Backpack Literature
An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and Writing
3rd Edition
Published on 13. January 2010
Book
Paperback/Softback
1248 pages
978-0-205-72758-2 (ISBN)
Description
The smallest and most economical member of the Kennedy/Gioia family, Backpack Literature is a brief paperback version of the discipline's most popular introduction to literature anthology. Like its bigger, bestselling predecessors, Backpack Literature features the authors' collective poetic voice which brings personal warmth and a human perspective to the discussion of literature, adding to students' interest in the readings. New features include: thirty-nine stories of well-loved classics as well as accessible contemporary works; more than 237 of the discipline's greatest, most teachable poems; and a wonderful collection of 11 high-quality plays.
More details
Edition
3rd edition
Language
English
Place of publication
United States
Publishing group
Pearson Education (US)
Target group
College/higher education
Dimensions
Height: 216 mm
Width: 140 mm
Weight
662 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-205-72758-2 (9780205727582)
Copyright in bibliographic data is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or its licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
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X. J. Kennedy | Dana Gioia
Backpack Literature
An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and Writing Plus NEW MyLiteratureLab -- Access Card Package
Book
10/2012
4th Edition
Longman Inc
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Previous edition
X. J. Kennedy | Dana Gioia
Backpack Literature
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10/2007
2nd Edition
Pearson
€52.18
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Persons
X. J. Kennedy, after graduation from Seton Hall and Columbia, became a journalist second class in the Navy ("Actually, I was pretty eighth class"). His poems, some published in the New Yorker, were first collected in Nude Descending a Staircase (1961). Since then he has written six more collections, several widely adopted literature and writing textbooks, and seventeen books for children, including two novels. He has taught at Michigan, North Carolina (Greensboro), California (Irvine), Wellesley, Tufts, and Leeds. Cited in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations and reprinted in some 200 anthologies, his verse has brought him a Guggenheim fellowship, a Lamont Award, a Los Angeles Times Book Prize, an award from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, an Aiken-Taylor prize, the Robert Frost Medal of the Poetry Society of America, and the Award for Poetry for Children from the National Council of Teachers of English. He now lives in Lexington, Massachusetts, where he and his wife Dorothy have collaborated on four books and five children.
Dana Gioia is a poet, critic, and teacher. Born in Los Angeles of Italian and Mexican ancestry, he attended Stanford and Harvard before taking a detour into business. ("Not many poets have a Stanford M.B.A., thank goodness!") After years of writing and reading late in the evenings after work, he quit a vice presidency to write and teach. He has published three collections of poetry, Daily Horoscope (1986), The Gods of Winter (1991), and Interrogations at Noon (2001), which won the American Book Award; an opera libretto, Nosferatu (2001); and three critical volumes, including Can Poetry Matter? (1992), an influential study of poetry's place in contemporary America. Gioia has taught at Johns Hopkins, Sarah Lawrence, Wesleyan (Connecticut), Mercer, and Colorado College.
He is also the co-founder of the summer poetry conference at West Chester University in Pennsylvania. From 2003-2009 he served as Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts. At the NEA he created the largest literary programs in federal history, including Shakespeare in American Communities and Poetry Out Loud, the national high school poetry recitation contest. He also led the campaign to restore active and engaged literary reading by creating The Big Read, which has helped reverse a quarter century of decline in U.S. reading. He currently divides his time between Washington, D.C. and Santa Rosa, California, living with his wife Mary, their two sons, and two uncontrollable cats.
Dana Gioia is a poet, critic, and teacher. Born in Los Angeles of Italian and Mexican ancestry, he attended Stanford and Harvard before taking a detour into business. ("Not many poets have a Stanford M.B.A., thank goodness!") After years of writing and reading late in the evenings after work, he quit a vice presidency to write and teach. He has published three collections of poetry, Daily Horoscope (1986), The Gods of Winter (1991), and Interrogations at Noon (2001), which won the American Book Award; an opera libretto, Nosferatu (2001); and three critical volumes, including Can Poetry Matter? (1992), an influential study of poetry's place in contemporary America. Gioia has taught at Johns Hopkins, Sarah Lawrence, Wesleyan (Connecticut), Mercer, and Colorado College.
He is also the co-founder of the summer poetry conference at West Chester University in Pennsylvania. From 2003-2009 he served as Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts. At the NEA he created the largest literary programs in federal history, including Shakespeare in American Communities and Poetry Out Loud, the national high school poetry recitation contest. He also led the campaign to restore active and engaged literary reading by creating The Big Read, which has helped reverse a quarter century of decline in U.S. reading. He currently divides his time between Washington, D.C. and Santa Rosa, California, living with his wife Mary, their two sons, and two uncontrollable cats.
Content
** = new selection vs. Backpack 2e
Fiction
**Talking with Amy Tan
1 Reading a Story
The Art of Fiction
Types of Short Fiction
W. Somerset Maugham n The Appointment in Samarra
A servant tries to gallop away from Death in this brief sardonic fable retold in memorable form by a popular storyteller.
Aesop n The North Wind and the Sun
The North Wind and the Sun argue who is stronger and decide to try their powers on an unsuspecting traveler.
**Bidpai n The Tortoise and the Geese
A fable that gives another dimension to Andrew Lang's quip, "He missed an invaluable opportunity to hold his tongue."
Chuang Tzu n Independence
The Prince of Ch'u asks the philosopher Chuang Tzu to become his advisor and gets a surprising reply in this classic Chinese fable.
Jakob and Wilhelm Grimm n Godfather Death
Neither God nor the Devil came to the christening. In this stark folktale, a young man receives magical powers with a string attached.
Plot
The Short Story
John Updike n A & P
In walk three girls in nothing but bathing suits, and Sammy finds himself no longer an aproned checkout clerk but an armored knight.
Writing Effectively
THINKING About Plot
Checklist: writing about plot
Writing Assignment on Plot
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
2 Point of View
Identifying Point of View
Types of Narrators
Stream of Consciousness
William Faulkner n A Rose for Emily
Proud, imperious Emily Grierson defied the town from the fortress of her mansion. Who could have guessed the secret that lay within?
Edgar Allan Poe n The Tell-Tale Heart
The smoldering eye at last extinguished, a murderer finds that, despite all his attempts at a cover-up, his victim will be heard.
**Eudora Welty n Why I Live at the P. O.
Since no one appreciates Sister, she decides to live at the Post Office. After meeting her family, you won't blame her.
Writing Effectively
THINKING about Point of View
CHECKLIST: Writing about Point of View
Writing Assignment on Point of View
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
3 Character
Types of Characters
**Katherine Anne Porter n The Jilting of Granny Weatherall
For sixty years Ellen Weatherall has fought back the memory of that terrible day, but now once more the priest waits in the house.
Katherine Mansfield n Miss Brill
Sundays had long brought joy to solitary Miss Brill, until one fateful day when she happened to share a bench with two lovers in the park.
**Naguib Mahfouz n The Lawsuit
He thought he'd seen the last of his late father's second wife, but now she's back to trouble his peaceful existence.
Raymond Carver n Cathedral
He had never expected to find himself trying to describe a cathedral to a blind man. He hadn't even wanted to meet this odd, old friend of his wife.
Writing Effectively
thinking about character
checklist: Writing about character
Writing Assignment on character
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
4 Setting
Elements of Setting
Historical Fiction
Regionalism
Naturalism
Kate Chopin n The Storm
Even with her husband away, Calixta feels happily, securely married. Why then should she not shelter an old admirer from the rain?
**Virginia Woolf n A Haunted House
Whatever hour you woke a door was shutting. From room to room the ghostly couple walked, hand in hand.
**Jack London n To Build a Fire
Seventy-five degrees below zero. Alone except for one mistrustful wolf dog,
a man finds himself battling a relentless force.\
Amy Tan n A Pair of Tickets
A young woman flies with her father to China to meet two half sisters she never knew existed.
Writing Effectively
THINKING about setting
CHECKLIST: Writing about setting
Writing Assignment on setting
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
5 Tone and Style
Tone
Style
Diction
Ernest Hemingway n A Clean, Well-Lighted Place
All by himself each night, the old man lingers in the bright cafe. What does he need more than brandy?
William Faulkner n Barn Burning
This time when Ab Snopes wields his blazing torch, his son Sarty faces a dilemma: whether to obey or defy the vengeful old man.
Irony
O. Henry n The Gift of the Magi
A young husband and wife find ingenious ways to buy each other Christmas presents, in the classic story that defines the word "irony."
Writing Effectively
THINKING about tone and style
CHECKLIST: Writing about tone and style
Writing Assignment on tone and style
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
6 Theme
Plot vs. Theme
Theme as Unifying Device
Finding the Theme
Chinua Achebe n Dead Men's Path
The new headmaster of the village school was determined to fight superstition, but the villagers did not agree.
**Stephen Crane n The Open Boat
In a lifeboat circled by sharks, tantalized by glimpses of land, a reporter scrutinizes Fate and learns about comradeship.
Luke 15:11-32 n The Parable of the Prodigal Son
A father has two sons. One demands his inheritance now and leaves to spend it with ruinous results.
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. n Harrison Bergeron
Are you handsome? Off with your eyebrows! Are you brainy? Let a transmitter sound thought-shattering beeps inside your ear.
Writing Effectively
THINKING about theme
CHECKLIST: Writing about theme
Writing Assignment on theme
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
7 Symbol
Allegory
Symbols
Recognizing Symbols
John Steinbeck n The Chrysanthemums
Fenced-in Elisa feels emotionally starved-then her life promises to blossom with the arrival of the scissors-grinding man.
**John Cheever n The Swimmer
A man decides to swim home through his neighbors' pools, but the water turns out to be much deeper than he realized.
**Ursula K. Le Guin n The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas
Omelas is the perfect city. All of its inhabitants are happy. But everyone's prosperity depends on a hidden evil.
Shirley Jackson n The Lottery
Splintered and faded, the sinister black box had worked its annual terror for longer than anyone in town could remember.
Writing Effectively
THINKING about symbols
CHECKLIST: Writing about symbols
Writing Assignment on Symbols
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
8 Stories for Further Reading
**Sherman Alexie n This Is What It Means to Say Phoenix, Arizona
The only one who can help Victor when his father dies is a childhood friend he's been avoiding for years.
Margaret Atwood n Happy Endings
John and Mary meet. What happens next? This witty experimental story offers five different outcomes.
Kate Chopin n The Story of an Hour
"There was something coming to her and she was waiting for it, fearfully. What was it? She did not know; it was too subtle and elusive to name."
Sandra Cisneros n The House on Mango Street
Does where we live tell what we are? A little girl dreams of a new house, but things don't always turn out the way we want them to.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman n The Yellow Wallpaper
A doctor prescribes a "rest cure" for his wife after the birth of their child. The new mother tries to settle in to life in the isolated and mysterious country house they have rented for the summer. The cure proves worse than the disease in this Gothic classic.
Nathaniel Hawthorne Young Goodman Brown
Urged on through deepening woods, a young Puritan sees-or dreams he sees-good villagers hasten toward a diabolic rite.
Zora Neale Hurston n Sweat
Delia's hard work paid for her small house. Now her drunken husband Sykes has promised it to another woman.
James Joyce n Araby
If only he can find her a token, she might love him in return. As night falls,
a Dublin boy hurries to make his dream come true.
Franz Kafka n Before the Law
A man from the country comes in search of the Law. He never guesses what will prevent him from finding it in this modern parable.
**Jhumpa Lahiri n Interpreter of Maladies
Mr. Kapasi's life had settled into a quiet pattern-and then Mrs. Das and her family came into it.
Joyce Carol Oates n Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?
Alone in the house, Connie finds herself helpless before the advances of a spellbinding imitation teenager, Arnold Friend.
Tim O'Brien n The Things They Carried
What each soldier carried into the combat zone was largely determined by necessity, but each man's necessities differed.
Flannery O'Connor n A Good Man Is Hard to Find
Wanted: The Misfit, a cold-blooded killer. An ordinary family vacation leads to horror-and one moment of redeeming grace.
Alice Walker, Everyday Use
When successful Dee visits from the city, she has changed her name to reflect her African roots. Her mother and sister notice other things have changed, too.
Poetry
Talking with Kay Ryan
9 Reading a Poem
Poetry or Verse
Reading a Poem
Paraphrase
William Butler Yeats n The Lake Isle of Innisfree
Lyric Poetry
Robert Hayden n Those Winter Sundays
Adrienne Rich n Aunt Jennifer's Tigers
Narrative Poetry
Anonymous n Sir Patrick Spence
Robert Frost n "Out, Out-"
Dramatic Poetry
Robert Browning n My Last Duchess
Didactic Poetry
Writing Effectively
thinking about Paraphrase
William Stafford n Ask Me
William Stafford n A Paraphrase of "Ask Me"
Checklist: Writing a Paraphrase
Writing Assignment on Paraphrasing
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
10 Listening to a Voice
Tone
Theodore Roethke n My Papa's Waltz
Countee Cullen n For a Lady I Know
Anne Bradstreet n The Author to Her Book
Walt Whitman n To a Locomotive in Winter
Emily Dickinson n I like to see it lap the Miles
**Kevin Young n Doo Wop
Weldon Kees n For My Daughter
The Person in the Poem
Natasha Trethewey n White Lies
Edwin Arlington Robinson n Luke Havergal
Ted Hughes n Hawk Roosting
Langston Hughes n Theme for English B
Anne Sexton n Her Kind
William Carlos Williams n The Red Wheelbarrow
Irony
Robert Creeley n Oh No
W. H. Auden n The Unknown Citizen
**Sharon Olds n Rite of Passage
Edna St. Vincent Millay n Second Fig
Thomas Hardy n The Workbox
For Review and Further Study
**William Blake n The Chimney Sweeper
Richard Lovelace n To Lucasta
Wilfred Owen n Dulce et Decorum Est
Writing Effectively
thinking About TONE
Checklist: writing about Tone
Writing Assignment on Tone
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
11 Words
Literal Meaning: What a Poem Says First
William Carlos Williams n This Is Just to Say
Diction
Marianne Moore n Silence
John Donne n Batter my heart, three-personed God, for You
The Value of a Dictionary
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow n Aftermath
**Kay Ryan n Chemise
J. V. Cunningham n Friend, on this scaffold Thomas More lies dead
Carl Sandburg n Grass
**Anonymous n Dog Haiku
Word Choice and Word Order
Robert Herrick n Upon Julia's Clothes
Thomas Hardy n The Ruined Maid
For Review and Further Study
E. E. Cummings n anyone lived in a pretty how town
Wendy Cope n Lonely Hearts
**Billy Collins n The Names
Anonymous n Carnation Milk
Gina Valdes n English con Salsa
Lewis Carroll n Jabberwocky
Writing Effectively
thinking About Diction
Checklist: writing About diction
Writing Assignment on Word Choice
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
12 Saying and Suggesting
Denotation and Connotation
William Blake n London
Wallace Stevens n Disillusionment of Ten O'Clock
Gwendolyn Brooks n Southeast Corner
Robert Frost n Fire and Ice
**Diane Thiel n The Minefield
Rhina Espaillat n Bilingual/Bilinguee
**Ron Rash n The Day the Gates Closed
Alfred, Lord Tennyson n Tears, Idle Tears
**Richard Wilbur n Love Calls Us to the Things of This World
Writing Effectively
thinking About Denotation and Connotation
Checklist: writing about What a Poem SAYS AND Suggests
Writing Assignment on Denotation and Connotation
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
13 Imagery
Ezra Pound n In a Station of the Metro
Taniguchi Buson n The piercing chill I feel
Imagery
T. S. Eliot n The winter evening settles down
Theodore Roethke n Root Cellar
Elizabeth Bishop n The Fish
Emily Dickinson n A Route of Evanescence
Gerard Manley Hopkins n Pied Beauty
Jean Toomer n Reapers
About Haiku
Arakida Moritake n The falling flower
Matsuo Basho n Heat-lightning streak
Matsuo Basho n In the old stone pool
Taniguchi Buson n On the one-ton temple bell
**Taniguchi Buson n Moonrise on mudflats
Kobayashi Issa n only one guy
Kobayashi Issa n Cricket
Etheridge Knightn Making jazz swing in
Lee Gurga n Visitor's Room
**Penny Harter n broken bowl
**Jennifer Brutschy n Born Again
For Review and Further Study
John Keats n Bright star! would I were steadfast as thou art
Robert Bly n Driving to Town Late to Mail a Letter
**Paul Goodman n Birthday Cake
**Billy Collins n Embrace
Stevie Smith n Not Waving but Drowning
Writing Effectively
thinking About Imagery
Checklist: Writing about imagery
Writing Assignment on Imagery
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
14 Figures of Speech
Why Speak Figuratively?
Alfred, Lord Tennyson n The Eagle
William Shakespeare n Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Howard Moss n Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day?
Metaphor and Simile
Alfred, Lord Tennyson n Flower in the Crannied Wall
William Blake n To see a world in a grain of sand
Emily Dickinson n My Life had stood - a Loaded Gun
Sylvia Plath n Metaphors
N. Scott Momaday n Simile
**Emily Dickinson n It dropped so low - in my Regard
**Craig Raine n A Martian Sends a Postcard Home
Other Figures of Speech
James Stephens n The Wind
Margaret Atwood n You fit into me
**George Herbert n The Pulley
Dana Gioia n Money
**Carl Sandburg n Fog
For Review and Further Study
Robert Frost n The Silken Tent
Robert Frost n The Secret Sits
**Kay Ryan n Turtle
Robert Burns n Oh, my love is like a red, red rose
Writing Effectively
thinking About Metaphors
Checklist: writing about metaphors
Writing Assignment on Figures of Speech
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
15 Sound
Sound as Meaning
Alexander Pope n True Ease in Writing comes from Art, not Chance
William Butler Yeats n Who Goes with Fergus?
**William Wordsworth n A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal
**Aphra Behn n When maidens are young
Alliteration and Assonance
A. E. Housman n Eight O'Clock
Alfred, Lord Tennyson n The splendor falls on castle walls
Rime
William Cole n On my boat on Lake Cayuga
Hilaire Belloc n The Hippopotamus
**William Butler Yeats n Leda and the Swan
Gerard Manley Hopkins n God's Grandeur
**Robert Frost n Desert Places
Reading Poems Aloud
Michael Stillman n In Memoriam John Coltrane
Writing Effectively
thinking About a poem's Sound
Checklist: Writing about a Poem's sound
Writing Assignment on Sound
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
16 Rhythm
Stresses and Pauses
Gwendolyn Brooks n We Real Cool
Alfred, Lord Tennyson n Break, Break, Break
Dorothy Parker n Resume
Meter
Edna St. Vincent Millay n Counting-out Rhyme
A. E. Housman n When I was one-and-twenty
Walt Whitman n Beat! Beat! Drums!
**Langston Hughes n Dream Boogie
Writing Effectively
thinking About Rhythm
Checklist: scanning a poem
Writing Assignment on Rhythm
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
17 Closed Form
Formal Patterns
John Keats n This living hand, now warm and capable
Robert Graves n Counting the Beats
John Donne n Song ("Go and catch a falling star")
Ballads
Anonymous n Bonny Barbara Allan
Dudley Randall n Ballad of Birmingham
The Sonnet
William Shakespeare n Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Claude McKay n America
Edna St. Vincent Millay n What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why
**Robert Frost n Acquainted with the Night
R. S. Gwynn n Shakespearean Sonnet
**The Epigram
**Alexander Pope n Epigram Engraved on the Collar of a Dog
**Sir John Harrington n Of Treason
**Hilaire Belloc n Fatigue
**Wendy Cope n Variation on Belloc's "Fatigue"
Other Forms
Dylan Thomas n Do not go gentle into that good night
Elizabeth Bishop n Sestina
Writing Effectively
thinking About a sonnet
Checklist: Writing about a sonnet
Writing Assignment on a Sonnet
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
18 Open Form
Denise Levertov n Ancient Stairway
Free Verse
E. E. Cummings n Buffalo Bill 's
**William Carlos Williams n The Dance
Stephen Crane n In the desert
Walt Whitman n Cavalry Crossing a Ford
Wallace Stevens n Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird
Prose Poetry
**Carolyn Forche n The Colonel
For Review and Further Study
E. E. Cummings n in Just-
** A. E. Stallings n First Love: A Quiz
Langston Hughes n I, Too
Writing Effectively
thinking About Free Verse
Checklist: Writing about Line Breaks
Writing Assignment on Open Form
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
19 Symbol
The Meanings of a Symbol
T. S. Eliot n The BostonEvening Transcript
Emily Dickinson n The Lightning is a yellow Fork
Identifying Symbols
Thomas Hardy n Neutral Tones
Yusef Komunyakaa n Facing It
Allegory
Matthew 13:24-30 n The Parable of the Good Seed
**George Herbert n The World
Robert Frost n The Road Not Taken
**Christina Rossetti n Uphill
For Review and Further Study
** Mary Oliver n Wild Geese
Lorine Niedecker n Popcorn-can cover
Wallace Stevens n Anecdote of the Jar
Writing Effectively
thinking About Symbols
Checklist: writing about symbols
Writing Assignment on Symbolism
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
**20 Myth and Narrative
Origins of Myth
Robert Frost n Nothing Gold Can Stay
**William Wordsworth n The world is too much with us
**H. D. n Helen
Archetype
**Louise Bogan n Medusa
Personal Myth
**William Butler Yeats n The Second Coming
** Sylvia Plath n Lady Lazarus
Myth and Popular Culture
**Anne Sexton n Cinderella
Writing Effectively
THINKING ABOUT MYTH
Checklist: WRITINg About Myth
Writing Assignment on Myth
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
21 What Is Poetry?
Dante, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, William Wordsworth, Thomas Hardy, Robert Frost, Wallace Stevens, Mina Loy, W. H. Auden, Jose Garcia Villa, Christopher Fry, Elizabeth Bishop, Joy Harjo, Charles Simic n Some Definitions of Poetry
22 Poems for Further Reading
**Aaron Abeyta n thirteen ways of looking at a tortilla
** Sherman Alexie n The Powwow at the End of the World
**Anonymous n Last Words of the Prophet
Matthew Arnold n Dover Beach
Margaret Atwood n Siren Song
**W. H. Auden n September 1, 1939
W. H. Auden n Musee des Beaux Arts
**Jimmy Santiago Baca n Spliced Wire
**Elizabeth Bishop n Filling Station
Elizabeth Bishop n One Art
William Blake n The Tyger
**Gwendolyn Brooks n the mother
Elizabeth Barrett Browning n How Do I Love Thee? Let Me Count the Ways
**Robert Browning n Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister
Judith Ortiz Cofer n Quinceanera
Samuel Taylor Coleridge n Kubla Khan
Billy Collins n Care and Feeding
E. E. Cummings n somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond
Emily Dickinson n I'm Nobody! Who are you?
Emily Dickinson n I heard a Fly buzz - when I died
Emily Dickinson n Because I could not stop for Death
John Donne n Death be not proud
John Donne n The Flea
**Rita Dove n Daystar
Paul Laurence Dunbar n We Wear the Mask
T. S. Eliot n The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
**Robert Frost n Birches
Robert Frost n Mending Wall
Robert Frost n Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
Allen Ginsberg n A Supermarket in California
**Thomas Hardy n The Darkling Thrush
Seamus Heaney n Digging
George Herbert n Easter Wings
Robert Herrick n To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time
**Tony Hoagland n Beauty
Gerard Manley Hopkins n Spring and Fall
Gerard Manley Hopkins n The Windhover
A. E. Housman n Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
A. E. Housman n To an Athlete Dying Young
Langston Hughes n The Negro Speaks of Rivers
Langston Hughes n Harlem [Dream Deferred]
Randall Jarrell n The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner
Robinson Jeffers n To the Stone-cutters
Ben Jonson n On My First Son
Donald Justice n On the Death of Friends in Childhood
John Keats n Ode on a Grecian Urn
**John Keats n To Autumn
Philip Larkin n Home is so Sad
D. H. Lawrence n Piano
**Denise Levertov n The Ache of Marriage
Shirley Geok-lin Lim n Learning to love America
Andrew Marvell n To His Coy Mistress
**Edna St. Vincent Millay n Recuerdo
John Milton n When I consider how my light is spent
**Howard Nemerov n The War in the Air
Pablo Neruda, Translated by Alastair Reid n We Are Many
**Lorine Niedecker n Sorrow Moves in Wide Waves
Sharon Olds n The One Girl at the Boys' Party
Wilfred Owen n Anthem for Doomed Youth
Sylvia Plath n Daddy
**Edgar Allan Poe n Annabel Lee
Alexander Pope n A little Learning is a dang'rous Thing
Ezra Pound n The River-Merchant's Wife: A Letter
Henry Reed n Naming of Parts
Edwin Arlington Robinson n Miniver Cheevy
William Shakespeare n When, in disgrace with Fortune and men's eyes
**William Shakespeare n That time of year thou mayst in me behold
William Shakespeare n My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun
Percy Bysshe Shelley n Ozymandias
Wallace Stevens n The Emperor of Ice-Cream
Alfred, Lord Tennyson n Ulysses
Dylan Thomas n Fern Hill
John Updike n Ex-Basketball Player
Derek Walcott n The Virgins
**Walt Whitman n I Hear America Singing
**Walt Whitman n O Captain! My Captain!
Richard Wilbur n The Writer
William Carlos Williams n Spring and All
**William Carlos Williams n To Waken an Old Lady
William Wordsworth n Composed upon Westminster Bridge
James Wright n Autumn Begins in Martins Ferry, Ohio
**Mary Sidney Wroth n In this strange labyrinth
**William Butler Yeats n Crazy Jane Talks with the Bishop
William Butler Yeats n When You Are Old
William Butler Yeats n Sailing to Byzantium
Drama
**Talking with David Ives
23 Reading a Play 1223
Theatrical Conventions
Elements of a Play
Susan Glaspell n Trifles
Was Minnie Wright to blame for the death of her husband? While the menfolk try to unravel a mystery, two women in the kitchen turn up revealing clues.
Analyzing Trifles
Writing Effectively
THINKING About a play
CHECKLIST: Writing about a play
Writing Assignment on Conflict
MORE Topics for Writing
Terms for Review
24 Modes of Drama: Tragedy and Comedy 1249
Tragedy
Christopher Marlowe n Scene From Doctor Faustus (Act 2, Scene 1)
In this scene from the classic drama, a brilliant scholar sells his soul to the devil. How smart is that?
Comedy
**David Ives n Soap Opera
Should a man choose a mere human lover instead of pure perfection? The world turns on the answer.
Writing Effectively
thinking about comedy
checklist: Writing about comedy
Writing Assignment on comedy
Topics for Writing About tragedy
Topics for Writing About Comedy
Terms for Review
25 The Theater of Sophocles 1277
The Theater of Sophocles 1277
The Civic Role of Greek Drama 1280
Aristotle's Concept of Tragedy 1282
Sophocles 1283
The Origins of Oedipus the King
Sophocles n Oedipus the King (Translated by Dudley Fitts and Robert Fitzgerald) 1285
"Who is the man proclaimed / by Delphi's prophetic rock / as the bloody handed murderer / the doer of deeds that none dare name? / . . . Terrribly close on his heels are the Fates that never miss."
Writing Effectively
THINKING About Greek Tragedy
CHECKLIST: writing about greek drama
Writing Assignment on Sophocles
More Topics for Writing
Terms for Review
26 The Theater of Shakespeare 1364
The Theater of Shakespeare 1365
William Shakespeare 1366
A Note on Othello 1367
**Picturing Othello 1367
William Shakespeare n Othello, the Moor of Venice 1368
Here is a story of jealousy, that "green-eyed monster which doth mock / The meat it feeds on"-of a passionate, suspicious man and his blameless wife, of a serpent masked as a friend.
Writing Effectively
Understanding Shakespeare
Checklist:writing about shakespeare
Writing Assignment on Tragedy 1671
More Topics for Writing 1676
27 The Modern Theater 1677
Realism
Experimental Drama
Henrik Ibsen n A Doll's House (Translated by R. Farquharson Sharp, Revised by Viktoria Michelsen)
The founder of modern drama portrays a troubled marriage. Helmer, the bank manager, regards his wife Nora as a "little featherbrain"-not knowing the truth may shatter his smug world.
**Anna Deavere Smithn Scenes from Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992
The violence that tore apart a city, in the words of those who were there.
Writing Effectively
THINKING About Dramatic Realism
CHECKLIST: writing about realism
Writing Assignment on Realism
More Topics for Writing
Terms for Review
28 Plays for Further Reading 1763
**David Henry Hwang n The Sound of a Voice 1976
A strange man arrives at a solitary woman's home in the remote countryside. As they fall in love, they discover disturbing secrets about one another's past.
**Jane Martin n Tattoo 1269
When all three of your current one-and-only girlfriends put their heads together, it can't be good.
Tennessee Williams n The Glass Menagerie 1836
Painfully shy and retiring, shunning love, Laura dwells in a world as fragile as her collection of tiny figurines-until one memorable night a gentleman comes to call.
August Wilson n Fences 1996
A proud man's love for his family is choked by his rigidity and self-righteousness, in this powerful drama by a great American playwright of our time.
WRITING
29 Writing About Literature
Read Actively
Robert Frost n Nothing Gold Can Stay
Think About the Reading
Plan Your Essay
Discover Your Ideas
Sample Student Prewriting Exercises
Develop a Literary Argument
Checklist
Developing an Argument
Write a Rough Draft
Sample Student Paper n (Rough Draft)
Revise Your Draft
Checklist
Revising Your Draft
Some Final Advice on Rewriting
Sample Student Paper n (revised Draft)
What's Your Purpose? Common Approaches to Writing About Literature 2083
Explication:
Sample Student Paper n By Lantern Light: An Explication of a passage in Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart"
Robert Frost n Design
Sample Student Paper n An Unfolding of Robert Frost's "Design"
Analysis:
Sample Student Paper n Faded Beauty: Bishop's Use of Imagery in "The Fish"
Sample Student Paper n Othello: Tragedy or Soap Opera?
Comparison and Contrast:
Sample Student Paper n Successful Adaptation in "A Rose for Emily" and "Miss Brill"
**Response paper
**Sample Student Paper n Response to tim O'Brien's "The Things They Carried"
The Form of Your Finished Paper
Topics for Writing on Fiction
Topics for Brief Papers
Topics for More Extended Papers
Topics for Long Papers
Topics for Writing on Poetry
Topics for Brief Papers
Topics for More Extended Papers
Topics for Long Papers
Topics for Writing on Drama
Topics for Brief Papers
Topics for More Extended Papers
Topics for Long Papers
30 Writing a Research Paper
Browse the Research
Choose a Topic
Begin Your Research
Print Resources
Online Databases
Reliable Web Sources
Checklist
Finding Reliable Sources
Visual Images
Checklist
Using Visual Images
Evaluate Your Sources
Print Resources
Web Resources
Checklist
Evaluating Your Sources
Organize Your Research
Organize Your Paper
Maintain Academic Integrity
Acknowledge All Sources
quotations
Citing Ideas
Document Sources Using MLA Style
Parenthetical References
Works-Cited List
Citing Print Sources in MLA Style
Citing WeB Sources in MLA Style
Sample List of Works Cited
Reference Guide for Citations
Fiction
**Talking with Amy Tan
1 Reading a Story
The Art of Fiction
Types of Short Fiction
W. Somerset Maugham n The Appointment in Samarra
A servant tries to gallop away from Death in this brief sardonic fable retold in memorable form by a popular storyteller.
Aesop n The North Wind and the Sun
The North Wind and the Sun argue who is stronger and decide to try their powers on an unsuspecting traveler.
**Bidpai n The Tortoise and the Geese
A fable that gives another dimension to Andrew Lang's quip, "He missed an invaluable opportunity to hold his tongue."
Chuang Tzu n Independence
The Prince of Ch'u asks the philosopher Chuang Tzu to become his advisor and gets a surprising reply in this classic Chinese fable.
Jakob and Wilhelm Grimm n Godfather Death
Neither God nor the Devil came to the christening. In this stark folktale, a young man receives magical powers with a string attached.
Plot
The Short Story
John Updike n A & P
In walk three girls in nothing but bathing suits, and Sammy finds himself no longer an aproned checkout clerk but an armored knight.
Writing Effectively
THINKING About Plot
Checklist: writing about plot
Writing Assignment on Plot
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
2 Point of View
Identifying Point of View
Types of Narrators
Stream of Consciousness
William Faulkner n A Rose for Emily
Proud, imperious Emily Grierson defied the town from the fortress of her mansion. Who could have guessed the secret that lay within?
Edgar Allan Poe n The Tell-Tale Heart
The smoldering eye at last extinguished, a murderer finds that, despite all his attempts at a cover-up, his victim will be heard.
**Eudora Welty n Why I Live at the P. O.
Since no one appreciates Sister, she decides to live at the Post Office. After meeting her family, you won't blame her.
Writing Effectively
THINKING about Point of View
CHECKLIST: Writing about Point of View
Writing Assignment on Point of View
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
3 Character
Types of Characters
**Katherine Anne Porter n The Jilting of Granny Weatherall
For sixty years Ellen Weatherall has fought back the memory of that terrible day, but now once more the priest waits in the house.
Katherine Mansfield n Miss Brill
Sundays had long brought joy to solitary Miss Brill, until one fateful day when she happened to share a bench with two lovers in the park.
**Naguib Mahfouz n The Lawsuit
He thought he'd seen the last of his late father's second wife, but now she's back to trouble his peaceful existence.
Raymond Carver n Cathedral
He had never expected to find himself trying to describe a cathedral to a blind man. He hadn't even wanted to meet this odd, old friend of his wife.
Writing Effectively
thinking about character
checklist: Writing about character
Writing Assignment on character
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
4 Setting
Elements of Setting
Historical Fiction
Regionalism
Naturalism
Kate Chopin n The Storm
Even with her husband away, Calixta feels happily, securely married. Why then should she not shelter an old admirer from the rain?
**Virginia Woolf n A Haunted House
Whatever hour you woke a door was shutting. From room to room the ghostly couple walked, hand in hand.
**Jack London n To Build a Fire
Seventy-five degrees below zero. Alone except for one mistrustful wolf dog,
a man finds himself battling a relentless force.\
Amy Tan n A Pair of Tickets
A young woman flies with her father to China to meet two half sisters she never knew existed.
Writing Effectively
THINKING about setting
CHECKLIST: Writing about setting
Writing Assignment on setting
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
5 Tone and Style
Tone
Style
Diction
Ernest Hemingway n A Clean, Well-Lighted Place
All by himself each night, the old man lingers in the bright cafe. What does he need more than brandy?
William Faulkner n Barn Burning
This time when Ab Snopes wields his blazing torch, his son Sarty faces a dilemma: whether to obey or defy the vengeful old man.
Irony
O. Henry n The Gift of the Magi
A young husband and wife find ingenious ways to buy each other Christmas presents, in the classic story that defines the word "irony."
Writing Effectively
THINKING about tone and style
CHECKLIST: Writing about tone and style
Writing Assignment on tone and style
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
6 Theme
Plot vs. Theme
Theme as Unifying Device
Finding the Theme
Chinua Achebe n Dead Men's Path
The new headmaster of the village school was determined to fight superstition, but the villagers did not agree.
**Stephen Crane n The Open Boat
In a lifeboat circled by sharks, tantalized by glimpses of land, a reporter scrutinizes Fate and learns about comradeship.
Luke 15:11-32 n The Parable of the Prodigal Son
A father has two sons. One demands his inheritance now and leaves to spend it with ruinous results.
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. n Harrison Bergeron
Are you handsome? Off with your eyebrows! Are you brainy? Let a transmitter sound thought-shattering beeps inside your ear.
Writing Effectively
THINKING about theme
CHECKLIST: Writing about theme
Writing Assignment on theme
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
7 Symbol
Allegory
Symbols
Recognizing Symbols
John Steinbeck n The Chrysanthemums
Fenced-in Elisa feels emotionally starved-then her life promises to blossom with the arrival of the scissors-grinding man.
**John Cheever n The Swimmer
A man decides to swim home through his neighbors' pools, but the water turns out to be much deeper than he realized.
**Ursula K. Le Guin n The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas
Omelas is the perfect city. All of its inhabitants are happy. But everyone's prosperity depends on a hidden evil.
Shirley Jackson n The Lottery
Splintered and faded, the sinister black box had worked its annual terror for longer than anyone in town could remember.
Writing Effectively
THINKING about symbols
CHECKLIST: Writing about symbols
Writing Assignment on Symbols
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
8 Stories for Further Reading
**Sherman Alexie n This Is What It Means to Say Phoenix, Arizona
The only one who can help Victor when his father dies is a childhood friend he's been avoiding for years.
Margaret Atwood n Happy Endings
John and Mary meet. What happens next? This witty experimental story offers five different outcomes.
Kate Chopin n The Story of an Hour
"There was something coming to her and she was waiting for it, fearfully. What was it? She did not know; it was too subtle and elusive to name."
Sandra Cisneros n The House on Mango Street
Does where we live tell what we are? A little girl dreams of a new house, but things don't always turn out the way we want them to.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman n The Yellow Wallpaper
A doctor prescribes a "rest cure" for his wife after the birth of their child. The new mother tries to settle in to life in the isolated and mysterious country house they have rented for the summer. The cure proves worse than the disease in this Gothic classic.
Nathaniel Hawthorne Young Goodman Brown
Urged on through deepening woods, a young Puritan sees-or dreams he sees-good villagers hasten toward a diabolic rite.
Zora Neale Hurston n Sweat
Delia's hard work paid for her small house. Now her drunken husband Sykes has promised it to another woman.
James Joyce n Araby
If only he can find her a token, she might love him in return. As night falls,
a Dublin boy hurries to make his dream come true.
Franz Kafka n Before the Law
A man from the country comes in search of the Law. He never guesses what will prevent him from finding it in this modern parable.
**Jhumpa Lahiri n Interpreter of Maladies
Mr. Kapasi's life had settled into a quiet pattern-and then Mrs. Das and her family came into it.
Joyce Carol Oates n Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?
Alone in the house, Connie finds herself helpless before the advances of a spellbinding imitation teenager, Arnold Friend.
Tim O'Brien n The Things They Carried
What each soldier carried into the combat zone was largely determined by necessity, but each man's necessities differed.
Flannery O'Connor n A Good Man Is Hard to Find
Wanted: The Misfit, a cold-blooded killer. An ordinary family vacation leads to horror-and one moment of redeeming grace.
Alice Walker, Everyday Use
When successful Dee visits from the city, she has changed her name to reflect her African roots. Her mother and sister notice other things have changed, too.
Poetry
Talking with Kay Ryan
9 Reading a Poem
Poetry or Verse
Reading a Poem
Paraphrase
William Butler Yeats n The Lake Isle of Innisfree
Lyric Poetry
Robert Hayden n Those Winter Sundays
Adrienne Rich n Aunt Jennifer's Tigers
Narrative Poetry
Anonymous n Sir Patrick Spence
Robert Frost n "Out, Out-"
Dramatic Poetry
Robert Browning n My Last Duchess
Didactic Poetry
Writing Effectively
thinking about Paraphrase
William Stafford n Ask Me
William Stafford n A Paraphrase of "Ask Me"
Checklist: Writing a Paraphrase
Writing Assignment on Paraphrasing
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
10 Listening to a Voice
Tone
Theodore Roethke n My Papa's Waltz
Countee Cullen n For a Lady I Know
Anne Bradstreet n The Author to Her Book
Walt Whitman n To a Locomotive in Winter
Emily Dickinson n I like to see it lap the Miles
**Kevin Young n Doo Wop
Weldon Kees n For My Daughter
The Person in the Poem
Natasha Trethewey n White Lies
Edwin Arlington Robinson n Luke Havergal
Ted Hughes n Hawk Roosting
Langston Hughes n Theme for English B
Anne Sexton n Her Kind
William Carlos Williams n The Red Wheelbarrow
Irony
Robert Creeley n Oh No
W. H. Auden n The Unknown Citizen
**Sharon Olds n Rite of Passage
Edna St. Vincent Millay n Second Fig
Thomas Hardy n The Workbox
For Review and Further Study
**William Blake n The Chimney Sweeper
Richard Lovelace n To Lucasta
Wilfred Owen n Dulce et Decorum Est
Writing Effectively
thinking About TONE
Checklist: writing about Tone
Writing Assignment on Tone
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
11 Words
Literal Meaning: What a Poem Says First
William Carlos Williams n This Is Just to Say
Diction
Marianne Moore n Silence
John Donne n Batter my heart, three-personed God, for You
The Value of a Dictionary
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow n Aftermath
**Kay Ryan n Chemise
J. V. Cunningham n Friend, on this scaffold Thomas More lies dead
Carl Sandburg n Grass
**Anonymous n Dog Haiku
Word Choice and Word Order
Robert Herrick n Upon Julia's Clothes
Thomas Hardy n The Ruined Maid
For Review and Further Study
E. E. Cummings n anyone lived in a pretty how town
Wendy Cope n Lonely Hearts
**Billy Collins n The Names
Anonymous n Carnation Milk
Gina Valdes n English con Salsa
Lewis Carroll n Jabberwocky
Writing Effectively
thinking About Diction
Checklist: writing About diction
Writing Assignment on Word Choice
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
12 Saying and Suggesting
Denotation and Connotation
William Blake n London
Wallace Stevens n Disillusionment of Ten O'Clock
Gwendolyn Brooks n Southeast Corner
Robert Frost n Fire and Ice
**Diane Thiel n The Minefield
Rhina Espaillat n Bilingual/Bilinguee
**Ron Rash n The Day the Gates Closed
Alfred, Lord Tennyson n Tears, Idle Tears
**Richard Wilbur n Love Calls Us to the Things of This World
Writing Effectively
thinking About Denotation and Connotation
Checklist: writing about What a Poem SAYS AND Suggests
Writing Assignment on Denotation and Connotation
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
13 Imagery
Ezra Pound n In a Station of the Metro
Taniguchi Buson n The piercing chill I feel
Imagery
T. S. Eliot n The winter evening settles down
Theodore Roethke n Root Cellar
Elizabeth Bishop n The Fish
Emily Dickinson n A Route of Evanescence
Gerard Manley Hopkins n Pied Beauty
Jean Toomer n Reapers
About Haiku
Arakida Moritake n The falling flower
Matsuo Basho n Heat-lightning streak
Matsuo Basho n In the old stone pool
Taniguchi Buson n On the one-ton temple bell
**Taniguchi Buson n Moonrise on mudflats
Kobayashi Issa n only one guy
Kobayashi Issa n Cricket
Etheridge Knightn Making jazz swing in
Lee Gurga n Visitor's Room
**Penny Harter n broken bowl
**Jennifer Brutschy n Born Again
For Review and Further Study
John Keats n Bright star! would I were steadfast as thou art
Robert Bly n Driving to Town Late to Mail a Letter
**Paul Goodman n Birthday Cake
**Billy Collins n Embrace
Stevie Smith n Not Waving but Drowning
Writing Effectively
thinking About Imagery
Checklist: Writing about imagery
Writing Assignment on Imagery
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
14 Figures of Speech
Why Speak Figuratively?
Alfred, Lord Tennyson n The Eagle
William Shakespeare n Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Howard Moss n Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day?
Metaphor and Simile
Alfred, Lord Tennyson n Flower in the Crannied Wall
William Blake n To see a world in a grain of sand
Emily Dickinson n My Life had stood - a Loaded Gun
Sylvia Plath n Metaphors
N. Scott Momaday n Simile
**Emily Dickinson n It dropped so low - in my Regard
**Craig Raine n A Martian Sends a Postcard Home
Other Figures of Speech
James Stephens n The Wind
Margaret Atwood n You fit into me
**George Herbert n The Pulley
Dana Gioia n Money
**Carl Sandburg n Fog
For Review and Further Study
Robert Frost n The Silken Tent
Robert Frost n The Secret Sits
**Kay Ryan n Turtle
Robert Burns n Oh, my love is like a red, red rose
Writing Effectively
thinking About Metaphors
Checklist: writing about metaphors
Writing Assignment on Figures of Speech
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
15 Sound
Sound as Meaning
Alexander Pope n True Ease in Writing comes from Art, not Chance
William Butler Yeats n Who Goes with Fergus?
**William Wordsworth n A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal
**Aphra Behn n When maidens are young
Alliteration and Assonance
A. E. Housman n Eight O'Clock
Alfred, Lord Tennyson n The splendor falls on castle walls
Rime
William Cole n On my boat on Lake Cayuga
Hilaire Belloc n The Hippopotamus
**William Butler Yeats n Leda and the Swan
Gerard Manley Hopkins n God's Grandeur
**Robert Frost n Desert Places
Reading Poems Aloud
Michael Stillman n In Memoriam John Coltrane
Writing Effectively
thinking About a poem's Sound
Checklist: Writing about a Poem's sound
Writing Assignment on Sound
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
16 Rhythm
Stresses and Pauses
Gwendolyn Brooks n We Real Cool
Alfred, Lord Tennyson n Break, Break, Break
Dorothy Parker n Resume
Meter
Edna St. Vincent Millay n Counting-out Rhyme
A. E. Housman n When I was one-and-twenty
Walt Whitman n Beat! Beat! Drums!
**Langston Hughes n Dream Boogie
Writing Effectively
thinking About Rhythm
Checklist: scanning a poem
Writing Assignment on Rhythm
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
17 Closed Form
Formal Patterns
John Keats n This living hand, now warm and capable
Robert Graves n Counting the Beats
John Donne n Song ("Go and catch a falling star")
Ballads
Anonymous n Bonny Barbara Allan
Dudley Randall n Ballad of Birmingham
The Sonnet
William Shakespeare n Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Claude McKay n America
Edna St. Vincent Millay n What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why
**Robert Frost n Acquainted with the Night
R. S. Gwynn n Shakespearean Sonnet
**The Epigram
**Alexander Pope n Epigram Engraved on the Collar of a Dog
**Sir John Harrington n Of Treason
**Hilaire Belloc n Fatigue
**Wendy Cope n Variation on Belloc's "Fatigue"
Other Forms
Dylan Thomas n Do not go gentle into that good night
Elizabeth Bishop n Sestina
Writing Effectively
thinking About a sonnet
Checklist: Writing about a sonnet
Writing Assignment on a Sonnet
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
18 Open Form
Denise Levertov n Ancient Stairway
Free Verse
E. E. Cummings n Buffalo Bill 's
**William Carlos Williams n The Dance
Stephen Crane n In the desert
Walt Whitman n Cavalry Crossing a Ford
Wallace Stevens n Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird
Prose Poetry
**Carolyn Forche n The Colonel
For Review and Further Study
E. E. Cummings n in Just-
** A. E. Stallings n First Love: A Quiz
Langston Hughes n I, Too
Writing Effectively
thinking About Free Verse
Checklist: Writing about Line Breaks
Writing Assignment on Open Form
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
19 Symbol
The Meanings of a Symbol
T. S. Eliot n The BostonEvening Transcript
Emily Dickinson n The Lightning is a yellow Fork
Identifying Symbols
Thomas Hardy n Neutral Tones
Yusef Komunyakaa n Facing It
Allegory
Matthew 13:24-30 n The Parable of the Good Seed
**George Herbert n The World
Robert Frost n The Road Not Taken
**Christina Rossetti n Uphill
For Review and Further Study
** Mary Oliver n Wild Geese
Lorine Niedecker n Popcorn-can cover
Wallace Stevens n Anecdote of the Jar
Writing Effectively
thinking About Symbols
Checklist: writing about symbols
Writing Assignment on Symbolism
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
**20 Myth and Narrative
Origins of Myth
Robert Frost n Nothing Gold Can Stay
**William Wordsworth n The world is too much with us
**H. D. n Helen
Archetype
**Louise Bogan n Medusa
Personal Myth
**William Butler Yeats n The Second Coming
** Sylvia Plath n Lady Lazarus
Myth and Popular Culture
**Anne Sexton n Cinderella
Writing Effectively
THINKING ABOUT MYTH
Checklist: WRITINg About Myth
Writing Assignment on Myth
More Topics for Writing
TERMS FOR REVIEW
21 What Is Poetry?
Dante, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, William Wordsworth, Thomas Hardy, Robert Frost, Wallace Stevens, Mina Loy, W. H. Auden, Jose Garcia Villa, Christopher Fry, Elizabeth Bishop, Joy Harjo, Charles Simic n Some Definitions of Poetry
22 Poems for Further Reading
**Aaron Abeyta n thirteen ways of looking at a tortilla
** Sherman Alexie n The Powwow at the End of the World
**Anonymous n Last Words of the Prophet
Matthew Arnold n Dover Beach
Margaret Atwood n Siren Song
**W. H. Auden n September 1, 1939
W. H. Auden n Musee des Beaux Arts
**Jimmy Santiago Baca n Spliced Wire
**Elizabeth Bishop n Filling Station
Elizabeth Bishop n One Art
William Blake n The Tyger
**Gwendolyn Brooks n the mother
Elizabeth Barrett Browning n How Do I Love Thee? Let Me Count the Ways
**Robert Browning n Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister
Judith Ortiz Cofer n Quinceanera
Samuel Taylor Coleridge n Kubla Khan
Billy Collins n Care and Feeding
E. E. Cummings n somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond
Emily Dickinson n I'm Nobody! Who are you?
Emily Dickinson n I heard a Fly buzz - when I died
Emily Dickinson n Because I could not stop for Death
John Donne n Death be not proud
John Donne n The Flea
**Rita Dove n Daystar
Paul Laurence Dunbar n We Wear the Mask
T. S. Eliot n The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
**Robert Frost n Birches
Robert Frost n Mending Wall
Robert Frost n Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
Allen Ginsberg n A Supermarket in California
**Thomas Hardy n The Darkling Thrush
Seamus Heaney n Digging
George Herbert n Easter Wings
Robert Herrick n To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time
**Tony Hoagland n Beauty
Gerard Manley Hopkins n Spring and Fall
Gerard Manley Hopkins n The Windhover
A. E. Housman n Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
A. E. Housman n To an Athlete Dying Young
Langston Hughes n The Negro Speaks of Rivers
Langston Hughes n Harlem [Dream Deferred]
Randall Jarrell n The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner
Robinson Jeffers n To the Stone-cutters
Ben Jonson n On My First Son
Donald Justice n On the Death of Friends in Childhood
John Keats n Ode on a Grecian Urn
**John Keats n To Autumn
Philip Larkin n Home is so Sad
D. H. Lawrence n Piano
**Denise Levertov n The Ache of Marriage
Shirley Geok-lin Lim n Learning to love America
Andrew Marvell n To His Coy Mistress
**Edna St. Vincent Millay n Recuerdo
John Milton n When I consider how my light is spent
**Howard Nemerov n The War in the Air
Pablo Neruda, Translated by Alastair Reid n We Are Many
**Lorine Niedecker n Sorrow Moves in Wide Waves
Sharon Olds n The One Girl at the Boys' Party
Wilfred Owen n Anthem for Doomed Youth
Sylvia Plath n Daddy
**Edgar Allan Poe n Annabel Lee
Alexander Pope n A little Learning is a dang'rous Thing
Ezra Pound n The River-Merchant's Wife: A Letter
Henry Reed n Naming of Parts
Edwin Arlington Robinson n Miniver Cheevy
William Shakespeare n When, in disgrace with Fortune and men's eyes
**William Shakespeare n That time of year thou mayst in me behold
William Shakespeare n My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun
Percy Bysshe Shelley n Ozymandias
Wallace Stevens n The Emperor of Ice-Cream
Alfred, Lord Tennyson n Ulysses
Dylan Thomas n Fern Hill
John Updike n Ex-Basketball Player
Derek Walcott n The Virgins
**Walt Whitman n I Hear America Singing
**Walt Whitman n O Captain! My Captain!
Richard Wilbur n The Writer
William Carlos Williams n Spring and All
**William Carlos Williams n To Waken an Old Lady
William Wordsworth n Composed upon Westminster Bridge
James Wright n Autumn Begins in Martins Ferry, Ohio
**Mary Sidney Wroth n In this strange labyrinth
**William Butler Yeats n Crazy Jane Talks with the Bishop
William Butler Yeats n When You Are Old
William Butler Yeats n Sailing to Byzantium
Drama
**Talking with David Ives
23 Reading a Play 1223
Theatrical Conventions
Elements of a Play
Susan Glaspell n Trifles
Was Minnie Wright to blame for the death of her husband? While the menfolk try to unravel a mystery, two women in the kitchen turn up revealing clues.
Analyzing Trifles
Writing Effectively
THINKING About a play
CHECKLIST: Writing about a play
Writing Assignment on Conflict
MORE Topics for Writing
Terms for Review
24 Modes of Drama: Tragedy and Comedy 1249
Tragedy
Christopher Marlowe n Scene From Doctor Faustus (Act 2, Scene 1)
In this scene from the classic drama, a brilliant scholar sells his soul to the devil. How smart is that?
Comedy
**David Ives n Soap Opera
Should a man choose a mere human lover instead of pure perfection? The world turns on the answer.
Writing Effectively
thinking about comedy
checklist: Writing about comedy
Writing Assignment on comedy
Topics for Writing About tragedy
Topics for Writing About Comedy
Terms for Review
25 The Theater of Sophocles 1277
The Theater of Sophocles 1277
The Civic Role of Greek Drama 1280
Aristotle's Concept of Tragedy 1282
Sophocles 1283
The Origins of Oedipus the King
Sophocles n Oedipus the King (Translated by Dudley Fitts and Robert Fitzgerald) 1285
"Who is the man proclaimed / by Delphi's prophetic rock / as the bloody handed murderer / the doer of deeds that none dare name? / . . . Terrribly close on his heels are the Fates that never miss."
Writing Effectively
THINKING About Greek Tragedy
CHECKLIST: writing about greek drama
Writing Assignment on Sophocles
More Topics for Writing
Terms for Review
26 The Theater of Shakespeare 1364
The Theater of Shakespeare 1365
William Shakespeare 1366
A Note on Othello 1367
**Picturing Othello 1367
William Shakespeare n Othello, the Moor of Venice 1368
Here is a story of jealousy, that "green-eyed monster which doth mock / The meat it feeds on"-of a passionate, suspicious man and his blameless wife, of a serpent masked as a friend.
Writing Effectively
Understanding Shakespeare
Checklist:writing about shakespeare
Writing Assignment on Tragedy 1671
More Topics for Writing 1676
27 The Modern Theater 1677
Realism
Experimental Drama
Henrik Ibsen n A Doll's House (Translated by R. Farquharson Sharp, Revised by Viktoria Michelsen)
The founder of modern drama portrays a troubled marriage. Helmer, the bank manager, regards his wife Nora as a "little featherbrain"-not knowing the truth may shatter his smug world.
**Anna Deavere Smithn Scenes from Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992
The violence that tore apart a city, in the words of those who were there.
Writing Effectively
THINKING About Dramatic Realism
CHECKLIST: writing about realism
Writing Assignment on Realism
More Topics for Writing
Terms for Review
28 Plays for Further Reading 1763
**David Henry Hwang n The Sound of a Voice 1976
A strange man arrives at a solitary woman's home in the remote countryside. As they fall in love, they discover disturbing secrets about one another's past.
**Jane Martin n Tattoo 1269
When all three of your current one-and-only girlfriends put their heads together, it can't be good.
Tennessee Williams n The Glass Menagerie 1836
Painfully shy and retiring, shunning love, Laura dwells in a world as fragile as her collection of tiny figurines-until one memorable night a gentleman comes to call.
August Wilson n Fences 1996
A proud man's love for his family is choked by his rigidity and self-righteousness, in this powerful drama by a great American playwright of our time.
WRITING
29 Writing About Literature
Read Actively
Robert Frost n Nothing Gold Can Stay
Think About the Reading
Plan Your Essay
Discover Your Ideas
Sample Student Prewriting Exercises
Develop a Literary Argument
Checklist
Developing an Argument
Write a Rough Draft
Sample Student Paper n (Rough Draft)
Revise Your Draft
Checklist
Revising Your Draft
Some Final Advice on Rewriting
Sample Student Paper n (revised Draft)
What's Your Purpose? Common Approaches to Writing About Literature 2083
Explication:
Sample Student Paper n By Lantern Light: An Explication of a passage in Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart"
Robert Frost n Design
Sample Student Paper n An Unfolding of Robert Frost's "Design"
Analysis:
Sample Student Paper n Faded Beauty: Bishop's Use of Imagery in "The Fish"
Sample Student Paper n Othello: Tragedy or Soap Opera?
Comparison and Contrast:
Sample Student Paper n Successful Adaptation in "A Rose for Emily" and "Miss Brill"
**Response paper
**Sample Student Paper n Response to tim O'Brien's "The Things They Carried"
The Form of Your Finished Paper
Topics for Writing on Fiction
Topics for Brief Papers
Topics for More Extended Papers
Topics for Long Papers
Topics for Writing on Poetry
Topics for Brief Papers
Topics for More Extended Papers
Topics for Long Papers
Topics for Writing on Drama
Topics for Brief Papers
Topics for More Extended Papers
Topics for Long Papers
30 Writing a Research Paper
Browse the Research
Choose a Topic
Begin Your Research
Print Resources
Online Databases
Reliable Web Sources
Checklist
Finding Reliable Sources
Visual Images
Checklist
Using Visual Images
Evaluate Your Sources
Print Resources
Web Resources
Checklist
Evaluating Your Sources
Organize Your Research
Organize Your Paper
Maintain Academic Integrity
Acknowledge All Sources
quotations
Citing Ideas
Document Sources Using MLA Style
Parenthetical References
Works-Cited List
Citing Print Sources in MLA Style
Citing WeB Sources in MLA Style
Sample List of Works Cited
Reference Guide for Citations