you decide?
8. What do you think of the ending of the book? Is it strong or weak? Interesting? Regardless of whether your like or dislike it, does it seem appropriate? Why or why not?
9. Go back to the first sentence of the book: “The Indian named Bull and his grandson took a walk into the mountains to look at a dam built in a cleft of rock, and what began as a walk became a journey into the world."After finishing, what do you think this means?
10. What parts of the book seems to reflect historical events?
PDF Version of Study Guide (7 pages)
Advanced Placement Writing Prompts
videos relating to English
William Shakespeare's Danish Tragedy
A short course on Hamlet
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Rascolnikov's Story
Raskolnikov's Story
The Six Stages of a Story (Michael Hauge)
The Journey to Freedom
Why read Frederick Douglass?
We know that he was one of the foremost leaders of the abolitionist movement, which fought to end slavery within the United States in the decades prior to the Civil War. We also know Douglass was a brilliant speaker; he was asked by the American Anti-Slavery Society to engage in a tour of lectures, and so became recognized as one of America’s first great black speakers. He won world fame when his autobiography was publicized in 1845.
Although this classic text will shock and inspire any reader, just as it did when it first appeared in 1845, it does more than shock. It still speaks to contemporary readers with stirring insights into Douglass’ discovery of the meaning of freedom. It’s a useful book for anyone looking to find new hope for their own lives.
Frederick Douglass shows us how one one’s personal plight has roots in larger public issues, opening up the possibility of new roles to play in society and a new sense of responsible citizenship. For example, when Douglass taught himself to read and write, starting as a boy of nine, it was because he realized even then that literacy was the key to personhood and to his vision of freedom. “If you teach that nigger how to read,” young Frederick overheard his master warning his wife, “it would forever unfit him to be a slave.” He did learn to read, and it did inoculate him against the slave mentality. This was his first step in understanding his condition, and thereby taking a hand in his own fate.
Later, when a white farmer, Edward Covey, determined to break his spirit, to fit him for field labor, Douglass fought back because at age sixteen he had begun to understand that what was at stake was not simply another beating. He recognized that he had arrived at a defining moment aimed at making him “a slave for life,” as he had now learned to phrase it. “This battle with Mr. Covey was the turning-point in my career as a slave. . . . My long-crushed spirit rose, cowardice departed, bold defiance took its place; and I now resolved that, however long I might remain a slave in form, the day had passed forever when I could be a slave in fact.”
Finally, after his escape four years later, Douglass devoted himself to the abolitionist movement, telling these stories over and over because he understood that his own destiny had depended on seeing beyond personal suffering to its significance as part of the slave system.
It teaches us one meaning of courage--the understanding that what we say and do can change our lives in a split second. Not only our lives. But the people in our own time. It was true in 1845 and it is true today. The book invites questions like the following: How do people learn to face the things that life will demand? Where do people get their courage, dignity, and knowledge of righteousness?
After the book made him famous, Douglass served as an adviser to President Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War and fought for the adoption of constitutional amendments that guaranteed voting rights and other civil liberties for blacks. Douglass provided a powerful voice for human rights during this period of American history and is still revered today for his contributions to a more just world.
Worksheets and Handouts
Study Guide: Most of the questions for the final exam will be drawn from this: Study Guide (8 page PDF)
Worksheet: Reading Douglass’ Rhetoric
(Handout on Aristotle’s “modes of persuasion"--logos, ethos, pathos--to be used with the “Reading Douglass’ Rhetoric” worksheet)
Worksheet: Analyzing Douglass’ Style
(Outline of the Elements of Style, to be used with the “Analyzing Douglass’ Style” worksheet)
Worksheet: Slave Spirituals: Myth and Reality
Worksheet: Irony Chart
Worksheet: Theme to Thesis
Worksheet:Characterization: What Virtues were Important to Douglass’ Greatness?
Writing Assignment: Autobiographical Paragraph
INTRODUCTION
The compelling autobiography of an extraordinary man born into slavery, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave is also a powerful inquiry into the question of what it means to be human. From the opening sentences of the narrative, Douglass delineates the context from which this question emerges—the fact that slave owners typically thought of slaves as animals. Douglass does not know how old he is, and he quickly asserts that this is not unusual, since most slaves “know as little of their ages as horses know of theirs” (p. 47). It is instructive that this initial comparison of slaves to animals does not serve to express something about the minds of the slave owners; instead, it expresses something about the minds of the slaves that is the consequence of being born into an environment constructed and carefully maintained by their owners. In an environment that does not permit the idea that slaves are human, the only perspective available to them is that of their owners. Their own perspective therefore becomes an additional barrier to thinking of themselves as human.
Learning to read and write is essential to the process whereby Douglass comes to see himself as human. As he describes it, the acquisition of these skills is inseparable from the dawning of self-consciousness. Reading gives Douglass access to a new world that opens before him, but the strongest effect of his literacy is the light it casts on the world he already knows. His anguish is so great that he “would at times feel that learning to read had been a curse rather than a blessing” (p. 84). It allows him to see his “wretched condition, without the remedy” (p. 84). Self-consciousness, the trait that most distinguishes humans from animals, produces such despair in Douglass that he confesses he often wished himself a beast.
Douglass portrays the breadth of slavery’s ability to dehumanize through his insights into the mentality of slave owners. Douglass suggests that if slaves are made rather than born, the same is sometimes true of slave owners. The mistress who began teaching him to read and write “at first lacked the depravity indispensable to shutting [him] up in mental darkness” (p. 81). Under the influence of her husband and, more generally, the institution of slavery, “the tender heart became stone, and the lamblike disposition gave way to one of tiger-like fierceness” (p. 82). The mistress not only stops teaching Douglass to read and write, but she is even more vigilant than her husband in preventing him from learning. The transformation of his mistress raises the question of how much of the behavior of slave owners toward their slaves was learned and how much was internally motivated. Douglass would have us believe that the mistress was the victim of her circumstances, yet the brutality other slave owners seemed to come by so easily makes it difficult to determine whether the behavior was learned or inherent.
Edward Covey undoubtedly counts among the slave owners who play the role as if born for it; his harsh treatment breaks Douglass “in body, soul, and spirit” (p. 105). Following his eloquent lament for the freedom he cannot have, represented by the ships sailing on Chesapeake Bay, Douglass writes, “You have seen how a man was made a slave; you shall see how a slave was made a man” (p. 107). The first part of this statement could refer to the methods employed by Covey, if not to all the owners at whose hands Douglass suffered. The second part refers to the story that follows, in which Douglass resists the whipping Covey intends to give him for disobeying. They fight for two hours, with Covey “getting entirely the worst end of the bargain” (p. 113). Douglass is never whipped again, and he describes this incident as “the turning-point in [his] career as a slave” and says that it “revived within [him] a sense of [his] own manhood” (p. 113). Douglass emphasizes the importance of literacy in developing his sense of himself as human. Is he suggesting, though, that his refusal to submit to Covey’s punishment was ultimately more important than his ability to read and write in shaping his sense of self?
In a letter that prefaces the narrative, Wendell Phillips, social activist and friend of Douglass’s, recalls “the old fable of ‘The Man and the Lion,’ where the lion complained that he should not be so misrepresented ‘when the lions wrote history’” (p. 43). As Phillips observes, Douglass’s narrative is history written from the perspective of those who previously had no voice. The very existence of the narrative makes it a testament to its author’s humanity and, therefore, a document of revisionist history. However, what gives Douglass’s narrative its universal relevance is his acute awareness of the complexities of human psychology. He observes that slaves usually spoke of themselves as content and of their masters as kind, concluding that slaves “suppress the truth rather than take the consequences of telling it, and in so doing prove themselves a part of the human family” (p. 62). Douglass is ever mindful that our humanity encompasses our failings no less than our capacity for nobility.
ABOUT FREDERICK DOUGLASS
Frederick DouglassFrederick Douglass was born into slavery in rural Maryland in 1818. Sent to work in Baltimore, he was taught to read by the mistress of the house and regarded this achievement as a turning point in his life. Another such point was his violent resistance to a beating by the man to whom he had been bound as a field slave at age seventeen. Three years later, he escaped to the North, married, and worked menial jobs until his debut as an orator at an antislavery convention in 1841.
To expand his audience and to document the authenticity of his story, Douglass published his autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, in 1845. The book was critically acclaimed and sold well both in the United States and in Europe. Douglass left for England later the same year, where he spent two years writing and lecturing. He returned to the United States after abolitionist friends purchased his legal emancipation.
From 1847 to 1863, Douglass published his own weekly paper, The North Star, leading to a break with his mentor William Lloyd Garrison. Douglass also produced a number of other periodicals, as well as two extensions of his narrative—Life and Times of Frederick Douglass and My Bondage and My Freedom. In 1848, he played a prominent role at the women’s rights convention in Seneca Falls, and he was a lifelong supporter of the women’s suffrage movement. During the Civil War he was an adviser to President Lincoln and recruited blacks, including his own sons, for the Union army. He was appointed to several government positions, including recorder of deeds for the District of Columbia and United States minister and consul general to Haiti. Douglass died in 1895.
What is Freedom?
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
1. Why does Douglass believe “Slavery proved as injurious to [his master’s wife] as it did to [him]” (p. 81)?
2. After his confrontation with Mr. Covey, what does Douglass mean when he writes “however long I might remain a slave in form, the day had passed forever when I could be a slave in fact” (p. 113)?
3. Why is Douglass able to “understand the deep meaning of those rude and apparently incoherent songs” (p. 57) sung by slaves only when he no longer is a slave himself?
4. When Douglass writes, “You have seen how a man was made a slave; you shall see how a slave was made a man” (p. 107), what does he understand a man to be?
5. Douglass describes knowledge as “valuable bread” (p. 83) and the Liberator, an anti-slavery paper, as his “meat and drink” (p. 151). How does literacy sustain him?
6. How is Douglass able to maintain his religious faith when that of his owners is used to justify their treatment of him?
7. Why does Douglass consider holiday celebrations as part of the “inhumanity of slavery” (p. 115)?
8. Why does Douglass describe the sails on Chesapeake Bay as “so many shrouded ghosts” (p. 106)?
9. To what extent should a piece of autobiographical writing be regarded as “factual”?
10. Can literacy be a curse as well as a blessing?
Free audio recording of entire book
A study of truth and justice
Background: A note on the historical accuracy of the play
A psychiatrist’s explanation of hysteria (scroll down for his discussion of the Salem Witch Trials)
Study Guide Questions crucible-study_guide.pdf
Complete Packet of Worksheets
By the time we finish studying this play, you will be expected to turn in the following materials:
A. A “conflicts” graphic organizer for Act One: Crucible-act1-conflict.pdf
B. A “changing status” graphic organizer for Act Two: Crucible-act2-status_changes.pdf
C. A “motivation” chart for Act Three: Crucible-act3-character.pdf
D. An “action/explanation” chart for Act FourCrucible-act4-character.pdf
In addition, you will need to write a 600-word essay about the play. Your essay should answer one of these questions:
1. How does Proctor’s major dilemma change in the course of the play?
2. How does Reverend Hale change during the play?
3. Compare or contrast the role of Abigail Williams with that of Elizabeth Proctor.
4. Which three characters are most to blame for the injustice that takes place in Salem?
5. Discuss Elizabeth as a symbol of truth.
In addition to the essay itself, you will need to turn in:
A. A completed “plot to theme” worksheet: http://www.flatheadreservation.org/images/phs/From_Plot_to_Theme-story_analysis.pdf
Here’s a sample worksheet that I filled out: http://www.flatheadreservation.org/images/phs/Notes_and_analysis_of_Crucible-truth_and_lies.pdf
B. A thesis/outline worksheet: http://www.flatheadreservation.org/images/phs/thesis-worksheet.pdf
Crucible-act4-status_changes.pdf
Crucible-act4-character.pdf
Crucible-act3-status.pdf
Writing About The Play
Plot to Theme worksheet: A Journey Toward Truth: John Proctor’s Choices in The Crucible
Story Analysis Worksheet
Posted by Michael L Umphrey on 11/15 at 11:43 PM
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A Poem by Wendell Berry
February 2, 1968
In the darkness of the moon, in flying snow, in the dead of winter,
war spreading, families dying, the world in danger,
I walk the rocky hillside, sowing clover.
- Wendell Berry
With only a date for a title, the poem invites contemplation about a particular moment in time. Anyone who remembers 1968 will suspect the poem is about trouble. During 1968 the Tet Offensive changed America’s attitude toward the Vietnam War; an incumbent president, Lyndon Johnson, announced he would not seek re-election; Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy were gunned down in public; and 12,000 police and 15,000 army regulars and National Guardsmen bloodily suppressed rioters at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. Trouble was everywhere, and the country seemed to be coming apart.
The day, February 2, calls to mind Groundhog Day-suggesting that the title might be intended symbolically-suggesting an ambiguous turning point, a day when we can hope the worst is over. But maybe not.
The poem begins with confirmation that it is, indeed, about trouble, a gathering of dark forces: the barren, snowswept imagery of night and winter, the swinging anapestic rhythm accelerated almost at once with quick iambs, the somber tone sustained through the final words: “dead of winter.”
The second line switches to a faster, more urgent trochaic rhythm, hard and driving, ratcheting up the pace and creating anticipation as the imagery becomes more strident, winter turning into war, militant “r” sounds harshly echoing and amplifying “winter” with a slant-rhyme: “danger.”
In two brief lines, the poet establishes a dark and troubled world with danger on the rise. Having been drawn into a sense of accelerating trouble, both in the imagery and in the rhythm, the reader expects the rising crescendo to continue, leading to fireworks of some sort in the final line.
But it doesn’t happen. Instead, the poet shifts to an iambic rhythm, the most natural rhythm in English-the basic rhythm of everyday speech. Everything relaxes. Disaster is averted, normalcy returns, and images of winter and war fade into an image of an ordinary springtime routine. The ominous sounds of “winter” and “danger” are transformed subtly into the green freshness of “clover.” Spring has arrived. In some sense, the world is in order.
Given what went before, a world of winter and war, is this enough? Is the poet’s response to the troubled world strong enough? Is his action-to be out planting clover-an adequate answer to the desolate world in which he lives?
There is more, of course. It isn’t a fertile field that he plants, but a rocky hillside, perhaps ruined by the short-sighted, abusive practices that Berry so eloquently laments in other writings. And he plants clover, a nitrogen-fixer that restores fertility to exhausted land. He isn’t merely doing spring planting, he is healing a place where life is hard because of neglect and shoddy work.
In a troubled world, he adopts a local focus: repairing his little bit of the earth and planting for the future, keeping the basic work of peace going. He tends to his own affairs, making his place more abundant, more beautiful, more productive. Is it enough?
I suppose we make our own answers, but for me the answer is “yes.” One response sane and intelligent response to trouble is to abandon trouble’s strident tones and rhythms, to leave the urge for a quick resolution which, in being quick, is bound to be violent.
Sometimes, taking a longer view and changing the rhythm is precisely the best we can do.
reading schedule
Monday, Nov 2: to page 299
Tues, 326
Wed 337
Thurs 356
Fri 586
Mon 405
Tues 434
Wed 460
Beginning paragraph
In romantic relationships, it’s often the case that the person who wants the least has the most power. This is true of the relationship between Ishmael and Hatsue, though this is not something Ishmael yet understands. He’s lost in yearning, caught up in a sort of angst-ridden bliss, at once content to simply be with Hatsue, filling up his senses with the sights and sounds of her body, and yet not content at all, sensing that there is more to her than he realizes and yearning to know all of her. Using the images of clam digging and the mingling of ocean waters, Guterson expresses both Ishmael’s quest to dig for something delectable below the surface and his mystical longing for something vast and unlimited. Unfortunately, Hatsue feels about things quite differently than Ishmael does, and this passage offers a series of contrast between them.
Poem by Robert Frost
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Today's Assignments
English 11:
Advanced English 11:
Mon, Feb 08
Assignment: Adv11 Work on Crucible Essay
In class: watch Crucible film
Homework: Do plot to theme worksheet for Crucible Essay. Do this for the essay topic you’ve chosen from this list:
You will need to write a 600-word essay that deals with one of these questions:
1. How does Proctor’s major dilemma change in the course of the play?
2. How does Reverend Hale change during the play?
3. Compare or contrast the role of Abigail Williams with that of Elizabeth Proctor.
4. Which three characters are most to blame for the injustice that takes place in Salem?
5. Discuss Elizabeth as a symbol of truth.
AP English 12:
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