In leaves no step had trodden black figure of speech

2 Responding to Literary Experiences Photo of an arched rock formation against the backdrop of a starry sky. © VideoBlocks Learning Objectives After reading this chapter, you should be able to do the following: Develop a framework for responding to what you read. Describe how the use of persona affects your response to literature. Analyze the themes and concepts in "The Story of an Hour." Identify the use of persona and symbol in "The Road Not Taken." Recognize figures of speech, including similes and metaphors. Discuss what literature contributes to your life. Analyze the themes and concepts in "Dream Boogie." Explore the use of tone and imagery in "The Blue Bowl." Identify the use of metaphor in "." Analyze the themes and concepts in "The Welcome Table." "I am a part of all that I have met; Yet all experience is an arch wherethrough Gleams that untravelled world, whose margin fades For ever and for ever when I move." —Alfred, Lord Tennyson 2.1 Writing About What You Read In our opening chapter, we observed that enjoying literature begins with the depth of connection you make with the imaginary world that a piece of literature creates. The purpose of this chapter is to look at a range of literary experiences and to describe what is involved in responding to them in meaningful ways. Responding is a personal activity that allows you to reflect on your experiences and to gain valuable insights about the human condition; responding can also be a structured analytical process that requires use of literary tools and techniques. Responding requires active mental engagement: exploring ideas, forming conclusions, and, ultimately, critiquing what you have read as objectively as possible. Because this book is an introduction to literature, it offers a broad range of reading experiences. Some selections may be familiar, some will introduce you to surprising insights, and others will engage you in human encounters and life complexities that don't have obvious solutions. The readings will pull you beyond the scope of popular literature, beyond conventional romances with happy endings, and beyond detective stories where impossible cases are always solved at the last moment, allowing the forces of good to succeed. Does exploring more challenging literature mean that you should never read popular literature, sometimes called "commercial literature"? No, this approach readily acknowledges the pleasure and delightful escape that such reading offers, but it also takes you beyond the popular literature horizon, where broader ventures and more challenging explorations await. The level of intellectual demands on the reader will vary because writers have very different purposes when they write. When the events in a story are presented simply and developed in a straightforward manner without extensive detail, the writer's intentions are likely to be obvious and easy to understand. But when a writer's primary purpose is hidden or buried in symbols—when, for example, the author sets out to interpret a puzzling phenomenon or human condition—the reader will likely need to make careful intellectual inquiry to understand the author's intent. Framework for Responding to What You Read As stated previously, reading creates imaginative experiences. It connects you to new experiences that become meaningful when you allow them to influence your thoughts and feelings. To make your responses active and engaging, you should ask: Is my reading experience echoing things that have happened in my life? Is it connecting me to things I've never considered before? Am I surprised by (or content with) the way it makes me feel? Does it make me think about a concept or issue that is important to me or to humanity at large? Also as you read, consider how the writer develops the situations, characters, and emotions that stand out for you. Analyze them. Then, draw conclusions about what you have read; develop your interpretation, focusing on how your reading experience relates to your life, ideas, and values—not just your values, but others' also. Your responses can be organized into three steps: connecting, considering, and concluding. These steps provide a simple but effective response framework that you will use throughout this book. See Table 2.1 for explanations of each step. At first glance, this matrix may suggest that reading should produce neat linear responses in an intellectual inquiry process that is orderly, almost mechanical. But certainly that is not what happens when you read literature. Life itself is not that way! When you read a piece of literature imaginatively and with mental vigor, you are stepping inside it, projecting your perspective across its landscape. Although the author may provide signposts to follow as you discover what the literary piece intends, you make your own path. Often, it's a winding one; progress can be slow. Maybe you miss important details that explain the behavior of an important character, or you limit the capabilities of a character to the boundaries of your own experience. Or, you might miss important connections between what is happening and why it's happening, requiring you to do some rereading. Stop-and-go reading like this can be frustrating, but it also creates learning opportunities. Expect to do this kind of reading in an introduction to literature course—because the truest satisfaction in reading comes from exploring, moving from insight to insight. Table 2.1 Reader's response framework: Connecting, considering, and concluding Connecting (Imaginative reading) Involves allowing feelings, curiosity, aspirations, desire to escape, and associations with past or present experiences to motivate you to read. Individual link and imaginative "entry" into a piece of literature. Considering (Analysis) Involves focusing on basic literary elements, artistic skills, aesthetic features, ideas, observations, contexts, and dilemmas that you discover as you read and want to explore in some depth. Personal inquiry, as you analyze and think about the content and unique structure of the literary work. Concluding (Interpretation) Involves finding your own explanations, making sense of what you are reading, and determining the value of its implications. The matrix in Table 2.1 provides a starting point in the exploratory process. It will help you discover insights, appreciate literary techniques, and find significance in your reading. Throughout this book, many reading selections include a follow-up Response and Reflection section containing questions based on the matrix. These questions—asking you to connect, consider, and conclude—are designed to call attention to details and ideas that will deepen your response. A Sample Response Knowing that you will be expected to write about what you read introduces an obligation. It requires you to read not just for pleasure, but also with specific purpose. When reading for pleasure, you can allow yourself to be caught up in experiencing a story, poem, or play—simply enjoying the suspenseful moments and identifying with imagined settings. But reading literature with a purpose requires you to have something to say about what you've read. It can't be just a sweeping general statement, such as "That was a great story; it really held my attention." Your written statement needs to include specific and thoughtful observations that can be supported by details in the piece of literature you have read. The framework of connecting, considering, and concluding can be used in developing your written responses, as illustrated in Responding to Reading: Sample Short-Answer Written Response. Responding to Reading Sample Short-Answer Written Response Question: Is Sammy presented in the story "A & P" as a person whose actions are solidly established, or as one "coming of age," searching for answers about how to act in the adult world? i Published in 1961, early in a decade of counterculture and social revolution in America, Updike's story presents a glimpse into different generational responses to these significant movements. The story is set north of Boston where people are proud of their Puritan heritage, which dates back to colonial days and remains firmly established in their culture. Lengel, the store manager, feels compelled to uphold this Puritan ethic when he sees the girls in swimming suits shopping in his store. He is offended, both by what they are wearing and also by their casual attitude when pushing social norms. He confronts them, pointing out that store policy does not permit shoppers to be dressed in swimwear. Sammy, a 19-year-old, is part of the younger generation that supports social change. He sees the situation differently, i demonstrating how adamantly he opposes Lengel's approach by quitting his job on the spot. He takes a gallant stand not only to impress the girls, but also to advance the spirit of freedom, excitement, and change introduced by their presence. Unfortunately, rather than producing heroic, dramatic results, his protest brings only embarrassing personal consequences. i Sammy quit his job in a voice loud enough for the girls to hear, hoping they would see him "as their unsuspected hero" (as cited in Clugston, 2014). However, they did not acknowledge him as they left, and when he got to the store parking lot they were gone. Consequently, he experiences no external affirmation of his action, no applause for being a hero. But, Sammy gains new insight: he realizes "how hard the world was going to be" (as cited in Clugston, 2014). That is, he begins to understand that his quest for change—stimulated not just by the girls' entrance but by stifling routines in his work environment—would be an arduous struggle requiring commitment and persistence over time; achievement of social i change is not driven by spur-of-the moment actions. He shows the strength of this awareness later when he disagrees with the idea that the A & P incident was a sad one. Sammy disagrees because he learned a lot from the experience. He may not have found answers to all the questions he has about becoming a man, but his self-knowledge and outlook are more realistically grounded than ever before. 2.2 How Use of Persona Affects Your Response to Literature If there's a nameplate on your desk at work, it's possible for someone who passes by to get a sense of who you are just by looking at your desk, noticing how things are arranged, glancing at the design of your coffee cup, and so on. If these items could speak, the observer could learn a lot more about you, of course. A piece of literature is somewhat like that desk: The author's name is on it, and you can discover things about the author when you read. But there's a difference. Unlike inboxes and coffee cups, the characters in stories and poems and plays can speak. As they do, they may represent what the author thinks, or they may be "speaking for themselves"—representing views that are different from the author's. In other words, it's important to understand an author's use of persona. Persona in "The Road Not Taken" In Latin, persona means "mask." When it is used in literature, persona refers to the person who is the narrator in a story or the speaker in a poem. In other words, the main voice in a work of fiction or poetry is usually not the author's voice, although it may reflect the author's views. The main voice comes from the person the author created to narrate or speak. In most cases, this speaker is a character in the story or the poem, but sometimes a persona can be an outside voice, a speaker who is looking at the action but is not part of it. Look carefully at the student's analysis in the box following Robert Frost's famous poem "The Road Not Taken." The analysis identifies the persona (speaker) as a person who is approaching decision making thoughtfully, but this person is not necessarily Robert Frost. Also note Frost's use of symbol in the poem. A symbol is an object, person, or action that conveys two meanings: its literal meaning and something it stands for. In "The Road Not Taken," Frost presents the literal image of two roads. But he suggests that they stand for something other than what their literal meaning conveys: They represent (symbolize) life's pathways on which our day-by-day experiences unfold. Robert Frost (1874–1963) Portrait of the American poet Robert Frost. © Bettmann/CORBIS Robert Frost was born in San Francisco. At age 11, he moved with his family to New England. He attended both Dartmouth College and Harvard but did not graduate. After an unsuccessful attempt at farming, he and his wife moved to England in 1912. There, with encouragement from poet Ezra Pound, he published his first two collections of poems, A Boy's Will and North of Boston. He returned to the United States in 1915 as a popular poet and was even more celebrated in the years that followed, winning the Pulitzer Prize for his works four times. He was sought after as an artist in residence at universities in New England and wrote candidly about the poetic process. His lyrical style and masterful use of ordinary language and rural settings made his poetry delightful. Building on delight, he engaged in ironic inquiry to give expression to complex ideas and questions that define the human spirit. The Road Not Taken Robert Frost (1916) Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth. 5 Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim, Because it was grassy and wanted wear; Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same. 10 And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back. 15 I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference. 20 "The Road Not Taken" from the book THE POETRY OF ROBERT FROST edited by Edward Connery Lathem. Copyright © 1923, 1969 by Henry Holt and Company, copyright © 1951 by Robert Frost. Reprinted by permission of Henry Holt and Company, LLC. Users are warned that this Selection is protected under copyright laws and downloading is strictly prohibited. The right to reproduce or transfer the Selection via any medium must be secured from Henry Holt and Company, LLC. SAMPLE RESPONSE AND REFLECTION QUESTIONS The following questions are reflective of those you will encounter throughout the remainder of this textbook. The sample answers provided are examples of how you might respond to these questions. Connecting (Imaginative reading) Q. What allowed you to connect to the poem? A. I was able to connect to this poem immediately because I'd often heard the title quoted in public speeches. Then, I became interested in seeing if I could figure out why the idea of "the road not taken" is so often mentioned in speeches. Considering (Analysis) Q. What do you know about the speaker in this poem? A. The speaker is a serious, thoughtful person, and could be either a woman or a man. There is no precise indication of the speaker's age, but the last line of the poem suggests that the person is reflective, thinking not just about a present decision but about future consequences as well. Even though stanza 2 suggests the choice could have gone either way—both roads were a lot alike—the speaker chose the one "less traveled by" and is willing to accept whatever the choice will bring, knowing that choosing the other road for future travel is not possible. It is clear, also, that the speaker is reflecting on a choice related to a significant life decision that involves commitment and integrity, and is not merely selecting a road in the woods. Concluding (Interpretation) Q. What do the comments "telling this with a sigh" (line 16) and "that has made all the difference" (line 20) reveal about life choices? A. I've concluded that the poem emphasizes the ambiguity associated with life choices. From what I already knew about the poem, I thought it dealt simply with making a challenging ("less traveled by") choice. However, I now see that it reflects not just on the motive for choosing, but also on the nature of choice making. There appears to be delight, at least satisfaction, on the part of the speaker at the beginning of the poem, but the "sigh" mentioned at the end suggests that the choice was more complex than it appeared: It may have even resulted in personal regret. Consequently, the poem reveals the nature of decision making, implying that, at best, it's a fuzzy process with ambiguous aspects—both at the moment a choice is made and afterwards. In this way, the poem makes a wise observation and explores important life knowledge. Your Turn Try using the literary response framework connecting, considering, concluding to explore meaning in Kate Chopin's "The Story of an Hour." In this brief narrative, there is not a lot of action, but you can gain important insights about the action—and the story's outcome—by paying close attention to what the main character, Mrs. Mallard, is thinking. Kate Chopin (1850ñ1904) Photo of writer Kate Chopin in a riding habit. Missouri History Museum, St. Louis Chopin was born in St. Louis (her birth name was Katherine O'Flaherty), one of five children—the only one to live beyond age 25. After attending Catholic schools, she married Oscar Chopin, a cotton broker, and moved to New Orleans. When he died 12 years later, she was left to raise their six children. Various journals, including Atlantic Monthly and Vogue, published her short stories. One of her novels, The Awakening, was controversial because it acknowledged a woman's strength in spite of her adulterous life. Chopin's writings expressed her personal quest for freedom and contributed to the rise of feminism. The Story of an Hour Kate Chopin (1894) Knowing that Mrs. Mallard was afflicted with a heart trouble, great care was taken to break to her as gently as possible the news of her husband's death. It was her sister Josephine who told her, in broken sentences; veiled hints that revealed in half concealing. Her husband's friend Richards was there, too, near her. It was he who had been in the newspaper office when intelligence of the railroad disaster was received, with Brently Mallard's name leading the list of "killed." He had only taken time to assure himself of its truth by a second telegram, and had hastened to forestall any less careful, less tender friend in bearing the sad message. She did not hear the story as many women have heard the same, with a paralyzed inability to accept its significance. She wept at once, with sudden, wild abandonment, in her sister's arms. When the storm of grief had spent itself she went away to her room alone. She would have no one follow. There stood, facing the open window, a comfortable, roomy armchair. Into this she sank, pressed down by a physical exhaustion that haunted her body and seemed to reach into her soul. She could see in the open square before her house the tops of trees that were all aquiver with the new spring life. The delicious breath of rain was in the air. In the street below a peddler was crying his wares. The notes of a distant song which some one was singing reached her faintly, and countless sparrows were twittering in the eaves. There were patches of blue sky showing here and there through the clouds that had met and piled one above the other in the west facing her window. She sat with her head thrown back upon the cushion of the chair, quite motionless, except when a sob came up into her throat and shook her, as a child who has cried itself to sleep continues to sob in its dreams. She was young, with a fair, calm face, whose lines bespoke repression and even a certain strength. But now there was a dull stare in her eyes, whose gaze was fixed away off yonder on one of those patches of blue sky. It was not a glance of reflection, but rather indicated a suspension of intelligent thought. 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. But she felt it, creeping out of the sky, reaching toward her through the sounds, the scents, the color that filled the air. 5 Now her bosom rose and fell tumultuously. She was beginning to recognize this thing that was approaching to possess her, and she was striving to beat it back with her will—as powerless as her two white slender hands would have been. When she abandoned herself a little whispered word escaped her slightly parted lips. She said it over and over under her breath: "free, free, free!" The vacant stare and the look of terror that had followed it went from her eyes. They stayed keen and bright. Her pulses beat fast, and the coursing blood warmed and relaxed every inch of her body. She did not stop to ask if it were or were not a monstrous joy that held her. A clear and exalted perception enabled her to dismiss the suggestion as trivial. She knew that she would weep again when she saw the kind, tender hands folded in death; the face that had never looked save with love upon her, fixed and gray and dead. But she saw beyond that bitter moment a long procession of years to come that would belong to her absolutely. And she opened and spread her arms out to them in welcome. There would be no one to live for her during those coming years; she would live for herself. There would be no powerful will bending hers in that blind persistence with which men and women believe they have a right to impose a private will upon a fellow-creature. A kind intention or a cruel intention made the act seem no less a crime as she looked upon it in that brief moment of illumination. 10 And yet she had loved him—sometimes. Often she had not. What did it matter! What could love, the unsolved mystery, count for in the face of this possession of self-assertion which she suddenly recognized as the strongest impulse of her being! "Free! Body and soul free!" she kept whispering. Josephine was kneeling before the closed door with her lips to the keyhole, imploring for admission. "Louise, open the door! I beg; open the door—you will make yourself ill. What are you doing, Louise? For heaven's sake open the door." "Go away. I am not making myself ill." No; she was drinking in a very elixir of life through that open window. Her fancy was running riot along those days ahead of her. Spring days, and summer days, and all sorts of days that would be her own. She breathed a quick prayer that life might be long. It was only yesterday she had thought with a shudder that life might be long. 15 She arose at length and opened the door to her sister's importunities. There was a feverish triumph in her eyes, and she carried herself unwittingly like a goddess of Victory. She clasped her sister's waist, and together they descended the stairs. Richards stood waiting for them at the bottom. Some one was opening the front door with a latchkey. It was Brently Mallard who entered, a little travel-stained, composedly carrying his grip-sack and umbrella. He had been far from the scene of the accident, and did not even know that there had been one. He stood amazed at Josephine's piercing cry; at Richards' quick motion to screen himself from the view of his wife. But Richards was too late. When the doctors came they said she had died of heart disease—of joy that kills. 20 This selection is in the public domain. RESPONSE AND REFLECTION QUESTIONS Connecting (Imaginative reading) How is your interest in this story immediately established? How does Chopin create suspense? Considering (Analysis) Locate details in the story that give you a sense of what Mrs. Mallard's relationship with her hus-band was like. In paragraphs five and six, how does the author's mention of new spring life, twittering sparrows, and patches of blue sky help you understand Mrs. Mallard's feelings—and her hopes? Concluding (Interpretation) Mrs. Mallard (in paragraphs eight and nine) is experiencing change. She feels that something is "approaching" her, seeking to "possess her." What do you think she is struggling with? Had she ever loved her husband? 2.3 What Literature Contributes to Our Lives How College Students Can Benefit from Literature Do you agree with Professor Auger that even if someone doesn't "like" poetry or certain types of writing, that it is still important to understand them and the importance of their themes? Why or why not? Critical Thinking Question Do you agree with Professor Auger that even if someone doesn't "like" poetry or certain types of writing, that it is still important to understand them and the importance of their themes? Why or why not? Through literature, we can explore human experiences deeply and search for meaning. It opens new worlds, presents new ideas, and stimulates personal change. In these ways, literature influences each individual differently. Nevertheless, its conventional contributions fall into widely recognized categories. Here are six of these notable contributions, with a literary example selected to illustrate each one. Literature Restores the Past In many ways, literature reflects historical issues and conditions. Long before stories were written down, they were passed along through oral traditions. At least eight periods in literary history can be roughly identified in the development of Western civilization (Wheeler, 2010). Classical period (8th century BCE to middle of 5th century CE) Medieval period (about 1,000 years, ending in 15th century) Renaissance and Reformation period (roughly, 16th to mid-17th century) Enlightenment or Neoclassical period (mid-17th century through 18th century) Romantic period (roughly, first half of 19th century) Victorian period (1832ñ1901) Modern period (roughly, first half of the 20th century) Postmodern period (roughly, since end of World War II, 1945) In all these periods, social, economic, political, and religious traditions greatly influenced writers. Century after century, their works reflected wars, natural disasters, common events, and human achievements in cultures they personally knew. So, although we often gain insights about permanent things from writers, we also get a glimpse of conditions that existed in the passing moment in which they were writing. Some writers develop works that openly celebrate ideas and the spirit of their age, describing them in detail and making it easy for readers to visualize past events and customs. Other writers take an indirect approach with much less description, requiring readers to read more deeply, to examine behaviors and values in order to get a sense of life in earlier periods. Either way, works of literature help to restore the past. For example, Langston Hughes's "Dream Boogie" (1951) lifts up the civil rights quest as a dream with human significance, "a dream deferred" that would be a long time in coming. In the 1950s, when Hughes published the poem, most black Americans were not experiencing the fulfillment of the hopes and dreams that Emancipation (nearly 100 years earlier) had promised. Looking back, we know that it would be more than a decade before significant change would come, as a result of non-violent protests under the leadership of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the passage of civil rights legislation, including the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and the Fair Housing Act of 1968. You might say, then, that this piece of literature functions both as Hughes's portrait of an important human ideal that has not yet been achieved (racial reconciliation), and as a photograph—a snapshot of the state of that idealistic dream in the United States in the early 1950s. In an earlier essay, Hughes acknowledged, Most of my poems are racial in theme and treatment, derived from the life I know. In many of them I try to grasp and hold some of the meanings and rhythms of jazz. . . . [J]azz to me is one of the inherent expressions of Negro life in America: the eternal tom-tom beating in the Negro soul—the tom-tom of revolt against weariness in a white world. (Hughes, 1926, p. 694) Founder of Jazz Poetry Jazz and blues feature prominantly in the poetry of Langston Hughes. This video explores Hughes's creation of a new literary form: Jazz Poetry.