Get Your Textbook and Start Reading!

You should have purchased (or borrowed from someone) your primary textbook already. I know that some of you like to go to www.half.com to get a deal. But you'll find there are lots of used copies available at www.amazon.com as well, starting at about $6 if you like hardback. The textbook is called Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing edited by Edgar V. Roberts and Henry E. Jacobs. Make sure you have the seventh edition.

Reading: You need to have read the first and second chapters by now. And in class we be discussing short fiction, specifically three stories ("The Necklace," "Neighbors," and "A Rose for Emily").

Writing: I'll be asking for your first out-of-class essay this week, an interpretation of either the symbolism in "Neighbors" or in "A Rose for Emily." On Monday, September 18, we'll have an in-class essay discussing the conflict of practicality versus art in the story by Alice Walker, called "Everyday Use."

Inquiry: I think we all try to escape conflict in life, although we find it in the very act of escaping or in some other situation we did not expect. In fiction, as in life, conflict seems impossible to avoid. Why is conflict critical to a story? What does conflict do for the plot of a story? And how are conflicts handled in a story?