INSTRUCTOR'S MANUAL
Instructor’s Manual
to accompany
FROM IDEA TO ESSAY
A Rhetoric, Reader, and Handbook
Eleventh Edition
Jo Ray McCuen
Glendale Community College
and
Anthony C. Winkler
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN
Boston New York
Contents
Part One: Comprehension Quizzes on Readings
Chapter Eight: Narration Quizzes 1
Chapter Nine: Description Quizzes 8
Chapter Ten: Example Quizzes 15
Chapter Eleven: Definition Quizzes 22
Chapter Twelve: Comparison/ Contrast Quizzes 29
Chapter Thirteen: Process Quizzes 36
Chapter Fourteen: Classification/ Division Quizzes 43
Chapter Fifteen: Causal Analysis Quizzes 50
Chapter Sixteen: Argumentation Quizzes 57
Part Two: Answers to Comprehension Quizzes on Readings and Exercises
Chapter Four: The Sentence 66
Chapter Five: The Paragraph 68
Chapter Six: Planning and Organizing the Essay 69
Chapter Seven: Drafting, Revising, and Style 72
Chapter Eight: Narration Answers 75
Chapter Nine: Description Answers 86
Chapter Ten: Example Answers 95
Chapter Eleven: Definition Answers 106
Chapter Twelve: Comparison/ Contrast Answers 115
Chapter Thirteen: Process Answers 128
Chapter Fourteen: Classification/ Division Answers 140
Chapter Fifteen: Causal Analysis Answers 150
Chapter Sixteen: Argumentation Answers 163
Chapter Nineteen: Writing the Research paper 176
Chapter Twenty: Grammar Fundamentals 179
Chapter Twenty-One: Correcting Common Errors 185
Preface
This Instructor’s Manual contains answers to all the questions and non-self-graded exercises in From Idea to Essay: A Reader, Rhetoric, and Handbook, Eleventh Edition. Although most of the exercises have one correct answer, a few of the Questions on Meaning and Technique are designed to evoke argument among the students and are therefore subject to several interpretive answers. These we have indicated with the expression, “Allow for open discussion.” In the handbook section, some exercises may have more than one acceptable solution. In such cases, the solutions provided serve as examples of appropriate student responses. References to pages in the main text are reproduced here where necessary.
For each of the professional selections in Chapters 8 through 16, this guide provides a simple, short multiple-choice quiz that may be used by the instructor to determine whether students have actually read the essay. In this edition of the manual, these quizzes are grouped together and featured first for easy access to the instructor. Each is printed on a separate sheet and may be reproduced and magnified with a copier. Answers to the quizzes are given in Part Two of this manual.
Possible uses for the Instructor’s Manual are numerous. The teacher can use the exercises and questions to test the students' mastery of the chapter, referring to the answers to facilitate marking. Or, the teacher may wish to reproduce the answers to selected chapters and distribute these to the students for self-testing.
JO RAY MCCUEN
ANTHONY C. WINKLER
PART ONE: COMPREHENSION QUIZZES ON READINGS
Chapters 8 through 16
CHAPTER EIGHT
Narration
The Code
Richard T. Gill
QUIZ
1. What incident first caused the narrator to question his religious faith?
_____ a. the divorce of his parents
_____ b. his unanswered prayer for a new car
_____ c. the death of his brother
_____ d. the amputation of his leg
2. Why did the narrator's father become angry with the aunts?
_____ a. because they were cooking too much food
_____ b. because they kept referring to the dead brother as a saint
_____ c. because they were singing too loudly
_____ d. because they were constantly quarreling
3. What major figure of World War II did the father most admire?
_____ a. Winston Churchill
_____ b. Franklin D. Roosevelt
_____ c. Charles de Gaulle
_____ d. Joseph Stalin
4. Where was the narrator when his father had a second heart attack?
_____ a. at home with the mother and aunts
_____ b. in a college dormitory
_____ c. vacationing in Hawaii
_____ d. on his way to Japan for the army
5. Why did the narrator want to beg his father's forgiveness?
_____ a. because he had not gone to college
_____ b. because he did not give his father the comfort of religion
_____ c. because he had not promised to take care of his mother
_____ d. because the narrator had always hated the father’s mistress
Richard Cory
Edwin Arlington Robinson
QUIZ
1. THE RICHARD CORY OF THE POEM IS
_____ a. dull but well-meaning.
_____ b. exceptionally glamorous.
_____ c. mean and power hungry.
_____ d. scholarly.
2. The “we” in the poem
_____ a. despise Richard Cory.
_____ b. pity Richard Cory.
_____ c. gang up on Richard Cory.
_____ d. envy Richard Cory.
3. One calm summer night, Richard Cory
_____ a. puts a bullet through his head.
_____ b. disappears forever.
_____ c. gives all of his money to the poor.
_____ d. admits that he is miserable and lonely.
A Gift of Laughter
Allan Sherman
Quiz
1. What gift was the son trying to give his father?
_____ a. a football
_____ b. a fruit bowl
_____ c. an erector set
_____ d. a drawing of his father
2. Why was the son trying to give his father a gift?
_____ a. because it was Hanukkah
_____ b. because his father's birthday was coming up
_____ c. because the son had gotten bad grades
_____ d. because he wanted his allowance increased
3. What was the name of the tough kid in the father's neighborhood?
_____ a. Gudgie
_____ b. Biff
_____ c. Spike
_____ d. Harry
4. What does the narrator say was the worst part about crying?
______ a. catching his breath
______ b. hiding his tears
______ c. feeling silly
______ d. trying to stop
5. What did the grandmother say about the narrator's gift?
_____ a. that anything from a child was beautiful
_____ b. that he misunderstood her
_____ c. that the color did not match the furniture
_____ d. that she did not know how he could afford it
Excerpt from Night
Elie Wiesel
Quiz
1. What old familiar fear did the author admit to having?
_____ a. that his mother would not keep up
_____ b. that he would lose his father
_____ c. that he would not find his sister
_____ d. that he would have nowhere to sleep
2. What no longer made an impression on the prisoners?
_____ a. the bad food
_____ b. the brutality of the guards
_____ c. the coarseness of the other inmates
_____ d. the sight of the crematory
3. What was the author's father stricken with?
_____ a. heart failure
_____ b. syphilis
_____ c. malaria
_____ d. dysentery
4. What did the author's father try to tell him?
_____ a. where the family's money and gold were buried
_____ b. how to escape the camp
_____ c. what medicine to take for the author's illness
_____ d. where the author's mother was hiding
5. How did the father's neighbors treat him?
_____a. they tried to help him.
_____ b. they beat him.
_____ c. they ignored him.
_____ d. they read scripture to him.
In Another Country
Ernest Hemingway
QUIZ
1. WHERE DID THE MEN FIND THEMSELVES EVERY AFTERNOON?
_____a. on the firing range
_____b. at the commissary
_____c. in the hospital
_____d. in church
2. What sport did the narrator play before the war?
_____a. ping-pong
_____b. basketball
_____c. soccer
_____d. football
3. Why did the man who had lost his nose in the war receive no medal?
_____a. He had been a spy against his country.
_____b. He had not been in the war long enough to earn a medal.
_____c. He refused a medal offered to him.
_____d. He wanted a gold medal, not a bronze one.
4. Why did the major insist that soldiers in a war should not marry?
_____a. Because he must not lose everything
_____b. Because a wife keeps a soldier from doing his best
_____c. Because a bachelor can have more fun than a married man
_____d. Because the army does not pay enough to keep a family
5. What did the major learn when he made his phone call?
_____a. He learned that the war was over.
_____b. He learned that his hand would need radiation treatments.
_____c. He learned that his wife had died.
_____d. He learned that his wife was pregnant.
The Tell-Tale Heart
Edgar Allan Poe
Quiz
1. Which of his senses does the narrator say was especially acute?
_____ a. his sense of taste
_____ b. his sense of smell
_____ c. his sense of vision
_____ d. his sense of hearing
2. Why did the narrator want to kill the old man?
_____ a. to steal the old man's money
_____ b. to revenge the old man’s insults
_____ c. to do away with the old man's eye
_____ d. to avoid having to pay the old man rent
3. What lantern did the narrator use to break into the old man's room?
_____ a. a ship's lantern
_____ b. a storm lantern
_____ c. a dark lantern
_____ d. a farmer's lantern
4. How did the narrator kill the old man?
_____ a. he threw the bed on top of him.
_____ b. he stabbed him to death.
_____ c. he shot him.
_____ d. he threw him out the window.
5. What did the narrator do with the old man’s body?
_____ a. he cut it up and buried it under the floorboards.
_____ b. he buried it in the garden.
_____ c. he hid it in the attic.
_____ d. he threw it in the river.
CHAPTER NINE
Description
The Lament
Anton Chekhov
Quiz
1. DURING WHAT TIME OF YEAR DOES THE STORY TAKE PLACE?
______ a. summer
______ b. winter
______ c. fall
______ d. spring
2. What does the central character do for a living?
______ a. drives a cab
______ b. runs a farm
______ c. makes shoes
______ d. facets diamonds
3. One of the men to address Iona impatiently is a
______ a. diabetic.
______ b. quadriplegic.
______ c. lunatic.
______ d. hunchback.
4. What is on Iona’s mind all during the story?
______ a. the death of his son
______ b. the marriage of his daughter
______ c. the illness of his wife
______ d. the impending Russian Revolution
5. To whom does Iona end up confiding his troubles?
______ a. his clients
______ b. his wife
______ c. his horse
______ d. his crucifix
Coats
Jane Kenyon
Quiz
1. WHAT WAS THE MAN OUTSIDE THE HOSPITAL CARRYING?
______ a. an umbrella
______ b. a bouquet
______ c. a hat
______ d. a woman's coat
2. What could the man’s sunglasses not conceal?
______ a. his wet face and bafflement
______ b. his guilty looks
______ c. his leering face
______ d. his smug expression
3. How was the weather that particular day?
______ a. rainy
______ b. foggy
______ c. it had just snowed.
______ d. fair and mild
4. What did the man do with his own coat?
______ a. he threw it in the garbage can.
______ b. he pawned it.
______ c. he gave it to a nearby panhandler.
______ d. he zipped it up on him.
5. What does the poem call the weather?
______ a. grim
______ b. a mockery
______ c. an ironic comment
______ d. a political statement
Mma Ramotswe Thinks about the Land
Alexander McCall Smith
QUIZ
1. In what continent does Mma Ramotswe live?
_____a. Asia
_____b. South America
_____c. Australia
_____d. Africa
2. What is described as “a slither of golden red ball”?
_____a. The sunrise
_____b. The mango blossoms
_____c. The banks of the Red River
_____d. Mma Ramotswe’s tiny van
3. Who leaped out of the bushes at the side of the road?
_____a. a lion
_____b. a hunter with a gun
_____c. a man who tried to flag down Mma Ramotswe
_____d. one of the local missionaries
4. Name the desert Mma Ramotswe had visited as a young girl.
_____a. Palm Desert
_____b. Lybia
_____c. Saudi Arabia
_____d. Kalahari
5. What were the tokoloshes?
_____a. supernatural beings
_____b. a nearby tribe
_____c. shoes worn in rain weather
_____d. birds of prey
The Monster
Deems Taylor
Quiz
1. THE MONSTER OF THE ESSAY IS
_____ a. Ludwig van Beethoven.
_____ b. Johann Sebastian Bach.
_____ c. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
_____ d. Richard Wagner.
2. The monster’s main character trait was supreme
_____ a. conceit.
_____ b. generosity.
______ c. loyalty to loved ones.
______ d. timidity.
3. The subject of the essay seemed to believe that
_____ a. World War II was inevitable.
_____ b. the world owed him a living.
_____ c. poetry was useless.
_____ d. wealthy men were unimportant.
4. The subject of the essay was unquestionably a
_____ a. handsome man.
_____ b. devoted father.
_____ c. musical genius.
_____ d. great military strategist.
5. The subject of the essay wrote thirteen
______ a. operas and music dramas.
______ b. symphonies and concertos.
______ c. pieces of chamber music.
______ d. works of jazz.
Sister Flowers
Maya Angelou
QUIZ
1. Which of the following characteristics best describes Mrs. Flowers?
_____a. snobbish elegance
_____b. shyness
_____c. aristocratic bearing
_____d. rudeness
2. How did the narrator meet Bertha Flowers?
_____a. at church
_____b. at the store where Momma worked
_____c. at the elementary school
_____d. at Mrs. Flowers’ house
3. What was the name of the narrator’s brother?
_____a. Bailey
_____b. Bruce
_____c. Buddy
_____d. Bert
4. Where had the narrator seen women like Mrs. Flowers?
_____a. at the movies
_____b. in some of the wealthy southern women’s homes
_____c. in Atlanta
_____d. in the novels she had read
5. Whose writing did the narrator memorize for Mrs. Flowers?
_____a. a biblical psalm
_____b. one of Shakespeare’s sonnets
_____c. a description from Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice
_____d. a passage from Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities
Laundromat
Susan Sheehan
Quiz
1. In what city is the laundromat located?
_____a. Miami
_____b. Detroit
_____c. San Juan
_____d. New York
2. The clothes are transferred in a “swooping motion”
_____a. from the pushcarts to the tables for folding.
_____b. from the tables to scales for weighing.
_____c. from the washers to the dryers for drying.
_____d. from one person to the next to speed up the work.
3. The laundromat smells of
_____a. dirty clothes.
_____b. soap and heat.
_____c. lavender water.
_____d. worn sneakers.
4. What is the constant number of people in the laundromat?
_____a. about twenty
_____b. about five
_____c. about sixty
_____d. about a dozen
5. Which of the following is NOT part of the Japanese boy’s load of
laundry?
_____a. a pair of Levis
_____b. a lacy slip
_____c. ruffled nightgown
_____d. embroidered rose buds
CHAPTER TEN
Example
We're Poor
Floyd Dell
Quiz
1. THE NARRATOR’S FATHER WAS HOME EVERY DAY BECAUSE
_____ a. he was seriously ill.
_____ b. the mother was working and he took care of the children.
_____ c. he was lazy and irresponsible.
_____ d. he was out of a job.
2. The little yellow envelope was to contain
_____ a. money for the poor.
_____ b. a Christmas wish list.
_____ c. verses from the Bible.
_____ d. a letter to the government.
3. What did the narrator whisper into the darkness?
_____ a. “I'm going to be President of the United States.”
_____ b. “When I grow up, I'm going to be rich.”
_____ c. “We're poor.”
_____ d. “I want to go to school.”
4. The narrator’s Christmas stocking contained a
_____ a. shiny new bicycle.
_____ b. bag of popcorn and a pencil.
_____ c. five-dollar bill.
_____ d. book by Charles Dickens.
5. The narrative ends with the words,
_____ a. “I didn't want anything.”
_____ b. “I hated rich people.”
_____ c. “I vowed to get a college education.”
_____ d. “I felt sorry for my parents.”
Eleanor Rigby
John Lennon and Paul McCartney
quiz
1. ON WHAT KINDS OF PEOPLE DO THE LYRICS FOCUS?
_____a. selfish people
_____b. lonely people
_____c. devoted Christians
_____d. war mongers
2. Where does Eleanor Rigby keep her face?
_____a. in front of the dirty mirror
_____b. always facing the North
_____c. hidden behind her hands
_____d. in a jar by the side of the door
3. What two activities preoccupy Father McKenzie?
_____a. writing sermons and darning his socks
_____b. riding a bicycle to town and buying tomatoes
_____c. grooming his dog and petting his cat
_____d. taking confession from imaginary people
4. When Eleanor Rigby died, what was buried along with her?
_____a. her pearl necklace
_____b. her diary
_____c. Father McKenzie’s photo
_____d. her name
5. The lyricist wonders
_____a. where all the lonely people come from.
_____b. why Eleanor Rigby was never married.
_____c. if Eleanor Rigby and Father McKenzie will go to heaven.
_____d. how much society is to blame for the fate of individuals.
How Near Death is a Near Death Experience?
Catherine Houck
QUIZ
1. WHICH OF THE FOLLOWING IS COMMON WHEN PEOPLE ARE NEAR DEATH?
_____ a. They are eager to return to normal life.
_____ b. They feel sad and lonely.
_____ c. They see a brilliant light.
_____ d. They climb a tall mountain.
2. Which of these is NOT a result of a near death experience?
_____a. a woman who had a hysterectomy
_____b. a man hit by a lightning bolt
_____c. a woman hooked up backward to a ventilator
_____d. a college student taking a drug overdose
3. According to the essay,
______a. NDEs are made up and thus untrue.
______b. NDEs are worthy of scientific study.
______c. NDEs are proof of the existence of God.
______d. NDEs are most likely to occur in church.
4. After a near death experience, many people
_____ a. are different from what they were before the experience.
______b. see medical doctors as the most loving professionals.
______c. give all of their money to the poor.
______d. want to remain single or get divorced.
5. According to Diane Sawyer, about all that’s clear is that
_____a. pain killers cause the near death experience.
______b. neither science nor religion can explain the NDE.
______c. the NDE is worse for children than grownups.
______d. all of us fade into darkness when we are near death.
What I’ve Learned From Men
Barbara Ehrenreich
QUIZ
1. Which of the following male characteristics should women emulate?
_____a. running a marathon
_____b. having an aura of power and control
_____c. being revered
_____d. not caring about respect
2. What did the prestigious professor do to anger the author?
_____a. He tried to fire her.
_____b. He talked incessantly about himself.
_____c. He made a sexual pass at her.
_____d. He ridiculed her knowledge of baseball.
What characteristic does the author attribute to some film stars?
_____a. a tough guy image
_____b. a sense of fairness
_____c. the image of being sexy
_____d. deep attachment to their roots
4. According to the author, women should stop
_____a. having so many babies.
_____b. wearing mini skirts.
_____c. manipulating men.
_____d. taking responsibility for making conversations go well.
5. Women need to learn from men
_____a. how to defend themselves in the work place.
_____b. how to be more patriotic.
_____c. how to deal with anger.
_____d. how to handle a gun.
Suing for Fun and Profit
Andy Rooney
QUIZ
1. What does Rooney say he's been thinking about doing?
_____a. Hiking the Appalachian Trail
_____b. Running for political office
_____c. Becoming a baseball umpire
_____d. Quitting work and making a living from suing
2. In Los Angeles a jury awarded a woman with lung cancer
_____a. $10 million.
_____b. $28 billion.
_____c. free hospital care for the rest of her life.
_____d. $1,500 per month for ten years.
3. Which companies have gone out of business because of law suits?
_____a. Manufacturers of motorcycles and speed boats
_____b. Manufacturers of snow skis and water skis
_____c. Manufacturers of diving boards and ladders
_____d. Manufacturers of electric blankets and bathroom nightlights
4. Whom did Caesar Barber sue?
_____a. McDonald’s, Burger King, KFC, and Wendy’s
_____b. Phillip Morris tobacco company
_____c. His own mother for cooking such high cholesterol foods
_____d. The local police department, a gun store, and a local armory
5. Whom would Rooney sue if he ever quits his present job?
_____a. The Writers Guild
_____b. FOX News
_____c. Dan Rather
_____d. CBS
The Word as Person: Eponyms
Don Farrant
Quiz
1. MELBA TOAST WAS NAMED AFTER A
_____ a. a Scottish engineer.
_____ b. an Australian soprano.
_____ c. an Italian chemist.
_____ d. a 19th-century American lacrosse player.
2. The Seventh Earl of Cardigan also led
_____ a. the Charge of the Light Brigade.
_____ b. the effort to cure measles.
_____ c. the University of Aberdeen.
_____ d. the search for the Northwest passage.
3. The word “boycott” was derived from
_____ a. the name of a St. Louis band leader.
_____ b. the name of a ship sunk in Crimea.
_____ c. the name of a lost tribe of Israel.
_____ d. the name of an unpopular land agent in Ireland.
4. "Mesmerism," after a German physician, is another term for
_____ a. biological symbiosis.
_____ b. a coronary condition.
_____ c. a theory about the dark side of the moon.
_____ d. hypnosis.
5. What is a Plimsoll mark?
_____ a. a loading mark on the side of a ship
_____ b. an Australian rugby out-of-bounds line
_____ c. the mark a cricket bowler steps on before his delivery
_____ d. a Heraldic term
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Definition
Arrangement in Black and White
Dorothy Parker
Quiz
1. WHO IS WALTER WILLIAMS?
_____ a. a French Impressionist painter
_____ b. a major in the Confederate army
_____ c. a black singer
_____ d. a director who makes arrangements for black-and-white films
2. What is the setting of the story?
_____ a. a funeral
_____ b. a wedding
_____ c. a church service
_____ d. a cocktail party
3. Whom does Burton visit in the kitchen every time he goes home?
_____ a. his ailing mother
_____ b. his black nurse
_____ c. the family cook
_____ d. the manor gardener
4. Why can’t the main character invite Walter Williams to her home?
_____ a. Her husband, Burton, would not allow it.
_____ b. Her home is not beautiful enough.
_____ c. The liberals in town would shun her.
_____ d. She and Williams have had a quarrel.
5. Whom does the main character call “a wonderful actress”?
_____ a. Shirley Temple
_____ b. Greta Garbo
_____ c. Katherine Burke
_____ d. Elizabeth Taylor
Incident
Countee Cullen
Quiz
1. WHEN THE INCIDENT TOOK PLACE, THE SPEAKER WAS VISITING THE CITY OF
_____ a. New York.
_____ b. Los Angeles.
_____ c. Baltimore.
_____ d. Washington, D.C.
2. When the speaker smiled, the other little boy
_____ a. smiled in return and said, “Hi.”
_____ b. kept looking straight ahead and ignored the speaker.
_____ c. asked him to play in the park with some local boys.
_____ d. poked out his tongue and called him “Nigger.”
3. Which of the following statements is most accurate, according to the speaker in the poem?
_____ a. Of all the things that happened between May and December, the speaker remembers only the confrontation with the little boy.
_____ b. The speaker considers this vacation the most enlightening he has ever spent.
_____ c. Never again will the speaker visit this particular city between May and December.
_____ d. The speaker vows to describe the incident to his own children as an object lesson.
We Aren’t Born Prejudiced
Ian Stevenson
QUIZ
1. What is prejudice?
_____ a. a true generalization
_____ b. a false generalization
_____ c. a kind of syllogistic thinking
_____ d. a kind of Zen reasoning
2. Which statement is false?
_____ a. ignorance is an opinion held because one knows no better.
_____ b. prejudice is an opinion not based on the facts.
_____ c. ignorance is a state of preparedness.
_____ d. ignorance is a lack of knowledge.
3. What does the writer call conforming prejudice?
_____ a. prejudice that conforms to popular opinion
_____ b. prejudice held in spite of popular opinion
_____ c. ingrained prejudice
_____ d. prejudice that is not believed
4. Which of these statements is true?
_____ a. prejudiced thinking is always confined to one subject.
_____ b. prejudiced thinking is rarely confined to one subject.
_____ c. prejudice is rare in Wyoming.
_____ d. prejudice can be treated by a drug.
5. A common type of prejudice is based on
_____ a. guilt.
_____ b. not attending college.
_____ c. membership in a certain religion.
_____ d. a deep sense of insecurity.
Will Someone Please Hiccup My Pat?
William Spooner Donald
Quiz
1. WHICH OF THE FOLLOWING DOES NOT DESCRIBE SPOONER AS A YOUNG MAN?
_____ a. defective hearing
_____ b. poor physique
_____ c. stammer
_____ d. weak eyesight
2. A spoonerism is best defined as
_____ a. an irony of word association.
_____ b. a hilarious joke.
_____ c. a linguistic transposition.
_____ d. a humorously misspelled word.
3. By profession, Spooner was a(n)
_____ a. high school teacher.
_____ b. priest.
_____ c. butcher.
_____ d. army officer.
4. By “an ordinary signifying glass,” Spooner really meant a
_____ a. drinking glass.
_____ b. mirror.
_____ c. windowpane.
_____ d. magnifying glass.
5. The author states that Spooner was
_____ a. happily married.
_____ b. never married.
_____ c. unhappily married.
_____ d. married three times.
Jim Crow Days
Sarah L. and A. Elizabeth Delany
QUIZ
1. JIM CROW LAWS WERE ENACTED TO
_____a. help slaves run away from their masters.
_____b. make sure that Negroes served in the Union army.
_____c. keep Negroes separate from whites.
_____d. keep Washington Carver from being elected.
2. According to the author,
_____a. few white people in those days were free of Negro blood.
_____b. the Negroes were smarter than the whites.
_____c. whites often earned less money than blacks.
_____d. Negroes were more religious than Caucasians.
3. The author’s father did not often shop at white stores because
_____a. they were more expensive than black stores.
_____b. he was afraid of being lynched.
_____c. all he could buy in white stores were the leftovers.
_____d. he felt that black store owners needed the business.
4. How were the white teachers viewed at Saint Aug’s?
_____a. They were viewed as outcasts for helping the Negro race.
_____b. They were seen as heroes by Abraham Lincoln.
_____c. They were seen as cruel masters by the Negro students.
_____d. They were viewed as religious fanatics.
5. The narrator’s grandfather was
_____a. a relative of Jim Crow.
_____b. lynched for running away from his white master.
_____c. white.
_____d. a Roman Catholic.
Black English Has Its Place
Ron Emmons
Quiz
1. WHICH OF THE FOLLOWING STATEMENTS WAS MADE BY THE AUTHOR?
_____ a. “Until I became an adult, I spoke only black English.”
_____ b. “I was taught throughout childhood to loathe black English.”
_____ c. “Black English is more powerful than regular English.”
_____ d. “Black English should be honored by grammarians.”
2. According to the author, black English is
_____ a. demeaning to Blacks.
_____ b. an aspect of the English language that should be abolished.
_____ c. gang-related.
_____ d. respectable and has enriched the fabric of American English.
3. Which of these did NOT bewilder older teachers:
_____ a. “def”
_____ b. “dis”
_____ c. “for the heck of it”
_____ d. “hit the skins”
4. How does the author use black English in his composition classes?
_____ a. To point out how multilingual the students are
_____ b. To point out how creative and inventive their culture is
_____ c. None of the above
_____ d. Both of the above
5. One conclusion drawn in the essay is that
_____ a. usage should be appropriate to the circumstance.
_____ b. black English users will remain powerless in life.
_____ c. the English language needs complete reformation.
_____ d. the university should teach more grammar.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Comparison/Contrast
The Dream House
Anthony C. Winkler
QUIZ
1. After moving from Jamaica to California, Jessie’s family
_____a. became extremely poor and remained poor.
_____b. eventually became quite wealthy.
_____c. contracted asthma from the Los Angeles smog.
_____d. made a decent living when the father became a car mechanic.
2. It took Mr. Peterson only two weeks to build
_____a. a vacation cabin in the mountains.
_____b. a computer for Josh.
_____c. a vacuum for his wife.
_____d. a deck off the kitchen.
3. Jessie’s dad’s house was made of
_____a. imaginary ingredients.
_____b. birch twigs.
_____c. materials borrowed from a neighbor.
_____d. bricks and mortar.
4. How many people could see Jessie’s playhouse?
_____a. ten people
_____b. three people
_____c. nobody
_____d. everybody
5. When summer ended, Mr. Peterson
_____a. had a heart attack.
_____b. built another playhouse.
_____c. filed for a divorce.
_____d. became a stock broker.
The Twins
Charles Bukowski
Quiz
1. THE SPEAKER’S FATHER DIED
_____ a. in a hotel room.
_____ b. on the kitchen floor.
_____ c. in a hospital bed.
_____ d. on a ship at sea.
2. He left his money to
_____ a. his son.
_____ b. the American Cancer Society.
_____ c. a woman in Duarte.
_____ d. the church.
3. The speaker stands in front of a mirror wearing
_____ a. hippy clothes.
_____ b. a tennis outfit.
_____ c. a blue jogging suit.
_____ d. his father's suit.
Diogenes and Alexander
Gilbert Highet
Quiz
1. DIOGENES LIVES LIKE A TYPICAL
_____ a. monk.
_____ b. king.
_____ c. beggar.
_____ d. soldier.
2. Diogenes believed that privacy was not necessary because
_____ a. natural acts were not shameful.
_____ b. privacy inevitably caused strife and war.
_____ c. it alienated human beings from each other.
_____ d. it promoted aristocracy.
3. Who was Alexander the Great’s teacher?
_____ a. Plato
_____ b. Sophocles
_____ c. Diogenes
_____ d. Aristotle
4. Alexander was in Corinth to
_____ a. study the Odyssey and the Iliad.
_____ b. learn Greek.
_____ c. find an appropriate wife.
_____ d. take command of the League of Greek States.
5. When Diogenes saw Alexander, Diogenes said,
_____ a. “Stand to one side. You’re blocking the sunlight.”
_____ b. “You won’t be happy until he wipes your nose for you.”
_____ c. “I am trying to find a man.”
_____ d. “You must restamp the currency.”
Grant and Lee
Bruce Catton
QUIZ
1. WHERE DID ROBERT E. LEE SURRENDER TO ULYSSES S. GRANT?
_____ a. At the White House in Washington, D.C.
_____ b. At the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland
_____ c. At the court house in Atlanta, Georgia
_____ d. At Appomattox, Virginia
2. How did Grant and Lee differ in social background?
_____ a. Lee was an aristocrat, Grant a western frontier man.
_____ b. Lee had traveled all over the world, Grant only the U.S.
_____ c. Lee suffered from asthma; Grant was healthy.
_____ d. Lee was a poor military strategist, Grant a brilliant one.
3. The men who followed Grant believed that
_____ a. Napoleon was their great model to emulate.
_____ b. life was competition, and everyone had a chance to win.
_____ c. victory was more important than truth.
_____ d. no slaves should be liberated.
4. The men who followed Lee believed that
_____ a. the landed nobility justified itself.
_____ b. Lee was not tough enough on northerners.
_____ c. money was more important than land.
_____ d. the Confederacy offered a miserably restricted life.
5. What did both men share in common? They both
_____ a. believed that the end justified the means.
_____ b. were unfaithful husbands.
_____ c. wanted peace and reconciliation.
_____ d. loved animals.
Priest and Pagan
Arthur Grimble
quiz
1. THIS ESSAY COMPARES AND CONTRASTS
_____ a. two different approaches to peaceful human death.
_____ b. Athens and Rome, representing two religions.
_____ c. the death of a priest with the death of a native.
_____ d. the foods eaten by Christians and native islanders.
2. What regulation did Father Choblet break?
_____ a. the regulation against hunting baby seals
_____ b. the regulation against trying to convert the natives
_____ c. the regulation against canoe voyages between islands
_____ d. the regulation against drinking liquor
3. What heroic deed was performed by Tabanaora?
_____ a. He walked over red hot coals.
_____ b. He saved ten people from drowning in a canoe.
_____ c. He sucked snake poison out of a child’s arm.
_____ d. He had a duel with a tiger shark.
4. What did Tabanaora do to save Tebina from everlasting extinction?
_____ a. He had to recover a limb for the death ritual.
_____ b. He had to find a priest who would baptize Tebina.
_____ c. He had to find Tebina a bride for his life in paradise.
_____ d. He had to bury him with a shark’s tooth.
5. What character trait did Father Choblet and Tabanora share?
_____ a. They were both angry men.
_____ b. They were both brave men.
_____ c. They were both easily frightened.
_____ d. They were both humorous.
Beauty Is in the Eye of the Beholder
Lee Dembart
QUIZ
1. What position does the author favor with respect to mind and brain?
_____a. the biological position
_____b. the position supported by her university
_____c. the reductionist position
_____d. the position found in the New Testament
2. Somewhere in the brain, the physical sensation
_____a. is erased completely.
_____b. is turned into a mental sensation.
_____c. is directed toward the pancreas.
_____d. is transferred to the nerves of the body.
3. Asking where vision comes from is like asking
_____a. where clouds come from.
_____b. where hearing comes from.
_____c. where laughter comes from.
_____d. where consciousness comes from.
4. In one experiment, subjects were told to
_____a. bend their finger.
_____b. look up into the sky.
_____c. cross their eyes.
_____d. burst a balloon.
5. According to Jack D. Cowan,
_____a. biology can learn a lot from physics.
_____b. geophysics will some day tell us how the eye works.
_____c. physics is easy compared to biology.
_____d. the eye can be used without our understanding of how it works.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Process
How Mr. Hogan Robbed a Bank
John Steinbeck
Quiz
1. WHEN DID MR. HOGAN COMMIT THE CRIME?
_____ a. on Thanksgiving Eve
_____ b. on Christmas Day
_____ c. on Saturday before Labor Day
_____ d. on Easter Sunday
2. What was Mr. Hogan’s how-to method for bank robbery?
_____ a. leave out the hullabaloo and hanky-panky
_____ b. do it only at night
_____ c. concentrate on getting to know the teller
_____ d. take only the big unmarked bills
3. Who died the year that Mr. Hogan robbed the bank?
_____ a. Mr. Hogan’s mother
_____ b. Mrs. Hogan’s brother
_____ c. Mr. Hogan’s first-born child
_____ d. Mrs. Hogan
4. What contest did Mr. Hogan’s children enter?
_____ a. a beauty contest
_____ b. a bicycle racing contest
_____ c. the “I Love America” essay contest
_____ d. a cookie baking contest
5. What kind of mask did Mr. Hogan wear during the bank robbery?
_____ a. a cardboard Mickey Mouse mask
_____ b. a Lone Ranger mask
_____ c. a Halloween mask
_____ d. a bandanna that covered his face
Tract
William Carlos Williams
Quiz
1. ACCORDING TO THE POEM, WHAT COLORS SHOULD NOT BE USED FOR A HEARSE?
______a. blue and yellow
______ b. green and pink
______ c. pink and purple
______ d. black and white
2. What, according to the poem, should a hearse be like?
______ a. embroidered with cushions
______ b. fancy and trimmed
______ c. rough and plain
______ d. motorized
3. What does the poet expressly ban from funerals?
______ a. mourners
______ b. parades
______ c. personal mementos of the deceased
______ d. wreaths and hothouse flowers
4. What does the poet suggest the hearse driver do?
______ a. drive the hearse with dignity
______ b. wear a silk hat
______ c. dress in black
______ d. hold the reins and walk beside the hearse
5. What sort of procession does the poem recommend for a funeral?
______ a. one in which the mourners follow in cars
______ b. one in which the mourners walk behind the hearse
______ c. one in which the mourners play music
______ d. one in which the mourners dress gaily
In the Garden of Childish Delights
Emily Fox Gordon
QUIZ
1. What jobs did the author’s parents hold?
____a. The father was a janitor, and the mother was a waitress.
____b. The father was a professor, and the mother was a faculty wife.
____c. The father was a priest, and the mother was a professor.
____d. The father owned a store, and the mother worked in the store.
2. White kind of dog accompanied the author to the library?
____a. a Saint Bernard
____b. a golden retriever
____c. a German shepherd
____d. a Great Dane
3. Before going to school, the author had been
____a. shy and lonely.
____b. undisciplined and disobedient.
____c. given to temper tantrums.
____d. a charming, lively child
4. How old is the author at the time of writing this essay?
____a. 56
____b. 86
____c. 26
____d. 36
5. To whom is the Williamstown of the author’s memory eerily accessible?
____a. to everyone who reads her memoir
____b. only to the author’s family
____c. only to the author
____d. to all little children
In the Valley of the Shadow
Carl Sagan
Quiz
1. HOW MANY TIMES DID THE AUTHOR FACE DEATH?
_____ a. two times
_____ b. he never did
_____ c. five times
_____ d. six times
2. What does the author say he would love to believe but can't?
_____ a. That there is life after death
_____ b. That life exists on other planets
_____ c That miracles happen
_____ d. That medical doctors are not in medicine for the money
3. Whose bone marrow did the author receive in a transplant?
_____ a. His mother's
_____ b. His sister's
_____ c. His twin brother's
_____ d. An anonymous donor's found on the Internet
4. What movie did the author and his wife co-write and co-produce?
_____ a. Space Sluts in the Slammer
_____ b. Contact
_____ c. The Annihilation of Fish
_____ d. Pulp Fiction
5. The author frequently quotes William John Rogers. Who is he?
_____ a. A passenger who went down with the Titanic
_____ b. A poet
_____ c. A Victorian novelist
_____ d. A short story writer from New York
Coming Into Language
Jimmy Santiago Baca
Quiz
1. WHY DOES THE AUTHOR LAND IN PRISON THE FIRST TIME?
_____ a. He forged a check.
_____ b. A friend blamed him for raping the friend’s girlfriend.
_____ c. He would not explain a cut on his forearm.
_____ d. He failed a lie detector test about a murder.
2. Harry, who was the author’s pen pal, sent him
_____ a. a popular spy novel.
_____ b. a book by Mary Baker Eddy.
_____ c. the Bible.
_____ d. Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn.
3. After serving time on death-row, the author was moved to
______ a. the tier that housed the mentally disturbed.
______ b. a new prison in Georgia.
______ c. Mexico.
______ d. Alcatraz.
4. From the time he was seven, teachers had punished him by
_____ a. slapping his hand.
_____ b. making him write “I will do better” a hundred times.
_____ c. calling him “stupid.”
_____ d. making him write lines on the chalkboard.
5. At one point the author describes how some detectives in the county jail
_____ a. kicked some poor drunk to his knees.
_____ b. spit on a prostitute dying of AIDS.
_____ c. called a homeless woman “damned disgusting.”
_____ d. burned a runaway kid with a cigarette.
How to Say Nothing in 500 Words
Paul Roberts
Quiz
1. THE COMPOSITION ASSIGNED IS ON THE SUBJECT OF
_____ a. a special vacation.
_____ b. college football.
_____ c. a favorite teacher.
_____ d. your favorite U.S. President.
2. Which of the following was not advice given by the author?
_____ a. Get rid of obvious padding.
_____ b. Slip out of abstraction.
_____ c. Call a fool a fool.
_____ d. Choose subjects familiar to your reader.
3. The author says that students often "hedge" in their writing because they
_____ a. want to deceive the instructor.
_____ b. have not prepared for the essay.
_____ c. feel inexperienced and incompetent.
_____ d. are trying to imitate great writers.
4. Expressions such as "to all practical intents and purposes" are
_____ a. pat expressions.
_____ b. important guideposts for the reader.
_____ c. excessively intellectual.
_____ d. useful when developing an argument.
5. "Colored" words are words
_____ a. calculated to produce a picture.
_____ b. loaded with associations.
_____ c. used by black writers.
_____ d. not found in the dictionary.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Classification/Division
Harrison Bergeron
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
Quiz
1. THE STORY BELONGS TO THE LITERARY CATEGORY OF
_____ a. parable.
_____ b. biography.
_____ c. mythology.
_____ d. science fiction.
2. The ballerinas in the story were burdened with weights so that
_____ a. they would develop strong muscles.
_____ b. their dancing would be noisy.
_____ c. their dancing would not excel.
_____ d. no other company would want them.
3. The duty of the Handicapper General was to
_____ a. make everyone the same.
_____ b. get rid of handicaps.
_____ c. experiment on handicapped people in the name of science.
_____ d. improve all quality of life.
4. Harrison Bergeron was sent to jail because he
_____ a. stole a loaf of bread.
_____ b. was talented, intelligent, and individualistic.
_____ c. was accused of being a communist terrorist.
_____ d. refused to marry the Handicapper General.
5. At the end of the story, Harrison Bergeron is
_____ a. allowed to marry the ballerina.
_____ b. praised by Diana Moon Glampers.
_____ c. shot by the Handicapper General.
_____ d. elected to be the next Handicapper General.
All the World’s a Stage
William Shakespeare
Quiz
1. HOW MANY AGES IN LIFE DOES SHAKESPEARE DESCRIBE?
_____ a. five
_____ b. ten
_____ c. seven
_____ d. three
2. Which age describes someone “sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything”?
_____ a. the first—babyhood
_____ b. the fourth—maimed soldier
_____ c. the last—senility
_____ d. none—the poem is about youth
3. According to Shakespeare, the world is a stage. Who are the actors?
_____ a. dramatists
_____ b. lawyers
_____ c. all human beings
_____ d. only people who understand life
The Plot Against the People
Russell Baker
Quiz
1. IN THIS ESSAY THE AUTHOR IS CLASSIFYING
_____ a. animals.
_____ b. tools.
_____ c. people.
_____ d. inanimate objects.
2. Which of the following items are difficult to break down:
_____ a. pliers, gloves, batteries
_____ b. pliers, lawn mowers, furnaces
_____ c. pliers, gloves, keys
_____ d. pliers, automobiles, garbage disposals
3. The third class listed is those things that
_____ a. don’t work.
_____ b. work all of the time.
_____ c. make work for others.
_____ d. work if you take care of them.
4. Which category has given man the only peace he receives from the things described?
_____ a. things that always work
_____ b. things that don’t work
_____ c. things that are well made
_____ d. things owned by others
Three Types of Resistance to Oppression
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Quiz
1. ACCORDING TO DR. KING, WHY IS ACQUIESCENCE TO OPPRESSION IMMORAL?
_____ a. because one will never win one’s freedom with acquiescence
_____ b. because to accept an unjust system is to cooperate with it
_____ c. because acquiescence is taken as proof of inferiority
_____ d. because an oppressor does not respect acquiescence
2. What two opposites does nonviolent resistance seek to reconcile?
_____ a. anger and determination
_____ b. frustration and humility
_____ c. hope and love
_____ d. acquiescence and violence
3. Why is violence unworkable for winning civil rights?
_____ a. because the racist powers are too strong
_____ b. because too many people would be killed
_____ c. because violence would lead to civil war
_____ d. because violence is both impractical and immoral
4. Against whom does Dr. King say nonviolent resistance is aimed?
_____ a. against oppression
_____ b. against the southern power structure
_____ c. against the Ku Klux Klan
_____ d. against racist northern states
5. How does Dr. King regard the struggle for civil rights?
_____ a. as a struggle between groups
_____ b. as a struggle between methods
_____ c. as a struggle between geographic regions
_____ d. as a struggle between justice and injustice
College Pressures
William Zinsser
Quiz
1. WHO IS CARLOS HORTAS, TO WHOM THE DESPERATE NOTES ARE ADDRESSED?
_____a. dean at the students’ college
_____b. president of Yale University
_____c. student body president
_____d. captain of the Yale football team
2. Which of the following pressures is NOT listed in the essay?
_____a. dating pressure
_____b. economic pressure
_____c. parental pressure
_____d. peer pressure
3. What do students often do when assigned a five-page paper?
_____a. They will get a paper off the Internet and hand it in.
_____b. They will hand in a shorter paper than required.
_____c. They will hand in a longer paper than required.
_____d. They will hand in the paper late.
4. Why are drama productions popular with students?
_____a. Students hope to become famous actors.
_____b. Acting gets students into a make-believe world.
_____c. These productions are self-limiting
_____d. Participants get to know each other.
5. Ultimately, who will have to break the circle of student pressures?
_____a. the college administration
_____b. the college teachers
_____c. the students’ parents
_____d. the students themselves
Mother Tongue
Amy Tan
QUIZ
1. WHAT DOES THE AUTHOR SAY MADE HER UNCOMFORTABLE DURING HER SPEECH?
_____ a. the presence of her grandmother
_____ b. her broken English
_____ c. her misquoting her brother
_____ d. her mother was in the audience
2. What kind of English did the author speak with her mother?
_____ a. Standard English
_____ b. Conversational English
_____ c. Broken English
_____ d. A mix of English and Chinese
3. About whom did the author's mother tell her a story?
_____ a. About a gangster in Shanghai
_____ b. About Franklin D. Roosevelt
_____ c. About Charles de Gaulle
_____ d. About Joseph Stalin
4. As a child, how did the author feel about her mother's English?
_____ a. She was indifferent to it.
_____ b. She was ashamed of it.
_____ c. She admired it.
_____ d. She did not understand it.
5. What effect did her mother’s English have on the author?
_____ a. It had no effect.
_____ b. It affected her scores on achievement tests.
_____ c. It affected her ability to speak Chinese.
_____ d. It left her with an accent.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Causal Analysis
The Girls in Their Summer Dresses
Irwin Shaw
Quiz
1. IN WHAT CITY DOES THE STORY TAKE PLACE?
_____ a. Chicago
_____ b. San Francisco
_____ c. Los Angeles
_____ d. New York
2. What does Michael do that Frances finds annoying?
_____ a. He propositions women.
_____ b. He looks at women.
_____ c. He sucks his teeth noisily.
_____ d. He was unfaithful to her five times in five years.
3. How does Frances resolve her differences with Michael?
_____ a. She doesn’t really.
_____ b. She divorces him.
_____ c. She agrees to a trial separation.
_____ d. She goes home to her mother.
4. What is the relationship between Michael and Frances?
_____ a. They are living together.
_____ b. She is his mistress.
_____ c. They date.
_____ d. They are married.
5. With whom were Michael and Frances supposed to go to the country?
_____ a. the Joneses
_____ b. the Stevensons
_____ c. the Blinkersmiths
_____ d. the Howards
Money
Victor Contoski
Quiz
1. AT FIRST MONEY WILL SEEM
_____ a. of no use to a wise person.
_____ b. the only important possession.
_____ c. tame and willing to be domesticated.
_____ d. illusive and unattainable.
2. Money is like an ameba because it
_____ a. makes love in secret only to itself.
_____ b. is a parasite that lives on others.
_____ c. keeps multiplying on its own.
_____ d. is the basis of life.
3. Money will
_____ a. make your friends jealous.
_____ b. popularize you among your friends.
_____ c. make you lose all of your friends.
_____ d. delight your friends.
4. One day money will
_____ a. disappear and leave you bankrupt.
_____ b. no longer have any value to society.
_____ c. bite you gently on the hand.
_____ d. kick you as a strong horse would.
Mary Todd Lincoln
Irving Stone
Quiz
1. THE NORTH ACCUSED MARY TODD LINCOLN OF BEING
_____ a. an outsider.
_____ b. a sell-out.
_____ c. a renegade.
_____ d. a spy.
2. Who committed Mary Todd Lincoln to a sanatorium?
_____ a. her daughter
_____ b. her niece
_____ c. her son
_____ d. her nephew
3. What base and ugly charge was made against Mary Todd Lincoln?
_____ a. that her husband did not love her
_____ b. that she was mad
_____ c. that she wanted the South to win
_____ d. that she was extravagant
4. What caused the beginning of Mary Todd Lincoln’s ill health?
_____ a. the assassination of her husband
_____ b. the death of her mother
_____ c. the death of her son William
_____ d. the Civil War
5. To what popular movement did Mary Todd Lincoln turn for comfort?
_____ a. mesmerism
_____ b. hypnotism
_____ c. jingoism
_____ d. spiritualism
Why We Crave Horror
Stephen King
Quiz
1. WHO DOES THE AUTHOR THINK IS MENTALLY ILL?
_____ a. himself
_____ b. his family
_____ c. all of us
_____ d. Southerners
2. What is one reason we go to horror movies?
_____ a. to prove that we can take it
_____ b. to make out
_____ c to see who's in the theater
_____ d. to find air-conditioning comfort
3. Who has to be let out to roll around and scream once in a while?
_____ a. the mother inside us
_____ b. the potential lyncher within us
_____ c. the saint within
_____ d. The frightened inner self
4. To what does the mythic horror movie appeal?
_____ a. the best in us
_____ b. the adult in us
_____ c. the worst in us
_____ d. our imagination
5. According to the author, who needs to be kept fed?
_____ a. the sadist
_____ b. the poet
_____ c. the gators
_____ d. the tigers
Grow Up? Not So Fast
Lev Grossman
QUIZ
1. What is the average age today for a woman to get married and have a baby?
_____a. 30 and 40
_____b. 18 and 21
_____c. 21 and 22
_____d. 25 and 25
2. According to Grossman’s essay, the twixters are not lazy but are simply
_____a. reaping the benefits of decades of American affluence.
_____b. escaping a military draft.
_____c. much more close to their parents than in the past.
_____d. waiting to enroll in graduate school to get a better job.
3. Twixters expect to jump laterally from job to job and place to place until
_____a. their parents cut off their money supply.
_____b. an easy job is available.
_____c. they find what they’re looking for.
_____d. society shows them that they are appreciated for the talents.
4. The transition to adulthood is more difficult
_____a. for those on the lower educational or economic ladder.
_____b. for sons whose fathers are ambitious for their offspring.
_____c. for immigrants with several children.
_____d. for girls than for boys.
5. Who sang the hit song “I’m Not a Girl, Not Yet a Woman”?
_____a. Madonna
_____b. Britney Spears
_____c. Julia Roberts
_____d. Janet Jackson
Black Men and Public Space
Brent Staples
Quiz
1. WHO WAS THE AUTHOR'S FIRST VICTIM?
_____ a. a bank
_____ b. his family
_____ c. a young woman
_____ d. a street preacher
2. Where did the author encounter his first victim?
_____ a. in Chicago's Hyde Park
_____ b. in Los Angeles
_____ c in Atlanta
_____ d. in Paris, France
3. What thunk thunk noise does the author often hear?
_____ a. the sounds of weapons being cocked
_____ b. the sounds of car door locks slamming shut
_____ c. the sounds of his own heart
_____ d. the sounds of a tapping foot
4. What does the author say about young black males?
_____ a. they are over-represented among attackers of women.
_____ b. they are not fearful to another black.
_____ c. they are often willing to compromise.
_____ d. they are misunderstood.
5. What melodies does the author often whistle as he walks?
_____ a. selections from rap artists
_____ b. oldies from the Supremes
_____ c. light ballads
_____ d. melodies from Beethoven and Vivaldi
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Argumentation
War
Luigi Pirandello
Quiz
1. IN WHAT SETTING DOES THIS STORY UNFOLD?
_____ a. the piazza of a fashionable restaurant
_____ b. the waiting room of a Rome medical center
_____ c. the banks of the river Arno, in Florence
_____ d. the second-class carriage of a railway car
2. What do the people at first argue about?
_____ a. whether it is worse to have one son at the front or two
_____ b. whether it is better to have sons than daughters
_____ c. whether the war is immoral or moral
_____ d. whether Italy should side with the Austro-Hungarian Empire
3. What is peculiar about the mouth of the fat traveler?
_____ a. He has a harelip.
_____ b. He wears gold braces.
_____ c. He has a badly trimmed mustache.
_____ d. He has two front teeth missing.
4. What does the fat traveler say about himself?
_____ a. that he has lost a son but does not mourn
_____ b. that he has lost three sons in the war
_____ c. that he lost his wife to a German soldier
_____ d. that he lost a daughter and a son in the trenches
5. What does the woman say to the old traveler that causes him to weep?
_____ a. “Then ... is your son really dead?”
_____ b. “I, too, weep for my fallen children.”
_____ c. “Your wife must have been a wonderfully brave woman.”
_____ d. “War is a nasty business.”
Dooley Is a Traitor
James Michie
Quiz
1. WHY HAS DOOLEY BEEN BROUGHT UP BEFORE THE JUDGE?
_____ a. because he refuses to fight
_____ b. because he has committed manslaughter
_____ c. because he has deserted from the army
_____ d. because he has stolen war material
2. What does the judge specifically forbid Dooley to do in the courtroom?
_____ a. take the Fifth Amendment
_____ b. smoke
_____ c. chew tobacco
_____ d. read the Bible out loud
3. How does Dooley say he would react to a foe attacking his sister?
_____ a. He says he would pray for the foe.
_____ b. He says he would call the police.
_____ c. He says he would knock his brains out.
_____ d. He says he would scream for help.
4. Of what crime does Dooley admit to being guilty?
_____ a. stealing
_____ b. rape
_____ c. kidnapping
_____ d. murder
5. What happens to Dooley at the end of the poem?
_____ a. He is sentenced to die.
_____ b. He is given a life term.
_____ c. He is let go.
_____ d. He is made to do alternative service.
The Case Against Man
Isaac Asimov
Quiz
1. WHAT IS THE FIRST MISTAKE IN THINKING ABOUT MAN?
_____ a. to think of mankind as a thing in itself
_____ b. to separate mankind from womankind
_____ c. to regard mankind as an animal
_____ d. to think that man has a soul
2. To what disease does Asimov compare man?
_____ a. tuberculosis
_____ b. AIDS
_____ c. measles
_____ d. cancer
3. What was the estimated population at the time of Julius Caesar?
_____ a. two billion
_____ b. 150 million
_____ c. 10 million
_____ d. 25 million
4. What does Asimov argue vehemently that mankind must do?
_____ a. alter the food shipment system
_____ b. aim for planetary migration
_____ c. lower the birthrate
_____ d. stop manufacturing plastic containers
5. In how many years will the population of the earth double?
_____ a. 35
_____ b. 1,000
_____ c. 1,200
_____ d. 500
I Want a Wife
Judy Syfers Brady
Quiz
1. WHAT TRIGGERED THE AUTHOR'S MUSING ABOUT A WIFE?
_____ a. the divorce of a male friend
_____ b. her own divorce
_____ c. her mother's bad marriage
_____ d. a dream
2. The author says that she was also
_____ a. a career woman.
_____ b. a mother.
_____ c. a flight attendant.
_____ d. a poet.
3. How does a wife help her husband with his schoolwork?
_____ a. she attends class for him.
_____ b. she reads the textbook and condenses it for him.
_____ c. she types his papers.
_____ d. she arranges his notes.
4. What is expected of a wife sexually?
_____ a. fidelity
_____ b. passion when the husband is in the mood
_____ c. putting the husband's satisfaction first
_____ d. all of the above
5. How must a wife react if her husband is unfaithful?
_____ a. she should understand.
_____ b. she should retaliate.
_____ c. she should leave her husband.
_____ d. she should scold her husband.
The “Don’t Impose Your Values” Argument Is Bigotry in Disguise
John Leo
QUIZ
1. The “Don’t Impose your Values” argument insists that
_____a. only voters have the right to impose their values.
_____b. teachers have no right to impose their values on students.
_____c. it is wrong to vote your moral convictions
_____d. parents should impose good moral values on their offspring.
2. The civil rights movement was primarily the work of
_____a. Jewish voters.
_____b. Martin Luther King.
_____c. the black churches.
_____d. Abraham Lincoln.
3. Rocco Buttiglione was kept from office because he
_____a. believed that homosexuality was a sin.
_____b. was a member of the Ku Klux Klan.
_____b. believed in interracial marriage.
_____d. had smoked marijuana in his youth.
4. The “don’t impose” people need to explain why
_____a. religious arguments are less worthy than secular ones.
_____b. religious arguments usually originate from fanatics.
_____c. secular arguments come from experts or educated people.
_____d. it is helpful to hear arguments from non Americans.
5. John Kerry tried to define the stem-cell argument as science versus
_____a. fiction.
_____b. superstition.
_____c. family values.
_____d. ideology.
What Would Happen if We Legalized Gay Marriage?
Michael Alvear
QUIZ
1. According to the author, allowing gays to marry will do to homophobia what
_____a. psychiatry did for schizophrenia.
_____b. Listerine does for bad breath.
_____c. the civil-rights legislation did for racism.
_____d. Social Security does for retired people.
2. How was the life of the author’s friend Cooper shattered?
_____a. He had a gay son who committed suicide.
_____b. He was gay but married to a woman for 38 years.
_____c. He lost his job because he was gay.
_____d. He could not join the Marines because he was gay.
3. How many orphaned kids languish in institutions?
_____a. 568,000
_____b. 2,000,000
_____c. 100
_____d. Very few
4. What percentage of the populace have identified themselves publicly as gay?
_____a. 12%
_____b. 1%
_____c. 3%
_____d. 10%
The Marriage Buffet
David Frum
QUIZ
1. The title of the essay is
_____a. The Marriage Contract.
_____b. Same-Sex Marriage.
_____c. The Marriage Bracelet.
_____d. The Marriage Buffet.
2. The institution of marriage is
_____a. more popular than ever.
_____b. on the verge of collapse.
_____c. being threatened by Islam.
_____d. causing envy among gays.
3. It has been estimated that 40% of couples entering civil pacts are
_____a. heterosexual.
_____b. miserable in such a union.
_____c. bisexual.
_____d. stable in their relationship.
4. Compared to marriage, a civil pact is
_____a. harder to get into.
_____b. more expensive.
_____c. less financially rewarding.
_____d. less glamorous.
5. Many advocates of same-sex marriage
_____a. have a heterosexual marriage.
_____b. have had to do jail time for their views.
_____c. are against civil pacts or domestic partnerships.
_____d. are indifferent to the plight of children.
A More Perfect Union
Jonathan Rauch
QUIZ
1. Which of the following men could NOT be considered a “founding father”?
_____a. Thomas Jefferson
_____b. George Washington
_____c. Abraham Lincoln
_____d. John Adams
2. Which of the following laws continue to be established by the states?
_____a. marriage and divorce laws
_____b. federal income tax laws
_____c. immigration laws
_____d. Medicare benefit laws
3. The state-by-state approach to same-sex marriage will
_____a. cost less money.
_____b. guarantee the legality of same-sex marriage.
_____c. allow a Democrat to be elected president.
_____d. avoid a national culture war.
4. The moral culture of the United States is
_____a. harmonious.
_____b. homogeneous.
_____c. diverse.
_____d. deplorable.
5. Article IV, Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution requires
_____a. U.S. citizens to speak English.
_____b. states to honor one another’s public acts and judgments.
_____c. that same-sex marriage be legalized.
_____d. that abortion be a matter of personal choice.
PART TWO: ANSWERS TO COMPREHENSION QUIZZES ON READINGS AND EXERCISES
CHAPTER FOUR
The Sentence: Combining, Generating, Judging
Exercises In Sentence Combining By Adding (55)
Here are some possible answers:
1. Wit is often sharp and sarcastic while humor is always soft and usually kind.
2. He studied artistic theory, practiced mixing colors, and painted hundreds of canvases.
3. The Muslims of Mecca exclude women from religious festivities because they fear familiarity between women and their overlords.
4. Miracle plays were still performed on wagons in Shakespeare's day after theaters had been built.
5. Some people are industrious in the sense that they work energetically for long periods of time while others are lazy and idle.
6. Scrabble is a fun game that can also increase your vocabulary.
7. My mother loves to shop, and often comes home with bargains, although she sometimes spends more money than she intended.
8. Boxing is a brutal sport that often results in serious injury or even death.
9. No sport is more addictive than golf, but it has a downside of being expensive.
10. The Internet is a source of vast quantities of information, but some of it is inaccurate.
Exercises in Sentence Combining by Deleting (57)
Here are some possible answers:
1. The trouble between the Israelis and Palestinians is a clash between two cultures fighting for supremacy in the Middle East.
2. Somehow she knew instinctively who had stolen her wallet.
3. He was a bold man who wanted to find a new home and to lead a less structured life.
4. I want to find a merry and wise man.
5. The quarrels of lovers are like summer storms that make everything more beautiful once they have passed.
6. I am a hard-working, conscientious, and trustworthy man.
7. Dictionaries are especially useful for looking up the meanings of words and their etymologies.
8. I don't like it when the weather is too cold, too hot, or too rainy.
9. The old lady, who walked like she was drunk, had taken too much medication.
10. Some astronomers are atheists, some are believers, and some are indifferent to religion.
Exercises (64-65)
The more effective sentences are listed below.
1. a; 2. b; 3. b; 4. a; 5. b; 6. a; 7. a; 8. b; 9. b.; 10 a.
CHAPTER FIVE
The Paragraph
Exercises (99-100)
1. a. The topic sentence is the lead sentence of the paragraph: “Everyone who makes money in the mechanical city uses the money that he makes to escape, as far and as frequently as he can, from the inferno that is the source of his wealth.”
b. The topic sentence is, “Logic is fun.” It is the final sentence of the paragraph.
c. The topic sentence is, “Computers, it is often said, manipulate symbols.” It is the lead sentence of the paragraph.
d. The topic sentence is, “There is a queer stillness and a curious peaceful repose about the Etruscan places I have been to, quite different from the weirdness of Celtic places, the slightly repellent feeling of Rome and the old Campagna, and the rather horrible feeling of the great Pyramid places in Mexico, Teotihuacán and Cholula, and Mitla in the south; or the amiably idolatrous Buddha places in Ceylon.” It is also the lead sentence.
2. a. The pattern of development is definition.
b. The pattern of development used in this paragraph is argumentation.
c. The pattern of development used by Russell is a comparison/contrast of Lenin and Gladstone.
CHAPTER SIX
Planning and Organizing the Essay
Exercises (122-123 )
1. The major divisions of (a) are the service, the topspin shot, the chop, the full volley, the overhead smash; of (b), secretion of digestive juices in the stomach, constriction of the circulatory system, elevated heartbeat; of (c), are vascular pain, nausea, and extreme sensitivity to all sensory stimuli; of (d), making reservations for guests, providing directions to restaurants, theaters, and meeting venues, and troubleshooting complaints.
2. Various answers are possible, among them the following:
a. Financial debt can affect a family not only fiscally but also psychologically and emotionally.
b. It is obvious from ancient art and literature that homosexuality has been around for a long time.
OR
Lately it has become fashionable in the United States for homosexuals to come out of the closet.
c. Many married women nowadays choose to have and raise babies by themselves.
d. Type A personalities thrive on competitiveness and the drive for power.
e. Because they value education highly, some people care more than others about staying in school.
3. Item II in the outline is irrelevant to the controlling idea and should be dropped. This is how the outline should look.
a. Controlling idea: A desktop computer is less expensive, more powerful, and more flexible than a laptop computer.
I. A desktop computer is less expensive than a laptop.
A. A desktop computer is often half the price of an equivalent laptop.
B. Laptop computers charge a premium for portability.
II. Desktop computers are more powerful than laptops.
A. Generally desktop computers are made from the fastest chips.
B. Laptop computers are not made from the fastest chips.
III. Desktop computers are more flexible than laptops.
A. Desktop computers are highly upgradeable.
B. Laptop computers are upgradeable only in a limited way.
b. Item III in the outline is irrelevant to the controlling idea and should be dropped. This is how the outline should look.
Controlling idea: The art of reading faster requires a student to read actively, avoid regressions, and be flexible in adjusting the reading pace for material of varying difficulty.
I. Active reading is necessary to increase reading speed.
A. Active reading requires a preview of the passage.
B. Active reading is emotional reading.
II. Regressions must be avoided.
A. Regression or rereading of material shows a lack of confidence.
B. Regression can be minimized by reading at a higher speed than usual.
Reading pace must be adjusted for the particular material.
A. Shakespeare and poetry cannot be speed-read.
B. Technical material will also require a slower pace.
Answer to Rewriting Assignment ( 124)
VARIOUS ANSWERS ARE POSSIBLE, INCLUDING THE ONE BELOW:
Controlling idea: An old goose down pillow can cause multiple sufferings for a person plagued with allergies.
I. Dust mites in an old goose down pillow can aggravate allergies.
A. They cause itching eyes.
B. They increase asthma in asthmatics.
C. They cause a runny nose.
II. Old skin can work its way through the goose down pillow cover.
A. It can cause morning headaches.
B. It can exacerbate eczema.
C. It can lead to itchy skin.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Drafting, Revising, and Style
Exercises (147)
1. VARIOUS ANSWERS ARE POSSIBLE FOR THIS REVISION EXERCISE. HERE IS ONE POSSIBILITY:
There were two things I learned in karate before I learned to fight. The first was respect. I was taught to salute the flags of Korea, the United States, and our martial arts when I entered or left the training hall. I was taught to bow to my teachers and my elders such as the black belts. I was expected to reply yes sir or no sir in a confident tone to all questions. Practicing this kind of respect encouraged a friendly atmosphere wherever I went and was part of living a peaceful life.
The second thing I learned was defensive movements. I learned how to block a punch or a kick and how to escape being held. In the beginning, I was not very happy with these lessons because I wanted to learn the karate kicks I had seen in movies. But as the lessons became more advanced and the escape movements more natural, I began to realize that karate(far from being aggressive(was a defensive skill for humble people who wanted to protect themselves against attack.
As I progressed in learning these defensive skills, I became more confident in everything. I advanced from one belt to the next, and as I learned to break bricks or boards and began to win trophies, I also acquired an unbeatable attitude. Karate teaches us to overcome our fears and to face up to obstacles. It is a sport that makes winners of everyone.
2. Various answers also possible for this exercise, including the following:
a. He expected to attract young Americans to the martial art of tae qwan do.
b. He thought the instructor's rebuttal to the accusation important.
c. The employees are deeply angered over the loss of a pay raise.
d. The hospital, as long as it sees no need for entertainment, cannot guarantee financial support for the choral group.
e. The Academic Affairs Committee cannot accept the validity of English prerequisites even though methods of corroborating their validity have improved.
3. Various answers also possible for this exercise.
a. Many verses have been written by people who believe they are poets but who are merely rhymesters.
b. Prof. Smith made many derogatory remarks about the Democratic ticket until after the election.
c. The safety committee planned a mock earthquake, including evacuating people from the Tower Building, creating a command post, establishing a triage area, and organizing a system of transportation.
d. During the medieval period, man was no longer viewed as a superb creature, capable of Promethean achievements; rather, he was viewed as a pitiful being, tarnished by original sin and in need of moral redemption.
e. Society has generally underestimated the ability of women to make right executive decisions under stress.
4. Here are the sentences without their redundancies.
a. Today, families should limit themselves to two children so as not to overcrowd planet Earth.
b. By taking ballet dancing lessons, I have achieved a greater self-confidence.
c. All of our cities' bureaucratic agencies that provide services, such as law-enforcement, fire prevention, sewage disposal, and library service, cannot continue to grow without higher local taxes.
d. All of Eloise Martin's hopes were based on her belief that human beings are able to set goals they can reach by applying themselves.
e. Suddenly, the computer graphic turned red and became ugly.
5. Here are some suggestions for replacing the trite, prepackaged expressions. Other possibilities exist.
a. For years, Gilespie thought he was safe, but in the end he went to jail for illegal drug trafficking, trapped in his own compromised cleverness.
b. Yes, Pete McClure should be appointed Senior Vice President of Marketing because over the past 20 years he has worked hard for Brendon and Company, selling to small businesses and private merchants even when our product was unpopular.
c. What I despise about my boss is that he simply mistreats his employees for the sake of profits.
d. Anyone who continues to buy Johnson and Smith stocks will sooner or later be disappointed.
e. Most of the crowd attending the town meeting had their own agendas and were not the least concerned about whether the proposed housing development was good or bad for the neighborhood.
6. Here are some possible ways to get rid of the grandiose diction in the sample sentences. Other possibilities exist.
a. Various tennis coaches called to ask about leasing equipment from the university for their tournament leaders.
b. Dear Mr. Webster: I am in receipt of your letter of March 10 in which you try to explain why you were not at our last townhouse Executive Committee meeting.
c. Surely it is education's function to help students understand the richness, profundity, and mystery of life.
d. Before I came to Harvard, I thought the campus would be socially harsh, frigid, and tumultuous and whose only compensation would be that I would get a good education.
e. She was smiling dreamily as she lay on the grass, reading a collection of Amy Lowell's poems.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Answers
The Code
Richard T. Gill
Answers to Quiz
c, b, a, d, b
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (161 )
1. The author was a Methodist. He was twelve years old when it first struck him that he might give up his religion (paragraph 1).
2. He was suddenly conscious of everyone's mortality, of the fact that all these people could suddenly pass away from the world as his brother had (paragraph 3). It was a fear response.
3. In paragraph 2, the author states that religion was his mother's and his aunts' “last support.” Similarly, in paragraph 23, the idea of religion as a crutch or support is repeated. For his mother and his aunts, religion was a source of consolation and support.
4. The implication in the story is that the father's athletic ability and ruggedness led the narrator to identify a rejection of religion with real masculinity. Moreover, the narrator had only witnessed religion being practiced by women, and his father's rejection of religion probably led the narrator to conclude that only women or weak men need the crutch of religion (paragraphs 20, 21, 23).
5. The intangible quality of courage (paragraph 21). The author came to believe that his father's rejection of religion was an act of courage. He shared this courage with his father by similarly rejecting religion.
6. In paragraph 24 the narrator dismisses four years in a single sentence. In paragraph 26 he writes, “Within forty-eight hours, I was standing in the early morning light,” thus pacing the story to gloss over the interminably long flight from Japan.
7. The father wanted the narrator to give him permission to speak to the minister so he could die consoled by religion. The narrator withheld this permission because giving it would have amounted to admitting his father’s weakness(his father’s fear of death. Rather than allowing that, the narrator withheld permission, forcing the father either to confess his weakness to his son and thus violate the bond of “courage” that had grown up between them, or to die alone and unconsoled by religion.
8. Allow for open discussion. The story indicts both role-playing and masculinity. Had the son not been playing the role of the masculine and courageous man, he would have been understanding enough to allow his father the consolation of religion on his deathbed.
9. Allow for open discussion. Clearly, the father was extremely courageous to the end. If he really believed that he had been wrong about religion as he confessed to the son, then it was doubtless courageous of him to forgo talking to the minister because of the son.
10. The significance is that the son continues to role-play what he conceives to be the part of the man. It was role-playing that made him deprive his father of the consolations of religion, now it is role-playing in front of three anonymous women that prevents him from expressing his grief.
Richard Cory
Edwin Arlington Robinson
Answers to Quiz
b, d, a
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (163)
1. The poem is narrated from the viewpoint of “we people on the pavement,” allowing the poet to contrast effectively Cory's lifestyle with that of the poorer people around him and to do so impartially and with no sentimentality. Cory's suicide is all the more shocking because he is portrayed as the object of envy to many.
2. He was enviable because he was imperially slim, quietly arrayed, rich, and schooled in every grace.
3. He caused excitement when he said, “Good morning.” Cory was such an admired and resplendent figure that a mere greeting from him caused hearts to skip.
4. Contrast. Cory is contrasted with the anonymous “we” who tell his story.
5. That they envied Cory; that they wished to be in his place; that they were poor, hungry, and struggling (“So on we worked, and waited for the light,/ And went without the meat, and cursed the bread….”). It is important for us to know these things about Cory's admirers; otherwise his suicide would not seem nearly as inexplicable, and the paradoxical flavor of the poem would be lost.
A Gift of Laughter
Allan Sherman
Answers to Quiz
d, b, a, d, a
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique ( 171)
1. The narrator involves us in the story by beginning in the middle of things, with his son's shrieking at him in his excitement to show the picture he had drawn of his father. This kind of beginning, known as in medias res( a term from Horace that signifies beginning in the middle of an action(is very effective for immediately drawing in an audience.
2. The language used throughout the story is colloquial and informal and helps set the tone and atmosphere for a casual narration. Given the elements and point of this tale, it is difficult to see how the narrator could have chosen any other kind of language than this.
3. Money problems are typically serious topics of conversation between adults and are usually engrossing. He tells us the subject to explain why he was so distracted that he had no time to listen to his son.
4. The flashback is triggered in paragraph 8 by the sound of his son slamming the door. That sound takes him back to the time when he slammed his own door after being rebuffed by his own mother.
5. He omits the details of the trade because he is pacing this story so that it sticks to the point(namely, that once he also made a sacrifice that was not appreciated by adults. Having told us what Gudgie wanted for the football, he does not need to show us the actual trade that took place.
6. Allow for open discussion. The adults in the story are actually quite loving and devoted to their children. The misunderstandings that they have with their children are quite understandable and typical in the day-to-day affairs of a family.
7. Strictly speaking, if one were grammatically picky one could object that the sentence should read “then give it back to whomever it belongs.” However, this stilted though grammatically correct speech would be totally inappropriate for the circumstances of this story. A writer is more obliged to faithfully write dialogue that fits the dramatic situation rather than dialogue that is grammatically right.
8. The odd capitalization of “leaving home” and "left home" indicates that this is a normal and expected ritual that children go through when they are hurt.
9. Allow for open discussion. The story is an amusing one and the sort that might be found in Reader's Digest or some other popular magazine of a similar level. It is intended strictly for a popular audience and has an amusing surface appeal. It does, however, lack the depth of some of the other narrations in this chapter.
Excerpt from Night
Elie Wiesel
Answers to Quiz
b, d, d, a, b
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (183)
1. Allow for open discussion. Many survivors, even though they are now very old, simply cannot forgive these cruel former SS officers.
2. The description consists merely of a series of short sentences that catalog what the author saw. The writing is plain and straightforward with no images whatsoever. This style of writing is commonly found in newspapers. It is highly effective here because of the extraordinary circumstances the author is describing.
3. He puts “coffee” in quotation marks to signify that the liquid being served was coffee only in a figurative sense. Later, in paragraph 30, he identifies the liquid as “hot water.” Using quotation marks is an effective shorthand way of making clear that the coffee being served was not really coffee.
4. Allow for open discussion. His behavior strikes us as loving, gentle, and caring under the harshest of circumstances. It seems to us that he has nothing to reproach himself about.
5 The author uses journalistic paragraphs, some of which are only a short sentence long. These paragraphs are highly effective for the reportorial style that the author uses in telling his story.
6. For us, the most moving part of this narration is the way the author keeps reproaching himself about wanting to stay alive and about the feelings he had that his dying father was a dead weight on his own chances of survival. But under the circumstances, these feelings were perfectly normal and would have been felt by anyone else in his position. Allow for open discussion.
7. Paragraph 54 consists of a single sentence fragment. It has no main verb and would therefore not be suitable for a student essay. Yet it is a highly effective summary of how the author felt and is a good example of the use of fragments to make a strong point.
8. The use of exclamation marks in paragraph 58 strongly signals the author’s outrage and indignation that his own father should thank him for showing mercy. The marks are a subtle commentary on the depths to which the inhuman prisoners have descended in the concentration camp.
9. The advice given to the author(that he save himself and forget about his dying father(is probably sound advice under the brutal circumstances, but it is also a chilling commentary on the viciousness of life in a Nazi concentration camp.
10. Many examples of pacing can be found throughout the material. In paragraph 27, for example, the author writes, “I walked for hours without finding him.” In paragraph 32, he passes over five uneventful hours in a single sentence. And in paragraph 36, he marks the passage of time by writing, “he grew weaker day by day.” Finally, an entire uneventful week in his father's decline is dismissed in paragraph 59 with a single sentence, “a week went by like this.”
In Another Country
Ernest Hemingway
Answers to Quiz
c, d, b, a, c
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (188)
1. On a literal level, the narrator, who is an American fighting a war in Europe, finds himself in Milan, Italy, “another country,” not his homeland. On a psychological level, the story tells of a group of soldiers wounded during the war, which makes them different from citizens who have never fought in a war. In a sense, they are in “another country.” On a third level, the narrator feels that he is a stranger to the other men working the machines because he is American and received his wound due to an accident rather than due to actual warfare. This difference, too, places him “in another country.”
2. He means that the war is still on, but the characters in this story no longer fight in the war because they have been wounded and are now in the process of getting care at a hospital in Milan.
3. Today we would simply term the cure “physical therapy,” which is still used widely to help people move again after they have lost the use of their limbs—in accidents or at war. Ask students if they trusted the machines—why or why not?
4. The role of the doctor is to keep up the morale of the soldiers using the machines. He wants to build up their confidence in the curative power of the machines, presumably so that the patients will improve. Allow students to discuss how they reacted to the doctor’s optimism.
5. The people hated these men, who were officers and as such were privileged—receiving better care and more medals than common soldiers. The people probably felt that, during fierce battles, officers did not put their lives on the line as much as did the more lowly foot soldier. Perhaps the people had lost some of their relatives who were soldiers, not officers, in the war. Have students discuss this point.
6. This young soldier contributes to the irony of this story. He came from an aristocratic family and had his nose shot off as he fought on the front line of the war immediately after graduating from the military academy. He did not have time to really prove himself; yet, his appearance has been destroyed forever. The reason “they” (probably the plastic surgeons) could never rebuild the boy’s nose correctly is because Italian aristocrats were said to have a Roman nose, denoting patrician looks and nobility. Have students discuss how they feel about this young soldier.
7. By “detached” the narrator means that the soldiers no longer felt great passion about their lives. They had lived with death and danger so long, that in order to save their sanity, they had to create distance between themselves and the world around them. Other words that might apply are “aloof,” “isolated,” and “impassive.”
8. Here are some suggested themes: 1) One effect of war is disillusionment with love and life. 2) One cannot always shield one’s own life and that of loved ones from inevitable tragedy. 3) The best way to live life is to savor those pleasant moments that come along.
9. The pivotal character is the major because he proves that life is ironic and unpredictable. He did not marry his wife until he was sure that he would not have to go back to war (having been severely wounded) and possibly make her a widow. But irony of ironies, she died of pneumonia while the major was having his hand treated.
10. The narrator is omniscient and omnipresent in the sense that he can move from character to character, relaying impressions to the reader. He knows all. One technique used is pacing—that is, featuring important events while passing quickly over less important ones. For instance, in paragraph 2, the narrator says, “We were all at the hospital every afternoon,” but he does not give us a blow by blow description of what happened on each of those afternoons. A second technique used is scattering vivid details throughout the essay. Good examples to study occur in paragraphs 1, 14, and 15. A third technique used is the use of symbolism. One example occurs in paragraph 17, when the narrator refers to the other three officers with medals as “hunting hawks,” meaning that they were eager to get into the front lines of the war and kill the enemy whereas the narrator is afraid of death and does not have the killer’s instinct. He is more of a dove than a hawk.
The Tell-Tale Heart
Edgar Allan Poe
Answers to Quiz
d, c, c, a, a
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (193)
1. The narrator begins by telling us that he is not mad precisely because he is mad. By having the narrator deny that he is mad at the very outset, Poe is drawing our attention to the fact that the man is most probably mad, and his madness is an explanation for the narrative that follows.
2. The point of the narrator telling us that he had no motive for killing the old man can only be to lay the groundwork for a psychological explanation of his motive(namely, that the narrator is mad.
3. The dashes add a breathlessness to the narration, as if the narrator were darting from one thought to the next in his confused state of mind. They are very effective for signaling broken thoughts that one would expect from someone who is demented.
4. From his language, we gather that the narrator is an educated man from at least a middle-class background. His vocabulary is sophisticated as is his sentence structure. The portrayal of him that emerges from his use of language adds to the inevitable conclusion that only madness can explain his actions.
5. A reader today would not be particularly shocked by anything in this story, so used to excesses in the portrayal of madness on the page and on the screen have we become. In Poe’s day, however, this story would’ve been shocking. Allow for open discussion of the second part of the question.
6. In pacing this story, Poe focuses his attention mainly on the night of the murder. In paragraph 4, for example, he passes over an entire week in his opening sentence. On the other hand, from paragraph 5 to the end of the book, the narrative focuses painstakingly on the murder of the old man, his dismemberment, and burial. Point out to students how time and events that are unimportant to the narrative are quickly glossed over, as for example the way the seven nights of watching the old man are treated in paragraph 4.
7. A modern writer would not invert the subject and object but would most likely write, “I had no desire for his gold.”
8. The best example of foreshadowing in paragraph 1 is the narrator's insistence on the acuteness of his hearing. Later, it is this overly sensitive hearing that gives him away when he imagines that he can hear the old man’s heart still beating from under the floor boards.
9. We would guess that they were stunned, the narrator having convinced us that he had fooled them all along. Part of the suspense of this story is that we are not told how the officers reacted, but are left to imagine for ourselves.
10. He uses italics and often. See, for example, paragraphs 5, 8, 12, and 14. Other paragraphs also use italics for the same effect.
CHAPTER NINE
Answers
The Lament
Anton Chekhov
Answers to Quiz
b, a, d, a, c
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (200)
1. A lament is an expression of grief over some loss. In the story the cabdriver expresses deep grief over the loss of his son.
2. Chekhov examines the sorrow of being rejected by other members of society, the sorrow associated with being poor, and the sorrow produced by a severe winter climate.
3. Iona desires desperately to communicate to someone(anyone(his grief over the loss of his son; he needs to find relief for his pent-up emotions.
4. They all are indifferent to the sorrows of a fellow human being. None shows the faintest sign of sensitivity or gentleness. All they care about is their own comfort and entertainment.
5. Paragraph 22.
6. Details suggesting loss or grief include the following: Iona's color(he is described as being white like “a phantom”; he is also described as being bent double (as if in pain) and motionless. He is so engrossed in his own thoughts that “if a whole snowdrift fell on him, it seems as if he would not find it necessary to shake it off.” The description suggests a pensive, possibly grieving man totally absorbed in his own sorrows.
7. The Paragraph 6: “Iona shifts about on his seat as if he were on needles, moves his elbows as if he were trying to keep his equilibrium, and gapes about like someone suffocating.” Paragraph 15: “Death mistook the door .... instead of coming to me, it went to my son.” Paragraph 16: “His grief, which has abated for a short while.... ”
8. The conflict is between Iona's urge to communicate his grief and the unwillingness of people to listen. The conflict is resolved when Iona pours out his grief to his horse.
Coats
Jane Kenyon
Answers to Quiz
d, a, d, d, b
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (201)
1. The omission of any particular details about the man makes him into a more universal “everyman” figure. We think the omission was deliberate to focus the poem not on a particular man, but on the man as an element in a mise en scene of grief.
2. This line is intended to reflect the viewpoint of the grief-stricken man. That the day was fair and mild for December is a mockery of the personal suffering he was experiencing. Explain to students how poets and writers manipulate weather and scenery to evoke mood. In this case the evocation is of opposites that a tragic scene should be played out on a mild and fair day.
3. Allow for open discussion. One meaning of the coats is the individual attempt of every soul to cope with its own particular destiny. The woman is dead and the man is carrying away her now useless coat, while he himself buttons his own coat against the “irremediable cold.” The poem is implying that every person rides on the ocean of life in his or her own particular boat.
4. The “irremediable cold” refers not to the chilly weather(the poem tells us that the day was mild and fair(but to the cold caused by the man's loss and grief. That is why it is “irremediable”; a coat cannot protect from this kind of cold.
5. That the coat the man is buttoning as he leaves the hospital on a mild and fair winter day cannot protect him from the chill of his own grief is the irony implied by the poem.
Mma Ramotswe Thinks about the Land
Alexander McCall Smith
Answers to Quiz
d, a, c, d, a
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (209)
1. The two descriptions are of Africa as a desert and Africa as a fertile land. The switch is easy to follow because at the end of paragraph 4, the narrator tells us that as a young woman she had been out in the Kalahari desert during the rainy season. This experience creates the turning point from the dry desert to the rain-soaked desert.
2. First, Mma Ramotswe attributes to the sun the human characteristic of “smiling” on Africa. Then she describes the sun as a “slither of golden red ball, inching up, floating effortlessly free of the horizon to dispel the last wisps of morning mist.” This is a highly charged, poetic description. Have students discuss their responses to the language.
3. The main ingredient of the land is its vast size and its sand the color of ochre. As one moves inland, the vegetation gets sparser and sparser until even the thorn bushes thin out. The dryness of the land is oppressive.
4. Probably the singing is performed by the hot, dry winds that sweep across this part of the country. It is surely an eerie, fearsome song.
5. Suddenly the dry, empty desert becomes a garden filled with delicate shoots of grass, flowers, melons, and vines. Anyone who has lived in a desert environment knows that as soon as water soaks the earth, a desolate, harsh piece of desert can turn into a flower garden or an orchard. This is one of the miracles of nature. Think of Palm Springs, California, which was once a vast, stark desert, but is now a patchwork of gorgeous lawns, limpid lakes, and brilliant flowers—simply because irrigation was introduced to the land.
6. The narrator ponders how small she is compared with the land’s endless expanses. But she finds comfort in thinking that in this vast country there is a place for everyone to live and call the land “their own.” The narrator loves the land the way a mother might love a child that broke her heart. In other words, the dry emptiness of the Kalahari desert is enough to break her heart, but she loves it despite its emptiness and lack of fertility. It is, above all, her native country.
7. Mma Ramotswe is aware of her environment and she is careful, the way a detective should be. She sees a man leap out from the bushes and try to flag her down, but she ignores him by driving on, fully aware of the dangers involved in picking up strangers at night.
8. Smith’s language is charged with vivid, poetic language, as exemplified in these passages: Paragraph 1: “Suddenly it (the sun) was there, smiling on Africa, a slither of golden red ball, inching up, floating effortlessly free of the horizon to dispel the last wisps of morning mist.” Paragraph 3: “This was a dry land. Just a short distance to the west lay the Kalahari, a hinterland of ochre that stretched off, for unimaginable miles, to the singing emptinesses of the Namib.” Paragraph 4: “For the lions were there still, on these wide landscapes, and they made their presence known in the darkness, in coughing grunts and growls.” Other passages exist.
9. The tiny white van serves to tie up the description at the beginning of this chapter. The description begins with Mma Ramotswe driving her tiny white van, and it ends with her continuing to drive the van along the road. Thus the description is neatly restricted.
10. Despite its infertility, its dangers, and its recurring ugliness, this is the narrator’s land; it is her homeland, and she is devoted to it as a patriot would be.
The Monster
Deems Taylor
Answers to Quiz
d, a, b, c, a
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (217)
1. He was a monster of conceit.” Paragraph 2.
2. He recounts incidents from the life of this genius that show him to be selfish, irresponsible, egocentric, unscrupulous, disloyal, and overbearing. Almost any paragraph reveals such incidents.
3. Allow for open discussion.
4. Allow for open discussion.
5. He means that any artist of Wagner’s magnificent talent deserves to be supported by society. In other words, the author feels that a cultured, civilized society ought to be willing to support the few rare geniuses.
6. Innocent connotes a kind of blamelessness. For instance, a child can be said to be innocent of evil or corruption because the concept of evil is as yet unformed in his or her mind.
7. In paragraph 12.
Sister Flowers
Maya Angelou
Answers to Quiz
c, b, a, d, d
Answers to Questions About Meaning and Technique (222)
1. Obviously Mrs. Flowers embodied the refinement and education the narrator could not find among most of the people in her neighborhood. Mrs. Flowers looked aristocratic and spoke with a natural, educated refinement—the kind the narrator had met only in novels she had read.
2. As often happens among blacks—especially decades ago--the grandmother takes over the nurturing of the grandchildren because the parents are divorced or they have to work and can’t take care of their offspring. So, the grandmother in those cases becomes the mother. The narrator has the typical reaction of most children to their parents: embarrassment because the parent is not as sophisticated, as educated, or as successful as a neighbor. In this case, Marguerite had been reading profusely and therefore had acquired the ability to use proper English grammar whereas her grandmother did not have this advantage. Marguerite is mortified when Momma can’t agree her subjects and verbs and uses the language of black southerners.
3. Mrs. Flowers and Momma bonded as human beings because they had much in common and were on intimate terms in matters of life and the people who surrounded them. Have students discuss how they have built strong, intimate relationships with people of less formal education than they have had. For instance, you could have strong bonds of friendship with your TV repairman, your pest control serviceperson, or your shoe repairman. These people may not have a college degree, but they know a great deal about work, life, and human relationships.
4. One lesson was that speaking is as important as reading because the human voice can make printed words come to life. The narrator learned that she needed to come out of her shell and speak up in class if she wanted to strengthen her reputation as a good student. Another lesson was about the difference between ignorance and illiteracy. The narrator learned that some illiterate people were not at all ignorant or stupid but had in fact a great deal of common sense or wit with which they could add to the “collective wisdom of generations.” Have students give examples from their experience to distinguish between ignorance and illiteracy.
5. For the first time in her life she felt the “enchantment” of reading classical literature, such as Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities (see paragraph 42). Moreover, for the first time in her life she felt liked and respected for being herself—the person she really was (see paragraph 44).
6. She often uses vivid language or figures of speech. Here are some examples: Paragraph 2: The entire paragraph is highly descriptive.
a. Paragraph 3: “Her skin was a rich black that would have peeled like a plum if snagged….”
b. Paragraph 4: The entire paragraph describes Mrs. Flowers’ smile.
c. Paragraph 12: “She acted just as refined as white folks in the movies and books and she was more beautiful, for none of them could have come near that warm color without looking gray by comparison.”
d. Have students point to further examples.
7. Here are some typical southern expressions from the text:
a. Paragraph 1: “I sopped around,” meaning “I walked around looking glum and sullen.
b. Paragraphs 12 and 13: “white folks,” or “powhitefolks,” referring to white southerners or poor white southerners.
8. Paragraph 17: “chifforobe,” to refer to a chiffonier, a small dresser in which clothes are stored.
a. These expressions increase the authenticity of the story.
9. Answers may vary. Encourage students to share their literary experiences with the class.
Laundromat
Susan Sheehan
Answers to Quiz
d, c, b, d, a
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (226)
1. The dominant impression is one of busy activity. Details that support this dominant impression are these: Paragraph 1: A pretty young black girl is folding clothes. Paragraph 2: People are busy inserting coins, stuffing clothes into the machines, and adding detergents, bleaches, or softeners during the appropriate cycles. Paragraph 3: The tumbling clothes and linens are in constant motion. Paragraph 4: A middle-aged man wearing a trench coat hurriedly takes a load of children’s clothes out of the washing machine and folds them. A young Japanese boy takes some clothes out of a dryer. Paragraph 5: People come and go.
2. Part of the reason this description keeps our attention is that laundromats are familiar places, so we chuckle with a sense of recognition. Additionally, though, Sheehan uses figures of speech that make the scene spring to life. For instance, she writes about “the kaleidoscopic activity” inside the machines. She describes some white shirts “jitterbugging with six or eight pairs of grey socks.” The clothes in the dryers seem to be “free falling, like sky divers drifting down to earth.”
3. The author makes a clear class observation when she states that most of the patrons at the laundromat are blacks or Puerto Ricans. The white people can afford to live in apartments that provide a laundry room where they can wash their linens and clothes or they can even afford to send their things out to be cleaned by a Chinese laundry. Another reference to class is the anecdote about the black woman who tossed a chicken bone at someone, but her gesture was accepted as “a reasonable protest against the miserableness of her life.”
4. Nothing much has changed. Sheehan’s description is still recognizable today. Perhaps the brand of washing machines has changed from Wascomat to General Electric or some other brand; the price has gone up; and Chinese laundries are not as widespread as they used to be. But in essence the picture of the laundromat is as it was.
5. The laundromat is in New York, situated between Seventy-seventh and Seventy-eighth Street on the west side of Broadway. These streets are landmarks of New York City.
6. The first parenthetical question occurs in paragraph 4 when the author asks why the father is in such a hurry. The second question also occurs in paragraph 4 when the author wonders to whom the lacy slip and ruffled nightgown, being washed by the Japanese boy, belong. These questions and their speculated answers add intrigue to the description.
7. Probably the woman’s age and her blond hair are mentioned because the woman is still young enough to attract attention in the basement laundry of an apartment complex. However, she is not just a teenager who might totally imagine some kind of sexual attack or person lurking about to steal. She is probably not just being paranoid or self-deluded.
8. Sheehan appeals to all of our senses: Visual (the signs listed in paragraph 1), hearing (the constant whirring of the machines), smell (the laundromat smells of “a sweet mixture of soap and heat,” paragraph 3), touch (the man in the trench coat holds some damp clothes over his arm, paragraph 4), and taste (the blond woman wishing she could watch her laundry while she savors a cup of coffee and a bun).
CHAPTER TEN
Answers
We're Poor
Floyd Dell
Answers to Quiz
d, a, c, b, a
1.
2. Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (232)
1. The style is simple and straightforward (notice that there are no vocabulary words) as is befitting the age of the author at the time of the narrative—six years old.
2. Deducing the age of the author at the time of the narrative requires a close reading of the text. He was actually six years old and seems extraordinarily sensitive and keen for one so young.
3. The lack of nourishing food and adequate clothing are two obvious physical wants. Notice also that poverty led to social isolation of the family as well as to its dispersal, with the children being farmed out to various relatives. This separation of children from their natural parents is another insidious effect of poverty and is our own candidate for its worst effect. Allow for open discussion of the second part of the question.
4. That she was proud and was doing her best to shield her young child from discovering the truth about them.
5. Throughout, the author is very detailed and concrete about enumerating the effects of poverty on his family, down to describing the insertion of cardboard insoles in his shoes to cover the holes. But possibly the most telling paragraph is paragraph 5, when the author says, “Taking my small bag of potatoes to Sunday school, I looked around for the poor children; I was disappointed not to see them.”
6. By asking himself a series of questions, the answers to which he already half suspects.
7. Dell went on to become a writer of some repute, so the incident cannot have had that great an effect on his life to the point of retarding his development. Allow for open discussion of the second part of the question. Certainly, the trauma of such a discovery could have been devastating on Dell, as on any other small child.
8. Certainly, it's plausible. What he means is that he had an intuition, but he did not want to consciously admit to it. Ask your students if they've ever had a similar experience where they knew something viscerally before their minds did.
Eleanor Rigby
John Lennon and Paul McCartney
Answers to Quiz
b, c, a, d, a
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (234)
1. The repetition of certain lines announces that this is a song—especially the couplet “Ah, look at all the lonely people!/Ah, look at all the lonely people!”
2. The most obvious of them is this: “Many people in this world are lonely, alienated, and unhappy.”
3. Eleanor Rigby lives in a dream world of wishful thinking. She wishes she could find love and marriage, but the closest she gets to marriage is picking up the rice thrown at weddings. Have students discuss what a typical day’s activities for Eleanor might be.
4. The meaning is somewhat obscure, but we believe that Eleanor has a certain face she puts on for company as they walk through the door; thus the lyricist pretends that she keeps her face (a mask?) by the door.
5. Father McKenzie is a dreamer like Eleanor Rigby, but his dream is to be a priest who delivers dynamic sermons that will save the listeners. He writes these sermons, but he never has the opportunity to move any audience because evidently people stay away from him (“no one comes near”). He too feels isolated and abandoned like Eleanor.
6. Where do all the lonely people come from? They come from everywhere—from luxurious mansions, from broken-down huts, from under bridges, and from a multitude of other places around the world.
7. Of course, we cannot answer the question specifically, but we can certainly insist that all lonely people deserve a place to call home—a place where they can feel safe and happy.
8. Eleanor Rigby died without ever achieving love, and Father McKenzie probably conducted her funeral, but if he gave an elegy or a sermon, it was ineffective because “no one was saved.”
9. The poem seems to blame all of us for their sad plight. Over and over again, the poem commands us to “look at all the lonely people!” and to ask ourselves not only where they come from but where they belong.
10. Have students present the case of any person they know who fits into the category of these “lonely people.”
How Near Death is a Near Death Experience?
Catherine Houck
Answers to Quiz
c, d, b, a, b
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (245)
1. In a NDE the person, once well, recalls seeing certain heavenly visions. Have students share any NDE experience they, or someone close to them, has experienced. Have them indicate how the experience affected them.
2. No, the NDE is not universally accepted. Some scientists suggest that NDEers were more likely to have experienced sexual or physical abuse during childhood (see paragraph 25). Many scientists believe that NDEs are little-understood products of the deteriorating brain, probably nature’s way to help victims of trauma relax and conserve energy (see paragraph 29). Other scientists maintain that, like physiological shock, the NDE keeps potentially damaging emotion in check. They also suggest that descriptions of NDEs are almost identical to the hallucinations reported by people who have taken hashish, opium, and angel dust (see paragraph 30). One psychologist, Susan Blackmore, a vehement skeptic of NDE’s, theorizes that oxygen deficiency brings about compression of the optic nerve, which can lead to vision of a tunnel and bright light. She claims that as oxygen levels fall, the brain can go wild, producing images that seem real but are not (see paragraph 32). Have students discuss the pros and cons of the controversy.
3. Personal examples are all science can go by at this point. In medical research case histories form an important base for experiments and their results. In the particular case of NDEs, however, personal examples can be misleading because the cause of the experience has not yet been scientifically established.
4. Turn to paragraphs 15 and 21 for a summary of the experiences.
5. We believe that the desire to know what happens at the edge between life and death is a human curiosity that pervades society. It does not matter whether people are educated or not, they are still intensely interested in what happens when one dies.
6. It seems reasonable that when a person almost loses his or her life, that life becomes more precious than ever. One probably does not need to go as far as having a NDE to feel an intensified love of life. People who have been diagnosed with any serious disease often say that they didn’t realize how much they loved life and how much they prayed to have this life continue. Even a divorce can lead to a greater appreciation of love as one tends to love more what one has lost.
7. Probably the fact that NDEers nowadays have their own networking center and that many reputable scientists have joined the group of researchers interested in NDEs has given the field greater integrity and reliance in the last 25 years.
8. Science converges with religion, but neither science nor religion has a satisfactory explanation for the NDE. Perhaps definitive answers will appear as more research on the subject is accomplished.
9. Sounds of discord or commotion are absent. Everyone feels peaceful and basks in love and the shimmering light of celestial beings. The whole atmosphere seems either too good to be true or it is a genuine religious blessing. Have students share their personal reactions. Do they believe or are they skeptical?
10. Raymond Moody is the Georgia psychiatrist credited with bringing NDEs to the world’s attention and coining the term “near death experience.” In 1975, he published a collection of accounts titled Life After Life. His contribution was then followed by many other researchers who analyzed thousands of episodes that seemed to have similar traits.
What I’ve Learned from Men
Barbara Ehrenreich
Answers to Quiz
b, c, a, d, c
Answers to Questions About Meaning and Technique (256)
1. The first example is taken from the author’s own experience, which adds validity to the example since in it the author exposes herself as weak and accommodating instead of strong and direct. Have female students bring up their own personal experiences in circumstances that required a firm attitude rather than ladylike behavior. Allow the male students to respond to these experiences.
2. Have students debate this question. It is quite possible that Ehrenreich indulges in some stereotyping, but stereotyping the male as strong and silent but the female as pleasing and protective of the male ego is a bias found throughout recorded history. Only as a result of the feminist movement in recent decades have women finally been featured as strong, purposeful, and self-sufficient. It is the stereotype of the puny woman that Ehrenreich is trying to shatter.
3. Stereotypes of women:
From Victorian novels: The pale invalid, sweetly lying on her couch, holding a lace handkerchief and smelling salts in her hand; the manipulator (like Becky Sharp in Vanity Fair and Scarlett O’Hara in Gone with the Wind) using her feminine wiles to get what she wants in life; the dumb blonde like Carol Channing who beguiles by being innocent; the tactful woman who never hurts anyone’s feelings, like the mother in Little Women.
Stereotypes of men:
The strong silent type like Clint Eastwood; the nimble athlete like Tom Cruise, the brilliant tycoon like Howard Hughes, the tough guy like John Wayne. Have students add to the list.
4. Ehrenreich uses humor throughout her essay—to poke fun both at men and women. Since she is good natured about her approach, the reader does not resent what she says. Here are some specific examples of humor in the essay:
a. Paragraph 1: The anecdote about the waiter.
b. Paragraph 2: “Let me try that again—we’re just too damn ladylike.”
c. Paragraph 3: Using the term AWOL for a male who reveals no emotions.
d. Paragraph 5: The descriptions of macho men.
e. Paragraph 7: The suggestions that women cut back on smiling so much.
f. Paragraph 11: Imitating men on what to do with anger.
g. Paragraph 12: The imaginative replaying of the author’s scene with the prestigious professor.
h. Humor is a wonderful technique to use when writing on a subject that could turn belligerent.
5. The kind of male who would approve of Ehrenreich’s attitude is one who is sure of his own masculinity and who would welcome women being more assertive in trying to achieve their proper rights. The kind of male who would be hostile to Ehrenreich’s essay is one who is already threatened by women’s growing competence and who feels that women’s place is in the home and subjugated to their men. Have students discuss where they stand on this issue.
6. The thesis of the essay can be stated in one sentence: “Women need to stand up for their rights the way men do.” The examples used all support the author’s thesis.
7. The two characteristics are power and control. But power and control alone can quickly lead to tyranny. We believe that power and control must always be softened by fairness and understanding. Have students discuss this point.
8. She uses the word “example” in paragraphs 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, and 12. In each case the word helps to make the passage more coherent by introducing the example to follow.
9. The first dictionary definition of the term ladylike is “the quality of being well-bred, refined, and delicate as associated with women of the aristocracy.” However, a secondary definition means “a woman who is unduly sensitive to matters of propriety or decorum.” A third definition means “lacking vitality and strength.” Have students come up with their own definitions, which the class can then discuss.
10. Answers will differ. Allow for open deliberations
Suing For Fun and Profit
Andy Rooney
Answers to Quiz
d, b, c, a, d
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (258)
1. The tone indicates a certain level of outrage. It is also occasionally ironic as when Rooney threatens to quit work in order sue big companies for a living. (Irony means saying something you don’t really mean.) His final paragraph is humorously ironic when he claims to be contemplating a suit against CBS because while in its employ he has acquired grey hair, a wrinkled face, a dead brain, and bent over body. This tone is totally in keeping with Andy Rooney’s curmudgeon image on the noted television program “60 Minutes.” Since Rooney is up in years, one tends to give him the right to complain vociferously while still liking him.
2. His thesis can be expressed in this sentence: "Suing has become a popular American pastime and I’d like to get in on some of the easy money" (paragraph 1). Rooney uses numerous examples of frivolous lawsuits to make his point.
3. Answers may differ, but perhaps the most frivolous lawsuit exemplified in the essay is the one where Stella Liebeck sued McDonald’s because their coffee was too hot and she was burned when she spilled some coffee on her lap while in a car. We think that drinking hot coffee in a car is not a smart thing to do, but if one insisted on doing it, then one should be infinitely careful not to spill the coffee.
4. Allow students to express their views on this question; however, it seems to us that for years the tobacco industry advertised smoking as chic, glamorous, and sophisticated. The movies were always filming gorgeous women and handsome men holding cigarettes and exhaling the smoke with enviable savoir faire. Thus, the tobacco industry can be said to carry some blame for the many deaths resulting from cancer and heart disease. But still, individuals who smoked bear the greatest part of the blame—for being so gullible.
5. He means that people tend to be irresponsible in the way they take risks. Then, when they reap painful consequences from the choices they made, they want to blame someone other than themselves. This tendency is often seen in students’ reactions to getting Fs or Ds on tests or papers. Instead of blaming themselves for partying instead of studying before the test, they prefer to belittle the teacher by accusing him of asking irrelevant questions or questions that were much too obscure and difficult. Have students cite other similar examples. Rooney is disgusted with the way no one takes responsibility for being stupid or rash.
6. The only way Rooney could have expanded his thought was to give examples, but medical examples require a medical vocabulary, which is often difficult to understand. Also, the perceptive reader will already know that doctors pay enormous insurance fees to cover liability suits—these fees sometimes making survival in a medical practice impossible. It seems to us that most doctors have received excellent training and do their best to heal their patients. Suing should be a last resort.
7. His tone is one of exasperation with the effrontery of people who sue for huge sums when they themselves are to blame for such faults as lack of discipline in eating and speeding out of control on the highway. He uses sarcasm to ridicule anyone who would sue the telephone company if someone slams into a telephone pole and is killed.
8. This is an opportunity for students to cite some examples of personal injuries they or a member of their family suffered. Have the class respond to the examples.
9. The reason why large companies get sued more often than small companies is that large companies have large amounts of money in reserve. However, in today’s market, this is no longer true of some large companies. For instance, the employee benefits to workers for General Motors is forcing General Motors to downsize before the company goes bankrupt. Many of the large airlines are in dire financial trouble, so suing them would be pointless. Have students debate the Kellogg and Black & Decker suits. Was the New Jersey couple neglectful, or should the toaster have had a mechanism that turned it off when the Pop Tart was done?
10. In the final paragraph of the essay, Rooney blasts trial lawyers as greedy people who make billions of dollars off their personal injury cases while their clients receive only a minuscule percentage of the court award. The derogatory term often used for personal injury lawyers is “ambulance chasers.”
The Word as Person: Eponyms
Don Farrant
Answers to Quiz
b, a, d, d, a
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (262)
1. Definition. The article provides a concrete definition of “eponym.”
2. The first two examples are of food eponyms.
3. This piece was excerpted from Sky magazine, the Delta Airlines in-flight publication. It was obviously written to entertain an audience of busy magazine readers, and it bears all the earmarks of a journalistic rather than a literary piece. These include the short crisp journalistic paragraphs, a simple diction, and a direct and decidedly uncomplicated syntax.
4. Students seldom appreciate that transitions between paragraphs are not necessary where the sense of the discussion already flows smoothly between them. In paragraph 6, the author is discussing eponyms under the announced heading of “the long history of wearing apparel,” and because the discussion of bloomers is merely a continuation under this theme, no transition is necessary. On the other hand, paragraph 11 introduces a whole new category of eponyms—inventors—and therefore needs the bridging sentence, “Inventors have done much to enrich our language with name-inspired nouns.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Answers
Arrangement in Black and White
Dorothy Parker
Answers to Quiz
c, d, b, a, c
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (268)
1. She is a pretty, superficial southern belle who loves to make small talk at parties and show off her vivacious “charm.”
2. Paragraph 5: She thinks that Walter Williams should be terribly grateful for being the guest of honor at a party with whites.
Paragraph 12: She says that when blacks are bad, they are simply terrible. In this way she is singling them out as being different from whites.
Paragraph 13: She wonders if she should shake hands with Walter Williams. An unprejudiced person would never question how to treat him; she would simply treat him as she would any other famous person.
Paragraph 18: She speaks to the black guest with exaggerated clarity, as if he lacked the intelligence to understand normal English.
Paragraph 23: She is disappointed that Katherine Burke is so dark, indicating that to her dark skin is not as beautiful as light. In fact, she almost slips and calls Katherine Burke a “nigger.”
3. She thinks that blacks are best suited to singing spirituals and that they all have music “right in them.” She believes that one must be cautious about being too nice to blacks because they may take advantage of one’s kindness. To her blacks are like little children—easygoing, singing, and laughing.
4. Burton’s attitude toward blacks is more honest and straightforward than his wife’s. He admits his prejudice where she does not. He takes a superior, patronizing attitude toward blacks, giving them castoff clothes and visiting them out in the kitchen.
5. He is polite but noncommittal. His role is to serve as a sounding board for the woman’s comments.
Incident
Countee Cullen
Answers to Quiz
c, d, a
3.
4. Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (270)
One painful incident in a strange or new environment can leave an unpleasant memory that can last for a long time.
1. Doubtless his environment had taught him to treat blacks as inferior. Children are not born prejudiced; they are conditioned.
2. The title is an understatement. The encounter was an “incident,” a minor event, yet it colored the speaker’s memory of Baltimore. .
3. The contrast between the black boy’s innocent smile and the white boy's vicious grimace. He was “heart-filled” and “head-filled” with glee. Also, he smiled at the white boy.
4. Allow for open discussion.
5. Answers will vary.
We Aren’t Born Prejudice
Ian Stevenson
Answers to Quiz
b, c, a, b, d
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (283)
1. The paragraph opens with the question, "What is prejudice?" which immediately focuses the essay on the task at hand—which is to write a definition. Opening a defining essay with a question is a good tactic because it gets you going on the definition immediately.
2. The use of the word "Negroes" dates the writer. Ask your students what word they would use in place of this. Most modern writers would say "Black," or "African-American."
3. In paragraph 3, the writer points out what prejudice is not—ignorance.
4. It makes sense because, as the author tells us, prejudice is a faulty way of thinking and those who would use it against one group of people would probably also use it against another.
5. The convention that every study quoted be properly cited is an academic, not a journalistic, one and would not be observed in a popular magazine such as Parents.
6. There are many examples throughout of paragraphs that use a different mode of development than definition. For example, paragraph 3 compares and contrasts ignorance with prejudice. Paragraph 4 is developed by process. Paragraph 5, by classification. Each paragraph adds an additional dimension to the definition of prejudice.
7. At the end of paragraph 4, the author uses an analogy of someone sorting through a box of strawberries and rejecting it because one or two berries are bad.
8. The author defines prelogical thinking in paragraph 10. It is thinking that recognizes the similarities of items in a group but fails to see their differences. The prejudiced person will therefore see all foreigners as alike but fail to see the difference between an Israeli and a Spaniard.
Will Someone Please Hiccup My Pat?
William Spooner Donald
Answers to Quiz
a, c, b, d, a
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (294)
5. It is a spoonerism. The title is a quotation from Spooner, made when a gust of wind blew off his hat.
6.
1. Examples. He cites example after example of spoonerisms.
7.
8. He uses the quotation marks to show that this is how Spooner was regarded among his Oxford circle, not necessarily how Spooner regarded himself. The epithet “character” means someone who is odd, eccentric, notable; it is usually used with affection.
2. In the final paragraph he finally tells us that a spoonerism is a “linguistic transposition.” Up to then, he has allowed examples of spoonerisms to speak for themselves. It was not necessary—in fact, it might even have been premature and anticlimactic for the author to have told us exactly what a spoonerism is before then.
9. Allow for open discussion. Personally, we think the business world would have been far more unforgiving of Spooner than was the tolerant world of Oxford.
3. The point is to show that Oxford was a somewhat isolated world of its own which tolerated not only ivory-towered intellectuals, but was equally tolerant of Spooner. Had the point not have been made, we might have wondered why Spooner’s odd linguistic transpositions were regarded as funny and not annoying.
4. Undoubtedly, a great part. Oxford is an influential center of the intellectual world whose members exert considerable weight over all kinds of styles and fashions, including linguistic ones. That Spooner was a member of this important center was no doubt responsible for the rapidity with which the term “spoonerism” spread.
Jim Crow Days
Sarah L. and A. Elizabeth Delany
Answers to Quiz
c, a, d, a, c
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (298)
1. The definition is clarified through examples of how blacks had to use special drinking fountains, sit in appointed sections on trains and buses, and could not interact socially. Here is a lexical definition of “Jim Crow”: The systematic practice of segregating and suppressing Negro people [named after Jim Crow, a character in an act by Thomas Rice, who died in 1860. He based the character on an anonymous 19th-century song called Jim Crow.]
2. The authors suggest that the Jim Crow laws were enacted after the Civil War to keep the freed Negroes from acquiring too much wealth and from making political demands. The laws were also a matter of sex—that is, keeping the whites and blacks from interbreeding. Have students compare the atmosphere today with that in existence when the Delany sisters were growing up.
3. The irony was that many of the whites who looked down on the blacks had black blood in them. Today our attitudes have shifted and intermarriage between blacks and whites is more accepted than in the past although many families, both white and black, still want to keep the races unmixed.
4. Sadie and Bessie’s mother looked white because she was the product of a romance between a white man and a black woman, proving that even after slavery was over, blacks and whites could be attracted to each other in a romantic way. The Delany family preferred to remain with the blacks even though the mother could have passed for white and could have avoided the Jim Crow laws. Have students discuss how they might have handled having a white mother if they were black.
5. The Delany parents advocated peaceful compliance with the Jim Crow laws because they did not want their daughters to become pugilistic and bitter. The father used to tell his daughters that only through education could they ever obtain true equality. Certainly these parents showed great wisdom in making that declaration. Today as well, the easiest way to equality of the races is through education. Have students discuss the influence of education on equality of the races.
6. The essay is written as if the two women were speaking informally. They often use interjections like “Honey” and “Child,” typically practiced in southern talk. They also often use expressions reflecting the informality of conversation. Here are some examples: Paragraph 2: “This is how we remember it….” Paragraph 4: “You see, a lot of this Jim Crow mess was….” Paragraph 10: “Funny thing is….” “That fella even became the mayor of Raleigh.” Paragraph 13: “So you see, he wasn’t perfect, but Lord, he did try!” Have students discuss how well they could hear the sisters' voices.
7. In paragraph 18 we are told that Miss Grace Moseley, a teacher at St. Aug’s, would invite Bessie and Sadie to her living quarters, where she would read Shakespeare to them while they piled on Miss Moseley’s bed. The sisters retained fond memories of these sessions. In paragraph 11 the father states that “equality would come as Negroes became more educated and owned their own land.” Paragraph 29 foreshadows the fact that Sadie was to achieve a Master’s degree from Columbia University.
8. The sisters lived in North Carolina, an enlightened, liberal state. The whites with whom they dealt were kind and friendly, especially the Confederate soldiers and the white teachers at St. Aug’s. But despite this superficial kindness, the blacks were considered inferior; thus the Civil War was a necessary to effect their liberation from slavery. Without this war, the black race would not have progressed to where it is today.
9. Have students discuss their reactions. The incident is certainly one of the most humorous in the essay, and it would make an excellent scene in a motion picture. Sadie is seen as clever and in control of her environment. She strikes us as someone with a strong survival instinct.
10. It was puzzling because it involved such hypocrisy. For instance, the mayor of Raleigh had a black family on the side; yet, he had to uphold the Jim Crow laws. Moreover, since Sadie and Bessie’s grandfather was white, the segregation issue became complicated and involved. Their mother could have passed for white, but their father could not. This kind of contradiction was confusing for the sisters.
Black English Has Its Place
Ron Emmons
Answers to Quiz
b, d, c, a, a
10.
11. Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (301)
1. Identifying himself as African American gives the author added credibility in the debate, since it shows him as one who comes to the argument not as merely an academic, but also as a speaker of black English. He therefore, we assume, can be expected to have more than just abstract knowledge about the subject.
2. Allow for open discussion. One effect, certainly, might be to build a kind of perverse defiance of the larger world and encourage the flaunting of black English as a way of asserting the self. On the other hand, acknowledging black English as a separate, respectable language with its own rules, allows for the teaching of other variants of English, such as Standard English, as a means to an end.
3. It adds weight of authority to his words, by showing that even a successful author such as Amy Tan also felt ashamed of the way her parents spoke.
4. He uses two fragments: “Shame when a prominent black said words in the wrong way with the wrong syntax or agreement. Shame when the pretty girlfriend spoke the wrong English in front of your parents.” Point out to students (it cannot be repeated often enough) that this use of fragments is deliberate, not merely an error.
5. He means it was inappropriate. Of course, by the rules of Standard English, the syntax of black English is wrong, but by the rules of black English, so is the syntax of Standard English.
6. Paragraph 6 gives a formal definition of black English backed by the authority of the American Speech, Language, and Hearing Association. Quoting this association shows that the author is not alone in his belief that black English is a separate language.
7. Examples. Paragraphs 7 and 8 are especially developed by examples.
8. Allow for open discussion. You might ask students to lay down the basic requirements of a “separate language.”
9. Allow for open discussion. Ask students if they instinctively know. Generally, we think black English appropriate for use in informal social situations where it is commonly spoken and easily understood. It is generally inappropriate in formal academic settings and social situations, especially where it is not likely to be understood. What you can do is construct various social situations and ask students if they would think black English appropriate for use here.
10. They prove his point about black English having its own lexicon. As an aside, ask your students to translate them into Standard English equivalents. Do this as a class project.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Answers
Dream House
Anthony C. Winkler
Answers to Quiz
b, d, a, b, c
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique(311)
1. One could contrast the two boys or the two fathers. But the most obvious contrast is the contrast between the two playhouses. One was real; the other was imaginary. Here are the bases of this contrast: 1) the designers of the two houses (Mr. Peterson, a skilled worker, and Jessie’s father, a dreamer); 2) the quality of the house (one is made of wood, the other of imaginary substances; 3) the value of the house (both have great value, but the imaginary house lasted longer and created more excitement than the real house).
2. To Josh and Jessie the playhouse symbolized their own personal territory, where they were in control. While lodging in the playhouse, they could feel like kings of a domain cluttered with enemies whom they could crush and subjugate. Children love to imagine living in castles or fortresses where they feel safe and in charge.
3. Mr. Peterson was gruff, practical, and sure of himself whereas Jessie’s father was artistic, sensitive, poetic, and filled with self-doubt about his practical abilities. Have students discuss which man they would choose to be their father and why.
4. The following passages contain figurative language and vivid imagery:
a. Paragraph 64: “The stars smothered under a muddy run-off of
b. light and smog from Los Angeles, and only a planet or two bobbing overhead like specks of fat in the primordial soup.” Anyone who has been to Los Angeles will recognize the thick smog of that area.
c. Paragraph 74: “The chalky night of Southern California ghosted by like an old clipper ship under full sail….” This is a way of emphasizing the speed with which time passes when one is engrossed in a thrilling conversation. But the author is also emphasizing the thick, ghostly air of the Los Angeles basin.
d. Paragraph 86: “The night was cool and dry, and from the nearby San Bernardino Freeway came the ceaseless droning of traffic—constant, shrill and unvarying like the flat line alarm of an electrocardiogram.” Here the traffic noise is described as never ending, loud, and without variation.
e. Paragraph 89: “He was still in traction from a back injury and had the puffy, whitish look of an old mushroom.” The reader quickly understands that Josh looks ill and beaten down from his injury.
f. Paragraph 101: “After several months on the market, the house sold and the dreaded day of Josh’s moving arrived slowly but irresistibly like death from cancer.” Nothing is more inevitable than death from a terminal disease like cancer. The reader can sense the unavoidable approach of Josh’s departure.
g. Paragraph 117: “Josh and I passed through the preadolescent years and entered our teens gingerly like explorers stepping into unmapped territory.” The change from elementary school to high school is truly like stepping into an unfamiliar, somewhat frightening foreign country.
h. Paragraph 118: “The playhouse aged slowly but steadily like a grounded freighter being devoured in microscopic nibbles by the sea.” The reader can imagine the freighter sitting in its dock, paint peeling away and metal parts rusting.
Figurative language and vivid imagery are always an author’s finest tools to make the writing come to life so that the reader can actually experience what is happening. While clarity in writing is a great achievement, it does not fire up the reader’s imagination the way figurative language does, as seen in the examples from Winkler’s story.
5. Like all good story tellers, Winkler writes in detail about important events; but unimportant events are dismissed with a sentence like the one in paragraph 54: "After his father left, Josh became depressed and avoided the playhouse completely." We are given no details about the father’s departure. Or paragraph 88 where a whole week is dismissed with the words "A week later…."
Or paragraph 101 where months are condensed into “After several months on the market, the house sold….” Or paragraph 117 where years are summed up in the sentence “Josh and I passed through the preadolescent years and entered our teens gingerly….” Or paragraph 118 where again years have passed without any details from the narrator’s life. The author merely writes, “I graduated college….” Obviously, it would have been incredibly tedious if the author had supplied every little detail of what happened during these years in the narrator’s life. A lively story entails proper pacing, which means that the writer highlights important scenes, but dismisses scenes that have no bearing on the story. All well-crafted stories leave some questions unanswered because life has a way of leaving questions unanswered, but these questions add to the fascination of the story. For instance, we do not know what eventually happened to Josh’s father, and we don’t know what Mrs. Peterson did after the divorce from her husband. But real life is filled with people who step in and out of the sphere of our lives, and we can only wonder what happened to the ones who disappear.
6. The mothers play minor roles in the story, which is really about the relationship of the boys with their fathers. We know that the mothers exist, but only as minor characters in the drama that plays out. Nevertheless, the story would suffer if they were eliminated because they are foils that emphasize the fathers’ personalities.
7. The real house has the advantage of being a physical structure that you can see, smell, and touch. You can actually sleep and play in it. You can invite your friends to step inside and enjoy this private retreat. It has the disadvantage of its physical limitations. It is not a palace, and it can neither soar nor fly. The imaginary house has the advantage of existing without limitations. It is like a house from a fairy tale. It can be anything you desire. It can even save you from predatory wild bears.
8. First, the dialogue adds humor to the story because it reveals the naïve thinking of these two eleven-year-old boys. We smile as we realize that Jessie felt he was betraying Josh because Jessie’s parents did not fight. He even goes so far as to apologize for his parents’ peaceful relationship. Second, the dialogue divulges certain Jamaican attitudes, such as anger at having the Jamaican accent ridiculed and fearing hell so much that even the word must not be spoken. Third, conversations make the characters sound human and alive.
9. The narrator feels that awesome is overused and thus has lost its punch. Other words in that same category today are words like cool, nifty, amped, or gross.
10. Jessie’s son is crucial to the story because he proves the importance of having an imagination. In a sense, he wraps up the whole story because we are sure that, like his father and grandfather, he too has an imagination that will serve him well when he is confronted with dull, hopelessly literal people or when he needs courage to confront a menacing situation. The son also symbolizes the generational cycle of grandfather, father, son, and grandson and the beauty of close ties between the older and younger generation.
The Twins
Charles Bukowski
Answers to Quiz
b, c, d
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (314)
1. Obviously, they had a stormy relationship and hated each other. The speaker also seems to have felt dominated by his father, as revealed in the line, “for a father is always your master even when he’s / gone.” We gather that there was some estrangement between them—“I am a stranger here, and have been (I suppose) somewhat / the rogue...”
2. The father was settled and rooted—we’re told that he owed $8,000 on his house and that he was 20 years on the same job. He also seems to have been financially better off than his son, who admits that his father’s blue suit is much better than anything he’d ever worn. We can infer that the son’s lifestyle was arty and drifting—he advises his father to learn to paint and to listen to Brahms while the father’s was somewhat conventional and ordinary. Further, the son accuses his father of being dominated by women and dollars. Notice that the son is decidedly the opposite in this respect—he says that he doesn’t give a damn that his father left it all “to some woman in Duarte.” The telling contrast between them comes in the final stanza: while his father was readying his bulbs for planting, the son says he was “laying with a whore from 3rd street.”
3. Allow for open discussion. He is simultaneously realistic and poignant about his dead father, honestly grasping the differences between them while wistfully trying on his suit.
4. They are twins in that they looked alike and share a common fate. The father is dead; the son is waiting his turn to die.
5. A Bukowski trademark is the working-class speaker, the kind of voice rarely, if ever, found in traditional poetry. The language is down-to-earth and not at all high-flown in the traditional poetic sense. Notice, for example, lines such as, “he was / my old / man / and he died.” One doesn’t usually find the speaker of a poem lying with a whore from 3rd street.
6. It has no rhyme and is written entirely in free verse with a rather colloquial diction. Bukowski has been a pioneer in importing the language of the street into poetry.
7. The line is a psychological truism. A son incorporates the image of the father into his internal psychological makeup and self, and in this way a father may be said to be a son’s master. Sons also tend to deify fathers, enlarging them in memory and retrospect beyond human size, and in this sense a father can be said to always be the master of a son. Allow for open discussion of the second question.
Diogenes and Alexander
Gilbert Highet
Answers to Quiz
c, a, d, d, a
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (323)
1. Highet’s comparison is based on economics, social position, looks, and intelligence.
2. He uses the vertical method, dealing fully first with Diogenes and then with Alexander.
3. In paragraph 11 the attention is shifted from Diogenes to Alexander. Highet accomplishes the shift smoothly by focusing on Diogenes viewing the attendants of Alexander.
4. In paragraph 6 the author contrasts Diogenes with the other great philosophers of his age, Plato and Aristotle.
5. Diogenes is compared to a dog “because he cared nothing for privacy and other human conventions, and because he showed his teeth and barked at those whom he disliked.”
6. They are both well educated and wise.
7. Contrasts drawn between Diogenes and Alexander include old age versus youth, poverty versus wealth, no political power versus great political power, lack of popularity versus great popularity, and coarse manners versus polished manners.
Grant and Lee: A Study in Contrasts
Bruce Catton
Answers to Quiz
d, a, b, a, c
Answers to Questions On Meaning and Technique (332)
1. The word “virtual” means “in practical terms.” While the war was not officially over, because some armies still had not surrendered, it was practically over because the South had been overpowered by the North. The opposite of “virtual” would be “theoretical” or “unreal.”
2. The “chief support” was the slaves who did all of the labor on the southern farms. Without this free labor, the southern plantation owner could not remain fiscally solvent.
3. The author sets this sentence off in one paragraph in order to gain emphasis. Lee represented the aristocracy of the South, but this aristocracy was about to be obliterated by a new, more democratic, society from the North.
4. Have students consider the enormous power wielded by wealthy corporations and their CEOs today. Is this not another form of aristocracy, meaning “a privileged ruling class”? Perhaps the power is not inherited, but it certainly makes a distinction between upper and lower classes.
5. Lee was a man whose family background was filled with culture and tradition. He was a thoroughbred southern gentleman, who believed that the ownership of land by a leisure class was important. Grant, on the other hand, was a frontiersman, who embodied toughness and self-reliance. He was a man who was far more interested in the future than in the past. Have students discuss which man appeals to them most.
6. Lee harked back to a time of chivalry—almost knighthood. His soldiers were willing to die for him just because he was their leader and embodied noble ideals of aristocracy. In Lee’s world, privilege was handed down from father to son. Unlike Lee, Grant looked to the future. Like all frontiersmen, he pushed toward the West, where he believed the greatness of the future lay. In Grant’s society, privilege had to be earned. Life was competitive. We believe that the best leader is one who studies the past and learns from it, but then moves forward toward the future.
7. He begins with Lee and writes about him; then he shifts to Grant and writes about him. The essay is sprinkled with contrast phrases, such as the following:
“Grant, the son of a tanner on the Western frontier, was everything Lee was not” (paragraph 7). "And that, perhaps, is where the contrast between Grant and Lee becomes most striking" (paragraph 10). “The Westerner, on the other hand….”(paragraph 11). “So Grant and Lee were in complete contrast…”(paragraph 12).
8. They were both marvelous fighters, and their fighting qualities were similar. They were both utterly tenacious and faithful to their cause. Most important, in the end, both men could turn from war to peace.
9. We believe that all Americans should take pride in what Lee and Grant represent in our brief history. Without skimping on modern historical studies, yes, students should know what happened at Appomattox and what it means to our present.
10. Have students discuss the advantages and disadvantages of economic growth and expansion. For instance, they might analyze what happens when industry takes over agriculture and when frontiers continue to be expanded. Consider the example of colonial empires such as England, France, Spain, Belgium, and Russia. Consider also the expansionist theory of Adolf Hitler.
Priest and Pagan
Arthur Grimble
Answers to Quiz
a, c, d, a, b
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (337)
1. Paragraph 2 announces that a comparison/contrast is going to be drawn between a pagan and a Christian. However, before the author begins his narration, he wants to explain that for Christians what happens before death is all important whereas for pagans, it is what happens after death that counts. Without this distinction, the story would be a mere recounting of an adventure.
2. Father Choblet broke the law that forbade canoe voyages between the islands from the end of September to the end of March every year. Have students discuss whether or not Father Choblet was in the right or wrong—considering the huge danger involved in the trip. What if all the canoe boys had been drowned? Are there times when a law must be broken in order to obey a greater law? This is a subject worth discussing. You might remind students of Martin Luther King, who went to jail rather than obey the southern laws of segregation. Student sit-ins and other protests have often involved breaking curfew laws or laws against assembly in public places. Have students offer their opinions of such acts of civil disobedience.
3. He received a desperate message from a mission teacher in Nukunau Island, 30 miles east of the Gilbertese island where Father Choblet lived. The message begged Father Choblet to hurry to the island of Nukunau, where Father Franchiteau lay dying, to administer the Last Sacrament to him. Since Catholics believe that unless one receives the Last Sacrament before death, one dies “unshriven”—that is, one’s sins are not forgiven. Because only an ordained priest can administer this last rite, it was important that Father Choblet respond. Have students discuss (with a sense of tolerance for differing views) what importance the Last Sacrament has for them.
4. While the report was handed to the author by Father Choblet’s canoe boys, the report would be considered reliable because it came from actual witnesses.
5. The canoe boys were probably inspired by Father Choblet’s own courage. Here was a frail little priest who was willing to undertake this brutal journey by himself, without anyone’s assistance. Somehow his faith and courage erased the islanders’ fear.
6. Paragraph 7 is utterly captivating in its drama of how the men hung on to half of the broken canoe despite the raging sea and were finally swept by a current to the shores of the Island of Nukunau.
7. The god Nakaa, according to Gilbertese belief, is the guardian of the gate between earth and paradise. He sits forever at this gate, waiting to catch and strangle the ghost of any dead persons who did not receive the proper rituals to send them into a happy afterlife. Underlying the entire plot of this anecdote is the belief that rituals for the dead are extremely important.
8. Another important ritual was the young boys’ passage into manhood. This initiation required the young boys to face some terrible ordeals, such as being segregated from the other villagers and then facing the “test by fire,” which presumably required the boy to undergo some severe burns. Tabanoara’s young brother Tebina successfully passed the initiation into manhood, which caused Tabanoara to be proud of his younger brother since Tabanoara had been the one to school Tebina.
9. Because the ritual required some part of the dead person’s body, Tabanaora valiantly goes to find the shark who killed his brother. He meets him in the lagoon and kills him with his spear, triumphantly bearing his brothers remains, found in the maw of the shark. It is common for people who accept a new religion to hang on to their old beliefs because there is comfort in tradition.
10. The final paragraph of the essay tells us clearly what the two stories have in common: First, both Father Choblet and Tabanaora showed immense courage in the face of overwhelming danger. Second, both men had faith in the god or gods of their choosing. Third, both men revealed deep love for mankind. Have students discuss whether or not it is important to have a certain belief when one faces death. The author seems to consider the government bureaucracy ultimately fair and even generous.
Beauty Is in the Eyes of the Beholder, Along With Everything Else
Lee Dembart
Answers to Quiz
c, b, d, a, c
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (341)
1. The process of seeing seems simple enough: Light passes through the lens of the eye and strikes the retina behind it, which tickles the optic nerve and sends an electrical signal to the brain. The mystery is how the scenes we perceive get put together by the brain. Somewhere in the brain the physical sensation is turned into a mental one, but how this happens is a mystery.
2. It is related to the whole mind-body question with which philosophers and scientists have grappled for centuries. Thoughts are mind; brain is body, but to fully understand how the two interact is extremely complex and may never be sorted out completely.
3. The question is at the heart of the essay; yet, the author never fully answers the question because exactly how seeing works is not understood. All we know is that somewhere in the brain the physical sensation is turned into a mental sensation.
4. The brain is an organ of the body, but it is different from other organs like, say, the pancreas, which secretes insulin. The brain secretes thoughts, but you cannot measure this secretion the way you can measure insulin. The whole process is baffling even to experts in the field.
5. The author announces that he plans to simplify the problem of understanding the relationship between the brain and the mind by dividing the approach into two theories. He achieves coherence by using the transition, "On the one hand…." in paragraph 8, and then moving on to paragraph 9 with the transition, "On the other hand." This kind of parallelism in phrasing makes the paragraphs easier to follow.
6. The author admits that she does not have the full answer, but she declares that she favors the reductionist position, which says that mind and brain are the same. She is confident that some day neuroscience will be able to trace and explain the relationship. Have students discuss the possibility of how “soul” works in the equation.
7. She quotes a famous experiment in which electrodes were placed on the heads of human subjects so their brain activity could be monitored. This experiment proved that brain activity preceded conscious decision to move. Have students discuss how convincing they found this experiment. This kind of scientific experimentation is at the basis of most progress in complex scientific problem solving.
8. The author questions our present notions of free will. For instance, she suggests that if thoughts follow brain activity, then we have much less freedom than we think. She even goes so far as to ponder that if mind and brain are the same, then people who are smart shouldn’t be praised or rewarded for it. They can’t help themselves. Certain religious people will vehemently oppose the idea that human beings have no free will because believing so would put an end to the great controversy between good and evil and a matter of choice. Allow for a lively debate on the question of free will.
9. The final sentence summarizes the whole essay by quoting a famous philosopher, Ludwig Wittgenstein, who wrote that “All the interesting things can’t be written down and described.” That is precisely what the author has been saying throughout her essay. We just don’t know enough about such complex things as the brain and mind to explain them in clear terms.
10. The title emphasizes the idea suggested in paragraph 19: “But it is fair to conclude that most of what we say about the world says more about us than it does about the world.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Answers
How Mr. Hogan Robbed a Bank
John Steinbeck
Answers to Quiz
c, a, b, c, a
12.
13. Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (350)
1. a. He observes all the daily operations of the bank.
b. He decides on which day to rob the bank—just before vacation when plenty of money would be available.
c. He goes to work as usual but makes himself a mask out of a cereal box in the store where he works.
d. He waits until the safe is open and the cash is in the tellers’ boxes. He puts on a coat, which covers his revolver and Mickey Mouse mask.
e. He puts on his mask, enters the bank, motions a teller to the floor with the gun, steals money out of a cash register, and leaves.
f. He goes back to work as if nothing had happened.
5. It draws the lesson that many people whose lifestyles label them as nice, respectable middle-class people harbor secret sins that would shock their neighbors if they knew about them. The story is an attack on the kind of moral hypocrisy that compels certain people to pretend to be good, decent, and upright in public when in actuality they are behaving despicably in secret.
6. Paragraph 1: The details of where and how the Hogans live. Paragraph 9: Typical middle-class domestic problems, such as the children having the mumps, Mrs. Hogan having to get dentures, a relative dying, John and Joan wanting to enter the “I Love America Contest.”
7. He will not allow his children to handle guns or shells; yet, he robs a bank at gunpoint.
8. It is an ironic statement because the author is writing as if robbing a bank were no different from any casual business venture.
Tract
William Carlos Williams
Answers to Quiz
d, c, d, d, b
14.
15. Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (352)
1. First, create a design for the hearse. Second, find appropriate decorations. Third, supply a proper place for the driver. Fourth, give instructions to the mourners.
2. He is trying to point out that a funeral is a way of expressing grief for a loved one who has died. Consequently, the ritual should be neither phony nor excessively elaborate. It should be natural because dying is a natural aspect of life, and mourning a loved one is a natural way of remembering him.
3. Presumably as a symbol of the fact that when a person is dead, one should gloss over his imperfections and remember only the good. The paint could symbolize the glossing-over process, or the gilt wheels could be intended as a limited, unfinished concession to the practice and custom of decorating funeral equipment.
4. Life is not smooth: It has its storms and rough spots.
5. He suggests a remembrance typical of the life of the dead one(his old clothes, some books, or anything else that would remind the mourners of the kind of person he was. Such a remembrance, compared to flowers, is more functional and suitable for the occasion of mourning.
6. Having a driver in a top hat suggests that the undertaker is the center of attraction of this ceremony when in fact he is not in the least moved by the death of the one in the coffin. He is merely doing a job and therefore should not occupy a seat of honor.
7. The author exhorts the mourners to show their grief openly by walking behind the hearse, not by hiding in the carriage behind veils or curtains. In a sense, he is saying, “No one is immune to grief (not even the speaker himself as indicated by the pronoun us), so save the money you would waste on an elaborate, artificial funeral that would not rightly represent what death and mourning are all about.”
In the Garden of Childish Delights
Emily Fox Gorden
Answers to Quiz
b, c, d, a, c
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (360)
1. Gordon is describing the process of how happiness is lost by growing up. The process begins with childish ecstasy and ends with the “adult variety of happiness,” which is hard won and ambivalent.
2. Most likely you were left with a feeling of melancholy, realizing how gradually childhood innocence and delight become tainted on the path to adulthood. It is easy to visualize the author and her brother romping through gardens, meadows, and woods in the safety of Williamstown—their German Shepherd in tow. We feel the regret of exchanging all of this innocence and joy with the seriousness of adult life and its hard-won moments of happiness.
3. Existential happiness is the kind that is so pervasive that it seems to exist spontaneously and artlessly inside the body whereas psychological happiness is the result of proper mental hygiene and adjustment. Have students discuss this contrast.
4. First step: The author goes to school, where she is an academic failure, a fatty, and a disappointment to her parents. Second step: At twelve her feelings become moods. Third step: She becomes a 56-year-old adult who finds that happiness is hard to maintain. Still, as an adult she can still go back to the fantasies of her childhood.
5. She believed in fairies, God, and history. Actually, some experts believe that it is healthy for children to believe in benevolent supernatural forces. For instance, children who believe in guardian angels feel secure and protected from danger. Of course, certain childhood beliefs, such as the belief in Santa Claus, the tooth fairy, or the Easter Bunny need to be replaced with more adult beliefs. But most adults still need to believe in a power stronger than they—such as God—in order to deal with the enormous challenges in life.
6. Arcadia is a term used by the ancient Greek poets to describe an environment of rustic simplicity. The people of Arcadia were innocent shepherds or farmers, who lived their lives in happy contentment. Her belief that she was living in an Arcadia at the end of time is probably the result of thinking that history has to end some time. The author does not describe what happens or what unravels at the end of time.
7. Here are examples of the author’s figures of speech:
Paragraph 2: The Williamstown campus was “a kind of Eden” (metaphor)
Paragraph 3: “The elms stood guard” (personification).
Paragraph 5: “I pushed the threatening world of school to the margins of my mind” (personification and metaphor).
Paragraph 5: “Feelings of happiness and sadness continued to run through me in discrete layers, like currents in a river” (personification, metaphor, simile).
Paragraph 5: “Feelings become soluble in mood” (metaphor).
Paragraph 5: “They carry the air of the that time and place as if the Williamstown of my childhood had been lying under an unbroken seal for 50 years” (personification, simile).
8. Allow for varying answers to this question. The author insists that she cannot “tell” a picture; she can only “describe” it. But she can tell a story. We assume that she can tell the story of her life so that it becomes a living experience.
In the Valley of the Shadow
Carl Sagan
Answers to Quiz
d, a, b, b, a
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (370)
1. This is a highly autobiographical essay. Like a diary, it allows the reader to catch glimpses of the author’s mind and emotions. From him the reader can learn what it is like to face physical pain and the agony of death. The title is taken from the Bible, Psalm 23: “Yeah though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, Thou art with me.” It is interesting that Sagan chose this title since he died an agnostic.
2. He writes in a restrained tone, always focusing on the scientific interpretation or observation of what is happening to his health. He could have whined and whimpered about all of the pain and agony he had to suffer, but he never loses sight of his point of view—that of a professional scientist.
3. Most ancient and worldwide cultures believe that when human beings die, they are eventually transformed into another body with an eternal life—of either gruesome punishment for having been evil or blissful reward for having been good. Yet, Sagan clearly asserts that he thinks the belief in a life beyond death is merely “wishful thinking.” Have students discuss the advantages and disadvantages of Sagan’s belief. Ask them what they think is the pivotal point on which believers and nonbelievers disagree. Is it faith? Is it intellectual pride?
4. Sagan felt that his illness had taught him much about life—especially the beauty of human existence, the preciousness of friends and family, and the transforming power of love. After reading the essay, we realize that he was particularly moved by the incredible devotion of certain people: his sister, Cari, who donated her own bone marrow to save Sagan’s life; his wife, Annie, who nursed him with untiring care; and total strangers whose sincere prayers wished him a speedy recovery. Sagan’s essay is in part a beautiful ode to human goodness. What keeps him from wishing the same experience on everyone is the risk factor. Life can hang on a thin thread, and anyone near death may actually die.
5. Step 1: Annie notices an ugly black-and-blue mark on Sagan’s arm.
Step 2: Blood tests indicate that Sagan’s white and red blood cells are compromised.
Step 3: Sagan enters the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle.
Step 4: Sagan’s sister, Cari, proves to have stem cells compatible with those of Sagan, and she donates her stem cells so that Sagan can have a bone marrow transplant.
Step 5: Preparations begin for the stem cell transplant, including lethal doses of chemotherapy.
Step 6: The transplantation takes place and turns out to be painless and successful, allowing Sagan to return home to lead a normal life.
Step 7: Sagan’s bone marrow reveals the presence of a new population of dangerous, rapidly reproducing cells. Sagan must go back to Seattle for a special enzyme cure and more stem cells from his sister. Again the procedure is successful, and Sagan seems to be cured. A year goes by.
Step 8: Because, after a year, the disease has returned with greater virulence than ever before, Sagan must return to Seattle for more therapy in the hospital and more bone marrow from Cari.
At the time the essay ends, Sagan is filled with hope concerning his health.
6. Just as the writer of the post card was living in a delusion, not realizing that he was about to die, so Sagan was living with false hope about his health, not aware that death was calling. The Titanic sank, and Sagan’s body gave up. Encourage students to discuss their reaction to life’s fickleness and betrayal.
7. This paragraph is a warning to all human beings that death can strike in the midst of happiness, well being, and success. It is similar to the warning in Oedipus Rex, where the Chorus warns that no man should call himself happy until he has witnessed the end of life.
8. He limits the amount of scientific terminology used. When he does use terms like “mylodisplasia,” “stem cells,” or “suppressed immune system,” he explains them clearly and simply so the average reader can understand them.
9. He compares the experience to swallowing a dose of arsenic or cyanide and hoping for the right antidote to be supplied in time to be saved from death. Have students indicate how this analogy affected them.
10. He learned, above all, that the future is unpredictable and that, in fact, there is no certainty about what even the next moment holds (see paragraph 27). Have students discuss this point. You might ask them if they would really want to know the future before it happens.
Coming Into Language
Jimmy Santiago Baca
Answers to Quiz
c, b, a, d, a
16.
17. Answers to Questions on Meaning and Content (377)
1. The voice is that of a prison inmate; it is clearly one of triumph over despair, of victory following ruin. Have students share their reactions to Baca’s story. Did they like him or were they turned off by his criminal background? Baca seems to be writing the essay the way a person writes a journal—partly to understand himself better and partly to relieve himself of the huge burden connected with such a horrendous past.
2. Here is a possible sequence; other possibilities exist, of course, depending on how the steps are summarized:
18. The author finds and peruses a hospital book with illustrations of the female anatomy.
19. The author looks at 450 Years of Chicano History, an illustrated book about Chicano revolts.
20. The author listens to male prisoners read aloud the works of famous writers.
21. The author reads a stolen university literature anthology that includes Wordsworth and Coleridge.
22. The author acquires a Red Chief notebook and starts to write down his impressions of life.
23. The author finds freedom in language (see paragraph 17).
24. The author establishes a barter business while in solitary confinement—trading his poems or letters for novels, pencils, and writing tablets.
25.
26. The author keeps a journal and finds unity with the universe, but also insanity.
27. The author is moved to death-row and then to the row for mentally-disturbed prisoners.
28. The author emerges from a state of total madness and rejection to be born a poet.
3. While answers may differ, we think that paragraph 17 expresses the author’s recognition of how language can set one free.
4. Examples abound throughout the essay. Here are three:
Paragraph 5: “Listening to the words of these writers, I felt that invisible threat from without lessen—my sense of teetering on a rotting plank over swamp water where famished alligators clapped their horny snouts for my blood.”
Paragraph 11: “But soon the heartache of having missed so much of life, that had numbed me since I was a child, gave way, as if a grave illness lifted itself from me and I was cured, innocently believing in the beauty of life again.”
Paragraph 17: “Each word steamed with the hot lava juices of my primordial making, and I crawled out of stanzas dripping with birth-blood, reborn and freed from the chaos of my life.”
5. Twice in the narrative he expresses an impassioned determination to conquer grammar (see paragraphs 12 and 20).
6. With phrases such as these: “One night. . .” (paragraph 2); “Before I was eighteen. . .” (paragraph 5); "Two years passed" (paragraph 8); “One night in my third month in the county jail. . . ” (paragraph 9); “Days later. . . ” (paragraph 13); “When I had been in the county jail longer than anyone else. . . ”(paragraph 18); “After that interview. . . (paragraph 20); As the months passed . . . " (paragraph 26).
7. His past was filled with rage, hopelessness, betrayal, psychological or physical damage, and injustice. He wrote because, despite this terrible past, he had an indestructible love of life and wanted to affirm “breath and laughter and the abiding innocence of things” (see final paragraph).
8. He was suffering from obvious depression, which is often anger turned inward. People who are depressed typically have no energy and want to sleep all the time, as a way of escaping the pain of their reality.
9. The punishment of humiliating students (having them sit in front of the class wearing a dunce cap, having them stand in a corner, or having them wear a sign stating “I need to behave in class”), although popular forty years ago, is today considered poor pedagogy and harmful to students’ psyche and future success. The trend today is to build up confidence in underachievers.
11. The title hints at the process so meticulously outlined in the essay. Indeed the essay tells us exactly how the author came into the English language, mastering it and becoming a successful writer. Encourage students to come up with other titles.
How to Say Nothing in 500 Words
Paul Roberts
Answers to Quiz
b, d, c, a, b
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (387)
1. The author's opening draws us in by giving us the hypothetical case of a student faced with having to write a paper on that old chestnut of a topic, "college football." Yet the author's detail is so fresh and vivid and the scenario he sketches is so plausible and true to life that we are caught up in it. Instead of merely regaling us with principles of essay writing, the author is able to vividly demonstrate the kind of essay writing errors students make and show us how to overcome them. This is a highly effective teaching technique and is partly responsible for the popularity of this essay.
2. The student writes the essay by delaying it to the last minute and then finally getting down to the job the night before the essay is due. While the author admits that there is some exaggeration in his portrayal of the student writer, he also says that he did not exaggerate much. We think his depiction is fairly true to life and gives an accurate picture of how students typically tackle an essay assignment. Ask your students for their own opinions.
3. We think the "D" is mainly deserved and for the precise reason given by the instructor(that the essay is weak in content. Ask your students what grade they think this essay deserves.
4. This effect is partly achieved by a sprightly writing style and a brisk, humorous discussion of the principles of essay writing. We think the popularity of this essay, however, is largely owing to its humor.
5. We think he would argue that the purpose of education is to overcome the shallowness of thought manifested in the student's thinking about a topic, and it is no excuse to say that the student knew no better about the topic and therefore could not write a good essay on it. Every writer, students included, is expected to master the topic on which he/she is supposed to write an essay. That the writer has failed to do that is no excuse for a trite essay.
6. Some teachers, in fact, have argued that Roberts’ approach is little better than pandering to the reader and that the student who takes his advice is doomed to write a shallow, self-serving essay. We do not agree with this point of view. Writers are expected to make any material fresh and inviting and to treat it with a new wrinkle whenever they can, and part of doing this often requires the writer to take the less than usual side.
7. The question at the beginning of paragraph 9 is intended as a transition that focuses the discussion on what a writer can do to make a dull subject interesting.
8. As a matter of fact, we think many, if not most, teachers would object to this sentence as altogether too slangy and colloquial for a student essay. Part of the students' burden is that they are discouraged from writing with this kind of extravagant flair and flamboyance but, instead, are expected to write good, solid, workmanlike prose that is grammatically correct and straightforward and not loaded down with idiosyncrasies. No doubt, in some rare cases this is an unfair requirement, but all writers labor under some stylistic expectation that they have to work around.
9. The second assertion is made in a fragment rather than a complete sentence, but it is done for the sake of emphasis and rhythm. Many teachers simply do not allow their students to write in fragments, while many professional writers use them every now and again to make a point emphatically.
10. The offensive assumption contained in this particular passage is that the student is male, and this stereotype is confirmed repeatedly by the use of third person male pronouns. A modern textbook writer would no doubt cast this particular passage in the plural, using the pronoun "they" and thus avoiding the sexual stereotype.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Answers
Harrison Bergeron
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
Answers to Quiz
d, c, a, b, c
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (395)
1. The types of handicaps are mental (noises that hinder ideas), physical (sash weights to stop athletic abilities), and aesthetic (masks to hide beauty).
2. The answer to this question depends on what students value in life. Some may value athletic ability; others may value beauty; yet others may value intelligence. We consider intelligence the greatest gift of humankind and consider mental handicaps as not only tragic but a way of truncating the advancement of civilization. Of course, without the beauty of art and athletics, life would be paltry, indeed.
3. George thinks more creatively, independently, and imaginatively than does Hazel, but his handicap keeps bringing him down to her level. She represents the well-adjusted “normal” commoner who is compassionate and simply exists in her society. Nothing about her stands out. She would hate a society in which all levels of intelligence and talent were competing for rank and position because she would not be able to compete, having no particular physical beauty, artistic talent, or mental brilliance. Occasionally George longs to be free of the mental handicap assigned to him, but then he has been brainwashed to believe that competition would lead to political and social chaos. On rare occasion Hazel wishes she could hear all of the sounds that handicap George, but inevitably she settles down to her average life, convinced that it is best to have all human beings equal.
4. The equality described here is an exaggerated version of totalitarian communism, a society in which nothing can surpass the norm—not in intelligence, artistic beauty, or physical prowess. This is a society in which there can exist no deep thinkers, no great artists, and no beautiful bodies. It is a dull, humdrum society that marches to the tune of an uninspired dictator. The narrator’s point of view reveals great contempt for the system. He never speaks out to vilify it, but the entire story is filled with satirical put-down. For example, in paragraph 2, he states, “Some things about living still weren’t quite right, though.” In paragraph 10, George toys with the idea that “maybe dancers shouldn't be handicapped.” In paragraph 41, the ballerina is made to apologize because her voice was “warm, luminous, timeless, melody.” Of course, the satire is obvious because no one should have to apologize for having a beautiful voice, especially not a radio announcer. In the end, the reader is totally on the side of the dancing lovers, and while the Handicapper General wins, the death of the lovers is tragically regrettable.
5. Allow the class to discuss their views on this question. We believe that history has palpably proved that equality of ambition, spirituality, and talents is impossible to achieve and that those totalitarian countries that try to do so ultimately face revolution. The human spirit must be free to express itself and to fulfill its dreams if society is to flourish.
6. It sets the stage for the action to follow. It informs us that the entire story is science fiction and that we shall deal with a society in which everyone is equal. The tone is satirical; we sense a critical attitude toward the conflict in the story.
7. An intriguing exercise for the class is to narrate the story from Harrison’s point of view. Doubtless he would be heroic in his defiance of the whole grotesque system. But the advantage of having an omniscient observer tell the story is that you, the reader, can render your own judgment.
8. He uses words that suggest movement: shifted, reeled, whirled, swiveled, flounced, capered, gamboled, spun, leaped.
All the World’s a Stage
William Shakespeare
Answers to Quiz
c, c, c
1. Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (397)
1. The world is conceived as the stage of a theatre, implying that human life is simply a play in which all human beings have their assigned parts. Other appropriate metaphors are these: life as a circus with people as clowns, acrobats, lion tamers, and sideshow characters; or, life as a battleground for the forces of good versus evil; or, life as a bordello, where everyone is a client seeking to fulfill some fantasy. Students’ choice of metaphor will largely depend on their out-look on life—whether optimistic or pessimistic.
2. Stage 1: Infants represent childhood.
Stage 2: Schoolboys represent boyhood.
Stage 3: Young lovers represent adolescence.
Stage 4: Soldiers represent adulthood.
Stage 5: Judges represent middle age.
Stage 6: Pantalooned gentlemen represent old age.
Stage 7: Senile old men represent second childhood.
Of course, the careful reader will realize that in Stage 7 life has come full circle.
3. It reveals the youthful passion so typical of first love, when the lover will write a sentimental poem praising some aspect of his mistress’s body, such as her eyebrows. Of course, Jacques is being satirical about young love.
4. The soldier is swaggeringly masculine, wearing a bristly beard and uttering swear words. He is also ambitious to earn some honor on the battlefield, even if doing so means death. Yes, soldiers today—especially regiments like the Marines—are seen as having considerable “machismo.” However, many young people today hate the army because it represents war, which is no longer a chance for honor but rather for annihilation of the human race.
5. He portrays life as “strange” and “eventful.” As usual, Shakespeare has written what most human beings feel—that life is indeed a strange and tangled web of events. No one is entirely free from the incomprehensible ironies and haphazard juxtapositions of happiness and sadness.
The Plot against People
Russell Baker
Answers to Quiz
d, c, a, b
2. Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (405)
1. On the fantasy that inanimate objects, such as a car, can think, plot, and plan like human beings. This literary technique is referred to as personification—imbuing inanimate objects with human characteristics. Sometimes personification is poetic and dramatic, such as in the lines, “Oh Death, where is thy sting?” But in this case it is comical.
2. He bases his classification on the method objects use to defeat humans—breaking down, getting lost, or never working. Other bases could be the following: quality, appearance, or importance, but, of course, these might not lend themselves to ironic humor.
3. The purpose is to create laughter. The argument is preposterous since neither side is right. Inanimate objects do not have the faculties to be either hostile or stupid; they just irritate in the same way hostile or stupid people do.
4. In paragraph 5 the author mentions that many inanimate objects find it extremely difficult to break down; therefore, they have evolved “a different technique for resisting man.” Then Baker goes on to describe the technique of breaking down.
5. Here are some examples of the personification he uses:
Paragraph 3: “With the cunning peculiar to its breed. . .” “It waits. . . .”
Paragraph 6: “They get lost.” “Science has still not solved the mystery of how they do it. . . .The most plausible theory is that they have developed a secret method of locomotion . . . .”
Paragraph 7: “. . .for a pair of pliers to climb . . . .” “Keys have been known to burrow. . . . ”
Paragraph 12: “. . .the things that don't work have attained the highest state possible . . . .”
Paragraph 14: “They have truly defeated man. . . .”
6. Because many of the inanimate objects mentioned in the essay are poorly built or assembled, they break down unnecessarily. Thus, factories should devise systems of strict quality control of such items as cars, washing machines, flashlights, and battery-operated things. The loss of objects can be reduced when owners keep certain objects, like keys or glasses, in their appointed places, concentrating on where they placed the object. Flighty persons are much more prone to losing objects than persons who are well organized.
7. You might lead a discussion in which you have the class imagine what would happen if a nuclear war or some other catastrophe wiped out our capacity to produce such objects as television sets, automobiles, clocks, and the like. Or, you might have the students answer this question: If you could keep only ten manufactured objects, which ten would you choose and why?
8. The paragraph sounds scientific—straight to the point and without frills. Such a no-nonsense beginning serves Baker’s purpose of pretending to be serious.
Three Types of Resistance to Oppression
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Answers to Quiz
b, d, d, a, d
3. Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (414)
1. The characteristic ways that oppressed people use to deal with oppressors.
2. Acquiescence, violent resistance, and nonviolent resistance.
3. They do not always welcome their deliverers.
4. That it is immoral to passively accept an unjust system. Moreover, he argues that acquiescence will confirm the oppressor’s contempt of the Negro.
5. He objects that it is impractical as well as immoral. He says that violence is immoral because it seeks to humiliate the opponent rather than to win his understanding.
6. Nonviolent resistance is a synthesis of the opposing views of acquiescence and violence. Proponents of nonviolent resistance oppose physical aggression but believe that evil must be resisted.
7. The height of opposing an unjust system while loving its perpetrators.
8. That it be militant, that it be nonviolent, and that it be a mass movement.
9. They will engage the support of people of conscience while exposing the oppressor as an instigator and practitioner of violence.
College Pressures
William Zinsser
Answers to Quiz
a, a, c, c, d
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (420)
1. His purpose is to identify four pressures faced by college students: 1). economic, 2). parental, 3). peer, and 4). self-induced. The author achieves his purpose by carefully describing each pressure and giving plenty of examples as evidence of the reality of these pressures.
2. The students are motivated by a relentless and nervous ambition to succeed by getting good grades so that they can be accepted into the proper graduate school and be successful in elite jobs. The author sees this motivation as stultifying and ultimately defeating. He believes that students should investigate courses and activities that will stretch their minds, enlarge their spirits, and satisfy their curiosity about life. Only then can they lead enriched lives.
3. He would look for graduates with a great deal of curiosity—students who risked themselves by taking a variety of courses that would enlarge their knowledge and stretch the limits of their abilities rather than by registering for safe courses that would assure them top grades that would then assure them prestigious jobs. Have students discuss what college courses they think would be valuable as a foundation for a happy life.
4. He singles her out because she wants to be an artist—a career that rarely brings huge commercial success or power. The result is that the student is torn between her father’s wish that she choose a practical, money-making career and her wish for a life of artistic satisfaction. Have students offer their advice and opinions.
5. Students should perceive that the notes reveal the desperation and frustration felt by students who are victims of the four pressures described in the essay. Also, they add a touch of reality because they are written by actual students.
6. Zinsser clearly states that women are under even more pressure than men because it is more difficult for them to succeed despite the fact that they may be superbly equipped with an excellent education. Society has not yet accepted fully the idea that women are as qualified for advanced jobs as are men.
7. He uses transitions from one pressure to the next. For instance, in paragraph 22 he writes, “Along with economic pressure goes parental pressure.” In paragraph 31 he writes, “Peer pressure and self-induced pressure are also intertwined….”
8. He wants his audience to realize that the students are not 100% uptight, driven, overly ambitious, and calculatingly clever in their attempts to make good grades. They have another side: They juggle their crowded schedules in order to maintain a balanced life of entertainment and studies. They are easy to like and they offer their friendships unstintingly.
9. He does not mention the computer age with its new hold on students. Have students discuss how computers have affected students in the last decade.
10. Some of the same pressures listed in the essay exist today. Students still need financial aid; students still try to please parents who want their offspring to make money; students still compete with each other for grades and may even stoop to cheating in order to get them; students still hesitate to follow their own bliss, worrying that they might end up as failures.
Mother Tongue
Amy Tan
Answers to Quiz
d, c, a, b, b
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (426)
1. By admitting that she is not an expert on English or literature, she narrows her purpose while staking out her ground as a best-selling writer.
2. The principle behind the classification is the audience for which the different kind of Englishes are meant. Since this classification is based on the author's personal use of English, it is an informal classification.
3. The sentence has no subject and its verb is truncated, which makes it seem cryptic. The formal equivalent of this sentence would be something like, “You should not waste money that way."
4. It is somewhat pedantic and academic, with stuffy phrases such as "the intersection of memory upon imagination." Ask students their opinion of it.
5. Allow for open discussion. Most languages of intimacy are based upon simplification of the formal language, which can be demonstrated in the student examples.
6. Various translations are possible. Here is one: “Du Yusong had a business like a fruit stand on the street. He is like Du Zong—but not like the Tsung-ming island people. He belonged to the putong people who live on the east side of the river. That man wanted to ask Du Zong’s father to take him into his own family. But the father didn't take him seriously until the man became a Mafia chieftain. Now that the man was an important figure, it was very hard not to invite him. He came only to show his respect for the big celebration, but did not stay for dinner. It is a Chinese custom that if you're very important, you don't have to stay long. He came to my wedding, but I did not see him, I only heard about his presence. I was 19 years old at the time and I had gone to the side of the boys at the YMCA dinner."
7. Allow for open discussion.
8. Although she does not outright classify the kinds of Englishes she uses, she seems to imply at least three: formal English, her mother's English, and intimate English. The distinction between number two or number three is not clear-cut but seems to exist anyway.
9. Language is not necessarily to blame. The explanation might lie in the different culture from the mainstream that was the author's.
10. Allow for open discussion. Most likely anyone who spoke nothing but formal standard English would be stereotyped as a prig or a stuffed shirt with a corresponding effect on his/her self-image. You should also point out to students that using nothing but formal English is really not suitable in all situations. Some occasions of intimacy demand the use of informal or street English.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Answers
The Girls in Their Summer Dresses
Irwin Shaw
Answers to Quiz
d, b, a, d, b
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (434)
1. Frances is jealous of Michael because she completely misunderstands his appreciation of beauty. She interprets his admiration of young girls as lust and as a rejection of her instead of as a genuine appreciation of youth, life, and beauty.
2. They are the culmination of the list of women Michael loves to look at. Presumably, he loves to look at them because, on a bright summer day, they represent beauty in a particularly lissome and unencumbered form.
3. He loves her and is attracted to her:
“I’m a happily married man” (paragraph 10)
“I have not touched another woman. Not once. In all the five years” (paragraph 13)
“I love you” (paragraph 19).
“You're beautiful.” (paragraph 19).
“Michael watched her walk, thinking what a pretty girl, what nice legs” (paragraph 25).
4. He makes her feel insecure because she interprets his attentions to other women as a desire to leave her and have an affair.
5. Allow for open discussion.
6. Frances has insisted that Michael not share his feelings with her. This kind of lack of communication is bound to create a growing barrier between them. It is quite possible that the marriage will not survive because Michael will one day “make a move” and get involved with another woman. On the other hand, if Frances comes to understand Michael’s feelings without being threatened, then the marriage may grow into a stable love relationship. It may also be argued that by censuring Michael’s harmless gazing at other women, Frances may deprive him of a useful channel for sublimating his sexual restlessness and thereby push him into a real affair.
7. If we are to believe the writings of psychologists and sociologists, Michael is very much the average male. Most men enjoy looking at pretty girls.
Money
Victor Contoski
Answers to Quiz
c, a, d, c
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (436)
1. The poem tells you that while money may appear to be your confidant, pleasurable companion, and submissive pet, in the end it will destroy you. Or, don’t trust money; it will destroy you. The theme is stated in the final line of the poem.
2. The dominant figure of speech is the comparison between money and a treacherous animal—probably a snake—whom you befriend and trust, only to have it bite you and kill you with its poison.
3. An allusion to the presidents of the United States—because several of them—Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, for example—appear on U.S. legal tender.
4. Allow students to express their views on whether money can be of benefit to one’s personal life. It seems rather clear that many individuals have used money wisely and for their own good. However, such a result is usually due to the person’s sense of discipline—not using money profligately or senselessly. Moreover, it appears that the happiest rich people are those who use part of their money for altruistic ends. An interesting question to ask the class is, “What would you do with a hundred million dollars?”
5. When you first receive a sizable amount of money, you may believe that it will never control you or change your way of life. For instance, you tell yourself that if you were to win the lottery, you would continue to keep your same friends and you would continue to remain down to earth and approachable. The phrase “at first” gives away the poet’s view that you are being deluded. The title is crucial to an understanding of the pronoun “It.”
6. Because the poem is not so much thinking of a physical death but rather of the slow erosion of character. It is possible that the corruption caused by money is slow and cumulative until one day a person who in the past was a simple, happy, loving, decent human being wakes up to realize that money has destroyed marriage, family, serenity, trust of other human beings, and even life itself. The poet is stressing the secret diabolism of money.
Mary Todd Lincoln: Second Thoughts on Our Most Vilified First Lady
Irving Stone
Answers to Quiz
d, c, a, c, d
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (449)
1. The worst charge was that Abraham Lincoln did not love his wife. According to the author, this accusation was first made by a jealous law partner, William Herndon. Mary reacted foolishly by showing her unmitigated hatred for Herndon.
1. Her excessive grief over the death of her second son, Edward. Our view is that no grief over a child can be considered excessive. In fact, psychological studies indicate that losing a child is the most stressful event a person can experience. Allow students to offer their views.
1. She turned a worn-down, shabby residence into a magnificent one because she felt that the executive mansion should be symbolic of a successful country—to Americans as well as to foreigners visiting the United States. Have students offer their opinions on this issue.
1. Eleanor Roosevelt, Bessy Truman, Jacqueline Kennedy, and Pat Nixon. Have students decide whether or not a first lady has the right, or even duty, to keep the White House looking impressively beautiful.
1. Time has a strange way of making some mistakes look worse than they were, while making others disappear or seem glossed over. In the case of Mary Lincoln, the fear might be that some people hated this woman so much that they would exaggerate her mistakes and then these exaggerations would show up in the history books.
1. He approaches the charges chronologically, beginning with the Springfield years.
1. To show that castigating first ladies is common among U.S. citizens.
1. It gives him credibility and also lets the reader know that the author was deeply interested in the Lincolns and their relationship to each other.
1. The causal analysis begins in paragraph 3, where the author probes what he considers the worst charge, refutes the charge, and assigns causes to it.
1. Have students discuss what view of Mary Todd Lincoln they retained after reading the essay. Especially, have them state how the essay changed their attitude toward this woman.
Why We Crave Horror Movies
Stephen King
Answers to Quiz
c, a, b, c, d
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (458)
1. The author is suggesting that inside each of us lurks a person with some kind of mental sickness. Whereas some people hide their mental sickness better than others, everyone falls into the category of being mentally ill. Have students discuss the validity of the author’s view. But first, have them give their definition of mental illness. For instance, can someone with a fear of flying airplanes be labeled as mentally ill? Surely a matter of degree becomes important here.
2. The author believes that anyone attending a horror movie is “daring the nightmare.” By that he means that the viewer in essence is saying this: “Yes, I am afraid of the many demons that plague my life and mind, but when I watch this horror movie, I am daring that nightmare to overcome me. I am showing the demons that I can stand my ground.
3. In paragraph 3, the author uses the analogy of a roller coaster because those boarding a roller coaster know that they are going to be somewhat frightened, but they board anyway, just to show that they can do it. Have students come up with another analogy. One student used the analogy of the glass floor at the top of a high rise in Toronto, Canada. The view through the glass floor is enormously frightening for most tourists because one feels sure that if walked on, the glass will break and one will fall through the air hundreds of stories to the cement sidewalk below. Knowing that the glass can’t possibly break does not seem to reassure the average visitor. Yet, hundreds of tourists each day force themselves to walk on the glass floor and look down—just to prove that they have the courage to do so.
4. One reason we go to horror movies is to be convinced that we are not as utterly abnormal as the hideous devils or witches in these movies. In other words, compared with them, we are essentially normal. The author also points out the conservative, reactionary nature of horror movies. These movies never change; they always deal with hideous creatures who pervade the dark places of the world, and they always react against light and goodness.
5. We are turned into children because horror movies make us see morality in terms of black and white, not shades of gray. In the world of horror movies the good and the bad are not at all the same, and we can see which is which clearly. We also become like children because we can freely let out our emotions. We can scream, gasp, or clench our teeth without embarrassment.
6. In paragraph 9 the author uses the metaphor of a “potential lyncher” who resides in all of us. This lyncher needs to be let out to roll about and scream once in a while in order to keep him from getting out of control and causing real damage—which is what happens with crazy people. Another way of expressing this thought is to say that pent up emotions need occasional release through anger, love, fear, or some other socially acceptable channel.
7. Here are some examples of informal English:
Paragraph 2: “bucks” rather than “dollars.”
Paragraph 8: “clap you away in the funny farm” rather than “place you in a mental hospital.”
Paragraph 10: “our rotten little puke of a sister” rather than our “annoying monster of a sister.”
Paragraph 13: “man” used as a slang accent.
Paragraph 14: “gators” rather than “alligators.”
Because Stephen King is a powerful novelist and essay writer, he can get by with an occasional informal or slang expression. We do not encourage students to use slang or informal English because formal English is what they will be required to write throughout their college education and in the professional world.
8. For King, sanity and insanity are a matter of degree. He believes all of us are insane, but society accepts certain forms of insanity, such as talking to yourself or making grimaces, but it does not accept other forms, such as carving up women.
9. He promises to tell us why we crave horror movies—a promise he does fulfill by listing the reasons why we want to see them and what happens to us psychologically when we give in to this desire.
10. He believes that in order for us to reveal the acceptable emotions of “love, friendship, loyalty, and kindness,” we must occasionally give vent to our less acceptable emotions. Have students suggest ways other than watching a horror movie to get rid of pent up emotions. Consider the following: exercising strenuously, listening to soft music, confiding in a good friend, or going for a long walk.
Grow Up? Not So Fast
Lev Grossman
Answers to Quiz
d, a, c, a, b
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (467)
1. Here are the other terms used: kidults, threshholders, emerging adult hood. All the terms connote the movement from one stage of life to another. Have students try to think of creative terms for the twixters. Here are examples from other countries: Canada: “boomerang kids,” England: “kippers,” (acronym for “kids in parents’ pockets eroding retirement savings” France: “Anguy syndrome” (from a 2001 film about a charming 28-year-old who refuses to move out of his parents’ apartment.) Germany: “nest hockers,” Italy: “mammones,” (for kids who won't give up their mother’s cooking) Japan: “freefers” (a combination of the words “free” and arbeiter,” (the German word for “worker). One student suggested delayed trail blazers. Another came up with ADs, for “adolescent adults.”
2. Social scientists are trying to answer the question, “Do the twixters refuse to grow up or is it that they simply can’t grow up? The essay seems to favor the idea that present economic and educational circumstances impede the twixter’s ability to grow up. Have students propose their own answers, backed up by personal experience.
3. It is taking students much longer to finish college with a degree than it used to. The average student now takes five years before getting a diploma. According to Grossman, the reason for this extended time is that colleges no longer prepare students for life because a B.A. or B.S. is now so common that employers pay little attention to such degrees, taking them for granted. Colleges are often so out of step with the demands of the real world that vocational schools are experiencing an enrollment boom. Also, going to college has become extremely expensive, causing students to stay at home so as to avoid paying for room and board in addition to the high college tuition and textbook costs.
4. This term is obviously a take off on the popular expression “thinking outside the box.” Thinking “outside the box” means using your imagination to go beyond the routine accomplishments of a company. Thinking “outside the book” means to leave the impractical ideas found in books and get down to the practical requirements of the work place. For instance, students who have completed their pre-medical school requirements will know little about healing patients. It is the hands-on experience that will turn them into accomplished doctors. Likewise, a student might learn the theory of accounting in a finance class, but until he has actually worked with real-life ledgers, he will not be ready to take his place in the world of finance. The author is criticizing colleges for not preparing students to enter the practical world and earn a decent income. Have student discuss whether or not this criticism is warranted.
5. See paragraph 29 for an answer to this question. The twixters make up for the loss in family support by having friends with whom they throw cocktail parties, dinner partiers, and poker games. They stay in touch with their friends by taking advantage of the new technologies of cell phones, email, instant messaging, and online communities. According to authors Cagen and Watters, they also remain close to their parents and contact them by cell phone daily. Have students confirm or deny this new emphasis on friendship. We suggest that remaining close to parents and other wise adults can keep these twixters from getting into self-destructive lifestyles, such as taking drugs, drinking too much, or going into debt.
6. See paragraph 33 for a partial answer to this question. According to Grossman, pop culture not only defines youth, but also shapes it. Various markets have noticed that while twixters are waiting to find out who and where they want to be, they spend considerable sums of money—propping up the markets for electronic gadgets like Game Boys, flat-screen TVs, Ipods, couture fashion, and expensive vacations. Other items to mention are joining exercise gyms and buying exotic cars. All these items are expensive and have caused numerous twixters to become debt ridden.
7. They ignore such matters as paying into Social Security, having medical benefits, and setting up retirement plans. While they probably think of life as a long, long journey with the end still far away, if they throw all caution to the wind, they may find themselves like the grasshopper in Aesop’s fable, who frittered away her days in fun and gaiety, neglecting to work, while her neighbor, the hard-working ant, stashed away food for the winter. Have student think of the advice they would give twixters living only for the here and now.
8. The following paragraphs contain figurative language: Paragraph 3: “Who are these . . . twentysome Peter Pans?" Peter Pan is the little boy in a children’s story who never grew up. This is an apt image to portray the twixters because they also don’t want to grow up. Paragraph 5: “…whatever cultural machinery used to turn kids into grownups has broken down.” The image of machinery cranking out people is effective. (But the machinery has broken down, so the kids are not coming out adults.) Paragraph 7: “Legally they’re adults, but they’re on the threshold, the doorway to adulthood, and they’re not going through it.” This metaphor of the threshold and doorway stresses the twixters’ reluctance to become adults—to walk over the threshold into adulthood. Paragraph 18: “To them, the period from 18 to 25 is a kind of sandbox, a chance to build castles and knock them down….” Again, this image reminds us that, in a way, twixters are still children. Paragraph 30: “Like Goldilocks, they want to find the one that’s just right.” This hopping about applies to their lovers as well as their jobs. Vivid images, including metaphors and similes, when aptly used, as they are by Grossman, add sparkle to an essay that could otherwise be dull.
9. His style is direct, and his sentences flow coherently throughout the essay. He remains objective and does not become emotionally involved in the argument. At no point does he vilify or denigrate young people. In fact, he points out that our culture may need to accommodate twixters as a permanent stage in life.
10. Grossman convinces by carefully analyzing the cause-effect relationship between society and the goals of young people facing adulthood. Grossman has done meticulous research for his essay. He quotes numerous scholars and social scientists. The essay is filled with quotations from experts in the field. This kind of documentation adds intellectual weight to the essay.
Black Men and Public Space
Brent Staples
Answers to Quiz
c, a. b, a, d
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (472)
1. Anecdotes are always an excellent way to capture the reader’s attention. The fact that the narrator calls the woman a “victim” makes the reader want to find out what happened because we are always fascinated with people who have been victimized. Ironically, in this case, the real victim was the narrator, who was totally misjudged. Later on in the essay we find out that pedestrians, especially women are often frightened by black males whom they encounter on deserted, dark streets.
2. The details add believability to the scene. Since the narrator is described as tall, with a beard and billowing hair, he does cut a rather fearsome figure. Allow the females in the class to discuss how they might have reacted under similar circumstances.
3. Staples’ primary purpose is to get across to his readers what it is like, as a black man, to be in public places at certain times, especially at night. He wants to describe in detail the irrational fear a passerby may feel when encountering a black man. Staples is writing in order to gain understanding from the reader. He probably knows that it takes time for society to stop having irrational fears of people who are different in color or looks from them. But by describing several incidents in which he was mistaken for a criminal just because he was black, he hopes to educate the reader to be tolerant. We think he hopes that when we are confronted by a person who looks different from us, we will not immediately attribute evil motives to that person, but will judge the situation intelligently.
4. In the last sentence of paragraph 3 he specifically refers to “policemen, doormen, bouncers, cab drivers, and others whose business it is to screen out troublesome individuals before there is any nastiness.”
5. The author’s definition is how people react physically and emotionally when they are afraid. In this essay, they start walking faster; they cross the street; or they try to protect themselves with a dog when they believe they are confronting a dangerous person. You might have students discuss how they react to persons from the Middle East since the suicide bombings of 2001 and on.
6. Indeed, statistics and news stories are grim evidence that the streets of most large cities are not completely safe for anyone vulnerable to criminal attacks. In recent years, parents have become especially watchful of their children because so many little girls have been kidnapped and murdered, grabbed by a total stranger with homicidal compulsions. Discuss how neighborhoods can make their streets safe without profiling certain cultures or races.
7. Allow students to discuss this question, especially the aspect of self-esteem. Let them consider what their city, college, church, or family is doing to improve tolerance in their communities.
8. The conclusion is effective because it injects a bright note into an otherwise somber text. Additionally, the narrator’s ruse of whistling “bright, sunny” tunes while walking at night probably works since it is true that most night strollers would not expect a mugger to be whistling tunes from Vivaldi’s compositions.
9. Factors cited by most sociologists and politicians are the following: 1) poverty that leads many blacks to desperation, 2) lack of education that keeps many blacks ignorant and thus unable to achieve middle or upper class status, 3) working mothers who are unable to give their children the supervision they need to grow up in a secure environment. Other factors can be cited. See if your students can think of some.
10. The tone seems to reflect some anger, but mostly dismay and resignation about a situation that exists and cannot be changed dramatically any time soon. For anger, see paragraph 11; for dismay and resignation, see paragraphs 2 and 11.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Answers
War
Luigi Pirandello
Answers to Quiz
d, a, d, a, a
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (479)
1. All the high-flown phrases about the glory of dying for one’s country lose their meaning entirely when one is confronted with the reality of losing one’s son in a war.
2. The fat man pretends that children do not belong to their parents but are destined for noble contributions to society, perhaps even to die for their nation. He waxes eloquent about the glory of sacrificing a son in the war, claiming that young men who die in a war die happily, having escaped the ugly sides of life. He even claims (paragraph 21) that he feels no unhappiness at his son’s death, that he does not even wear mourning for his son. In fact, however, he has not yet faced the death of his son, and when he suddenly realizes that his son is actually dead, he breaks into uncontrollable sobs.
3. The conflict lies in the difference between the attitudes toward war of the fat man whose son has just died and the woman whose son has just been called to service. It is also mirrored in the fat man’s professed attitude toward the war versus his secret grief over the loss of his son.
4. The woman asks him, “Then is your son really dead?” She does this to reassure herself, but this seemingly incongruous question completely destroys the fat man’s steadiness.
5. When the fat man is first introduced in paragraph 15, he is described as a “red-faced man with bloodshot eyes of the palest gray.” This detail suggests that the man is not at ease but has spent some sleepless nights.
6. Allow for open discussion.
Dooley Is a Traitor
James Michie
Answers to Quiz
a, b, c, d, a
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (482)
1. He objects to war because it requires that a man kill in cold blood. Dooley himself has been in jail for murder, but it was murder as a result of personal anger. He killed with passion and vengeance because he held a personal grudge against the man he killed. He finds it morally intolerable to kill unknown masses of people in an impersonal way and for an abstract idea.
2. He argues that fighting a war on behalf of one’s country is fighting for principles that are “sanctioned by God, led by the Church, against a godless, churchless nation!”
3. Dooley summarizes the New Testament incident where Christ chased some evil spirits out of a man and had them enter a herd of pigs, which then threw themselves over a cliff. The implied lesson is that Christ did not declare war in which entire nations kill each other off in a coldly calculated, premeditated manner.
4. He admits without hesitation that he’d knock the enemy's brains out. This is consistent with Dooley's view that killing for personal reasons is excusable while impersonal killing is not.
5. Dooley’s logic is mad logic, but Dooley makes more sense in his madness than the judge who argues by repeating set phrases and standard suppositions.
6. No one wins—all lose in the end because all are doomed to die eventually. But Dooley would rather be shot as a deserter and have a clear conscience than kill or be killed in a war.
7. Allow for open discussion.
8. The fact that Dooley has killed before adds authenticity and belief to his opposition to war. It also underscores his attitude toward war: that it involves cold-blooded killing rather than killing done in a state of intense passion.
The Case Against Man
Isaac Asimov
Answers to Quiz
a, d, b, c, a
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (501)
1. His argument is that we must start using birth control now. He states this point explicitly in the final paragraph. Doing so allows him to present first all the evidence he needs to convince the reader that future life is unthinkable if our population is allowed to grow unchecked.
2. We will reach the stage of planetary high-rise with no animals but man, no plants but algae, no room for even one more person (see paragraphs 28 and 35.)
3. He states that just as cells out of control in the human body (cancer) can destroy a human life, so any organism growing out of control would eventually destroy the larger system of life it belongs to.
4. They are both intricately interrelated systems. Both are made up of nonliving as well as living portions. Loss of any part will affect the whole.
5. They add authority and also an element of horror as the reader follows the mathematical growth explosion.
6. We are not ready to send 80 million people per year to another planet. We could not engineer those worlds to sustain that many people.
7. Allow for discussion.
I Want a Wife
Judy Syfers Brady
Answers to quiz
a, b, c, d, a
Answers to Questions About Meaning and Technique (513)
1. Syfer’s argument is based on the premise that all wives are completely devoted to advancing their husbands' causes, be it their careers or their home life. At the same time, they remain glamorous and ready to shine at a social gathering. Careful thinking, of course, should lead you to recognize that the amazing creature –“a wife”—she describes probably exists only as a composite picture of many outstanding wives. Moreover, the author never addresses the advantages of being a wife, only those of being a husband.
2. Exaggeration, also known as hyperbole, contributes heavily to the delight of reading this essay. The wife described simply has no faults. She is every man’s dream companion, but since we know that no such perfect wife exists, we can laugh at the portrait.
3. She keeps using the pronouns “I,” “my,” and “me” in order to emphasize the point that a wife is most useful and laudable when she caters to her husband’s every need and desire. See paragraph 4 and 8, where my is italicized for emphasis.
4. The evidence she uses is probably based on her own experience, having observed husbands who had wives support them through school, take care of their children, run their social life, and clean their house—all without bothering the husband’s own busy schedule and, of course, without complaining.
5. Have students discuss the fairness issue. We think that much of the essay is written with the voice of exaggerated sarcasm—as if by someone who felt bitter about having been used and then discarded like a dirty handkerchief.
6. Many husbands today provide the following comforts for their wives:
▪ income so that a wife can remain at home with the children
▪ hard physical work, such as carrying heavy bags or suitcases
▪ intelligent companionship
▪ doing most of the driving when an automobile trip is involved
▪ maintaining success on the job to keep the family happy and respectable
Have students add to the list.
7. Since 1970, women have made immense strides in the work place, becoming lawyers, physicians, CEOs, TV news anchors, college presidents, and successful political candidates. While women still complain about a “glass ceiling” that keeps them from getting the top jobs as easily as men do, they have become ever more educated and ever more visible in the world of executive privilege.
8. She makes it look as if the wife is the long-suffering martyr in a relationship where the husband is selfish and demanding while also being extremely nonchalant about his own spousal fidelity. We believe this picture to be grossly exaggerated because in the real world, sexual ennui is displayed by both genders, as is sexual fidelity.
9. The final sentence of the essay is like taking a big breath after quickly reciting a long list of items. The answer she expects from the reader is, “No one would not want a wife!” The sentence is italicized for emphasis.
10. Encourage freedom of discussion on this question. You might consider placing a list on the chalkboard, giving each item a ranking in terms of its importance in a marriage.
The “Don’t Impose Your Values” Argument is Bigotry in Disguise
John Leo
Answers to Quiz
c, c, a, a, d
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (516)
1. He interprets it as the belief that “it is wrong, and perhaps dangerous, to vote your moral convictions unless everybody else already shares them.” The author turns the belief into a paradox, because if you did not vote your beliefs unless everyone already shared them, then there would be no need for voting them—because voting is lawmaking, and lawmaking is a way of imposing one’s belief.
2. Leo points to the abolition movement and the civil rights movement as being primarily responsible for the freedom of the slaves and for giving blacks equal rights with whites. Religious movements in the country have also contributed excellent hospitals, schools, and valuable social programs for the poor.
3. Leo deplores the fact that whereas the “don’t impose” people criticize Catholics for being against abortion and stem cell research, they forget to criticize those Catholics who do not follow the pope’s insistence that rich people should share their wealth with the poor or that they should oppose the death penalty. In other words, Leo feels that the “don’t impose” people are biased in favor of their own special interests. Have students think of similar inconsistencies on the part of the evangelicals or Catholics. One example is the fact that many religious people insist on everyone’s freedom to pursue happiness; yet, they would deny gays the right to marry or adopt children.
4. This question should engender a lively class discussion. Encourage students to share their views with the class.
5. All of us tend to scoff at people whose views we consider fanatic, or inhumane, or stupid; however, in a democratic society we must be careful not to trample on individual, personal beliefs—especially if they do not harm the public weal.
6. The example is bared because it supports the author’s argument that voters should not keep someone out of office just because that person holds a religious views in conflict with that of the voter. Now, let’s look at this example: Should a teetotaler refrain from voting for, say, a city mayor because the mayor was seen having a glass of wine at a public banquet? Have students bring up other possible examples for discussion by the class.
7. Allow for individual answers and examples.
8. In paragraph 9. Leo’s assertion merely reinforces the truth that what we personally believe always seems more right or moral than what an opponent believes. It is difficult to listen without bias to someone who thinks quite differently from what we do, but unprejudiced listening is what an intelligent person must develop.
9. Leo’s answer is to realize that neither religious nor secular answers are privileged or out of bounds. The goal is to drop the “don’t impose your beliefs on me” argument and to be unprejudiced.
10. He makes himself look reasonable by admitting that he is “struggling” to understand the “don’t impose your values” attitude. Also, he never becomes emotional or irrational. During this short essay, he uses four references from other sources to support his view: 1) Paragraph 2 and 9: UCLA law professor Eugene Volokh, 2) Paragraph 7: The Times’ comment on the Rocco Buttiglione case. In your own writing, remember that the opinion of experts gives strong support to an opinion.
What Would Happen if We Legalized Gary Marriage?
Michael Alvear
Answers to Quiz
c,b, a, c, d
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (522)
1. The opening sentence of the essay is the author’s thesis, and he repeats the thesis in the final sentence, thus leaving the reader with the thesis as the last thought to remember. Moreover, the thesis is a direct answer to the title of the essay. Only a superficial reader would miss the main point of this essay.
2. Students may differ in their answers, but we think that the two most persuasive elements are the statistics used by the author to show the vast numbers of people involved in the homosexual community, and the reference to how children’s lives would be improved if they were adopted by gay parents.
3. He cites six powerful agencies to prove his point: 1) The American Academy of Pediatrics, 2) the Child Welfare League of America, 3) the North American Council on Adoptable Children, 4) the American Psychiatric Association, 5) the American Psychological Association, and 6) the National Association of Social Workers. One weakness of these reference is that he does not quote any one person from these organizations, but simply assumes that we will accept his blanket statement that these agencies have concluded that gay and lesbian homes would be an improvement for many kids in foster care. The reader might want to check on these agencies to confirm their view.
4. This is a sticky issue because no one would want to see Billy suffer; however, one might ask, “Do we need to revamp the entire marriage code in order to save Billy?” If our society would allow civil unions that would grant legal rights to gay couples, that might save Billy without having his parents actually “get married.” Encourage debate, but not hostility or intolerance, on this issue.
5. According to the author, gays will go in and refurbish a community so that it will then attract the “creative class” because this class is drawn to the values gays represent—diversity, open-mindedness, variety, eccentricity. We add to this the argument that people like to see gays move into a run-down community because they refurbish the community with great artistic skills. Real estate values that have plummeted rise again—a boon to business.
6. This is an important question to ponder. The class might consider such factors as the ease with which divorces can be obtained, the absence from home of working parents—during the children’s formative years, the secularization of moral values, or the longer life spans that place tension on an already rocky marriage. Encourage students to bring other ideas to this debate.
The Marriage Buffet
David Frum
Answers to Quiz
d, b, a, a, c
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (526)
1. Frum focuses on the word marriage, thus getting away from the issue of homosexuality. The author wants to emphasize the fact that his argument is not a vilification of the gay community, but rather a protection of marriage.
2. Frum says that these advocates of change are riding a very fast train—one that will not stop anywhere between the criminalization of homosexuality and full state recognition of homosexual relationships. A train hurtling along its tracks is certainly a powerful image, indicating that such a train would be difficult to stop before it reaches its destination. Have students suggest other images, such as a huge rock rolling downhill, or a tsunami advancing toward the shore.
3. It is ironic that both sides have come to understand the importance of marriage at a time when the institution of marriage is approaching collapse. The author is surely thinking of the high divorce rate among married couples and the ease with which some modern couples sever their marriage ties. Have students discuss what has contributed to this growing frailty of marriage. Consider such factors as couples living longer, women holding jobs, and the secularization of society so that churches have lost their influence on parishioners.
4. Frum insists that same-sex marriage would reduce the odds of children growing up in a stable home. In support of his argument, he cites the laws of foreign countries like Denmark, France, Hungary, Iceland, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, and Canada, which have established legal partnerships similar to same-sex marriage, and these partnerships blur the line between being married and not married; moreover, they are easier to get out of than a marriage and thus do not offer greater stability for children than the present concept of marriage. Have students offer their opinions on this point.
5. By “continuum” the author means a gradual change from true singlehood to formal matrimony. The author finds this continuum bad for children because in countries where pact laws occur, couples usually break up before they have co-habited for five years, leaving the child in a broken home.
6. The “crazy-quilt” figure of speech brings to mind one of these quilts where people add squares of their own making in order to celebrate a special occasion. While in some cases the quilt can be striking, from an artistic point of view it often reveals confusion and disorder. Frum uses another image in the title of his essay—“the marriage buffet,” which also indicates the variety of relationships that would result from pact laws. We consider both images vivid and effective. Have students discuss why appropriate figurative language perks up and improves an essay.
7. Frum states his thesis as the final sentence of his essay: “It is a strange idea of conservatism that would fail to see marriage as something to conserve.” This is the punch line the reader is left with. The beginning and the end of an essay are usually the best places for the most important idea the writer wants to put across.
A More Perfect Union: How the Founding Fathers Would Have Handled Gay Marriage
Jonathan Rauch
Answers to Quiz
c, a, d, c, b
Answers to Questions on Meaning and Technique (529)
1. Rauch, himself an acknowledged homosexual, takes the position that the federalist approach—that is, the approach that the rights of the individual states must be protected against blanket dictatorship by the federal government. This idea forms the thesis of his essay.
2. One certainly must admit that emotions run hot among many conversations on the subject of homosexual marriage. Some people shudder at the idea as if Satan himself were threatening the moral fiber of our world; others are uncomfortable with the notion but remain silent so as not to offend; yet others support an individual’s right to control his or her own destiny in matters of love and marriage. To avoid the turmoil associated with conflict, people will need to study the issue calmly and vote on it when the opportunity presents itself. Then, as is our custom in the United States, whatever the outcome is, we must accept it—just as we do in presidential elections. The losing side simply settles down to normal living.
3. At the end of paragraph 2, the author indicates that he will present three reasons why a decentralized approach would improve the odds of making same-sex marriage work. Then, he introduces his first guidepost with the word “First,….” In paragraph 4, he introduces his second guidepost with the words “Just as important is the social benefit of letting the states find their own way.” He introduces his third guidepost at the beginning of paragraph 5 with the word “Finally,….” Guidepost like these add to the coherence of the essay, making it flow more smoothly and logically.
4. Probably the most obvious moral communities are the people who believe in the Bible as a moral guide and those who see the Bible as a collections of myths. Other moral communities are those who form attitudes about capital punishment, the welfare system, and treatment of immigrants. Have students add their own examples of moral communities they have confronted. We believe that living in a homogeneous society is a true blessing (despite its challenges) because it assures that the talents of a varied citizenry are used for the improvement of our country. If we were all white Anglo Saxon Protestants or all black southern Baptists our country would not have the verve or the progress it experiences due to so many divergent cultures living side by side.
5. They can move to a state where this law does not exist. For instance, if you were uncomfortable in a state that allowed homosexual marriage, you could move to a state that did not allow it. Of course, moving from one state to another in order to find a compatible environment could cause a hardship to individual families. Have students discuss this issue and offer their opinions on it.
6. He feels that domestic laws are best handled by the individual states because the citizens in our country often disagree strongly on matters of personal choice and morality; thus a law forced on all states might cause pandemonium. Rauch feels that for the sake of domestic tranquility, domestic laws should be left to a level of government closest to home—in other words, the state.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Writing and Documenting the Research Paper
Exercises (589)
Exercise 1
a. Doctorow, E. L. Ragtime. New York: Random House, 1975.
b. “What Is the Federation Cup?” World Tennis Aug. 1976: 32-34.
c. O’Connor, Flannery. “Good Country People.” The Modern Tradition. 2nd ed. Ed. Daniel F. Howard. Boston: Little, Brown, 1972.
d. Dostoevsky, Feodor. Crime and Punishment. Trans. Jessie Coulson. New York: Oxford UP, 1953.
e. “The Dutiful Child’s Promises.” Readings from American Literature. Eds. Mary Edwards Calhoun and Emma Lenore MacAlarney. Boston: Ginn, 1915.
f. Wallbank, T. Walter, and Alastair M. Taylor. Civi1ization—Past and Present. 2 vols. Chicago: Scott, Foresman, 1949.
g. “Tiryns.” Encyclopaedia Britannica. 1963 ed.
h. Garrison, Karl C. Psychology of Adolescence. 6th ed. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1965.
i. “To Plains with the Boys in the Bus.” Time 9 Aug. 1976: 16, 19.
j. Murray, Jim. "The Real Olympian." Los Angeles 'Times, 4, Aug. 1976, pt. 3: 1, 7.
Exercise 2
a. The Canadian Tax Foundation. (1979). Provincial and municipal finances. Toronto, Canada.
b. Rice, B. (1988, April). Boom & doom on Wall Street. Psychology Today, 52-54.
c. Kerr, B., Davison, J., Nelson, J., & Haley S. (1982). Children and psychological testing. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 34, 526-541.
d. Skinner, B.F. (1952). Beyond freedom and dignity. In H. Hall and N. B. Bowie (eds.) The tradition of philosophy (pp. 321-325). Belmont, California: Wadsworth.
e. Athlete’s heart. (1975) New Columbia encyclopedia (p. 176). New York: Columbia UP.
Exercise 3
MLA
a. (Garrison 25)
b. (50)
c. (Wallbank and Taylor, vol. 1: 30)
d. (31)
e. (Calhoun and MacAlarney 205)
f. (Murray 1)
g. (“Tiryns” 248)
h. (Dostoevsky 48).
i. (qtd. in The Modern Tradition 507).
j. (Doctorow 46).
Exercise 4
Answers will vary. Have students read their choices.
Exercise 5
Answers will vary. Have students volunteer to read their summaries.
Exercise 6
Answers will vary. Have students volunteer to read their paraphrases.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Grammar Fundamentals
The Sentence (616)
Underline the simple subject once and the simple predicate twice in the following sentences. Identify the verb first. To find the subject, ask, “Who or what did it?”
1. The teacher arrived ten minutes after the class was to begin.
2. Mary believes in the intelligence and honesty of dogs.
3. After seeing the movie twice, Alice was sure she was in love with Robert Redford.
4. At the end of the first act, the big star made his appearance.
5. People all over the world expect America to feed them.
6. Ted was elected to run as vice-president.
7. We danced in the hallway, in the cellar, and on the patio.
8. Grace, her voice controlled and her head held high, debated the issues with her rival.
9. My father, a business consultant, is going to New York on Friday.
10. At the end of the examination, Bill breathed a sigh of relief.
In the following sentences, draw a line between the complete subject and the complete predicate. (617)
1. Jane / arranged her schedule to allow for study.
2. As an usher as well as a waiter, Bruce /worked to save $300.
3. Alaska, with all of its natural beauty, /appealed to the Smiths.
4. Playing a guitar / demands skill and sensitivity. Angry and tired, the dean / arrived and was hit with a water balloon.
5. Separate wills / are recommended for couples who have been married twice.
6. The top of Mt. Whitney / offers a breathtaking view of the Sierras.
7. The undefeatable Johnson / was dropped from the squad.
8. Horses, covered with flies, / stood scratching their backs on the fence.
9. Honor / is more important than love.
Clauses and Phrases (619)
Label the following passages I (independent clause), D (dependent clause), or P (phrase).
1. Spring has begun (I)
2. Since their parents died (D)
3. Although Sam is an atheist (D)
4. Follow the main road for a mile (I)
5. Between the two houses (P)
6. Everyone told him to stay home (I)
7. For your country (P)
8. If Mary enrolled in the class (D)
9. You may wish to return the picture today (I)
10. People who attend religious services (D)
11. Begging her to love him (P)
12. Flowers blossom (I)
13. Have you seen the five napkins (I)
14. He seldom speaks his mind (I)
15. Because she grew up in Poland (D)
Sentence Types (622)
Place the appropriate punctuation mark at the end of the following sentences.
1. Oh, crime and violence, how long will you continue to rob us of peace?
2. This is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country.
3. Come here this minute!
4. Have you, by chance, already met this gentleman?
5. Help! I am caught in a mousetrap.
6. Go to the store and buy me a quart of milk.
7. If I need you, will you be available?
8. What an exciting evening!
9. Should we never meet again, I wish you the best of luck.
10. I asked him if he had been paid for his time.
Classify each of the following sentences as (A) simple, (B) compound, (C) complex, or (D) compound-complex. Justify your classification by identifying the various clauses. (623)
1. At the end of the day, Alice made an appearance; however, she did not smile once. (B)
2. Because the winter was nearly over, Maxine arranged to be home with her mother, her grandmother, and her sisters. (C)
3. After he had reached the end of the road, Mr. Leffingwell began to cross the bridge. (C)
4. Big Tom was dropped from the club after one month of membership; he now is trying out for the swimming team. (B)
5. At the end of the race, Jane let out a yell, for she had finished in third place. (B)
6. Maybelle operated an elevator for three years to save enough money to go to night school, to buy a new car, and to pay her mother's doctor bills. (A)
7. In the top drawer you will find two pairs of old gloves, three torn sweaters, and a yellowed picture album. (A)
8. We all believed that the U.S. Constitution must be preserved, because our liberties, which our ancestors paid for with their lives, must be nurtured with care. (C)
9. After freezing all night, Nancy decided she should have worn a sweater. (A)
10. When my family left for New Orleans, I thought they would return within two weeks; instead, they stayed there a full year. (D)
11. My uncle, a famous poet, gave me a handwritten manuscript and asked me to take care of it for him. (A)
12. Your letter was delightful; I am sure that it offended no one. (B)
13. Because Tom gave the most forceful pep talk, he was asked to represent the senior class at the fine arts festival. (C)
14. The mayor, his voice trembling with rage, denounced his opponent, Jack Wilson. (A)
15. He flew to New York, and she drove to Chicago because she was afraid to fly with him. (D)
Parts of Speech (632)
Identify the part of speech of each italicized word in the following paragraphs:
Il went back to the Devon School2 not long ago and3 found4 it looking oddly5 newer than when6 I was a student there7 fifteen years before. It seemed more8 sedate than9 I remembered it, more perpendicular10 and straitlaced, with11 narrower12 windows and shinier woodwork, as though13 a coat of14 varnish had been put15 over16 everything for better preservation. But,17 of course, fifteen years before18 there had been a war going on. Perhaps the school wasn’t as well19 kept up in those days; perhaps2O varnish, along with2l everything22 else, had gone to war.
I didn’t entirely23 like this glossy new surface,24 because25 it made the school look like26 a museum, and that’s exactly what27 it was to me, and what I did not want it to be. In the deep, tacit way in which feeling28 becomes stronger than thought, I had always felt29 that30 the Devon School came into31 existence the day32 I entered it, was vibrantly real33 while34 I was a student there, and then blinked out like a candle the35 day I left.
John Knowles, A Separate Peace
| 1. pronoun |2. noun | 3. conjunction |
|4. verb |5. adverb | 6. conjunction |
| 7. adverb |8. adverb | 9. conjunction |
|10. adjective |11. preposition |12. adjective |
|13. conjunction |14. preposition |15. verb |
|16. preposition |17. conjunction |18. adverb |
|19. adverb |20. adverb (conjunctive adverb) |21. preposition |
|22. pronoun |23. adverb |24. noun |
|25. conjunction |26. preposition |27. pronoun |
|28. noun |29. verb |30. pronoun |
|31. preposition |32. adverbial noun |33. adjective |
|34. conjunction |35. article | |
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Correcting Common Errors
Fragments, Comma Splices, Run-Together Sentences (635)
C means the sentence is correct; frag, means it is a fragment; CS means it is a comma splice, and RT means it is a run-together sentence. Correct any sentence that is incorrect.
1. People must eat. (C)
2. The countless women who need jobs. (frag)
3. Chicago being a city riddled with crime. (frag)
4. The rivers overflowed their banks the trees were swept away. (RT)
5. Houses were destroyed, and homes were burned. (C)
6. Pet lovers in our country as well as abroad. (frag)
7. In particular the mayor, who had supported a transit system when he spoke to the legislature. (frag)
8. Irresistible also were the lovely orchards surrounding the swimming pool. (C)
9. However, some crowds were vengeful. (C)
10. “I cannot marry you,” said the princess, “I am too ugly.” (CS)
11. Every one of us felt the loss. (C)
12. The Vietnam War was senseless it gained us nothing. (RT)
13. Run as fast as you can you need the practice. (RT)
14. Recalling his visit to Paris, my uncle smiled. (C)
15. All of us visited the statue, few of us admired it. (CS)
16. Originally made in Taiwan but then transported to the United States. (frag)
17. Soon giving up trying. (frag)
18. She was as delicate as a butterfly. (C)
19. I want to excel not only as a musician, but also as a human being. (C)
20. The car weighed a ton; they could not lift it. (C)
Subject-Verb Agreement (638)
Answers to exercise on changing each verb that does not agree with its subject. C means the sentence is correct.
1. Neither storms nor illness delay (delays) our newspapers.
2. His five children and their education was (were) his main worry.
3. There's much to be said for simplicity. (C)
4. The importance of words are (is) being stressed in all newspapers.
5. My chief concern this summer are (is) my expenses.
6. Taste in books differs from student to student. (C)
7. The Three Stooges are (is) a wonderful movie.
8. Mathematics is one of my worst subjects. (C)
9. Either you or I am mistaken. (C)
10. My brothers as well as my sister is (are) coming to visit me.
Case (643)
Answers to exercise on underlining the correct form of the pronoun in the following sentences:
1. I am more to be pitied than (he, him).
2. The saleslady (who, whom) they think stole the stockings lives next to us.
3. You must praise (whoever, whomever) does the best job.
4. During the Vietnam War some of (we, us) football players felt guilty.
5. Florence insists that I was later than (he, him).
6. Was it (she, her) who called you the other day?
7. The candidate made an excellent impression on us—my Dad and (I, me).
8. (Who, whom) do you think will set a better example?
9. We were relieved by (his, him) paying the bill.
10. Between you and (me, I), is she innocent or guilty?
11. The coach said that I swim better than (him, he).
12. (Him, his) daydreaming affected his work negatively.
13. Bud doesn't care (who, whom) he gives his cold to.
14. The pinecones were divided among the three of us—John, Bill, and (me, I).
15. (Our, us) leaving the inner city was a blessing in disguise.
16. Do you remember (me, my) telling you?
17. Can you tell me the rank of the general (who, whom), it is said, struck one of his soldiers?
18. (Whom, who) the Cubs will play next is unknown.
19. Marilyn Monroe, (who, whom) most women envied, was unhappy.
20. Give the papers to (he and I, him and me).
Point of View (647)
Possible answers to exercise on shifts in sentences. A shift in person is indicated by (A), in tense by (B), in mood by (C), in discourse by (D), in voice by (E), and in key word by (F).
1. (A) Everyone must live according to his or her conscience.
2. (D) She insisted loudly, “I am opposed to abortions.”
3. (E) All of us enjoy a good meal, and we like fresh air, too.
4. (B) She revealed that an unknown intruder was in the room.
5. (A) So far we have not mentioned poverty. So let us discuss it now.
6. (A) Truth is a principle everyone should cherish because one can be a better person when one adheres to it.
7. (C) Lock the door and turn out the lights.
8. (E) The robber stole her jewelry and mugged her, too.
9. (B) Slowly he crept toward me and grabbed for my wallet.
10. (D) A straightforward question to ask the salesman is, “Why should people buy your razors?”
11. (A) He helped me by pointing out where I could find an inexpensive hotel.
12. (E) The doorman opened the door; then a porter picked up my baggage.
13. (B) In his memory he heard the melody of the song and knew that time was passing quickly.
14. (B) She was a spoiled brat, it always seemed to me.
15. (F) The senator’s question was an intelligent one; the chairman’s answer was also intelligent.
Pronoun Reference (650)
Possible answers to exercise on sentences with confusing, implied, nonexistent, or vague pronoun references.
1. Many people have difficulty showing their emotions.
2. At the factory where I work at night, my fellow workers say not to ask for salary advances.
3. My dad warned my brother, “You won't got a promotion.”
4. She sat knitting by the window, which was too small to let in any light.
5. The nuclear bomb was developed in the twentieth century; this weapon completely changed man’s approach to war.
6. The fact that the leading baritone did not show up for opening night caused all kinds of gossip.
7. New York accents are not understood in the South.
8. Life is a cycle of happiness followed by misery, but I want to have equal portions of happiness and misery.
9. Although the river’s bank is muddy, the water looks inviting.
10. The first chapter awakens the readers’ interest in mining, and this interest continues until the Camerons move to America.
11. The American colonists’ refusal to pay taxes without being represented was the major cause of the 1776 revolution.
12. Our roof must be protected against the rain that may fall tomorrow.
13. Because the heat really bothered them, the guests were perspiring and fanning themselves with the printed program.
14. The rose garden in Hoover Park is spectacular. Some of the roses are deep purple, almost black.
15. Although, I went over my check stubs three times, my account never balanced.
Dangling and Misplaced Modifiers (654)
The following are possible answers to the exercise on dangling or misplaced modifiers.
1. Looking down in horror, I saw the snake crawl away.
2. The teachers organized collective bargaining to protect their rights.
3. She did not realize until Friday that he had had major surgery.
4. For two weeks John had looked forward to getting married to Mary Ellen.
5. The Honda was promoted in response to consumer demands for better gasoline mileage.
6. At a small stand we bought ice cream cones that cost forty cents.
7. She decided to telephone her friend immediately.
8. Arriving at the pack station, we noticed our dried food had been stolen.
9. I held my breath as the car that had raced ahead suddenly slid into the curb.
10. While I dreamed about the future, lightning flashed and the rain began to pour.
11. My mother reluctantly consented to let me use her car.
12. Continue to whip the cream until you are tired.
13. One must read the classics in order to understand The Lord of the Rings.
14. I could tell he was an excellent dentist by the way he drilled my teeth.
15. He was not willing to give up drinking completely.
16. Looking at the mountain range from the valley, we could see a lovely rainbow.
17. My uncle warned me never to leave a loaded gun in my car.
18. If you want a Democrat in the White House, now is the time to vote for our governor.
19. At the party hors d’oeuvres on silver trays were served to all the guests.
Parallelism (658)
Possible answers to exercise on parallelism.
1. Bright sunbeams on the water, dark shadows across the cliffs, and delicate flowers in the desert created a memorable picture.
2. I prefer small dinners to big banquets.
3. What we claim to believe rarely coincides with what we do.
4. The anthropologist traveled into heated jungles, along insect-infested rivers, and up steep mountain trails.
5. I tried to explain that time was short, that the firm wanted an answer, and that efficiency was important.
6. Most women’s fashions come from Paris, Rome, and New York.
7. As we watched through the bars of the cage, we could see the monkeys eating bananas, scratching their fur, and swinging on rails.
8. Most teachers try not only to engage the students’ attention but also to say something important.
9. Victor Hugo was a statesman who also wrote novels, including Les Miserables.
10. Bigger Social Security checks would allow senior citizens to pay for decent living quarters, to get proper medical help, and to afford sound nutrition.
11. Basketball, football, and baseball are favorite American spectator sports.
12. I admire the songs of Paul McCartney, formerly a member of the Beatles but now on his own.
13. Their divorce was due to his stressful job, his hot temper, and his dislike of her friends.
14. You have two choices: to take the exam or to write a research paper.
Word Choice (668)
The correct term in each of the following sentences is underlined:
1. When they arrived at West Point, they received some practical (advise, advice) regarding the honor system.
2. During his lecture the professor made an (allusion, illusion) to Abraham Lincoln.
3. The prime minister's illness was so (aggravated irritated) by his drinking that he needed surgery.
4. My aunt does a (credible, creditable) job of sewing evening gowns.
5. In the past, interviewers were (disinterested, uninterested) when they interviewed candidates; now they are biased.
6. I was (enthusiastic, enthused) when they told me about the new director.
7. When we heard about the theft, we immediately (suspicioned, suspected) collusion within the company.
8. They received the news that he would return (within, inside of) a week.
9. Pete Sampras’ (latest, last) match gave the world of tennis something to rave about.
10. Be careful not to (loose, lose) the keys.
11. We drank the spring water (as if, like) we would never drink water again.
12. That information seriously (affects, effects) the decision.
13. The agreement was (oral, verbal), so it will not hold up in court.
14. The reason grades are necessary (is that, is because) they are a point of reference for students.
15. If I had known you were coming I (would of, would have) baked a cake.
16. Most people improve (somewhat some) the moment they take one spoonful of Kay's cough syrup.
17. For Christmas I sent mother some blue (stationary, stationery) so she could write to her friends.
18. Never use a large (number, amount) of words when (less, fewer) will do.
19. We still had a long (way, ways) to trudge uphill, but none of the students complained.
20. Will the person (who’s, whose) wallet this is please claim it at the front ticket booth?
21. Before the tall buildings were built, we (used to could, used to be able to) see the ocean.
22. That scandal in her (passed, past) may keep her from getting the promotion.
23. Many Americans want to return to old-fashioned (principals, principles).
24. (Regardless, irregardless) of the consequences, the ambassador stood by his post.
25. The glint in her eye (implied, inferred) more clearly than words how she really felt.
Concrete Words (671)
Some possible answers to exercise on replacing vague words with more concrete words or phrases are given below.
1. John leaped on his horse and quickly galloped away.
2. Eloise always wears such sloppy blue jeans and blouses.
3. The streets of Amsterdam are crowded with cars and bicycles.
4. The lecturer was tediously dull.
5. She gobbled her food voraciously.
6. It was fascinating to watch the children laughing and frolicking on the playground.
7. I was upset by this whole scandal.
8. What an ingenious idea!
9. We expect to have a relaxing time in Palm Springs.
10. Eskimos have many peculiar customs.
11. I couldn’t follow the complicated ritual in his church.
12. My psychology class was one of the most enlightening experiences of my college days.
13. Spanking is an important practice of child rearing.
14. The problems of driving large cars outweigh the pleasures.
15. All the President’s Men is a suspenseful movie.
16. Here are the arbitrary and unfair considerations that bother me about assigning grades.
Wordiness (675)
Answers to exercise on eliminating redundancies or wasted words.
1. The secretary behind the big mahogany desk seemed efficient.
2. Most people find tenderness difficult to express.
3. The winner was reticent to accept the trophy.
4. Her fur coat cost $2,000.
5. Ancestor worship is a venerable tradition among the Chinese.
6. My study of history indicates that the Danes were a militant people.
7. Paying decent wages is usually the right thing to do.
8. The employed shouldn't be allowed to collect food stamps.
9. If he wants to be president, he had better bring about some innovations in Congress.
10. Generally speaking, improper diet causes gallstones.
11. Present clothing styles reflect a taste for the bizarre.
12. At 10:00 P.M. a strange knock was heard.
13. The consensus of our class was to invite Dr. Boling as our keynote speaker.
14. The story dealt with a murder and had a tragic ending.
15. As a rule, one should lock one’s car while shopping.
16. Three women decided to volunteer for the job.
17. Neil Simon writes comedies that really make you laugh.
18. If we don’t cooperate with the Russians, a nuclear war could annihilate the world.
19. Palestinians and Israelis are very different.
20. Today it is difficult to find a musician who touches people’s hearts the way Charles Witt does.
Choosing the Right Subordinator (681)
1. The doctor was taking the patient’s temperature when suddenly a rock came crashing through the window.
2. In mid-July he was inspecting the dig when he was alerted by someone who was moving along the northern edge of the plateau.
3. It was a bright day in May when the drums exploded as two priests from the temple appeared.
4. The crowd groaned with disappointment since they had hoped to see a glamorous young girl.
5. While others planned the forthcoming battle, he remained alone in the shaded grove, meditating and praying to his god, from whom he needed guidance.
6. Members of the city council can ill afford to vote themselves additional fringe benefits inasmuch as their constituents mistrust them.
7. Alif was entirely wrong when he guessed that she was in love with Abdul since in fact she was merely bedazzled by his brilliant lyrics, which reminded her of starry nights in Egypt.
8. The fraternity members all carried banners as they marched back and forth tirelessly, their signs calling for an end to building nuclear reactors.
9. It occurred to Madeline that perhaps she could improve the situation if she could create an atmosphere of goodwill.
10. Give out those sample tubes of toothpaste to whoever asks for one.
11. Phil Brown regularly attends church, where he loves to hear the old hymns and a rousing sermon, which make him feel purged and give him a new lease on life.
12. Although the specific notes had faded from his memory, a certain melody remained, which haunted him for the rest of his life.
13. Such facts cannot be ignored, assuming that we want to preserve the wilderness.
14. Those of us who are prisoners must face the grim truth, which is that even our wives and lovers will leave us even though we have shared the most tender and intimate moments with them.
15. The scientific establishment now believes that the earth was formed 10-15 billion years ago, after an explosion, or “big bang,” which set the universe in motion.
Punctuation (692)
Answers to exercises on inserting commas. C means that the sentence is correct.
1. Professor Grover, as all of his students agree, is one of the most exciting history teachers on campus.
2. Madam, I beg to differ with you; that is my purse.
3. We were asked to check with Mr. Weaver, our head custodian. (C)
4. Because the water was murky, cold, and swift, we did not go swimming.
5. In denouncing the hypocritical, Truman encouraged honest dealings.
6. Let’s not give up until everyone agrees with us. (C)
7. Since they belong to the neighborhood, they should pay for part of the damage.
8. Address your letter to Mrs. Margerie Freedman, 320 N. Lincoln Blvd., Reading, Massachusetts.
9. So many memories are connected with the home of my grandparents, a big red brick mansion surrounded by a white picket fence.
10. Twice the doctor asked, “Have you ever had laryngitis before?”
11. Relaxed and happy, Jim ignored the people who were angered by his decision.
12. July 4, 1776, is an important date for patriotic Americans.
13. Glistening like a diamond in the sun, the lake beckoned us.
14. Readers of the Times, however, were not all equally impressed with the editorial on abortions.
15. All together, some ten thousand people filled out the questionnaire.
16. “My most exquisite lady,” he said gallantly, “you deserve the Taj Mahal.”
17. From the mountains, from the prairies, and from numerous villages came the good news. (C)
18. One of her sisters lives in Chicago; the other, in New York. (C)
19. Pat Moynihan, who was once the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, is a popular lecturer.
20. Well, Mary, are you satisfied with the effect of your crass remark?
21. The laboratory technician has finished the gold tooth, hasn't he?
22. Anyone who feels this is a bad law should write to his congressman. (C)
23. Outside, a spectacular rainbow arched across the deep blue sky.
24. We walk down this street unafraid, not even thinking of danger. (C)
25. Now his grandparents live in a condominium in Florida, where they have no yard.
Answers to punctuation exercise (694)
1. Shakespeare wrote many plays, including the famous Hamlet.
2. “Listen,” he said, “if you want, we can to go to a movie—any movie.”
3. The word renaissance has several pronunciations.
4. We can have the party at John’s cabin or the Fieldings’ apartment.
5. Its overtaxed heart failing, the race horse collapsed before everyone’s eyes.
6. The most tragic poem I can imagine is Keats’ “Ode to Melancholy.”
7. Get off my lawn, you swine!
8. The big bands of the ’40s still sell millions of records.
9. Last year’s flowers have wilted; they have withered and died.
10. As far as the committee is concerned, you have lost the grant; nevertheless, you are to take the exam one more time.
11. Just as the situation appeared hopeless, a surprising thing happened: a number of leading American artists became interested in making lithographic prints.
12. Then, in the summer of 1976 the counterrevolutionary army took over.
13. Do you know the difference between the verbs compose and comprise?
14. Wonderful! Here comes the beer! Cheers!
15. He entitled his paper “June Wayne: Profile of a California Artist.”
16. He lived a stone’s throw from Twin Lakes.
17. This is what Bertrand Russell says: “Science from the dawn of history and probably longer has been intimately associated with war.”
18. Bertrand Russell has said: “Science...has been intimately associated with war.” (Refer to item 17.)
19. He received his Ph.D. at 9:00 A.M. on Sunday, June 6.
20. My friend asked me, “Did you read Bill Shirley’s article ‘World’s First Bionic Swim Team,’ published in the Sports Section of the Los Angeles Times?”
21. The rule is that you must sign up two days in advance. (See Section 25, paragraph 2.)
22. Dear Sir: This is in answer to your letter of May 13.
23. A slight tinge of embarrassment—or was it pleasure?—crept across his face.
24. The first day we studied; later in the week, however, we relaxed.
25. The babies’ carriages were broken.
Capitalization (698)
Answers to the exercise on capitalization. C means the sentence is correct.
1. Our memorial day picnic was canceled due to rain.
2. The headline read: “U.S. agent Fired in Investigation of Missing Ammunition.”
3. Any mayor of a city as large as Chicago should be on good terms with the President of the United States. (C)
4. The democrats will doubtless hold their convention at the cow palace in san francisco.
5. The tennis courts at Nibley park are always busy.
6. If you have to take a psychology course, take psychology 101 from Dr. Pearson, a graduate of harvard.
7. There is something elegant about the name “Tyrone Kelley, III, esq.”
8. Until easter of 1949, they lived in a big white georgian home.
9. During the second world war, switzerland remained neutral.
10. I intend to exchange my capri for a toyota.
11. Socrates, the famous Greek philosopher, used dialogue as a teaching method.
12. Some Socialists have joined the Republican Party. (C)
13. She said, “the ticket entitles you to spend a night at the Holiday inn in Las Vegas.”
14. The bible was not fully canonized until the council of trent.
Exercise (699)
Some possible answers are given below:
1. street Jane lives on a narrow street.
2. Street Mail it to 22 Plymouth Street.
3. Democratic The Democratic National Committee will meet.
4. democratic We live in a democratic country.
5. academy He went to school in a private academy.
6. Academy The Academy of Renaissance Arts donated the statue.
7. biology I hate biology.
8. Biology Biology 101 is a difficult course.
9. memorial The tree is a living memorial to his worth.
10. Memorial They never celebrate Memorial Day.
11. father Shakespeare’s father tanned gloves.
12. Father Father and Mother agree with me.
13. senior My brother is the senior member.
14. Senior Will you go to the Senior Election Council?
15. against Don’t fight against the owners.
16. Against The book was entitled One Against All.
17. company Mr. McDuff owns the company.
18. Company McDuff and Company, Inc. is a large firm.
Spelling (702)
Exercise 3
a. existance, describe, personal existence
b. paid, particular, oportunity opportunity
c. benificial, apparent, experience beneficial
d. controversy, concious, occurred conscious
e. preformance, similar, succeed performance
f. probably, marriage, predjudice, prejudice
g. profession, persue, separate pursue
h. catagory, paid, disastrous category
i. effect, disasterous, mere disastrous
j. preceed, proceed, procedure precede
k. embarrass, exaggerate, envirement environment
l. prevailent, probably, existent prevalent
m. coming, heighth, professor height
n. define, fascinate, posession possession
o. repetition, quiet, receive receive by the
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