Please answer the five prompts listed below: Short essay questions require at least six sentences each and you will need to reference the literary texts with quotes, paraphrases, or summaries (cited).
1. Identify the theme of Writs of Possession and discuss how sections 2, 3, 5, and 8 develop that theme, using evidence from the text to support your argument.
2. Using two short stories from this unit, discuss the differences between first person and third person narrator and how each affects the tone, organization, and theme of each story.
3. Using evidence from the text of Pretty Monsters, argue about who is the protagonist(s) and who/what is the antagonist(s). How does Link manipulate us as readers to root for the protagonist and against the antagonist (think about authors phrasing, organizational strategies, descriptive language)?
4. Some short stories we read this unit were relatively short, while others were considerably longer. Please pick one shorter short story and one longer short story and compare how their authors developed the pyramidal structure of fiction in each, with evidence from each text to make your point. Some things to consider: how long the exposition section lasted and why, where in the story the climax occured (ie, how much resolution followed), whether everything was resolved at the end of the story or not (ie, are there ‘loose ends’ and how do those affect the reader’s experience)?
5. The Yellow Wallpaper is very much a product of its time (1892), when psychology as a field of study was less than twenty years old and postpartum depression was not even known about, much less understood OR a legitimate diagnosis. Keeping the basic plot of the story the same (wife isolated from society by husband), how would you modernize Gilmans setting, complications, and climax to appeal to a 21rst-century audience?
For each prompt please read the stories below
1. Writs of Possession by Benjamin Percy
2. Girl by Jamaica Kincaid and A rose for Emily by William Faulkner
3. Pretty Monsters by Kelly Link
4. Girl by Jamaica Kincaid and The Faery Handbag by Kelly Link
5. The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkin Gilman
