Discovering the Many Worlds of Literature: Literature for Composition Book

Preface.


1. Reading and Writing About Literature.

Reading Essays.

The Personal Essay.

Reading Critically.

Reading for Ideas and Organization.

Humor, Irony and Satire.

Analyzing Essays.

Guidelines for Annotating.

Keeping a Reading Journal.

Opening a Dialogue.

Octavio Paz, “Fiesta.”

Writing About Essays.

Pre-Writing Techniques.

Creating a Rough Draft.

Revising Your Essay.

Formatting.

Drawing on Additional Sources for Evidence.

Electronic Sources.

Sample Analytical Essay: “Fiestas Are a 'Time-Out' for Mexicans.”

Reading Fiction.

Evolution of the Short Story.

Modern Fiction.

Postmodernist Fiction.

Analyzing a Work of Short Fiction.

Nabil Gorgy, “Cairo Is a Small City.”

Writing About Fiction.

Using Paraphrases and Quotes as Evidence.

Outlining Before Writing a Rough Draft.

Sample Essay: “Two Different Worlds in Nabil Gorgy's 'Cairo Is a Small City'.”

Reading Poetry.

Differences Between Poetry and Prose.

Kinds of Poetry.

Analyzing Poetry.

Ted Hughes, “Pike.”

Writing About Poetry.

Sample Essay: “An Encounter with the Irrational: An Explication of Ted Hughes's 'Pike'.”

Reading Drama.

Dramatic Structure.

Origins of Western Drama.

Conflict as Dramatic Device.

Watching Versus Reading Dramas.

Analyzing Drama.

Betty Keller, Tea Party.

Contextual Elements.

Writing About Drama.

Free Writing.

Developing a Thesis.

Sample Essay: “The 'Unattended' Tea Party.”

2. Topics for Literary Analysis.

Writing AboutCharacterization and Setting.

Characterization in Short Fiction.

Setting in Short Fiction.

Characterization and Setting in Poetry.

Characterization and Setting in Drama.

Writing About Point of View.

Point of View in Short Fiction.

Point of View in Poetry.

Point of View in Drama.

Writing About Language.

Language in Short Fiction.

Language in Poetry.

Language in Drama.

Writing About Reader Expectation.

Reader Expectation in Short Fiction.

Reader Expectation in Poetry.

Reader Expectation in Drama.

Writing a Response Statement.

Writing About Plot, Conflict, and Structure.

Plot, Conflict and Structure in Short Fiction.

Plot, Conflict and Structure in Poetry.

Plot, Conflict and Structure in Drama.

Writing About Works in Context.

Psychological Contexts.

Literary Context.

Social Context.

Historical Context.

Writing About Symbolism and Myth.

Symbolism in Short Fiction.

Symbolism in Poetry.

Symbolism in Drama.

Myth in Short Fiction, Poetry, and Drama.

Arguing for an Interpretation of a Literary Work.

Arguments That Define and Draw Distinctions.

Arguments That Establish Causes and Draw Consequences.

Arguments That Make Value Judgments.

Arguments That Propose Solutions.

3. Family and Cultural Ties.


Each readings chapter begins with an introductory essay, and ends with “Connections” and “Filmography.”

Essays.

Fritz Peters, Boyhood with Gurdieff.

Jill Nelson, Number One!

Amy Tan, The Language of Discretion.

Short Fiction.

Amy Tan, Two Kinds.

John Cheever, Reunion.

Bessie Head, Looking for a Rain God.

Louise Erdrich, The Red Convertible.

Inés Arredondo, The Shunammite.

Eudora Welty, A Worn Path.

Kazuo Ishiguro, A Family Supper.

Poetry.

Anonymous, Edward, Edward.

Naomi Shihab Nye, Where Children Live.

Anne Bradstreet, The Author to Her Book.

Cathy Song, The Youngest Daughter.

Sharon Olds, The Planned Child.

Ben Jonson, On My First Son.

Robert Hayden, Those Winter Sundays.

William Butler Yeats, A Prayer for My Daughter.

Rita Dove, The Wake.

Garrett Hongo, Who Among You Knows the Essence of Garlic?

Chenjerai Hove, You Will Forget.

Drama.

Kobo Abe, Friends.

4. Coming of Age.

Essays.

Sabine Reichel, Learning What Was Never Taught.

Mark Salzman, Lessons.

Short Fiction.

James Joyce, Araby.

Katherine Mansfield, Her First Ball.

Hanan Al-Shaykh, The Persian Carpet.

Joyce Carol Oates, Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?

Kate Chopin, The Story of an Hour.

Jerzy Kosinski, The Miller's Tale.

Natsume Soseki, I Am A Cat.

Tayeb Salih, A Handful of Dates.

Poems.

Linda Pastan, Ethics.

Robert Frost, The Road Not Taken.

Fadwa Tugan, I Found It.

Xu Gang, Red Azalea on the Cliff.

Miriam Baruch, Sunflower.

William Blake, Ah! Sun-flower.

Maurice Kenny, Sometimes…Injustice.

Octavio Paz, The Street.

Emily Dickinson, Tell All the Truth But Tell It Slant.

Robert Desnos, Midway.

Sara Teasdale, The Solitary.

Dramas.

Tennessee Williams, The Glass Menagerie.

Christopher Durang, For Whom the Southern Belle Tolls.

5. Gender.

Essays.

Judith Ortiz Cofer, The Myth of the Latin Woman: I Just Met a Girl Named Maria.

Nawal Ed-Saadawi, The Mutilated half.

Short Fiction.

Anton Chekhov, The Lady and The Pet Dog.

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., Who Am I This Time?

Sembene Ousmane, Her Three Days.

Margaret Atwood, Happy Endings.

James Joyce, Eveline.

Ernest Hemingway, Hills Like White Elephants.

Robert Fox, A Fable.

Charlotte Perkins Gilman, The Yellow Wallpaper.

Monique Proulx, Feint of Heart.

Alberto Moravia, Jewellery.

Poems.

Edna St. Vincent Millay, What Lips My Lips Have Kissed.

Muriel Rukeyser, Myth.

Gregory Corso, Marriage.

Jimmy Santiago Baca, Spliced Wire.

Grace Caroline Bridges, Lisa's Ritual, Age 10.

John Frederick Nims, Love Poem.

Shakespeare, Sonnet 130: My Mistress's Eyes Are Nothing Like the Sun.

Robert Browning, My Last Duchess.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning, How Do I Love Thee?

Dramas.

Susan Glaspell, Trifles.

David Ives, Sure Thing.

6. Class, Race, and Ethnicity.

Essays.

Margaret Sanger, The Turbid Ebb & Flow of Misery.

Jonathan Swift, A Modest Proposal.

Mary Crow Dog & Richard Erdoes, Civilize Them with a Stick.

James Baldwin, Letter to My Nephew.

Short Fiction.

Kate Chopin, Desiree's Baby.

F. Scott Fitzgerald, Winter Dreams.

Guy de Maupassant, The Necklace.

Mahdokht Kashkuli, The Button.

Catherine Lim, Paper.

Dorothy Allison, I'm Working on My Charm.

Liliana Heker, The Stolen Party.

Poems.

Bertolt Brecht, A Worker Reads History.

Mascha Kaleko, Mannequins.

Leon Damas, Hiccup.

Marge Piercy, The Nine of Cups.

Linda Hogan, Workday.

Francis E.W. Harper, Learning to Read.

Nikki Giovanni, Nikki-Rosa,.

Gary Soto, Dirt.

Martin Espada, Jorge the Church Janitor Finally Quits.

Drama.

Dario Fo, We Won't Pay! We Won't Pay!

7. Politics and Power.

Essays.

George Orwell, Shooting an Elephant.

Luis Sepulveda, Daisy.

Tim O'Brien, If I Die in a Combat Zone.

Barbara Kingsolver, And Our Flag Was Still There.

Short Fiction.

Ambrose Bierce, An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge.

Tadeusz Borowski, Silence.

Irene Zabytko, Home Soil.

Panos Ioannides, Gregory.

Luisa Valenzuela, The Censors.

Gloria Anzaldua, Cervicide.

Ernesto Cardenal, The Swede.

P'an Jen-mu, A Pair of Socks with Love.

Poems.

Diana Der Hovanessian, Looking at Cambodian News Photos.

Wilfred Owen, Strange Meeting.

W. H. Auden, The Unknown Citizen.

Carolyn Forche, The Colonel.

Eleni Fourtouni, Child's Memory.

Ira Sadoff, Nazis.

Yehuda Amichai, An Arab Shepherd is Searching for His Goat on Mount Zion.

Margaret Atwood, At First I was Given Centuries.

Drama.

Vaclav Havel, Protest.

8. Outcasts, Scapegoats, and Exiles.

Essays.

Paul Monette, Borrowed Time: An AIDS Memoir.

Luis Alberto Urrea, Border Story.

Short Fiction.

Raymond Carver, Neighbors.

Jhumpa Lahiri, This Blessed House.

Albert Camus, The Guest.

H.G. Wells, The Country of the Blind.

Mahasweta Devi, Giribala.

Milorad Pavíc, The Wedgwood Tea Set.

Wakako Yamauchi, And the Soul Shall Dance.

Alice Walker, The Flowers.

Poems.

Bruce Springsteen, Streets of Philadelphia.

Lennart Sjogren, The Roses.

Wing Tek Lum, Minority Poem.

Rahel Chalfi, Porcupine Fish.

Diane Wakoski, The Orange.

Czeslaw Milosz, My Faithful Mother Tongue.

Barbara Kingsolver, This House I Cannot Leave.

Kelly Cherry, Alzheimer's.

Drama.

Tewfik al-Hakim, The Donkey Market.

9. Nature and the Spirit.

Essays.

Aldo Leopold, Thinking Like a Mountain.

Ursula Le Guin, A Very Warm Mountain.

Langston Hughes, Salvation.

Short Fiction.

Premchand, Deliverance.

Naguib Mahfouz, Half a Day.

Chinua Achebe, from Things Fall Apart.

Edgar Allan Poe, The Masque of the Red Death.

William Faulkner, A Rose for Emily.

Joaquim María Machado de Assis, A Canary's Ideas.

Carmen Naranjo, And We Sold the Rain.

Olaf Stapledon, from Star Maker.

Poems.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, The Sound of the Sea.

Walt Whitman, When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer.

Anna Kamienska, Funny.

Vasko Popa, The Lost Red Boot.

Gerard Manley Hopkins, The Windhover.

Alfred Jarry, The Passion of Jesus Considered As An Uphill Bicycle Race.

Dylan Thomas, Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night.

Bella Akhmadulina, The Garden.

Jorge Luis Borges, Afterglow.

John Milton, When I Consider How My Light Is Spent.

Mary Oliver, When Death Comes.

William Wordsworth, Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood.

Les A. Murray, Poetry and Religion.

William Butler Yeats, The Second Coming.

Drama.

Shakespeare, Hamlet, Prince of Denmark.

Appendix A: Critical Approaches to Literature.


Appendix B: Documenting Sources.


Glossary of Literary Terms.


Special Indexes.


Index of First Lines of Poetry.


Index of Authors and Titles.