Essay Question (100 points) –Respond to one of the following prompts in at least 500 words. This essay needs to be in MLA format and have an introduction, body and conclusion. This essay should also include in-text citations. Be sure to cite specific examples from the text to support your argument. Content and grammar will be evaluated.

1. Pick one of the texts we have read this semester and explain how that text is an example of a Realism text.

2. Pick one of the texts we have read this semester and explain how that text is an example of a Modern text.

3. Pick one of the texts we have read this semester and explore the portrayal of women. What do these portrayals suggest about the cultural dynamics of the times in which they were written?

4. Pick one of the texts we have read this semester and explain how that text is an example of a Postmodern text.

5. Pick one of the texts we have read this semester and explain how that text is an example of a Contemporary text.

6. Pick one of the texts we have read this semester and explain how that text is an example of a Gothic text.

The Norton Anthology of American Literature: 1865 to the Present, 9th d ed., Package (Vols. C, D, E), ed. Robert Levine

Lesson 1

Realism

Introduction (C1-22)

Whitman: “Song of Myself” (C23-65)

Lesson 2

Local Color Realism

Twain, “The Notorious Jumping Frog” (C115-19)

Chopin, ” The Awakening ” (C548-576)

Week 3

Lesson 3

Mainstream Realism

James, “Daisy Miller” (C410-50)

Lesson 4

Chopin, “The Story of an Hour” (C542-544)

Week 4

Lesson 5

Naturalism

Gilman, “The Yellow Wallpaper” and “Why I Wrote TYWP” (C842-57)

Crane, “The Open Boat” (C1048-63)

Week 5

Lesson 6

African-American Lit

Washington, Up from Slavery (C701-24)

DuBois, from The Souls of Black Folk (C920-55)

Week 6

Lesson 7

Modernism I: Poetry

Moore, “Poetry” (D339-40)

Pound, “In a Station of the Metro” (D297)

Pound, “The River Merchant’s Wife” (D297-98)

Pound, “Hugh Selwyn Mauberley” (D300-308)

Eliot, “The Waste Land” (D365-78)

Lesson 8

Modernism II: Fiction

Anderson, “Winesburg” & “Hands” (D253-57)

Porter, “Flowering Judas” (D473-81)

Hemingway, “The Snows of Kilimanjaro” (http://xroads.virginia.edu/~drbr/heming.html (Links to an external site.) )

Fitzgerald, “Babylon Revisited” (D646-61)

Week 7

Lesson 9

Modernism III: Poetry

Cummings “Cambridge Ladies” (D611)

Cummings, “next to god…” (D612)

Stevens, “Sunday Morning” (D273-76)

H.D., “Leda” (D333), “Helen” (D335)

Williams, “The Red Wheelbarrow” (D288), “Spring & All” (D286)

Frost, “Mending Wall” (D220-21); “Stopping By Woods” (D233-34)

Week 8

Lesson 10

The Political 1930s

Faulkner, “Barn Burning” (D771-83)

Lesson 11

The 60s

Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse Five (E344-55)

Lesson 12

Minimalism & Postcolonialism

Carver, “Cathedral” (E743-54)

“A Good Man is Hard to Find.” by Flannery O’Connor . This text is located in Volume E of your text book.

“Good Country People” by Flannery O’Connor . This text is located in Volume E of your textbook on pages 435-449.

read John Cheever’s, ” The Swimmer”(139-147) read Eudora Welty’s ” Petrified Man ” (45-54).

read John Cheever’s, ” The Swimmer”(139-147) .

read Kurt Vonnegut’s, Slaughterhouse Five (E344-55) .

read “Babylon Revisited” by F. Scott Fitzgerald. This text is located in Volume D on pages 646-660.

read Faulkner, “Barn Burning”