Final Blog Prompt: Chapters 22 and 23 contain a strong sense of foreboding, or the feeling of a catastrophe around the corner. Look through these chapters and demonstrate how suspense is used to foreshadow future doom. Use several examples to prove your point. Relate these examples to the function of a gothic novel. Primary Blog Expectations (respond to the prompt above): 200-250 words, minimal errors in grammar and usage, thoughtful and thorough writing. Please use the name you were assigned in class as your nom de plume and be sure to add word count. Due by 11:59pm Friday night 12-11-2020! Secondary Blog Response Expectations (read everyone's primary responses, select two that interest you, and respond to their ideas): 100-150 words EACH, minimal errors in grammar and usage, thoughtful and thorough writing. Please use the name you were assigned in class as your nom de plume and be sure to add word count. Due by 11:59pm Sunday night 12-13-2020! Each student has been assigned a topic (you will find your name in the list at the bottom of the page). 1. After reading As I Lay Dying, you will respond to your assigned prompt in a 400-550 word informal response. 2. Once you have posted your informal response as a blog entry (I suggest typing on a word document and then copy/pasting into the blog entry box - ADD WORD COUNT AT END OF RESPONSE), you will then read all of your colleagues' entries. 3. You will then respond to 2 colleagues' entries (each in a different topic from yours and from each other) in 100-150 word informal responses. This is similar to the usual blog entries that we have completed, except that you will discussing and responding to different topics. This is an important activity and, done correctly, will expose you to at least three different lens analyses of As I Lay Dying. In light of the importance of this activity, I will be counting this assignment as a 200 point Summative Assessment (100 points for Primary Responses and 50 points each for Secondary Responses). The Due Dates are: -Primary Responses must be completed by Sunday, May 4th at midnight. -Secondary Responses must be completed by Tuesday, May 6th at midnight. Topics: 1. Family and Honor - Samantha, Abigail, Edgar, Jahnai As I Lay Dying could be read as a metaphor for any family; the Bundrens are stuck together on a long journey, to help or hurt each other. The conflicts between feelings of desire, love, honor, and a longing for identity outside the family eventually lead to disaster. How do the Bundrens exemplify "family values?" How do they fail to? Does Faulkner see the Bundrens as a typical American family? (Are most people like this?) Do you? 2. Religion - Nathaniel, Cynthia, Akwasi The religious characters in the book (Whitfield, Cora) have very little positive impact on the Bundrens. Addie explicitly rejects religion after her affair with Whitfield. Cora uses her religious outlook chiefly as a way to judge and criticize the impoverished and low-class Bundrens. Anse often quotes scripture to justify his own selfish actions. Do you agree with Faulkner’s depiction of religion in modern life? If so, build upon it. If not, create a counter-argument. 3. Mortality and Ritual - Brittani, Thomas, Arvinda To the ancient Greeks, burial ritual was an extremely important religious task, representative of the loyalty a person has engendered in his family in life. Agamemnon speaks from hell to Odysseus: "As I lay dying, the woman with the dog's eyes would not close my eyes as I descended into Hades." He is referring to his wife Clytemnestra, whom conspired to murder him. Do the Bundrens betray Addie, or do they honor her? Does Addie betray them by asking Anse to make the journey to Jefferson? Does it matter what happens to our bodies after we die? 4. Sanity - Elizabeth, Nicole, Denean “Sometimes I think it aint none of us pure crazy and aint none of us pure sane,” says Cash. He then decides that if a person acts without thinking about how his actions affect other people, he is crazy. Do you agree with Cash? Are we all a little crazy? How does society use the word “crazy”—or even “mental illness”— to define people? Does Darl deserve his fate? How are Darl's "special powers" of narration related to what happens to him? 5. Perspective - Maricarmen, Stephanie, Patricia Comment on the multiple perspectives of the novel. What do we learn cumulatively about the characters through their various voices? What is the effect of these shifts in view? Which is the truer perspective of ourselves: the one from our eyes or from the eyes of others? You may analyze in depth one voice, or contrast two opposing voices (Darl and Jewel, for example). 6. Desire - Shayna, Kayla, Abril All of the family members use their mother’s burial as an excuse to go to town in order to acquire something. Which desires are more sympathetic, and which are less so? Is this a betrayal of Addie? Do our modern desires for material goods come between us and those we love? 7. Symbolism - Julie, Thalia, Adam Faulkner's shifting voices often finds commonality in elemental natural symbols: water, fire, horse, earth, sky, eye, wood, bird, etc. Choose one or more of these and make a unified comment on the symbol's ties to an allusion, perspective, insight, comment, or traditional generic convention. 1. What is it about Mr. Rochester that attracts Jane when she plainly states that she doesn't find him handsome when he asks her, “Do you find me handsome?” (pg. 149)? How does Jane’s view that “beauty is of little consequence” (pg 149) affect Mr. Rochester? What is it about their personalities that attract them to each other as well as the readers? 2. How has their relationship between Jane and Mr. Rochester change when he told her that she “did not strike delight to my very inmost heart for nothing”? How will Jane do Mr.Rochester some “good in some way”? What is it that he’s hoping she will give him? In your Primary Blog Entry, you should respond to the two questions above in a single entry. Your Secondary Blog Entry should respond to two of your colleagues' entries that are especially interesting to you. Part One Expectations (respond to the prompt above): 200-250 words, 2 quotes from the novel, minimal errors in grammar and usage, thoughtful and thorough writing. Please use the assigned "pen name" given to you in class PLEASE FINISH BY FRIDAY NIGHT! Part Two Expectations (read everyone's first responses, select two that interest you, and respond to their ideas): 100-150 words EACH, minimal errors in grammar and usage, thoughtful and thorough writing. Please use the assigned "pen name" given to you in class. FINISH BY SUNDAY NIGHT! |
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