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Summary
Better readers make better writers. Today's students do readwe know that they read a significant amount of email, text messages, web pages, and even magazines. What many do not do is read in a sustained way. Many do not come to college prepared to read long texts, nor do they come with the tools necessary to analyze and synthesize what they read. Nick Delbanco and Alan Cheuse have proven in their own teaching that when you improve students' ability and interest in reading, you will help them improve their writing.Bringing writers to students, Bringing students to writing. Literature: Craft and Voiceis an innovative new Introductory Literature program designed to engage students in the reading of Literature, all with a view to developing their reading, analytical, and written skills. Accompanied by, and integrated with, video interviews of dozens of living authors who are featured in the text, conducted by authors Nick Delbanco and Alan Cheuse specifically for use with their textbook, the book provides a living voice for the literature on the page and creates a link between the student and the authors of great works of literature. The first text of its kind,Literature: Craft and Voiceoffers a more enjoyable and effective reading experience through its fresh, inviting design and accompanying rich video program.Take a virtual product tour
Table of Contents
detailed contents
Preface
Acknowledgments
Foreword to the Student video interview with the authors available online @ xxx
Fiction
CHAPTER 1: READING A STORY IN ITS ELEMENTS
A Conversation on Writing with John Updike, video
interview available online @ xxx
John Updike, A&P
A summer job turns into a life-lesson when three girls in bathing suits walk in to a sea-side supermarket.
Kate Chopin, Story of an Hour
Love, and its burdens, can be dangerous for the heart.
Alice Munro, An Ounce of Cure
A Canadian high-school girl raids the liquor cabinet while babysitting, and the ceiling begins spinning like a great plate--as does her future.
CHAPTER 2: GOING FURTHER : An Interactive Reading
An Interactive Reading: Anton Chekhov, Rapture, translated by Patrick Miles and Harvey Pitcher
A young Russian man discovers alcohol, and the world discovers him.
A Student Critical Response
A Conversation on Writing with the Richard Ford, video interview available online @ xxx
Richard Ford, Optimists
A Montana family at the table, the father strikes a terrible blow against the future.
A Conversation on Writing with Amy Tan, video interview available online @ xxx
Amy Tan, Two Kinds
A young Asian-American woman in San Francisco wrestles with her identity.
CHAPTER 3: WRITING ABOUT FICTION
A Conversation on Writing with Jamaica Kincaid, video interview available online @ xxx
Jamaica Kincaid, Girl
An island girl’s mother talks and talks—but does the girl listen?
A Student’s Critical Analysis Paper on Girl (three drafts)
CHAPTER 4: PLOT
A Conversation on Writing with T. Coraghessan Boyle, video interview available online @ xxx
T. Coraghessan Boyle, Greasy Lake
A place we’ve all visited, some never to return.
James Joyce, Araby
A young Dublin boy’s quest to please a girl changes his life.
Naguib Mahfouz, The Conjurer Made Off with the Dish, translated by Denys Johnson-Davies
His mother sends him into the streets of Cairo with a dish to fill withbeans…and a meeting with a street magician knocks him off course.
Pramoedya Ananta Toer, Circumcision
An old religious custom alters the way one young Indonesian Muslim sees the world.
A Checklist: Reading for Plot
Suggestions for Writing about Plot
CHAPTER 5: CHARACTER
A Conversation on Writing with Gish Jen, video interview available online @ xxx
Gish Jen, Who’s Irish?
An immigrant mother turns her family, and her own life, inside out.
Katherine Anne Porter, The Jilting of Granny Weatherall
A dying old woman relives her most memorable hour and days.
Willa Cather, Paul’s Case
Some money from the till, and a train ticket out of Pittsburgh to New York City make for a striving young man quite a dangerous escapade.
Jack London, A Wicked Woman
Loretta thought she was a wicked wicked woman, but did the world agree?
A Checklist: Reading for Character
Suggestions for Writing about Character
CHAPTER 6: SETTING
A Conversation on Writing with Barry Lopez, video interview available online @ xxx
Barry Lopez, The Location of the River
A modern westerner meets the strange truths of old maps and ancient traditions.
Edgar Allan Poe, The Fall of the House of Usher
The cursed relationship of a brother and sister brings down the house.
Eudora Welty, Why I Live at the P.O.
Before TV sitcoms, there was Sister’s family down in Mississippi.
Bernard Malamud, The Magic Barrel
How to arrange love in immigrant New York—with complications a young fellow hadn’t figured on.
A Checklist: Reading for Setting
Suggestions for Writing about Setting
CHAPTER 7: POINT OF VIEW
A Conversation on Writing with Z. Z. Packer, video interview available online @ xxx
Z. Z. Packer, Brownies
A troop of young black girls find togethernes and estrangement in the world of camps and badges.
Ernest Hemingway, The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber
An African safari yields dangerous results for animals and their hunters.
Lorrie Moore, How to Become a Writer Or, Have You Earned This Cliché?
Instructions on how to write, and how to live with what you write—a comedy of typing.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman, The Yellow Wallpaper
Diary of a woman confined to her room on rest cure—but is she alone?
A Checklist: Reading for Point of View
Suggestions for Writing about Point of View
CHAPTER 8: LANGUAGE, TONE, AND STYLE
A Conversation on Writing with Aimee Bender, video interview available online @ xxx
Aimee Bender, The Rememberer
Love alters not—though the beloved changes, and changes, and changes.
Thomas Wolfe, Only the Dead Know Brooklyn
A trip into the subway, and the world of urban mythology, all of it wid a Brooklin aksent…
Ha Jin, Saboteur
The Chius take a honeymoon trip to a provincial Chinese town, and an incident turns honey to ashes.
Junot Diaz, How to Date a Browngirl, Blackgirl, Whitegirl, or Halfie
How to solve a wonderful multicultural dilemma for a young multicultural guy.
A Checklist: Reading for Language, Tone, and Style
Suggestions for Writing about Language, Tone, and Style
CHAPTER 9: THEME
A Conversation on Writing with Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, video interview available online @ xxx
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Cell One
Her brother gets arrested, and the family erupts, and a young Nigerian girl learns some new truths.
Stephen Crane, The Open Boat
Four men against the sea, in an adventure off the coast of Florida.
D. H. Lawrence, The Odour of Chrysanthemums
The news is not good in a small English coal-mining town as mother and son wrestle with a terrible event.
Jhumpa Lahiri, The Interpreter of Maladies
A clash of cultures in the Indian countryside, attended by monkeys.
A Checklist: Reading for Theme
Suggestions for Writing about Theme
CHAPTER 10: SYMBOL
A Conversation on Writing with Tim O’Brien, video interview available online @ xxx
Tim O’Brien, The Things They Carried
On patrol in the jungles of Vietnam, bearing the burden of the past and the terrors of the future…
Elizabeth Tallent, No One’s a Mystery
The end of her first love affair, over the speed limit, and under the age limit, in Wyoming…
Nathaniel Hawthorne, Young Goodman Brown
In old New England, the dark woods at night prove to be filled with dangers and temptations.
Franz Kafka, The Metamorphosis
Gregor wakes up one morning to discover he’s been transformed into an insect. What’s worse—he’s late for work!
A Checklist: Reading for Symbol
Suggestions for Writing about Symbol
CHAPTER 11: FICTION AS SOCIAL COMMENTARY: A Case Study on Joyce Carol Oates
A Conversation on Writing with Joyce Carol Oates, video interview available online @ xxx
Three Girls
Is that…? Could it be…? Some girls at a used book store in NYC have a special celebrity sighting…
Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?
A teenage girl is courted by the worst possible suitor.
Getting Started: A Research Project
Further suggestions for Writing and Research
Some Sources for Research
CHAPTER 12: AMERICAN REGIONALISM AND SENSE OF PLACE:
Two Case Studies
THE AMERICAN WEST
A Conversation on Writing with William Kittredge, video interview available online @ xxx
William Kittredge, Thirty-Four Seasons of Winter
Two Montana brothers, and thirty-four years of work, fights, and thwarted love.
A Conversation on Writing with Dagoberto Gilb, video interview available online @ xxx
Dagoberto Gilb, Romero’s Shirt
For love of an old wool shirt, an El Paso man comes to terms with his difficult life.
John Steinbeck, The Chrysanthemums
When a visitor arrives to sharpen her knives, a California farm wife sharpens her understanding of herself and her marriage.
Leslie Marmon Silko, The Man to Send Rain Clouds
How to bury an old Indian rain maker—with the help of the local priest or not?
Sylvia Watanabe, Talking to the Dead
One generation of Hawaiians passes the knowledge to the next generation—but how to receive it?
THE AMERICAN SOUTH
Flannery O’Connor
A Good Man Is Hard to Find
Granny is trying to be a good woman, but how good do she or her family have to be to avoid death at the hands of the Kid and his gang?
Revelation
Insights into the Power and Glory of things come in the strangest places.
William Faulkner
A Rose for Emily
A proud old woman, a small Mississippi town, and a terrible secret revealed.
Barn Burning
A father and son struggle about the question of a fire.
Ralph Ellison
Battle Royal
This graduation day one black student discovers his hopes, and some awful truth about the powers that be.
A Party Down at the Square
A young visitor from Kentucky witnesses horror in a Southern town square.
Getting Started: A Research Project
Further suggestions for Writing and Research
Some Sources for Research
CHAPTER 13: VISUAL ARTS, FILM, AND FICTION
Gareth Hinds, Beowulf: The Graphic Novel [Grendel’s Defeat]
Beowulf [Grendel’s Approach and Demise], translated by CB Tinker
Two Novel Adaptations:
John Gardner, Grendel [Grendel’s first glimpse of Beowulf; Grendel’s demise]
Michael Crichton, Eaters of the Dead [Ibn Fadlan’s first glimpse of Buliwyf; battle with the Wendol]
Two Film Adaptations:
The 13th Warrior (film stills of Grendel’s defeat)
Beowulf: The Movie (film stills of Grendel’s defeat)
Getting Started: A Research Project
Further suggestions for Writing and Research
Some Sources for Research
CHAPTER 14: AN ANTHOLOGY Of STORIES FOR FURTHER READING
A Conversation on Writing with Amy Hempel, video interview available online @ xxx
Amy Hempel, San Francisco
Who has mama’s watch? A tumultuous wake after an earthquake of a death.
Sherman Alexie, What You Pawn I Will Redeem
An alcoholic street Indian rescues his grandmother’s dancing regalia—and himself—from near-certain oblivion.
Margaret Atwood, Happy Endings
How many happy endings can one story have?
James Baldwin, Sonny’s Blues
A black man from New York tries to be his musician brother’s keeper, but the brother won’t be kept.
J.L. Borges, The Circular Ruins, translated by Anthony Bonner
You may be dreaming, but who is dreaming you?
Raymond Carver, Cathedral
A blind man leads a sighted man to new insights about life and love.
Anton Chekhov, The Lady with the Pet Dog, translated by Avrahm Yarmolinsky
Adultery, and its aftermath, at a Russian sea-side resort.
Zora Neale Hurston, The Gilded Six-Bits
The costs of a carefree life among black Georgia workers turn out to be more expensive than anyone thought.
Gabriel Garcia Marquez, The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World, translated by Gregory Rabassa
An encounter with death leads a Columbian village to a celebration of life.
Ursula K. Le Guin, The Kerastion
She had made that instrument, the kerastion, the flute that is played only at a funeral. But can she hear its tune?
Katherine Mansfield, Miss Brill
Every Sunday in the park, Miss Brill wears her fur—except an overheard remark makes this Sunday her last.
Herman Melville, Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street
One man’s determined campaign to defy his employer, a city, and the world.
Ana Menendez, Traveling Madness
A Cuban visionary takes off for the skies and his troubles balloon.
R. K. Narayan, An Astrologer’s Day
He was as much a stranger to the stars as were his innocent customers, but one particular day his luck began to shine.
Leo Tolstoy, The Death of Ivan Ilyich, translated by Louise and Aylmer Maude
Matters of life and death, in old Russia, impinging on our own lives and time.
Alice Walker, Everyday Use
For a Southern black country family, the times they are a-changing…but how much change does a family need?
Poetry
CHAPTER 15: READING A POEM IN ITS ELEMENTS
A Conversation on Writing with Carolyn Forché, video interview available
online @ www.mhhe.com/delbanco1e
An Interactive Reading: Carolyn Forche, The Museum of Stones
The Craft of Poetry
Robert Burns, O My Luve’s Like a Red, Red Rose
Robert Hayden, Those Winter Sundays
Sappho, A Fragment [“The moon has set”]
William Wordsworth, I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
Mary Oliver, At Blackwater Pond
William Butler Yeats, Sailing to Byzantium
Stephen Dunn, Poem for People That Are Understandably Too Busy to
Read Poetry
CHAPTER 16: GOING FURTHER WITH READING
An Interactive Reading: William Shakespeare My Mistress’ Eyes Are
Nothing like the Sun
Leonard Cohen, For Anne
FORMS OF POETRY
Lyric
Song of Solomon 4:1-7 [“Behold thou art fair, my love”]
D. H. Lawrence, Piano
William Butler Yeats, Leda and the Swan
Epic
George Gordon, Lord Byron, Don Juan [“Bob Southey, you’re a poet”]
George Gordon, Lord Byron, Don Juan [“I want a hero”]
Dramatic
Robert Browning, My Last Duchess
A Conversation on Translation with Stephen Mitchell, video interview
available online @ www.mhhe.com/delbanco1e
Bhagavad Gita [The Secret of Life], translated by Stephen Mitchell
Rumi, Some Kiss We Want, translated by Coleman Parks
Pablo Neruda, Do Not Love You Except Because I Love You, translated by
Gustavo Escobedo
For Review and Further Study
Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Go From Me
Robert Browning, Love Among the Ruins
William Dickey, Therefore
Edna St. Vincent Millay, Not In A Silver Casket Cool With Pearls
Adrienne Rich, Living In Sin
Rainer Maria Rilke, Archaic Torso of Apollo, translated by Stephen Mitchell
CHAPTER 17: WRITING ABOUT POETRY
A Conversation on Writing with Li-Young Lee, video interview available