Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing, 9th Edition

This anthology focuses on writing about literature which is integrated in every chapter.  Each element  (i.e. character, setting, tone) is covered by a sample student essay and commentary on the essay.    32 MLA –Format Demonstrative student essays serve as models for good student writing.  Three NEW chapters on research—one each for fiction, poetry and drama—feature full MLA-style research papers annotated to point out research information specific to each genre.  NEW-MLA document maps:  These visual representations help students locate key information on frequently-cited sources such as books and websites.  NEW "visualizing" sections on fiction, poetry and drama each feature a section devoted to images that represent key literary principles or visual-based media within the genre.  Color insert–This insert features works of art and connects them to various pieces of literature throughout the book.  These images help reinforce the themes found in the literature.  Fifty short illustrative writing examples embody the strategies and methods described in the various chapters and appendices.   

 

Topical and Thematic Contents

Preface

 

PART I

The Process of Reading, Responding

to, and Writing About Literature

WHAT IS LITERATURE, AND WHY DO WE STUDY IT?

Types of Literature: The Genres

Reading Literature and Responding to It Actively

GUY DE MAUPASSANT The Necklace

To go to a ball, Mathilde Loisel borrows a necklace from a rich friend, but her rhapsodic evening has unforeseen consequences

Reading and Responding in a Computer File or Notebook

Sample Notebook Entries on Maupassant’s “The Necklace”

 

MAJOR STAGES IN THINKING AND WRITING ABOUT LITERARY TOPICS: DISCOVERING IDEAS, PREPARING TO

WRITE, MAKING AN INITIAL DRAFT OF YOUR ESSAY, AND COMPLETING THE ESSAY

Writing Does Not Come Easily—for Anyone

The Goal of Writing: To Show a Process of Thought

Discovering Ideas (“Brainstorming”)

Study the Characters in the Work

Determine the Work’s Historical Period and Background

Analyze the Work’s Economic and Social Conditions

Explain the Work’s Major Ideas

Describe the Work’s Artistic Qualities

Explain Any Other Approaches that Seem Important

Preparing to Write

Build Ideas from Your Original Notes

Trace Patterns of Action and Thought

The Need for the Actual Physical Process of Writing

Raise and Answer Your Own Questions

Put Ideas Together Using a Plus-Minus, Pro-Con, or Either-Or Method

Originate and Develop Your Thoughts Through Writing

Making an Initial Draft of Your Essay

Base Your Essay on a Central Idea, Argument, or Statement

The Need for a Sound Argument in Essays About Literature

Create a Thesis Sentence as Your Guide to Organization

Begin Each Paragraph with a Topic Sentence

Select Only One Topic—No More—for Each Paragraph

Referring to the Names of Authors

Use Your Topic Sentences as the Arguments for Your Paragraph Development

The Use of Verb Tenses in the Discussion of Literary Works

Develop an Outline as the Means of Organizing Your Essay

Illustrative Student Essay (First Draft): How Setting in “The Necklace” Is Related to the Character of Mathilde

Completing the Essay: Developing and Strengthening Your Essay Through Revision

Make Your Own Arrangement of Details and Ideas

Use Literary Material as Evidence to Support Your Argument

Always Keep to Your Point; Stick to It Tenaciously

Check Your Development and Organization

Try to Be Original

Write with Specific Readers as Your Intended Audience

Use Exact, Comprehensive, and Forceful Language

Illustrative Student Essay (Improved Draft): How Maupassant Uses Setting in “The Necklace”to Show the Character of

Mathilde

Commentary on the Essay

Essay Commentaries

A Summary of Guidelines

Writing Topics About the Writing Process

A SHORT GUIDE TO THE USE OF REFERENCES AND QUOTATIONS IN ESSAYS ABOUT LITERATURE

Integrate Passages and Ideas into Your Essay

Distinguish Your Thoughts from Those of Your Author

Integrate Material by Using Quotation Marks

Blend Quotations into Your Own Sentences

Indent Long Quotations and Set Them in Block Format

Use an Ellipsis to Show Omissions

Use Square Brackets to Enclose Words that You Add Within Quotations

Be Careful Not to Overquote

Preserve the Spellings in Your Source

 

PART II

Reading and Writing About Fiction

 

1 FICTION: AN OVERVIEW

Modern Fiction

The Short Story

Elements of Fiction I: Verisimilitude and Donnée

Elements of Fiction II: Character, Plot, Structure, and Idea or Theme

Elements of Fiction III: The Writer’s Tools

Visualizing Fiction: Cartoons, Graphic Narratives, Graphic Novels

Dan Piraro, Bizarro

Art Spiegelman, from Maus

STORIES FOR STUDY

AMBROSE BIERCE An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge

EDWIDGE DANTICAT Night Talkers

WILLIAM FAULKNER A Rose for Emily

TIM O’BRIEN The Things They Carried

LUIGI PIRANDELLO War

ALICE WALKER Everyday Use

EUDORA WELTY A Worn Path

Plot: The Motivation and Causality of Fiction

Writing About the Plot of a Story

Illustrative Student Essay: The Plot of Eudora Welty’s “A Worn Path”

Writing Topics About Plot in Fiction

 

2 POINT OF VIEW: THE POSITION OR STANCE OF THEWORK’S NARRATOR OR SPEAKER

An Exercise in Point of View: Reporting an Accident

Conditions That Affect Point of View

Point of View and Opinions

Determining a Work’s Point of View

Mingling Points of View

Point of View and Verb Tense

Summary: Guidelines for Points of View

STORIES FOR STUDY

RAYMOND CARVER Neighbors

SHIRLEY JACKSON The Lottery

LORRIE MOORE How to Become a Writer

JOYCE CAROL OATES The Cousins

Writing About Point of View

Illustrative Student Essay: Shirley Jackson’s Dramatic Point of View in “The Lottery”

Writing Topics About Point of View

 

3 CHARACTERS: THE PEOPLE IN FICTION

Character Traits

How Authors Disclose Character in Literature

Types of Characters: Round and Flat

Reality and Probability: Verisimilitude

STORIES FOR STUDY

RAYMOND CARVER Cathedral

SUSAN GLASPELL A Jury of Her Peers

KATHERINE MANSFIELD Miss Brill

AMY TAN Two Kinds

MARK TWAIN Luck

Writing About Character

Illustrative Student Essay: The Character of Minnie Wright in Glaspell’s “A Jury of Her Peers”

Writing Topics About Character

 

4 SETTING: THE BACKGROUND OF PLACE, OBJECTS, AND CULTURE IN STORIES

What Is Setting?

The Literary Uses of Setting

STORIES FOR STUDY

SANDRA CISNEROS The House on Mango Street

JOSEPH CONRAD The Secret Sharer

JOANNE GREENBERG And Sarah Laughed

JAMES JOYCE Araby

CYNTHIA OZICK The Shawl

Writing About Setting

Illustrative Student Essay The Setting of Conrad’s “The Secret Sharer”

Writing Topics About Setting

 

5 STRUCTURE: THE ORGANIZATION OF STORIES

Formal Categories of Structure

Formal and Actual Structure

STORIES FOR STUDY

RALPH ELLISON Battle Royal

THOMAS HARDY The Three Strangers

JAMAICA KINCAID What I Have Been Doing Lately

JOYCE CAROL OATES Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?

TOM WHITECLOUD Blue Winds Dancing

Writing About Structure in a Story

Illustrative Student Essay: Conflict and Suspense in Hardy’s “The Three Strangers”

Writing Topics About Structure

 

6 TONE AND STYLE: THEWORDS THAT CONVEY ATTITUDES IN FICTION

Diction: The Writer’s Choice and Control of Words

Tone, Irony, and Style

Tone, Humor, and Style

STORIES FOR STUDY

KATE CHOPIN The Story of an Hour

WILLIAM FAULKNER Barn Burning

ERNEST HEMINGWAY Hills Like White Elephants

ALICE MUNRO The Found Boat

FRANK O’CONNOR First Confession

DANIEL OROZCO Orientation

JOHN UPDIKE A & P

Writing About Tone and Style

Illustrative Student Essay: Frank O’Connor’s Control of Tone and Style in “First Confession”

Writing Topics About Tone and Style

 

7 SYMBOLISM AND ALLEGORY: KEYS TO EXTENDED MEANING

Symbolism

Allegory

Fable, Parable, and Myth

Allusion in Symbolism and Allegory

STORIES FOR STUDY

AESOP The Fox and the Grapes

ANONYMOUS The Myth of Atalanta

ANITA SCOTT COLEMAN Unfinished Masterpieces

NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE Young Goodman Brown

FRANZ KAFKA A Hunger Artist

LUKE The Parable of the Prodigal Son

GABRIEL GARCÍA MARQUEZ A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings

KATHERINE ANNE PORTER The Jilting of Granny Weatherall

JOHN STEINBECK The Chrysanthemums

Writing About Symbolism and Allegory

Illustrative Student

Essay (Symbolism): Symbols of Light and Darkness in Porter’s “The Jilting of Granny Weatherall”

Second Illustrative Student Essay (Allegory): The Allegory of Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown”

Writing Topics About Symbolism and Allegory

 

8 IDEA OR THEME: THE MEANING AND THE MESSAGE IN FICTION

Ideas and Assertions

Ideas and Issues

Ideas and Values

The Place of Ideas in Literature

How to Find Ideas

STORIES FOR STUDY

JAMES BALDWIN Sonny’s Blues

TONI CADE BAMBARA The Lesson

ANTON CHEKHOV The Lady with the Dog

D. H. LAWRENCE The Horse Dealer’s Daughter

AMÉRICO PAREDES The Hammon and the Beans

Writing About a Major Idea in Fiction

Illustrative Student Essay: D. H. Lawrence’s “The Horse Dealer’s Daughter”as an Expression of the Idea that Loving Commitment is Essential in Life

Writing Topics About Ideas

 

 

9 A CAREER IN FICTION: FOUR STORIES BY EDGAR ALLAN POE WITH CRITICAL READINGS FOR RESEARCH

POE’S LIFE AND CAREER

Poe’s Work as a Journalist and Writer of Fiction

Poe’s Reputation

Bibliographic Sources

Writing Topics About Poe

FOUR STORIES BY EDGAR A. POE (IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER)

The Fall of the House of Usher (1839)

The Masque of the Red Death (1842)

The Black Cat (1843)

The Cask of Amontillado (1846)

Edited Selections from Criticism of Poe’s Stories

1. Poe’s Irony

2.The Narrators of “The Cask of Amontillado”and “The Fall of the House of Usher”

3. “The Fall of the House of Usher”

4.“The Black Cat”and “The Tell-Tale Heart”

5.“The Masque of the Red Death”

6. Symbolism in “The Masque of the Red Death”

7.“The Masque of the Red Death ”as Representative of a “Diseased Age”

8. Sources and Analogues of “The Cask of Amontillado”

9. Poe’s Idea of Unity and “The Fall of the House of Usher”

10.The Narrators of “The Cask of Amontillado” and “The Black Cat”

11. Poe, Women, and “The Fall of the House of Usher”

12.The Deceptive Narrator of “The Black Cat”

 

10 SEVEN STORIES FOR ADDITIONAL ENJOYMENT AND STUDY

JOHN CHIOLES Before the Firing Squad

STEPHEN CRANE The Open Boat

ANDRE DUBUS The Curse

CHARLOTTE PERKINS GILMAN The Yellow Wallpaper

FLANNERY O’CONNOR A Good Man Is Hard to Find

TILLIE OLSEN I Stand Here Ironing

PETRONIUS (GAIUS PETRONIUS ARBITER) The Widow of Ephesus

 

10A WRITING RESEARCH ESSAYS ON FICTION

Selecting a Topic

Setting up a Bibliography

Online Library Services

Important Considerations About Computer-Aided Research

Taking Notes and Paraphrasing Material

Being Creative and Original While Doing Research

Documenting Your Work

Strategies for Organizing Ideas in Your Research Essay

Plagiarism: An Embarrassing but Vital Subject—and a Danger to be Overcome

Illustrative Student Essay Using Research: The Structure of Katherine Mansfield’s “Miss Brill”

Writing Topics About How to Undertake Research Essays

 

PART III

Reading and Writing About Poetry

 

11 MEETING POETRY: AN OVERVIEW

The Nature of Poetry

BILLY COLLINS Schoolsville

LISEL MUELLER Hope

ROBERT HERRICK Here a Pretty Baby Lies

Poetry of the English Language

How to Read a Poem

Studying Poetry

ANONYMOUS Sir Patrick Spens

POEMS FOR STUDY

GWENDOLYN BROOKS The Mother

EMILY DICKINSON Because I Could Not Stop for Death

ROBERT FRANCIS Catch

ROBERT FROST Stopping by Woods on aSnowy Evening

THOMAS HARDY The Man He Killed

JOY HARJO Eagle Poem

RANDALL JARRELL The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner

BEN JONSON On My First Daughter

EMMA LAZARUS The New Colossus

LOUIS MACNEICE Snow

JIM NORTHRUP Ogichidag

NAOMI SHIHAB NYE Where Children Live

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE Sonnet 55: Not Marble, Nor the Gilded Monuments

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY To — [“Music, When Soft Voices Die”]

ELAINE TERRANOVA Rush Hour

Writing a Paraphrase of a Poem

Illustrative Student Paraphrase: A Paraphrase of Thomas Hardy’s “The Man He Killed”

Writing an Explication of a Poem

Illustrative Student Essay: An Explication of Thomas Hardy’s “The Man He Killed”

Writing Topics About the Nature of Poetry

 

12 WORDS: THE BUILDING BLOCKS OF POETRY

Choice of Diction: Specific and Concrete, General and Abstract

Levels of Diction

Special Types of Diction

Syntax

Decorum: The Matching of Subject and Word

Denotation and Connotation

ROBERT GRAVES The Naked and the Nude

 

POEMS FOR STUDY

WILLIAM BLAKE The Lamb

ROBERT BURNS Green Grow the Rashes, O

LEWIS CARROLL Jabberwocky 663

HAYDEN CARRUTH An Apology for Using the Word “Heart” in Too Many Poems

E. E. CUMMINGS next to of course god america

JOHN DONNE Holy Sonnet 14: Batter My Heart, Three-Personed God

RICHARD EBERHART The Fury of Aerial Bombardment

BART EDELMAN Chemistry Experiment

THOMAS GRAY Sonnet on the Death of Richard West

JANE HIRSHFIELD The Lives of the Heart

A. E. HOUSMAN Loveliest of Trees, the Cherry Now

CAROLYN KIZER Night Sounds

DENISE LEVERTOV Of Being

EUGENIO MONTALE English Horn (Corno Inglese)

JUDITH ORTIZ [COFER] Latin Women Pray

HENRY REED Naming of Parts

EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON Richard Cory

THEODORE ROETHKE Dolor

STEPHEN SPENDER I Think Continually of Those Who Were Truly Great

WALLACE STEVENS Disillusionment of Ten O’Clock

MARK STRAND Eating Poetry

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH Daffodils (I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud)

Writing About Diction and Syntax in Poetry 679 • Illustrative Student

Essay: Diction and Character in Robinson’s ‘Richard Cory’

Writing Topics About the Words of Poetry

 

13 CHARACTERS AND SETTING: WHO, WHAT, WHERE, AND WHEN IN POETRY

Characters in Poetry

ANONYMOUS Western Wind, When Wilt Thou Blow?

ANONYMOUS Bonny George Campbell

BEN JONSON Drink to Me, Only, with Thine Eyes

BEN JONSON To the Reader

Setting and Character in Poetry

LISEL MUELLER Alive Together

POEMS FOR STUDY

MATTHEW ARNOLD Dover Beach

WILLIAM BLAKE London

ELIZABETH BREWSTER Where I Come From

ROBERT BROWNING My Last Duchess

WILLIAM COWPER The Poplar Field

ALLEN GINSBERG A Further Proposal

LOUISE GLÜCK Snowdrops

THOMAS GRAY Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard

THOMAS HARDY The Ruined Maid

DORIANNE LAUX The Life of Trees

C. DAY LEWIS Song

ROBERT LOWELL Memories of West Street and Lepke

CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE The Passionate Shepherd to His Love

JOYCE CAROL OATES Loving

SIR WALTER RALEGH The Nymph’s Reply to the Shepherd

CHRISTINA ROSSETTI A Christmas Carol

JANE SHOREA Letter Sent to Summer

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH Lines Composed a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey

JAMES WRIGHT A Blessing

Writing About Character and Setting in Poetry

 Illustrative Student Essay: The Character of the Duke in Browning’s “My Last Duchess”

Writing Topics About Character and Setting in Poetry

 

14 IMAGERY: THE POEM’S LINK TO THE SENSES

Responses and the Writer’s Use of Detail

The Relationship of Imagery to Ideas and Attitudes

Types of Imagery

JOHN MASEFIELD Cargoes

WILFRED OWEN Anthem for Doomed Youth

ELIZABETH BISHOP The Fish

POEMS FOR STUDY

ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING Sonnets from the Portuguese, Number 14: If Thou Must Love Me

SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE Kubla Khan

T. S. ELIOT Preludes

SUSAN GRIFFIN Love Should Grow Up Like a Wild Iris in the Fields

THOMAS HARDY Channel Firing

GEORGE HERBERT The Pulley

GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS Spring

A. E. HOUSMAN On Wenlock Edge

DENISE LEVERTOV A Time Past

THOMAS LUX The Voice You Hear When You Read Silently

EUGENIO MONTALE Buffalo (Buffalo)

MARIANNE MOORE The Fish

PABLO NERUDA Every Day You Play

EZRA POUND In a Station of the Metro

MIKLÓS RADNÓTI Forced March

FRIEDRICH RÜCKERT If You Love for the Sake of Beauty

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE Sonnet 130: My Mistress’ Eyes Are Nothing Like the Sun

JAMES TATE Dream On

DAVID WOJAHN “It’s Only Rock and Roll, but I Like It”: The Fall of Saigon

Writing About Imagery

Illustrative Student Essay: Imagery in T. S. Eliot’s “Preludes”

Writing Topics About Imagery in Poetry

 

15 FIGURES OF SPEECH, OR METAPHORICAL LANGUAGE: A SOURCE OF DEPTH AND RANGE IN POETRY

Metaphors and Similes: The Major Figures of Speech

Characteristics of Metaphorical Language

JOHN KEATS On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer

Vehicle and Tenor

Other Figures of Speech

JOHN KEATS Bright Star

JOHN GAY Let Us Take the Road

POEMS FOR STUDY

JACK AGÜEROS Sonnet for You, Familiar Famine

WILLIAM BLAKE The Tyger

ROBERT BURNS A Red, Red Rose

JOHN DONNE A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning

JOHN DRYDEN A Song for St. Cecilia’s Day

ABBIE HUSTON EVANS The Iceberg Seven-Eighths Under

THOMAS HARDY The Convergence of the Twain

JOY HARJO Remember

JOHN KEATS To Autumn

MAURICE KENNY Legacy

JANE KENYON Let Evening Come

HENRY KING Sic Vita

ROBERT LOWELL Skunk Hour

JUDITH MINTY Conjoined

PABLO NERUDA If You Forget Me

MARGE PIERCY A Work of Artifice

MURIEL RUKEYSER Looking at Each Other

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE Sonnet 18: Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day?

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE Sonnet 30: When to the Sessions of Sweet Silent Thought

ELIZABETH TUDOR, QUEEN ELIZABETH I On Monsieur’s Departure

MONA VAN DUYN Earth Tremors Felt in Missouri

WALT WHITMAN Facing West from California’s Shores

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH London, 1802

SIR THOMAS WYATT I Find No Peace

Writing About Figures of Speech

Illustrative Student Paragraph: Wordsworth’s Use of Overstatement in “London, 1802”

Illustrative Student Essay: A Study of Shakespeare’s Metaphors in Sonnet 30: “When to the Sessions of Sweet Silent Thought”

Writing Topics About Figures of Speech in Poetry

 

16 TONE: THE CREATION OF ATTITUDE IN POETRY

Tone, Choice, and Response

CORNELIUS WHUR The First-Rate Wife

Tone and the Need for Control

WILFRED OWEN Dulce et Decorum Est

Tone and Common Grounds of Assent

Tone in Conversation and Poetry

Tone and Irony

THOMAS HARDY The Workbox

Tone and Satire

ALEXANDER POPE Epigram from the French

ALEXANDER POPE Epigram, Engraved on the Collar of a Dog Which I Gave to His Royal Highness

POEMS FOR STUDY

WILLIAM BLAKE On Another’s Sorrow

JIMMY CARTER I Wanted to Share My Father’s World

LUCILLE CLIFTON homage to my hips

BILLY COLLINS The Names

E. E. CUMMINGS she being Brand /-new

BART EDELMAN Trouble

MARI EVANS I Am a Black Woman

SEAMUS HEANEY Mid-Term Break

WILLIAM ERNEST HENLEY When You Are Old

DAVID IGNATOW The Bagel

YUSEF KOMUNYAKAA Facing It

ABRAHAM LINCOLN My Childhood’s Home

PAT MORA La Migra

SHARON OLDS The Planned Child

ROBERT PINSKY Dying

ALEXANDER POPE from Epilogue to the Satires Dialogue I

SALVATORE QUASÍMODO Auschwitz

ANNE RIDLER Nothing Is Lost

THEODORE ROETHKE My Papa’s Waltz

JANE SHOREA Letter Sent to Summer

JONATHAN SWIFT A Description of the Morning

DAVID WAGONER My Physics Teacher

C. K. WILLIAMS Dimensions

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH The Solitary Reaper

WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS When You Are Old

Writing About Tone in Poetry

Illustrative Student Essay: The Speaker’s Attitudes in Sharon Olds’s “The Planned Child”

Writing Topics About Tone in Poetry

 

17 PROSODY: SOUND, RHYTHM, AND RHYME IN POETRY

Important Definitions for Studying Prosody

Segments: Individually Meaningful Sounds

Poetic Rhythm

The Major Metrical Feet

Special Meters

Substitution

Accentual Strong-Stress, and “Sprung” Rhythms

The Caesura: The Pause Creating Variety and Natural Rhythms in Poetry

Segmental Poetic Devices

Rhyme: The Duplication and Similarity of Sounds

Rhyme and Meter

Rhyme Schemes

POEMS FOR STUDY

GWENDOLYN BROOKS We Real Cool

ROBERT BROWNING Porphyria’s Lover

EMILY DICKINSON To Hear an Oriole Sing

JOHN DONNE The Sun Rising

T. S. ELIOT Macavity: The Mystery Cat

RALPH WALDO EMERSON Concord Hymn

ISABELLA GARDNER At a Summer Hotel

ROBERT HERRICK Upon Julia’s Voice

GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS God’s Grandeur

JOHN HALL INGHAM George Washington

PHILIP LEVINE A Theory of Prosody

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW The Sound of the Sea

HERMAN MELVILLE Shiloh: A Requiem

OGDEN NASH Very Like a Whale

EDGAR ALLAN POE Annabel Lee

EDGAR ALLAN POE The Bells

ALEXANDER POPE From An Essay on Man Epistle I

WYATT PRUNTY March

EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON Miniver Cheevy

CHRISTINA ROSSETTI Echo

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE Sonnet 73: That Time of Year Thou May’st in Me Behold

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY Ode to the West Wind

ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON From Idylls of the King: The Passing of Arthur

DAVID WAGONER March for a One-Man Band

Writing About Prosody

Referring to Sounds in Poetry

First Illustrative Student Essay: Rhyme, Rhythm, and Sound in Browning’s “Porphyria’s Lover”

Second Illustrative Student Essay: The Rhymes and Repeated Words in Christina Rossetti’s “Echo”

Writing Topics About Rhythm and Rhyme in Poetry

 

18 FORM: THE SHAPE OF POEMS

Closed-Form Poetry

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH Fragment from The Prelude

ALEXANDER POPE Fragment from The Rape of the Locke

ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON The Eagle

JOHN MILTON Fragment from Lycidas

ANONYMOUS Spun in High, Dark Clouds

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE Sonnet 116: Let Me Not to the Marriage of True Minds

Open-Form Poetry

WALT WHITMAN Reconciliation

Visualizing Poetry: Poetry and Artistic Expression: Visual Poetry, Concrete Poetry, and Prose Poems

E. E. CUMMINGS Buffalo Bill’s Defunct

GEORGE HERBERT Colossians 3:3 (Our Life is Hid With Christ in God)

GEORGE HERBERT Easter Wings

CHARLES HARPER WEBB The Shape of History

JOHN HOLLANDER Swan and Shadow

WILLIAM HEYEN Mantle

MAY SWENSON Women

CAROLYN FORCHÉ The Colonel

POEMS FOR STUDY

ELIZABETH BISHOP One Art

BILLY COLLINS Sonnet

JOHN DRYDEN To the Memory of Mr. Oldham

ROBERT FROST Desert Places

ALLEN GINSBERG A Supermarket in California

NIKKI GIOVANNI Nikki-Rosa

ROBERT HASS Museum

GEORGE HERBERT Virtue

JOHN KEATS Ode to a Nightingale

CLAUDE MCKAY In Bondage

JOHN MILTON On His Blindness (When I Consider How

My Light Is Spent)

DUDLEY RANDALL Ballad of Birmingham

THEODORE ROETHKE The Waking

GEORGE WILLIAM RUSSELL (Æ) Continuity

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY Ozymandias

DYLAN THOMAS Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night

JEAN TOOMER Reapers

PHYLLIS WEBB Poetics Against the Angel of Death

WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS The Dance

Writing About Form in Poetry

Illustrative Student Essay: Form and Meaning in George Herbert’s “Virtue”

Writing Topics About Poetic Form

 

19 SYMBOLISM AND ALLUSION: WINDOWS TO WIDE EXPANSES OF MEANING

Symbolism and Meanings

VIRGINIA SCOTT Snow

The Function of Symbolism in Poetry

Allusions and Meaning

Studying for Symbols and Allusions

POEMS FOR STUDY

EMILY BRONTË No Coward Soul Is Mine

AMY CLAMPITT Beach Glass

ARTHUR HUGH CLOUGH Say Not the Struggle Nought Availeth

PETER DAVISON III Delphi

JOHN DONNE The Canonization

STEPHEN DUNN Hawk

ISABELLA GARDNER Collage of Echoes

DAN GEORGAKIS Hiroshima Crewman

LOUISE GLÜCK Celestial Music

JORIE GRAHAM The Geese

THOMAS HARDY In Time of “The Breaking of Nations”

GEORGE HERBERT The Collar

JOSEPHINE JACOBSEN Tears

ROBINSON JEFFERS The Purse-Seine

JOHN KEATS La Belle Dame Sans Merci: A Ballad

X. J. KENNEDY Old Men Pitching Horseshoes

TED KOOSER Year’s End

PHILIP LARKIN Next, Please

DAVID LEHMAN Venice Is Sinking

ANDREW MARVELL To His Coy Mistress

MARY OLIVER Wild Geese

GARY SNYDER Milton by Firelight

JUDITH VIORST A Wedding Sonnet for the Next Generation

WALT WHITMAN A Noiseless Patient Spider

RICHARD WILBUR Year’s End

WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS The Second Coming

Writing About Symbolism and Allusion in Poetry

Illustrative Student Essay: Symbolism in Oliver’s “Wild Geese”

Writing Topics About Symbolism and Allusion

 

20 MYTHS: SYSTEMS OF SYMBOLIC ALLUSION IN POETRY

Mythology as an Explanation of How Things Are

Mythology and Literature

WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS Leda and the Swan

MONA VAN DUYN Leda

Six Poems Related to the Myth of Odysseus

POEMS FOR STUDY

LOUISE GLÜCK Penelope’s Song

W. S. MERWIN Odysseus

DOROTHY PARKER Penelope

LINDA PASTAN The Suitor

ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON Ulysses

PETER ULISSE Odyssey: 20 Years Later

Six Poems Related to the Myth of Icarus

POEMS FOR STUDY

BRIAN ALDISS Flight 063

W. H. AUDEN Musée des Beaux Arts

EDWARD FIELD Icarus

MURIEL RUKEYSER Waiting for Icarus

ANNE SEXTON To a Friend Whose Work Has Come to Triumph

WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS Landscape with the Fall of Icarus

Four Poems Related to the Myth of Orpheus

POEMS FOR STUDY

EDWARD HIRSCH The Swimmers

RAINER MARIA RILKE The Sonnets to Orpheus, 1.19

MARK STRAND Orpheus Alone

ELLEN BRYANT VOIGT Song and Story

Three Poems Related to the Myth of the Phoenix

POEMS FOR STUDY

AMY CLAMPITT Berceuse

DENISE LEVERTOV Hunting the Phoenix

MAY SARTON The Phoenix Again

Two Poems Related to the Myth of Oedipus

POEMS FOR STUDY

MURIEL RUKEYSER Myth

JOHN UPDIKE On the Way to Delphi

Three Poems Related to the Myth of Pan

POEMS FOR STUDY

E. E. CUMMINGS in Just-

JOHN CHIPMAN FARRAR Song for a Forgotten Shrine to Pan

ROBERT FROST Pan with Us

Writing About Myths in Poetry

Illustrative Student Essay: Myth and Meaning in Dorothy Parker’s “Penelope”

Writing Topics About Myths in Poetry

21 FOUR MAJOR AMERICAN POETS: EMILY DICKINSON, ROBERT FROST, LANGSTON HUGHES, AND SYLVIA PLATH

EMILY DICKINSON’S LIFE AND WORK

Writing Topics About the Poetry of Emily Dickinson

POEMS BY EMILY DICKINSON (ALPHABETICALLY ARRANGED)

After Great Pain, a Formal Feeling Comes (J341, F372)

Because I Could Not Stop for Death (J712, F479)

(Included in Chapter 11, p. 635)

The Bustle in a House (J1078, F1108)

The Heart Is the Capital of the Mind (J1354, F1381)

I Cannot Live with You (J640, F706)

I Died for Beauty – But Was Scarce (J449, F448)

I Dwell in Possibility (F466, J657)

I Felt a Funeral in My Brain (J280, F340)

I Heard a Fly Buzz – When I Died (J465, F491)

I Like to See It Lap the Miles (J585, F383)

I’m Nobody! Who Are You? (J288, F260)

I Never Lost as Much but Twice (J49, F39)

I Taste a Liquor Never Brewed (J214, F207)

Much Madness Is Divinest Sense (J435, F620)

My Life Closed Twice Before Its Close (J1732, F1773)

My Triumph Lasted Till the Drums (J1227, F1212)

One Need Not Be a Chamber – To Be Haunted (J670, F407)

Safe in Their Alabaster Chambers (J216, F124)

Some Keep the Sabbath Going to Church (J324, F236)

The Soul Selects Her Own Society (J303, F409)

Success Is Counted Sweetest (J67, F112)

Tell All the Truth but Tell It Slant (J1129, F1263)

There’s a Certain Slant of Light (J258, F320)

To Hear an Oriole Sing (J526, F402) (Included in Chapter 17 p. 859)

Wild Nights – Wild Nights! (J249, F269)

Edited Selections from Criticism of Dickinson’s Poems

1. From “Orthodox Modernisms”

2.“The Landscape of the Spirit”

3. From “The American Plain Style”

4. From “The Histrionic Imagination”

5. From “The Gothic Mode”

 

ROBERT FROST’S LIFE AND WORK

Writing Topics About the Poetry of Robert Frost

POEMS BY ROBERT FROST (CHRONOLOGICALLY ARRANGED)

The Tuft of Flowers (1913)

Pan with Us (in Chapter 20, p. 1015)

Mending Wall (1914)

Birches (1915)

The Road Not Taken (1915)

”Out, Out—” (1916)

The Oven Bird (1916)

Fire and Ice (1920)

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening (1923)

(In Chapter 11, p. 637)

Misgiving (1923)

Nothing Gold Can Stay (1923)

Acquainted with the Night (1928)

Desert Places (1936) (In Chapter 18, p. 918)

Design (1936)

The Silken Tent (1936)

The Gift Outright (1941)

A Considerable Speck (1942)

Take Something Like a Star (1943)

 

LANGSTON HUGHES’ LIFE AND WORK

Writing Topics About the Poetry of Langston Hughes

POEMS OF LANGSTON HUGHES (ALPHABETICALLY ARRANGED)

Bad Man

Cross

Dead in There

Dream Variations

Harlem

Let America Be America Again

Madam and Her Madam

Negro

The Negro Speaks of Rivers

125th Street

Po’ Boy Blues

Silhouette

Subway Rush Hour

Theme for English B

The Weary Blues

 

SYLVIA PLATH’S LIFE AND WORK

Writing Topics About the Poetry of Sylvia Plath

POEMS OF SYLVIA PLATH (ALPHABETICALLY ARRANGED)

Ariel

The Colossus

Cut

Daddy

Edge

The Hanging Man

Lady Lazarus

Last Words

Metaphors

Mirror

The Rival

Song for a Summer’s Day

Tulips

 

22 ONE HUNDRED SIXTEEN POEMS FOR ADDITIONAL ENJOYMENT AND STUDY

MAYA ANGELOU My Arkansas

ANONYMOUS (NAVAJO) Healing Prayer from the Beautyway Chant

ANONYMOUS Lord Randal

MARGARET ATWOOD Variation on the Word Sleep

W. H. AUDEN The Unknown Citizen

WENDELL BERRY Another Descent

LOUISE BOGAN Women

ARNA BONTEMPS A Black Man Talks of Reaping

ANNE BRADSTREET To My Dear and Loving Husband

GWENDOLYN BROOKS Primer for Blacks

ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING Sonnets from the Portuguese: Number 43, How Do I Love Thee

ROBERT BROWNING Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT To Cole, the Painter, Departing for Europe

GEORGE GORDON, LORD BYRON The Destruction of Sennacherib

NEW GEORGE GORDON, LORD BYRON She Walks in Beauty

LEONARD COHEN “The killers that run . . .”

BILLY COLLINS Days

FRANCES CORNFORD From a Letter to America on a Visit to Sussex: Spring 1942

STEPHEN CRANE Do Not Weep, Maiden, for War Is Kind

ROBERT CREELEY “Do you think . . .”

E. E. CUMMINGS if there are any heavens

CARL DENNIS The God Who Loves You

JOHN DONNE The Good Morrow

JOHN DONNE Holy Sonnet 10: Death Be Not Proud

JOHN DONNE A Hymn to God the Father

PAUL LAURENCE DUNBAR Sympathy [I Know What the Caged Bird Feels]

T. S. ELIOT The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

JAMES EMANUEL The Negro

LYNN EMANUEL Like God

CHIEF DAN GEORGE The Beauty of the Trees

NIKKI GIOVANNI Woman

NIKKI GIOVANNI Poetry

MARILYN HACKER Sonnet Ending with a Film Subtitle

DANIEL HALPERN Snapshot of Hué

DANIEL HALPERN Summer in the Middle Class

H. S. (SAM) HAMOD Leaves

FRANCES E. W. HARPER She’s Free!

MICHAEL S. HARPER Called

ROBERT HASS Spring Rain

ROBERT HAYDEN Those Winter Sundays

ROBERT HERRICK To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time

WILLIAM HEYEN The Hair: Jacob Korman’s Story

A. D. HOPE Advice to Young Ladies

GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS Pied Beauty

GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS The Windhover

CAROLINA HOSPITALDear Tia

ROBINSON JEFFERS The Answer

DONALD JUSTICE On the Death of Friends in Childhood

JOHN KEATS Ode on a Grecian Urn

GALWAY KINNELL After Making Love We Hear Footsteps

KATHERINE LARSON Statuary

IRVING LAYTON Rhine Boat Trip

LI-YOUNG LEE A Final Thing

ALAN P. LIGHTMAN In Computers

LIZ LOCHHEAD The Choosing

AUDRE LORDE Every Traveler Has One Vermont Poem

AMY LOWELL Patterns

ARCHIBALD MACLEISH Ars Poetica

HEATHER MCHUGH Lines

CLAUDE MCKAY The White City

W. S. MERWIN Listen

EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY What Lips My Lips Have Kissed, and Where, and Why

N. SCOTT MOMADAY The Bear

MARIANNE MOORE Poetry

LISEL MUELLER Monet Refuses the Operation

HOWARD NEMEROV Life Cycle of Common Man

JIM NORTHRUP wahbegan

MARY OLIVER Ghosts

SIMON ORTIZ A Story of How a Wall Stands

DOROTHY PARKER Résumé

LINDA PASTAN Ethics

LINDA PASTAN Marks

MOLLY PEACOCK Desire

MARGE PIERCY The Secretary Chant

EDGAR ALLAN POE The Raven

JOHN CROWE RANSOM Bells for John Whiteside’s Daughter

JOHN RAVEN Assailant

ADRIENNE RICH Diving into the Wreck

ALBERTO RÍOS The Vietnam Wall

LUIS OMAR SALINAS In a Farmhouse

SONIA SANCHEZ rite on: white america

CARL SANDBURG Chicago

SIEGFRIED SASSOON Dreamers

GJERTRUD SCHNACKENBERG The Paperweight

ALAN SEEGER I Have a Rendezvous with Death

BRENDA SEROTTE My Mother’s Face

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE Sonnet 29: When in Disgrace with Fortune and Men’s Eyes

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE Sonnet 146: Poor Soul, the Center of My Sinful Earth

KARL SHAPIRO Auto Wreck

LESLIE MARMON SILKO Where Mountain Lion Lay Down with Deer

STEVIE SMITH Not Waving But Drowning

GARY SOTO Oranges

WILLIAM STAFFORD Traveling Through the Dark

GERALD STERN Burying an Animal on the Way to New York

WALLACE STEVENS The Emperor of Ice-Cream

MAY SWENSON Question

DYLAN THOMAS A Refusal to Mourn the Death, by Fire, of a Child in London

DANIEL TOBIN My Uncle’s Watch

CHASE TWICHELL Blurry Cow

JOHN UPDIKE Perfection Wasted

TINO VILLANUEVA Day-Long Day

JUDITH VIORST True Love

SHELLY WAGNER The Boxes

ALICE WALKER Revolutionary Petunias

EDMUND WALLER Go, Lovely Rose

BRUCE WEIGL Song of Napalm

PHILLIS WHEATLEY On Being Brought from Africa to America

WALT WHITMAN Beat! Beat! Drums!

WALT WHITMAN Dirge for Two Veterans

WALT WHITMAN Full of Life Now

WALT WHITMAN I Hear America Singing

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER The Bartholdi Statue

RICHARD WILBUR April 5, 1974

WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS The Red Wheelbarrow

WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS The Wild Swans at Coole

PAUL ZIMMER The Day Zimmer Lost Religion

 

22A WRITING RESEARCH ESSAYS ON POETRY

Topics to Discover in Research

Illustrative Student Essay Written with the Aid of Research: “Beat! Beat! Drums!” and “I Hear America Singing”: Two Whitman Poems Spanning the Civil War

 

PART IV

Reading and Writing About Drama

 

23 THE DRAMATIC VISION: AN OVERVIEW

Drama as Literature

Performance: The Unique Aspect of Drama

Drama from Ancient Times to Our Own: Tragedy, Comedy, and Additional Forms

ANONYMOUS The Visit to the Sepulcher (Visitatio Sepulchri)

How do the Three Marys respond to the news told by the angel? Visualizing Plays

PLAYS FOR STUDY

EDWARD ALBEE The Sandbox

SUSAN GLASPELL Trifles

BETTY KELLER Tea Party

EUGENE O’NEILL Before Breakfast

Writing About the Elements of Drama

Referring to Plays and Parts of Plays

Illustrative Student Essay: Eugene O’Neill’s Use of Negative Descriptions and Stage Directions in Before Breakfast as a Means of Revealing Character

Writing Topics About the Elements of Drama

 

24 THE TRAGIC VISION: AFFIRMATION THROUGH LOSS

The Origins of Tragedy

The Ancient Athenian Competitions in Tragedy

The Origin of Tragedy in Brief

Aristotle and the Nature of Tragedy

Aristotle’s View of Tragedy in Brief

Irony in Tragedy

The Ancient Athenian Audience and Theater

Ancient Greek Tragic Actors and Their Costumes

Performance and the Formal Organization of Greek Tragedy

PLAYS FOR STUDY

SOPHOCLES Oedipus the King

Renaissance Drama and Shakespeare’s Theater

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark

Tragedy from Shakespeare to Arthur Miller

Death of a Salesman: Tragedy, Symbolism, and Broken Dreams

ARTHUR MILLER Death of a Salesman

 Writing About Tragedy

Illustrative Student Essay: The Problem of Hamlet’s Apparent Delay

Writing Topics About Tragedy

 

25 THE COMIC VISION: RESTORING THE BALANCE

The Origins of Comedy

Comedy from Roman Times to the Renaissance

The Patterns, Characters, and Language of Comedy

Types of Comedy

PLAYS FOR STUDY

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE A Midsummer Night’s Dream

The Life and Theater of Molière

Love Is the Doctor (L’Amour Médecin): A Comic Farce

MOLIÈRE (Jean Baptiste Poguelin) Love Is the Doctor (L’Amour Médecin)

Comedy Since Shakespeare and Molière

ANTON CHEKHOV The Bear, A Joke in One Act

BETH HENLEY Am I Blue

Writing About Comedy

Illustrative Student Essay: Setting as Symbol and Comic Structure in Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Writing Topics About Comedy

 

26 VISIONS OF DRAMATIC REALITY AND NONREALITY: VARYING THE IDEA OF DRAMA AS IMITATION

Realism and Nonrealism in Drama

Elements of Realistic and Nonrealistic Drama

PLAYS FOR STUDY

Langston Hughes Biography

Hughes and the African American Theater after 1920

Hughes’s Career as a Dramatist

Mulatto and the Reality of the Southern Black Experience

LANGSTON HUGHES Mulatto

TENNESSEE WILLIAMS The Glass Menagerie

August Wilson Biography

The Background of Fences

AUGUST WILSON Fences

Writing About Realistic and Nonrealistic Drama

Illustrative Student Essay: Realism and Nonrealism in Tom’s Triple Role in The Glass Menagerie

Writing Topics About Dramatic Reality and Nonreality

 

27 DRAMATIC VISION ON FILM: FROM THE SILVER SCREEN TO THEWORLD OF DIGITAL FANTASY

A Thumbnail History of Film

Stage Plays and Film

DVD Technology and Film Study

The Aesthetics of Film

The Techniques of Film

TWO FILM SCENES FOR STUDY

ORSON WELLES AND HERMAN J. MANKIEWICZ Shot 71 from the Shooting Script of Citizen Kane

ARTHUR LAURENTS A Scene from The Turning Point

Writing About Film

Illustrative Student Essay: Welles’s Citizen Kane: Whittling a Giant Down to Size

Writing Topics About Film

 

28 HENRIK IBSEN AND THE REALISTIC PROBLEM PLAY: A DOLLHOUSE

Ibsen’s Life and Early Work

Ibsen’s Major Prose Plays

A Dollhouse: Ibsen’s Best-Known Problem Play

Ibsen’s Symbolism in A Dollhouse

A Dollhouse as a “Well-Made Play”

The Timeliness and Dramatic Power of A Dollhouse

Bibliographic Studies

HENRIK IBSEN A Dollhouse (Et Dukkehjem)

Edited Selections from Criticism of Ibsen’s A Dollhouse and Other Plays

1. Freedom,Truth, and Society—Rhetoric and Reality

2. Ibsen’s Feminist Characters

3.“A Marxist Approach to A Doll House”

 

28A WRITING RESEARCH ESSAYS ON DRAMA

Topics to Discover in Research

Illustrative Student Essay Written with the Aid of Research: The Ghost in Hamlet

 

PART V

Special Writing Topics About Literature

 

29 CRITICAL APPROACHES IMPORTANT IN THE STUDY OF LITERATURE

Moral/Intellectual

Topical/Historical

New Critical/Formalist

Structuralist

Feminist Criticism/Gender Studies/Queer Theory

Economic Determinist/Marxist

Psychological/Psychoanalytic

Archetypal/Symbolic/Mythic

Deconstructionist

Reader-Response

 

30 COMPARISON-CONTRAST AND EXTENDED COMPARISON-CONTRAST: LEARNING BY SEEING LITERARY WORKS TOGETHER

Guidelines for the Comparison-Contrast Method

The Extended Comparison-Contrast Essay

Writing a Comparison-Contrast Essay

Illustrative Student Essay (Two Works): The Treatment of Responses to War in Amy Lowell’s “Patterns” and Wilfred Owen’s “Anthem for Doomed Youth”

Illustrative Student Essay (Extended Comparison-Contrast): Literary Treatments of the Conflicts Between Private and Public Life

Writing Topics for Comparison and Contrast

 

31 TAKING EXAMINATIONS ON LITERATURE

Answer the Questions That Are Asked

Systematic Preparation

Two Basic Types of Questions About Literature

 

APPENDIXES

I. MLA RECOMMENDATIONS FOR DOCUMENTING SOURCES

II. BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES OF THE POETS IN PART III

 

A GLOSSARY OF IMPORTANT LITERARY TERMS