el paso community college syllabus part i instructor’s

1

El Paso Community College

Syllabus Part I Instructor’s Course Requirements

Spring 2012

Research & Literary Analysis 1302.27, CRN# 21906

Welcome to Research & Literary Analysis1302! My name is Adam Webb and I will be your instructor for

this semester!

Please make sure that you are in the correct classroom! Double-check your schedules!

Instructor: Adam Webb

Meeting time: 2:00-2:50 am Monday-Wednesday-Friday

Classroom: A1124 (but we will also be meeting in the Foreign Language Lab, room B227)

Office: B242 (my office hours are on Monday, Wednesday & sometimes Friday from 3:00

pm - 5:00 pm)

Phone: Best way to reach me is through email

Email: [email protected]

VERY IMPORTANT WEBSITE: http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com

Our Facebook Page (optional to join): Connective Communities -

http://www.facebook.com/groups/168840599888411/

Required Textbooks: The “textwork” we will be using this semester (click me)

Research and Writing website: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/

Introduction

Course description and introduction: Writing and reading are individual and collaborative processes. English 1302 continue to

emphasize the writing and research processes started in 1301. Students will be required to research

and analyze literature, as well as to engage in discussion about the readings. We will be reading,

analyzing, and critically responding to a number of short stories, poetry, news articles, and film.

The emphasis will be on helping students become more critical and analytical in their research and

writing.

Purpose:

To engage students in identifying rhetorical choices, as well as means of persuasion and

argumentation in research and writing, as well as interpreting and analyzing the information from

multiple perspectives, as well as to introduce and help students develop a better understanding of

how and why they research.

Goals:

To use and develop a better understanding of how technologies can be used to research and write

To broaden the concept of what writing and research means

mailto:[email protected]

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/


http://therhizomalparadigm.pbworks.com/w/page/35772867/therhizomalparadigm

http://owl.english.purdue.edu/

2

To define what a “text” is

To read and interpret a variety of texts

To question the rhetorical effectiveness of a text

To engage in class discussions about the texts we will be covering in class

To understand and apply various literary terms to the readings

To discuss and analyze modes of argumentation

To understand and practice the means of persuasion

Objectives:

Students will create their own PBWorks wiki pages in order to post their research &writing on

Students will be required to create a Prezi presentation about themselves

Students are expected to read, watch, and listen to all of the texts we will be covering in class

Students are excepted not only participate in class discussion, but also ask questions about the

various texts we read, as well as identify any arguments

Students will create ten discussion postings over the texts we read

Students will create and present one presentation over one week’s readings

Students will create an narrative analysis assignment over the readings we cover in the course

Student Expectations:

Students are expected to be on time to class

Students are expected to thoroughly engage in the class discussions, activities, and assignments

Students are expected to respect their peers and offer constructive feedback, as well as help one

another out

Students are expected to turn all major assignments in on time, however, if there is an emergency,

please let the instructor know your situation

Students will respect the technology in the classroom

Instructor Expectations:

The instructor will clearly explain all of the activities and assignments

The instructor will guide and contribute to classroom discussions

The instructor will assist the students in their research and writing endeavors

The instructor will assist students with technology issues as best as possible

The instructor will allow for as much class time as possible to complete certain activities and

assignments

Writing Formats and Standards: All assignments should be typed! Please follow these standard requirements:

Follow APA guidelines located at this website: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/01/

Use 1 inch margins all around (when appropriate)

Double spaced (when appropriate)

Use 12 point font in Times New Roman (when appropriate)

Please print out in black ink (when appropriate)

http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/01/

3

Attendance—Drops: A critical element of learning in this course is the interaction between the students and the instructor.

Being absent means that neither I nor your classmates can help you with understanding an assignment or

any other questions you have about writing. If you feel that you cannot attend because of outside reasons

such as schedule conflicts, it is up to you to withdraw from the course. The instructor assumes no

responsibility for student withdrawal from the course.

Electronic Devices: Please do not use your cell phones during class time. If you need to take a call or make a call, please step

outside of the classroom to do so. No texting in class. No phone or iPod music in class. If you have a

laptop, please bring it to class!

Late Work: No late work will be accepted. A zero will be assigned all missing assignments, including writing

assignments and quizzes. Definitely NO chewing gum in class!

Plagiarism & Cheating: Students will be reported to the Academic Dean and Vice President for Student Services. A grade of zero

will be given for the assignment. Consequences may also include suspension and a written report on your

academic record. Cheating consists of submitting someone else’s work under your name (plagiarism),

obtaining information from someone other than the instructor during an exam, making copies of disks,

etc. Please adhere to the student code of conduct for the college in matters of academic honesty.

Course Grade: The course grade will be determined by the instructor’s evaluation and judgment of several elements: 1)

writing projects, including papers, will be weighted and accounted for 50% of the course grade; 2)

Assignments, including readings, discussions, the final exam paper, and a multimedia presentation over

the research project will be weighted and accounted for 50% of the course grade. The grading scale on the

official course description will be used for this class.

Purpose of Writing Assignments: The writing projects will be connected. Students are encouraged to research and write about things we

read and discuss in class. Students are encouraged to use their time wisely doing these research projects.

Instead of hard copies, students will be turning their work in online, using PBWorks. PBWorks is a free

online program where you can your own personal space for putting pictures, uploading MS Word

documents, and adding hyperlinks. We will discuss more about PBWorks in class. PBWorks =

https://plans.pbworks.com/signup/basic20 (PBWorks is free). As part of the writing assignments listed

below, there will be readings covering them.

Major assignments, Rubrics, & Descriptions (100 points total)

Structure of the Class

Literature circles- students will all read the text and then get into groups of 3-4 and discuss the text

amongst themselves as well as answer any guiding questions about the text. Groups will then share their

findings with the class. This sharing will take the form of informal presentations and discussions posted

onto their PBWorks wikipages.

Readings - we will read poetry and short stories this semester

https://plans.pbworks.com/signup/basic20

4

Technology- we will be a paper free class, which means that all major writing and research assignments

will be submitted electronically through a web-based wiki space called PBWorks. All students will be

required to create their own PBWorks wiki page this semester. It is free.

Writing and research assignments- there will be five major research and writing assignments. Each

assignment will build on the previous one.

Assignment #1: PBWorks wiki pages & Prezi presentation = 20% (Due on January 23, 2012)

PBWorks Wikipage: Students will be required to create a PBWorks (http://pbworks.com) wiki account.

The instructor will provide you with a detailed handout on how to do this the first day of class. Each

student will be required to have these elements on their wiki pages by the end of the semester. Once you

are done creating your PBWorks wiki pages, please email me the HTTP address to your PBWorks

wikipages.

On your PBWorks wikipage, you should have a portfolio link that has this information in it (these will be

separate links):

Ten Discussion Postings, One Presentation and a Narrative Analysis Assignment

Discussion Posting 1










Presentation 1

Narrative Analysis Assignment

Prezi iNarrative:

Assignment description: Please carefully read and answer the questions below. You may answer the

questions in paragraphs or in a presentation format. Please provide descriptive details in your responses.

You will be presenting this narrative to the class.

What are some of your best attributes and/or characteristics, qualities and talents you possess? Please give

examples for each one that you list.

Attributes/characteristics, qualities and talents can include things such as:

Organizer

Time manager

Friendly

http://pbworks.com/

http://pbworks.com/

5

Problem-solver

Good listener

Considerate

Adaptable

Planner

Artistic

Goal-setter

Motivator

Public speaker

Learner

1) How can these attributes/characteristics, qualities and talents help you succeed in life? In school?

In this class? Give an example.

2) List goals that you would like to reach this semester? In this class? Any lifetime goals?

What motivates you to reach your goals? How do you stay motivated? Give an example.

3) What communities do you belong to? How do these communities enhance your life? Give an

example.

4) What are your strengths? Weaknesses?

5) Are there any attributes/characteristics listed above that you would like to improve upon this

semester?

Assignment #2: Five Discussion Posting & Presentations Over the Readings = 30% (6% each

Discussion Posting & Presentation)

Literature circles- students will all read the text and then get into groups of 3-4 and discuss the text

amongst themselves as well as answer any guiding questions about the text. Groups will then share their

findings with the class. This sharing will take the form of informal presentations and discussions posted

onto their PBWorks wikipages.

The way it works, all groups MUST write an analysis, discussion posting, over the readings we read, but

different groups will present on each of the readings. All groups will post five discussion postings on their

PBWorks wikipages, but each group will present once on their chosen story or poem. Some weeks, I will

present and lead group discussions over that week’s readings.

Discussion Posting & Presentation Dates:

February 8, 2012 Over “Ozymandias” by Percy Bysshe Shelley & Horace Smith’s “On a

Stupendous Leg of Granite” (compare & contrast and use of imagery)

February 22, 2012 Over “A Dream Within a Dream” by Edgar Allan Poe (interpret the

symbolism)

March 7, 2012 Over “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson (analyze use of metaphors)

March 21, 2012 Over “Repent Harlequin! said the Ticktock Man” by Harlan Ellison

(analyze symbolism and use of metaphors)

March 28, 2012 Over “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman (analyze use of

imagery)

http://www.potw.org/archive/potw46.html

http://www.poetryatlas.com/poetry/poem/604/on-a-stupendous-leg-of-granite.html


http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/16092

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/w/file/fetch/20401271/The-Lottery.pdf

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/f/'Repent%2C%2BHarlequin!'%2BSaid%2Bthe%2BTicktockman%2Bby%2BHarlan%2BEllison.pdf

http://www.library.csi.cuny.edu/dept/history/lavender/wallpaper.html

6

For the format for the two discussion postings, please see below:

The posting can be two to four or more paragraphs long

300-500 words in length (presentation word counts can vary)

No grammar, spelling or punctuation inconsistencies

Can contain direst quotes from the text

Can contain images that pertain to the text

Should use two or more literary terms from our discussion

Questions to consider in the stories in poems we read:

Who are the main characters in the story?

What other important characters interact with the main characters in the story?

What is the setting of the story?

Does the setting change in the story? How does the setting change?

What is the major action that is happening in the story?

Which of the literary terms can you apply to the story?

What do you notice about the language being used in the story?

How are gender, race and class handled in the story?

Are there any stereotypes in the story? Explain.

What is the theme of the story?

How does this story relate to another story? How?

Assignment #3: =20% Draft 1 (Due on April 20, 2012) 30% Draft 2 (Due on April 30, 2012) – Can

be a Group Project


The goal of this assignment is for students to create their own emotional analytical timeline where the

students consider the most significant stories and poems we read in class during the course of the

semester. The Students can choose anywhere from 5-10 of the readings:

Are there any significant connections or relationships between any of the readings (how did any of

the readings connect to one another in any way)? What concepts or ideas did any of the readings

share?)

What significant emotions (such as fear, love, hate, loneliness, etc.) were displayed in the readings

the most? Explain and make connections between the readings and give examples of them from

the readings. How do these emotions contribute to the atmosphere of the story or poem?

Discuss any literary terms displayed in the readings (such as metaphors, use of symbols) and why

these literary terms important.

The format of the writing:

1,000-1,500 words

12 point font

Use of MLA or APA in citing direct quotes and/or paraphrased information from the short stories

or poems you are analyzing

Multiple paragraphs that include:

7

Introductory Paragraph - Introduction that discusses the stories and poems that affected

you the most and that you plan to analyze

3 to 5-Body Paragraphs – That discuss the three elements mentioned in the above

paragraph

Final Concluding Paragraph – That wraps up your analysis of the stories and poems and

makes any final statements

Grade Breakdown

Assignment Descriptions

Grade Percentages

PBWorks wikipage & Prezi

presentation 1302

20% (Due date = January 23, 2012)

Five Group Discussion Postings &

Presentations Over the Stories and

Poetry We Read in Class (The way it

works, all groups MUST write an

analysis, discussion posting, over the

readings we read, but different groups

will present on each of the readings …

there will also be practice postings

before February 8th and extra “make-

up” ones during the instructor led

presentations)

30% (6% for each one)

Discussion & Presentation Dates for

Each One:

February 8, 2012

February 22, 2012

March 7, 2012

March 21, 2012

March 28, 2012


Draft

20% (Due date = April 20, 2012)

Narrative Draft Assignment Final

Draft

30% (Due date = April 30, 2012)

Total

100%

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/w/page/49852964/PBWorks%20wikipage%20%20Prezi%20presentation%C2%A01302


http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/Five%20Group%20Discussion%20Postings%20%20Presentations%20Over%20the%20Stories%20and%20Poetry%20We%20Read%20in%20Class



http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/Narrative%20Analysis%20Assignment

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/w/page/49855557/Narrative%20Analysis%20Assignment

8

Class Plans (subject to change)

Week 1 (Jan. 16-20)

Syllabus and explanation (handout)

Introduction to Webb (click me)

Our Facebook Group Page: http://www.facebook.com/groups/168840599888411/ (please join this

Facebook page)

Literary Terms & Concepts (to apply to the texts we are reading)

Reading & Discussion groups' postings

What is a “text?” (discussion)

PBWorks PDF Handout (click me)

Creating a Prezi (http://prezi.com/)

Helpful tips and steps when using PBWorks and Prezi (click on this link)

Share our wikisites and Prezis about ourselves

Writing Assignment #1 = PBWorks wikipage & Prezi presentation 1302 on yourself (you will

need to email me your URL link to your PBWorks wikipage)

Examples of student created PBWorks wikipages (on them, you will also see their Prezi

presentations):

Example 1

Example 2

Example 3

Week 2 (Jan. 23-27)

Due - Writing Assignment #1 = PBWorks wikipage & Prezi presentation 1302 on yourself (you

will need to email me your URL link to your PBWorks wikipage)

Review and Discussion over PBWorks and Prezi (finish sharing Prezi presentations)

What do you think of the technology? PBWorks? Prezi?

Benefits?

Limitations?

Questions or problems?

Sharing during classroom discussion

“Thinking” is an individual’s ability to engage in a process where they interpret and organize his

or her thoughts about their actions and interactions with others and their surroundings, as well as

understand the feelings and perceptions that are produced by these thoughts.

“Critical thinking” is an individual’s ability to engage in a process of awareness where they

question how and why they interpret and organize thoughts about their actions and interactions

with others and their surroundings in a particular way, as well as how they understand and are able

to articulate the relationships between the feelings and perceptions that are produced by these

thoughts.

Reading this week: “The Flea” & “The Apparition” by John Donne

http://prezi.com/ry7yz2z3dkka/adam-webb/


http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/w/page/41967710/Literary-Terms--Concepts-1302,-Summer-2

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/f/PBWorks%20How%20To%20Create%20Your%20Own%20Wikipagev2.pdf

http://prezi.com/

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/Helpful-tips-and-steps-when-using-PBWorks-and-Prezi


http://kmb219.pbworks.com/w/page/40835152/FrontPage

http://mayraalexandra.pbworks.com/w/page/40787976/FrontPage

http://rubenpatt.pbworks.com/w/page/40797973/FrontPage


http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/sharing-during-classroom-discussion

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/The-Flea

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/The-Apparition

9

Video Readings: “The Flea” & “The Apparition”

Analyzing John Donne’s “The Flea” (presentation)

Literature Circles

Creating a “group contract”

Practice Discussion Posting, please view the criteria below when writing out your discussion

posting in your group:













For the format for the discussion postings, please see below:


300-500 words in length





Literary Terms & Concepts (to apply to the text we are reading)

Readings for next week lead by the instructor: William Blake – “The Lamb,” “The Tiger”

Week 3 (Jan. 30-Feb.3)

Readings this week lead by the instructor: William Blake – “The Lamb,” “The Tiger”

Video Readings: “The Tiger” (Reading) “The Tiger” (Song by Tangerine Dream) & “The Lamb”

A analytic breakdown of William Blake's two poems “The Tyger” and “The Lamb” (click me)

Literature Circles

Practice Discussion Posting, please view the criteria below when writing out your discussion

posting in your group:




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9tJ8IlPh_qA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a7vqNKOnTmU

http://prezi.com/3qyodef2mklk/analyzing-john-donnes-the-flea/

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/Literature-Groups

http://therhizomalparadigm.pbworks.com/w/page/35853084/Creating%20a%20Contract%20for%20Group%20Projects


http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/The-Lamb

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/The-Tiger

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/The-Lamb

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/The-Tiger

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTMPJVDOoag

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKBoxlmjsQU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DG6dExraCLg&feature=endscreen&NR=1

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/A%C2%A0analytic%20breakdown%20of%20William%20Blake's%20two%20poems%20%22The%20Tyger%22%20and%20%22The%20Lamb%22

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/A%C2%A0analytic%20breakdown%20of%20William%20Blake's%20two%20poems%20%22The%20Tyger%22%20and%20%22The%20Lamb%22

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/Literature-Groups

10

















Literary Terms & Concepts (to apply to the text we are reading)

Next week we will have our first group’s presentation

Next week’s reading (everyone should read both poems): “Ozymandias” by Percy Bysshe Shelley

& Horace Smith’s “On a Stupendous Leg of Granite” (compare & contrast and use of imagery) –

The first group will present on both

Week 4 (Feb. 6-10)

Discuss and Start the Discussion Postings and the Presentations

First Group Presentation on Feb. 8

Discussion Posting 1 over the reading of these two poems: “Ozymandias” by Percy Bysshe

Shelley & Horace Smith’s “On a Stupendous Leg of Granite” (compare & contrast and use of

imagery)

Video Reading: “Ozymandias”

Presenting Criteria:

Grading Rubric for the presentation

If your visual presentation meets all of the criteria below, you will receive full credit for this

assignment.

There is evidence that the students analyzed the readings thoroughly

The writing is visibly free from any inconsistencies (i.e. grammar, punctuation, mechanics)

The visuals (i.e. pictures, video) are used effectively and have a purpose in your presentation

Students present the information effectively, clearly, and consistently




http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/w/page/49855520/Five%20Group%20Discussion%20Postings%20%20Presentations%20Over%20the%20Stories%20and%20Poetry%20We%20Read%20in%20Class



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tz8VG1zIEL8

11

Students are prepared to answer questions from the audience, or have questions to ask their

audience




















Next Week’s Readings lead by the instructor: Lord Bryon – “Prometheus,” “Sonnet to Chillon”

Week 5 (Feb. 13-17)

Readings this week lead by the instructor: Lord Bryon – “Prometheus,” “Sonnet to Chillon”

Video Readings: “Prometheus” & “Sonnet to Chillon”













http://mural.uv.es/vinepar/prometheus.htm

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/Sonnet-to-Chillon

http://mural.uv.es/vinepar/prometheus.htm

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/Sonnet-to-Chillon

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bdS2QbPJsok

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBA7ldJhbsQ

12








Continue the Discussion Postings and the Presentations

Second Group Presentation on Feb. 22

Discussion Posting 2 over the reading of this poem: February 22, 2012 Over “A Dream Within

a Dream” by Edgar Allan Poe (interpret the symbolism)

Week 6 (Feb. 20-24)


Second Group Presentation on Feb. 22

Discussion Posting 2 over the reading of this poem: February 22, 2012 Over “A Dream Within

a Dream” by Edgar Allan Poe (interpret the symbolism)

Video Reading: “A Dream Within a Dream”




assignment.






audience















http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTTefnf61n4

13










Next Week’s Readings lead by the instructor: John Keats ― “When I have Fears” and “Bright

Star”

Week 7 (Feb. 27-Mar. 2)

Readings this week lead by the instructor: John Keats ― “When I have Fears” and “Bright Star”

Video Readings: “When I Have Fears” & “Bright Star”




















Next week we will have our third group’s presentation over: “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson

(analyze use of metaphors)

http://www.sonnets.org/keats.htm#600





http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vFTwcd8WZ8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bbeGlWcgbE0


14

Week 8 (Mar. 5-9)


Third Group Presentation on March 7, 2012

Discussion Posting 3 over the reading of this short story: March 7, 2012 Over “The Lottery” by

Shirley Jackson (analyze use of metaphors)

Short Film: “The Lottery” Part 1 & “The Lottery” Part 2




assignment.






audience





















http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIm93Xuij7k&feature=player_embedded

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PMhV3fwx5Sg&feature=player_embedded

15

After Spring Break we will have our fourth group’s presentation over: March 21, 2012 Over

“Repent Harlequin! said the Ticktock Man” by Harlan Ellison (analyze symbolism and use of

metaphors)

Comic Book Version of: “Repent Harlequin! said the Ticktock Man”

A Young Harlan Ellison Speaks Part 1, Part 2 & Part 3

Week 9 (Mar. 12-16)

Spring Break

Week 10 (Mar. 19-23)


Fourth Group Presentation on March 21, 2012

Discussion Posting 4 over the reading of this short story: March 21, 2012 Over “Repent

Harlequin! said the Ticktock Man” by Harlan Ellison (analyze symbolism and use of metaphors)

Comic Book Version of: “Repent Harlequin! said the Ticktock Man”

A Young Harlan Ellison Speaks Part 1, Part 2 & Part 3




assignment.






audience












http://bronzeageofblogs.blogspot.com/2009/03/and-from-unknown-worlds-of-science.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4GVR3G_DJU&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_Uok5Xu2mk&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5Wg0ErDVRE&feature=related



http://bronzeageofblogs.blogspot.com/2009/03/and-from-unknown-worlds-of-science.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4GVR3G_DJU&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_Uok5Xu2mk&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5Wg0ErDVRE&feature=related

16











Fifth Group Presentation on March 28, 2012

Discussion Posting 5 over the reading of this short story: March 28, 2012 Over “The Yellow

Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman (analyze use of imagery)

Film from the BBC: “The Yellow Wallpaper” Part 1 (There are 8 parts total on YouTube but you

will have to watch them individually)

Week 11 (Mar. 26-30)


Fifth Group Presentation on March 28, 2012

Discussion Posting 5 over the reading of this short story: March 28, 2012 Over “The Yellow

Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman (analyze use of imagery)

Film from the BBC: “The Yellow Wallpaper” Part 1 (There are 8 parts total on YouTube but you

will have to watch them individually … you will be able to find these other links on the sidebar on

the right hand said…)




assignment.






audience






http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BAJm6gFJb4I



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BAJm6gFJb4I

17

















Week 12 (Apr. 2-6)

Discuss and Start the Narrative Analysis Assignment

Workshops over the Narrative Analysis Assignment

Week 13 (Apr. 9-13)

Continue workshops on the Narrative Analysis Assignment

Week 14 (Apr. 16-20)

First Draft due of Narrative Analysis Assignment

Week 15 (Apr. 23-27)

Continue workshops on the Narrative Analysis Assignment – April 20, 2012

Survey over the course (click on the link provided)

Week 16 (Apr. 30-May4)

Second Draft due on the Narrative Analysis Assignment – April 30, 2012

http://compositionawebb.pbworks.com/w/page/49855557/Narrative%20Analysis%20Assignment

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/RWXCDDH

18

Important terms:

1. Language: Words, speech, dialect, vernacular

2. Discourse: Dialogue, conversation, discussion; agreed upon community-based ways of

communicating

3. Context: Background, circumstance, situation, framework, perspective, environment

4. Ideology: Philosophy, values, beliefs, principles, ideas

Literary terms to apply to the text(s) we are reading:

1. Analogy: The comparison of two pairs, which have the same relationship

2. Allegory: An extended metaphor lying outside of the narrative or story; The underlying meaning

has moral, social, religious, or political significance, and characters are often personifications of

abstract ideas as charity, greed, or envy

3. Fable: A succinct fictional story, in prose or verse, that features animals, mythical creatures,

plants, inanimate objects, or forces of nature which are anthropomorphized (given human

qualities), and that illustrates a moral lesson (a "moral"), which may at the end be expressed

explicitly in a pithy maxim.

4. Irony: An implied discrepancy between what is said and what is meant. The use of words to

convey the opposite of their literal meaning; a statement or situation where the meaning is

contradicted by the appearance or presentation of the idea

5. Metaphor: The comparison of two UNLIKE things

6. Parable: Succinct story, in prose or verse, which illustrates one or more instructive principles, or

lessons, or (sometimes) a normative principle (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki)

7. Paradox: Reveals a kind of truth which at first seems contradictory. Two opposing ideas

8. Symbol: Using an object or action that means something more than its literal meaning

9. Theme: The general idea or insight about life that a writer wishes to express

10. Tone: The attitude a writer takes towards a subject or character: serious, humorous, sarcastic,

ironic, satirical, tongue-in-cheek, solemn, objective

11. Verisimilitude: The appearance of truth; the quality of seeming to be true; something that has the

appearance of being true or real

All definitions are retrieved from: http://www.tnellen.com, unless otherwise noted.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki)

http://www.tnellen.com/

19

Complete List Readings

“The Flea”

by John Donne

MARK but this flea, and mark in this,

How little that which thou deniest me is ;

It suck'd me first, and now sucks thee,

And in this flea our two bloods mingled be.

Thou know'st that this cannot be said

A sin, nor shame, nor loss of maidenhead ;

Yet this enjoys before it woo,

And pamper'd swells with one blood made of two ;

And this, alas ! is more than we would do.

O stay, three lives in one flea spare,

Where we almost, yea, more than married are.

This flea is you and I, and this

Our marriage bed, and marriage temple is.

Though parents grudge, and you, we're met,

And cloister'd in these living walls of jet.

Though use make you apt to kill me,

Let not to that self-murder added be,

And sacrilege, three sins in killing three.

Cruel and sudden, hast thou since

Purpled thy nail in blood of innocence?

Wherein could this flea guilty be,

Except in that drop which it suck'd from thee?

Yet thou triumph'st, and say'st that thou

Find'st not thyself nor me the weaker now.

'Tis true ; then learn how false fears be ;

Just so much honour, when thou yield'st to me,

Will waste, as this flea's death took life from thee.

20

“The Apparition”

by John Donne

WHEN by thy scorn, O murd'ress, I am dead,

And that thou thinkst thee free

From all solicitation from me,

Then shall my ghost come to thy bed,

And thee, feign'd vestal, in worse arms shall see :

Then thy sick taper will begin to wink,

And he, whose thou art then, being tired before,

Will, if thou stir, or pinch to wake him, think

Thou call'st for more,

And, in false sleep, will from thee shrink :

And then, poor aspen wretch, neglected thou

Bathed in a cold quicksilver sweat wilt lie,

A verier ghost than I.

What I will say, I will not tell thee now,

Lest that preserve thee ; and since my love is spent,

I'd rather thou shouldst painfully repent,

Than by my threatenings rest still innocent.

21

William Blake's "The Lamb" visual poem (clikc on the link)

Little lamb, who made thee?

Dost thou know who made thee?

Gave thee life, and bid thee feed

By the stream and o'er the mead;

Gave thee clothing of delight,

Softest clothing, woolly, bright;

Gave thee such a tender voice,

Making all the vales rejoice?

Little lamb, who made thee?

Dost thou know who made thee?

Little lamb, I'll tell thee,

Little lamb, I'll tell thee:

He is called by thy name,

For He calls Himself a Lamb.

He is meek, and He is mild;

He became a little child.

I a child, and thou a lamb,

We are called by His name.

Little lamb, God bless thee!

Little lamb, God bless thee!

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_ftC_9zRiCFs/TS9IMpTclZI/AAAAAAAAANA/CDJqwdtKClM/s1600/thelamb-1.jpg

22

William Blake's "The Tyger" visual poetry (click on the link)

Tiger! Tiger! burning bright

In the forests of the night,

What immortal hand or eye

Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies

Burnt the fire of thine eyes?

On what wings dare he aspire?

What the hand dare seize the fire?

And what shoulder, and what art,

Could twist the sinews of thy heart?

And when thy heart began to beat,

What dread hand? and what dread feet?

What the hammer? what the chain?

In what furnace was thy brain?

What the anvil? what dread grasp

Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears,

And watered heaven with their tears,

Did he smile his work to see?

Did he who made the Lamb make thee?

Tiger! Tiger! burning bright

In the forests of the night,

What immortal hand or eye

Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

http://richardbrenneman.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/blog-22-november-blake.jpg

http://richardbrenneman.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/blog-22-november-blake.jpg

23

“Ozymandias”

Percy Bysshe Shelley

I met a traveller from an antique land

Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone

Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,

Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,

And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,

Tell that its sculptor well those passions read

Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,

The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;

And on the pedestal these words appear:

"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:

Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"

Nothing beside remains. Round the decay

Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare

The lone and level sands stretch far away.

“ON A STUPENDOUS LEG OF GRANITE”

Horace Smith

In Egypt's sandy silence, all alone,

Stands a gigantic Leg, which far off throws

The only shadow that the Desart knows: -

"I am great OZYMANDIAS," saith the stone,

"The King of Kings; this mighty City shows

"The wonders of my hand." - The City's gone, -

Nought but the Leg remaining to disclose

The site of this forgotten Babylon.

We wonder,- and some Hunter may express

Wonder like ours, when thro' the wilderness

Where London stood, holding the Wolf in chace,

He meets some fragment huge, and stops to guess

What powerful but unrecorded race

Once dwelt in that annihilated place.

http://www.poemofquotes.com/percybyssheshelley/

http://www.poetryatlas.com/poetry/author/56/horace-smith.html

24

“PROMETHEUS” (1816)

George Gordon Lord Byron (1788-1824)

TITAN! to whose immortal eyes

The sufferings of mortality,

Seen in their sad reality,

Were not as things that gods despise;

What was thy pity's recompense?

A silent suffering, and intense;

The rock, the vulture, and the chain,

All that the proud can feel of pain,

The agony they do not show,

The suffocating sense of woe,

Which speaks but in its loneliness,

And then is jealous lest the sky

Should have a listener, nor will sigh

Until its voice is echoless.

Titan! to thee the strife was given

Between the suffering and the will,

Which torture where they cannot kill;

And the inexorable Heaven,

And the deaf tyranny of Fate,

The ruling principle of Hate,

Which for its pleasure doth create

The things it may annihilate,

Refus'd thee even the boon to die:

The wretched gift Eternity

Was thine--and thou hast borne it well.

All that the Thunderer wrung from thee

Was but the menace which flung back

On him the torments of thy rack;

The fate thou didst so well foresee,

But would not to appease him tell;

And in thy Silence was his Sentence,

And in his Soul a vain repentance,

And evil dread so ill dissembled,

That in his hand the lightnings trembled.

Thy Godlike crime was to be kind,

To render with thy precepts less

The sum of human wretchedness,

And strengthen Man with his own mind;

But baffled as thou wert from high,

Still in thy patient energy,

In the endurance, and repulse

Of thine impenetrable Spirit,

Which Earth and Heaven could not convulse,

25

A mighty lesson we inherit:

Thou art a symbol and a sign

To Mortals of their fate and force;

Like thee, Man is in part divine,

A troubled stream from a pure source;

And Man in portions can foresee

His own funereal destiny;

His wretchedness, and his resistance,

And his sad unallied existence:

To which his Spirit may oppose

Itself--and equal to all woes,

And a firm will, and a deep sense,

Which even in torture can descry

Its own concenter'd recompense,

Triumphant where it dares defy,

And making Death a Victory.

“Sonnet to Chillon”

Lord Byron

Eternal spirit of the chainless mind!

Brightest in dungeons, Liberty! thou art,

For there thy habitation is the heart,

The heart which love of thee alone can bind;

And when thy sons to fetters are consigned

To fetters, and the damp vault's dayless gloom,

Their country conquers with their martyrdom,

And Freedom's fame finds wings on every wind.

Chillon! thy prison is a holy place,

And thy sad floor an altar, for 'twas trod,

Until his very steps have left a trace

Worn, as if thy cold pavement were a sod,

By Bonnivard! - May none those marks efface!

For they appeal from tyranny to God.

26

A Dream Within a Dream

by Edgar Allan Poe

Take this kiss upon the brow!

And, in parting from you now,

Thus much let me avow:

You are not wrong who deem

That my days have been a dream;

Yet if hope has flown away

In a night, or in a day,

In a vision, or in none,

Is it therefore the less gone?

All that we see or seem

Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar

Of a surf-tormented shore,

And I hold within my hand

Grains of the golden sand--

How few! yet how they creep

Through my fingers to the deep,

While I weep--while I weep!

O God! can I not grasp

Them with a tighter clasp?

O God! can I not save

One from the pitiless wave?

Is all that we see or seem

But a dream within a dream?

http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/130

27

“When I Have Fears”

By John Keats

When I have fears that I may cease to be

Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain,

Before high-piled books, in charactery,

Hold like rich garners the full ripen'd grain;

When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face,

Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,

And think that I may never live to trace

Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;

And when I feel, fair creature of an hour,

That I shall never look upon thee more,

Never have relish in the faery power

Of unreflecting love;--then on the shore

Of the wide world I stand alone, and think

Till love and fame to nothingness do sink.

“Bright Star”

Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art--

Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night

And watching, with eternal lids apart,

Like nature's patient, sleepless Eremite,

The moving waters at their priestlike task

Of pure ablution round earth's human shores,

Or gazing on the new soft-fallen mask

Of snow upon the mountains and the moors

No--yet still stedfast, still unchangeable,

Pillow'd upon my fair love's ripening breast,

To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,

Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,

Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,

And so live ever-or else swoon to death.

http://www.sonnets.org/keats.htm

http://www.sonnets.org/keats.htm

28

“The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson

The morning of June 27th was clear and sunny, with the fresh warmth of a full-summer day; the flowers

were blossoming profusely and the grass was richly green. The people of the village began to gather in the

square, between the post office and the bank, around ten o'clock; in some towns there were so many

people that the lottery took two days and had to be started on June 27th. But in this village, where there

were only about three hundred people, the whole lottery took

less than two hours, so it could begin at ten o'clock in the morning and still be through in time to allow the

villagers to get home for noon dinner.

The children assembled first, of course. School was recently over for the summer, and the feeling of

liberty sat uneasily on most of them; they tended to gather together quietly for a while before they broke

into boisterous play and their talk was still of the classroom and the teacher, of books and reprimands.

Bobby Martin had already stuffed his pockets full of stones, and the other boys soon followed his

example, selecting the smoothest and roundest stones; Bobby and Harry Jones and Dickie Delacroix-- the

villagers pronounced this name "Dellacroy"--eventually made a great pile of stones in one

corner of the square and guarded it against the raids of the other boys. The girls stood aside, talking

among themselves, looking over their shoulders at the boys, and the very small children rolled in the dust

or clung to the hands of their older brothers or sisters.

Soon the men began to gather. Surveying their own children, speaking of planting and rain, tractors and

taxes. They stood together, away from the pile of stones in the corner, and their jokes were quiet and they

smiled rather than laughed.

The women, wearing faded house dresses and sweaters, came shortly after their menfolk. They greeted

one another and exchanged bits of gossip as they went to join their husbands. Soon the women, standing

by their husbands, began to call to their children, and the children came reluctantly, having to be called

four or five times. Bobby Martin ducked under his mother's grasping hand and ran, laughing, back to the

pile of stones. His father spoke up sharply, and Bobby came quickly and took his place between his father

and his oldest brother.

The lottery was conducted--as were the square dances, the teen club, the Halloween program--by Mr.

Summers who had time and energy to devote to civic activities. He was a round-faced, jovial man and he

ran the coal business, and people were sorry for him because he had no children and his wife was a scold.

When he arrived in the square, carrying the black wooden box, there was a murmur of conversation

among the villagers, and he waved and called, "Little late today, folks." The postmaster, Mr. Graves,

followed him, carrying a three- legged stool, and the stool was put in the center of the square and Mr.

Summers set the black box down on it. The villagers kept their distance, leaving a space between

themselves and the stool, and when Mr. Summers said, "Some of you fellows want to give me a hand?"

there was a hesitation before two men. Mr. Martin and his oldest son, Baxter came forward to hold the

box steady on the stool while Mr. Summers stirred up the papers inside it.

The original paraphernalia for the lottery had been lost long ago, and the black box now resting on the

stool had been put into use even before Old Man Warner, the oldest man in town, was born. Mr. Summers

spoke frequently to the villagers about making a new box, but no one liked to upset even as much

tradition as was represented by the black box.

There was a story that the present box had been made with some pieces of the box that had preceded it,

the one that had been constructed when the first people settled down to make a village here. Every year,

after the lottery, Mr. Summers began talking again about a new box, but every year the subject was

29

allowed to fade off without anything's being done. The black box grew shabbier each year: by now it was

no longer completely black but splintered badly along one side to show the original wood color, and in

some places faded or stained.

Mr. Martin and his oldest son, Baxter, held the black box securely on the stool until Mr. Summers had

stirred the papers thoroughly with his hand. Because so much of the ritual had been forgotten or

discarded, Mr. Summers had been successful in having slips of paper substituted for the chips of wood

that had been used for generations. Chips of wood, Mr. Summers had argued had been all very well when

the village was tiny, but now that the population was more than three hundred and likely to keep on

growing, it was necessary to use something that would fit more easily into the black box.

The night before the lottery, Mr. Summers and Mr. Graves made up the slips of paper and put them in the

box, and it was then taken to the safe of Mr. Summers' coal company and locked up until Mr. Summers

was ready to take it to the square next morning. The rest of the year, the box was put way, sometimes one

place, sometimes another; it had spent one year in Mr. Graves's barn and another year underfoot in the

post office and sometimes it was set on a shelf in the Martin grocery and left there.

There was a great deal of fussing to be done before Mr. Summers declared the lottery open. There were

the lists to make up--of heads of families, heads of households in each family, members of each

household in each family. There was the proper swearing-in of Mr. Summers by the postmaster, as the

official of the lottery; at one time, some people remembered, there had been a recital of some sort,

performed by the official of the lottery, a perfunctory, tuneless chant that had been rattled off duly each

year; some people believed that the official of the lottery used to stand just so when he said or sang it,

others believed that he was supposed to walk among the people, but years and years ago this part of the

ritual had been allowed to lapse. There had been, also, a ritual salute, which the official of the lottery had

had to use in addressing each person who came up to draw from the box, but this also had changed with

time, until now it was felt necessary only for the official to speak to each person approaching. Mr.

Summers was very good at all this; in his clean white shirt and blue jeans with one hand resting carelessly

on the black box he seemed very proper and important as he talked interminably to Mr. Graves and the

Martins.

Just as Mr. Summers finally left off talking and turned to the assembled villagers, Mrs. Hutchinson came

hurriedly along the path to the square, her sweater thrown over her shoulders, and slid into place in the

back of the crowd. "Clean forgot what day it was," she said to Mrs. Delacroix, who stood next to her, and

they both laughed softly. "Thought my old man was out back stacking wood," Mrs. Hutchinson went on,

"and then I looked out the window and the kids was gone, and then I remembered it was the twenty-

seventh and came a-running." She dried her hands on her apron, and Mrs. Delacroix said, "You're in time,

though. They're still talking away up there."

Mrs. Hutchinson craned her neck to see through the crowd and found her husband and children standing

near the front. She tapped Mrs. Delacroix on the arm as a farewell and began to make her way through the

crowd. The people separated good-humoredly to let her through: two or three people said in voices just

loud enough to be heard across the crowd, "Here comes your, Missus, Hutchinson," and "Bill, she made it

after all." Mrs. Hutchinson reached her husband, and Mr. Summers, who had been waiting, said

cheerfully. "Thought we were going to have to get on without you, Tessie."

Mrs. Hutchinson said grinning, "Wouldn't have me leave m'dishes in the sink, now, would you. Joe?" and

soft laughter ran through the crowd as the people stirred back into position after Mrs. Hutchinson's arrival.

30

"Well, now." Mr. Summers said soberly, "guess we better get started, get this over with, so's we can go

back towork. Anybody ain't here?"

"Dunbar." several people said. "Dunbar. Dunbar."

Mr. Summers consulted his list. "Clyde Dunbar." he said. "That's right. He's broke his leg, hasn't he?

Who's drawing for him?"

"Me. I guess," a woman said and Mr. Summers turned to look at her. "Wife draws for her husband." Mr.

Summers said. "Don't you have a grown boy to do it for you, Janey?" Although Mr. Summers and

everyone else in the village knew the answer perfectly well, it was the business of the official of the

lottery to ask such questions formally. Mr. Summers waited with an expression of polite interest while

Mrs. Dunbar answered.

"Horace's not but sixteen vet." Mrs. Dunbar said regretfully. "Guess I gotta fill in for the old man this

year."

"Right." Sr. Summers said. He made a note on the list he was holding. Then he asked, "Watson boy

drawing this year?"

A tall boy in the crowd raised his hand. "Here," he said. "I m drawing for my mother and me." He blinked

his eyes nervously and ducked his head as several voices in the crowd said things like "Good fellow,

lack." and "Glad to see your mother's got a man to do it."

"Well," Mr. Summers said, "guess that's everyone. Old Man Warner make it?"

"Here," a voice said and Mr. Summers nodded.

A sudden hush fell on the crowd as Mr. Summers cleared his throat and looked at the list. "All ready?" he

called.

"Now, I'll read the names--heads of families first--and the men come up and take a paper out of the box.

Keep the paper folded in your hand without looking at it until everyone has had a turn. Everything clear?"

The people had done it so many times that they only half listened to the directions: most of them were

quiet. wetting their lips not looking around. Then Mr. Summers raised one hand high and said, "Adams."

A man disengaged himself from the crowd and came forward. "Hi. Steve." Mr. Summers said and Mr.

Adams said. "Hi. Joe." They grinned at one another humorlessly and nervously. Then Mr. Adams reached

into the black box and took out a folded paper. He held it firmly by one corner as he turned and went

hastily back to his place in the crowd where he stood a little apart from his family not looking down at his

hand.

"Allen." Mr. Summers said. "Anderson.... Bentham."

"Seems like there's no time at all between lotteries any more." Mrs. Delacroix said to Mrs. Graves in the

back row.

"Seems like we got through with the last one only last week."

31

"Time sure goes fast -- Mrs. Graves said.

"Clark.... Delacroix"

"There goes my old man." Mrs. Delacroix said. She held her breath while her husband went forward.

"Dunbar," Mr. Summers said, and Mrs. Dunbar went steadily to the box while one of the women said.

"Go on. Janey," and another said, "There she goes."

"We're next." Mrs. Graves said. She watched while Mr. Graves came around from the side of the box,

greeted Mr. Summers gravely and selected a slip of paper from the box. By now, all through the crowd

there were men holding the small folded papers in their large hand turning them over and over nervously

Mrs. Dunbar and her two sons stood together, Mrs. Dunbar holding the slip of paper.

"Harburt.... Hutchinson."

"Get up there, Bill," Mrs. Hutchinson said and the people near her laughed.

"Jones."

"They do say," Mr. Adams said to Old Man Warner, who stood next to him, "that over in the north village

they're talking of giving up the lottery."

Old Man Warner snorted. "Pack of crazy fools," he said. "Listening to the young folks, nothing's good

enough for them. Next thing you know, they'll be wanting to go back to living in caves, nobody work any

more, live that way for a while. Used to be a saying about 'Lottery in June, corn be heavy soon.' First

thing you know, we'd all be eating stewed chickweed and acorns. There's always been a lottery," he added

petulantly. "Bad enough to see young Joe Summers up there joking with everybody."

"Some places have already quit lotteries." Mrs. Adams said.

"Nothing but trouble in that," Old Man Warner said stoutly. "Pack of young fools."

"Martin." And Bobby Martin watched his father go forward. "Overdyke.... Percy."

"I wish they'd hurry," Mrs. Dunbar said to her older son. "I wish they'd hurry."

"They're almost through," her son said.

"You get ready to run tell Dad," Mrs. Dunbar said.

Mr. Summers called his own name and then stepped forward precisely and selected a slip from the box.

Then he called, "Warner."

"Seventy-seventh year I been in the lottery," Old Man Warner said as he went through the crowd.

"Seventy-seventh time."

32

"Watson" The tall boy came awkwardly through the crowd. Someone said, "Don't be nervous, Jack," and

Mr. Summers said, "Take your time, son."

"Zanini."

After that, there was a long pause, a breathless pause, until Mr. Summers holding his slip of paper in the

air, said, "All right, fellows." For a minute, no one moved, and then all the slips of paper were opened.

Suddenly, all the women began to speak at once, saving. "Who is it?" "Who's got it?" "Is it the Dunbars?"

"Is it the Watsons?" Then the voices began to say, "It's Hutchinson. It's Bill," "Bill Hutchinson's got it."

"Go tell your father," Mrs. Dunbar said to her older son.

People began to look around to see the Hutchinsons. Bill Hutchinson was standing quiet, staring down at

the paper in his hand. Suddenly. Tessie Hutchinson shouted to Mr. Summers. "You didn't give him time

enough to take any paper he wanted. I saw you. It wasn't fair!"

"Be a good sport, Tessie." Mrs. Delacroix called, and Mrs. Graves said, "All of us took the same chance."

"Shut up, Tessie," Bill Hutchinson said.

"Well, everyone," Mr. Summers said, "that was done pretty fast, and now we've got to be hurrying a little

more to get done in time." He consulted his next list. "Bill," he said, "you draw for the Hutchinson family.

You got any other households in the Hutchinsons?"

"There's Don and Eva," Mrs. Hutchinson yelled. "Make them take their chance!"

"Daughters draw with their husbands' families, Tessie," Mr. Summers said gently. "You know that as well

as anyone else."

"It wasn't fair," Tessie said.

"I guess not, Joe." Bill Hutchinson said regretfully. "My daughter draws with her husband's family; that's

only fair.

And I've got no other family except the kids."

"Then, as far as drawing for families is concerned, it's you," Mr. Summers said in explanation, "and as far

as drawing for households is concerned, that's you, too. Right?"

"Right," Bill Hutchinson said.

"How many kids, Bill?" Mr. Summers asked formally.

"Three," Bill Hutchinson said.

"There's Bill, Jr., and Nancy, and little Dave. And Tessie and me."

"All right, then," Mr. Summers said. "Harry, you got their tickets back?"

33

Mr. Graves nodded and held up the slips of paper. "Put them in the box, then," Mr. Summers directed.

"Take Bill's and put it in."

"I think we ought to start over," Mrs. Hutchinson said, as quietly as she could. "I tell you it wasn't fair.

You didn't give him time enough to choose. Everybody saw that."

Mr. Graves had selected the five slips and put them in the box and he dropped all the papers but those

onto the ground where the breeze caught them and lifted them off.

"Listen, everybody," Mrs. Hutchinson was saying to the people around her.

"Ready, Bill?" Mr. Summers asked and Bill Hutchinson, with one quick glance around at his wife and

children, nodded.

"Remember," Mr. Summers said, "take the slips and keep them folded until each person has taken one.

Harry, you help little Dave." Mr. Graves took the hand of the little boy, who came willingly with him up

to the box. "Take a paper out of the box, Davy." Mr. Summers said. Davy put his hand into the box and

laughed. "Take just one paper." Mr. Summers said. "Harry, you hold it for him." Mr. Graves took the

child's hand and removed the folded paper from the tight fist and held it while little Dave stood next to

him and looked up at him wonderingly.

"Nancy next," Mr. Summers said. Nancy was twelve, and her school friends breathed heavily as she went

forward switching her skirt, and took a slip daintily from the box "Bill, Jr.," Mr. Summers said, and Billy,

his face red and his feet overlarge, near knocked the box over as he got a paper out. "Tessie," Mr.

Summers said. She hesitated for a minute, looking around defiantly and then set her lips and went up to

the box. She snatched a paper out and held it behind her.

"Bill," Mr. Summers said, and Bill Hutchinson reached into the box and felt around, bringing his hand out

at last with the slip of paper in it.

The crowd was quiet. A girl whispered, "I hope it's not Nancy," and the sound of the whisper reached the

edges of the crowd.

"It's not the way it used to be." Old Man Warner said clearly. "People ain't the way they used to be."

"All right," Mr. Summers said. "Open the papers. Harry, you open little Dave's."

Mr. Graves opened the slip of paper and there was a general sigh through the crowd as he held it up and

everyone could see that it was blank. Nancy and Bill Jr. opened theirs at the same time and both beamed

and laughed, turning around to the crowd and holding their slips of paper above their heads.

"Tessie," Mr. Summers said. There was a pause, and then Mr. Summers looked at Bill Hutchinson, and

Bill unfolded his paper and showed it. It was blank.

"It's Tessie," Mr. Summers said, and his voice was hushed. "Show us her paper. Bill."

Bill Hutchinson went over to his wife and forced the slip of paper out of her hand. It had a black spot on

it, the black spot Mr. Summers had made the night before with the heavy pencil in the coal company

office. Bill Hutchinson held it up and there was a stir in the crowd.

34

"All right, folks." Mr. Summers said. "Let's finish quickly."

Although the villagers had forgotten the ritual and lost the original black box, they still remembered to

use stones.

The pile of stones the boys had made earlier was ready; there were stones on the ground with the blowing

scraps of paper that had come out of the box Delacroix selected a stone so large she had to pick it up with

both hands and turned to Mrs. Dunbar. "Come on," she said. "Hurry up."

Mr. Dunbar had small stones in both hands, and she said gasping for breath. "I can't run at all. You'll have

to go ahead and I'll catch up with you."

The children had stones already. And someone gave little Davy Hutchinson few pebbles.

Tessie Hutchinson was in the center of a cleared space by now, and she held her hands out desperately as

the villagers moved in on her. "It isn't fair," she said. A stone hit her on the side of the head. Old Man

Warner was saying,

"Come on, come on, everyone." Steve Adams was in the front of the crowd of villagers, with Mrs. Graves

beside him. "It isn't fair, it isn't right," Mrs. Hutchinson screamed, and then they were upon her

35

Author Harlan Ellison (1936- )

TV and movie scripter Harlan Ellison is a small, intense, muscular 'young man, something like a

miniature Rod Serling, who never gets anywhere on time. Here is a story written to the rhythm of a clock

without a balance wheel, out of whack, out of synch, tock-tick, tick-tock.

Nebula Award, Best Short Story 1965

"REPENT, HARLEQUIN!" SAID THE TICKTOCKMAN (1965)

By Harlan Ellison (1936- )

There are always those who ask, what is it all about? For those who need to ask, for those who need

points sharply made, who need to know "where it's at," this: "The mass of men serve the state thus, not as

men mainly, but as machines, with their bodies. They are the standing army, and the militia, jailors,

constables, posse comitatus, etc. In most cases there is no free exercise whatever of the judgment or of the

moral sense; but they put themselves on a level with wood and earth and stones; and wooden men can

perhaps be manufactured that will serve the purposes as well. Such command no more respect than men

of straw or a lump of dirt. They have the same sort of worth only as horses and dogs. Yet such as these

even are commonly esteemed good citizens. Others as most legislators, politicians, lawyers, ministers,

and office-holders serve the state chiefly with their heads; and, as they rarely make any moral distinctions,

they are as likely to serve the Devil, without intending it, as God. A very few, as heroes, patriots, martyrs,

reformers in the great sense, and men, serve the state with their consciences also, and so necessarily resist

it for the most part; and they are commonly treated as enemies by it."

Henry David Thoreau, "Civil Disobedience"

That is the heart of it. Now begin in the middle, and later learn the beginning; the end will take care of

itself. But because it was the very world it was, the very world they had allowed it to become, for months

his activities did not come to the alarmed attention of The Ones Who Kept The Machine Functioning

Smoothly, the ones who poured the very best butter over the cams and mainsprings of the culture. Not

until it had become obvious that somehow, someway, he had become a notoriety, a celebrity, perhaps

even a hero for (what Officialdom inescapably tagged) "an emotionally disturbed segment of the

populace," did they turn it over to the Ticktockman and his legal machinery. But by then, because it was

36

the very world it was, and they had no way to predict he would happen possibly a strain of disease long-

defunct, now, suddenly, reborn in a system where immunity had been forgotten, had lapsed he had been

allowed to become too real.

Now he had form and substance.

He had become a personality, something they had filtered out of the system many decades ago. But there

it was, and there he was, a very definitely imposing personality. In certain circles middle-class circles it

was thought disgusting. Vulgar ostentation. Anarchistic. Shameful. In others, there was only sniggering,

those strata where thought is subjugated to form and ritual, niceties, proprieties. But down below, ah,

down below, where the people always needed their saints and sinners, their bread and circuses, their

heroes and villains, he was considered a Bolivar; a Napoleon; a Robin Hood; a Dick Bong (Ace of Aces);

a Jesus; a Jomo Kenyatta.

And at the top where, like socially-attuned Shipwreck Kellys, even tremor and vibration threatens to

dislodge the wealthy, powerful, and titled from their flagpole she was considered a menace; a heretic; a

rebel; a disgrace; a peril. He was known down the line, to the very heartmeat core, but the important

reactions were high above and far below. At the very top, at the very bottom.

So his file was turned over, along with his time-card and his cardioplate, to the office of the Ticktockman.

The Ticktockman: very much over six feet tall, often silent, a soft purring man when things went

timewise. The Ticktock-man.

Even in the cubicles of the hierarchy, where fear was generated, seldom suffered, he was called the

Ticktockman.

But no one called him that to his mask.

You don't call a man a hated name, not when that man, behind his mask, is capable of revoking the

minutes, the hours, the days and nights, the years of your life. He was called the Master Timekeeper to his

mask. It was safer that way.

"This is what he is," said the Ticktockman with genuine softness, "but not who he is? This time-card I'm

holding in my left hand has a name on it, but it is the name of what he is, not

who he is. This cardioplate here in my right hand is also named, but not whom named, merely what

named. Before I can exercise proper revocation, I have to know who this what is."

To his staff, all the ferrets, all the loggers, all the finks, all the commex, even the mineez, he said, "Who is

this Harlequin?"

He was not purring smoothly. Timewise, it was jangle.

However, it was the longest single speech they had ever heard him utter at one time, the staff, the ferrets,

the loggers, the finks, the commex, but not the mineez, who usually weren't around to know, in any case.

But even they scurried to find out.

Who is the Harlequin?

High above the third level of the city, he crouched on the humming aluminum-frame platform of the air-

boat (foof! air-boat, indeed! swizzleskid is what it was, with a tow-rack jerry-rigged) and stared down at

the neat Mondrian arrangement of the buildings.

37

Somewhere nearby, he could hear the metronomic left-right-left of the 2:47 P.M. shift, entering the

Timkin roller-bearing plant in their sneakers. A minute later, precisely, he heard the softer right-left-right

of the 5:00 A.M. formation, going home. An elfish grin spread across his tanned features, and his dimples

appeared for a moment. Then, scratching at his thatch of auburn hair, he shrugged within his motley, as

though girding himself for what came next, and threw the joystick forward, and bent into the wind as the

air-boat dropped. He skimmed over a slidewalk, purposely dropping a few feet to crease the tassels of the

ladies of fashion, andinserting thumbs in large ears he stuck out his tongue, rolled his eyes, and went

wugga-wugga-wugga. .It was a minor diversion. One pedestrian skittered and tumbled, sending parcels

every whichway, another wet herself, a third keeled slantwise and the walk was stopped automatically by

the servitors till she could be resuscitated. It was a minor diversion.

Then he swirled away on a vagrant breeze, and was gone.

Hi-ho.

As he rounded the cornice of the Time-Motion Study Building, he saw the shift, just boarding the

slidewalk. With practiced motion and an absolute conservation of movement, they sidestepped up onto

the slowstrip and (in a chorus line reminiscent of a Busby Berkeley film of the antediluvian 1930's)

advanced across the strips ostrich-walking till they were lined up on the expresstrip.

Once more, in anticipation, the elfin grin spread, and there was a tooth missing back there on the left side.

He dipped, skimmed, and swooped over them; and then, scrunching about on the air-boat, he released the

holding pins that fastened shut the ends of the home-made pouring troughs that kept his cargo from

dumping prematurely. And as he pulled the trough-pins, the air-boat slid over the factory workers and one

hundred and fifty thousand dollars' worth Of jelly beans cascaded down on the expresstrip.

Jelly beans! Millions and billions of purples and yellows and greens and licorice and grape and raspberry

and mint and round and smooth and crunchy outside and soft-mealy inside and sugary and bouncing

jouncing tumbling clittering clattering skittering fell on the heads and shoulders and hardhats and

carapaces of the Timkin workers, tinkling on the slidewalk and bouncing away and rolling about

underfoot and filling the sky on their way down with all the colors of joy and childhood and holidays,

coming down in a steady rain, a solid wash, a torrent of color and sweetness out of the sky from above,

and entering a universe of sanity and metronomic order with quite-mad coocoo newness. Jelly beans!

The shift workers howled and laughed and were pelted, and broke ranks, and the jelly beans managed to

work their way into the mechanism of the slidewalks after which there was a hideous scraping as the

sound of a million fingernails rasped down a quarter of a million blackboards, followed by a coughing

and a sputtering, and then the slidewalks all stopped and everyone was dumped thisawayandthataway in a

jackstraw tumble, and still laughing and popping little jelly bean eggs of childish color into their mouths.

It was a holiday, and a jollity, an absolute insanity, a giggle. But . ..

The shift was delayed seven minutes.

They did not get home for seven minutes.

The master schedule was thrown off by seven minutes.

Quotas were delayed by inoperative slidewalks for seven minutes.

He had tapped the first domino in the line, and one after another, like chik chik chik, the others had fallen.

38

The System had been seven minutes worth of disrupted. It was a tiny matter, one hardly worthy of note,

but in a society where the single driving force was order and unity and promptness and clocklike precision

and attention to the clock, reverence of the gods of the passage of time, it was a disaster of major

importance.

So he was ordered to appear before the Ticktockman. It was broadcast across every channel of the

communications web. He was ordered to be there at 7:00 dammit on time. And they waited, and they

waited, but he didn't show up till almost ten-thirty, at which time he merely sang a little song about

moonlight in a place no one had ever heard of, called Vermont, and vanished again. But they had all been

waiting since seven, and it wrecked hell with their schedules. So the question remained: Who is the

Harlequin?

But the unasked question (more important of the two) was: how did we get into this position, where a

laughing, irresponsible japer of jabberwocky and jive could disrupt our entire economic and cultural life

with a hundred and fifty thousand dollars' worth of jelly beans . . .

Jelly for God's sake beans! This is madness! Where did he get the money to buy a hundred and fifty

thousand dollars' worth of jelly beans? (They knew it would have cost that much, because they had a team

of Situation Analysts pulled off another assignment, and rushed to the slidewalk scene to sweep up and

count the candies, and produce findings, which disrupted their schedules and threw their entire branch at

least a day behind.) Jelly beans! Jelly . . . beans? Now wait a second a second accounted forno one has

manufactured jelly beans for over a hundred years. Where did he get jelly beans?

That's another good question. More than likely it will never be answered to your complete satisfaction.

But then, how many questions ever are?

The middle you know. Here is the beginning. How it starts: A desk pad. Day for day, and turn each day.

9:00open the mail. 9:45appointment with planning commission board. 10:30discuss installation progress

charts with J.L. 11:45 pray for rain. 12:00lunch. And so it goes.

"I'm sorry. Miss Grant, but the time for interviews was set at 2:30, and it's almost five now. I'm sorry

you're late, but those are the rules. You'll have to wait till next year to submit application for this college

again." And so it goes.

The 10:10 local stops at Cresthaven, Galesville, Tonawanda Junction, Selby, and Farnhurst, but not at

Indiana City, Lucas-vine, and Colton, except on Sunday. The 10:35 express stops at

Galesville, Selby, and Indiana City, except on Sunday & Holi-days, at which time it stops at . . . and so it

goes.

"I couldn't wait, Fred. I had to be at Pierre Cartain's by 3:00, and you said you'd meet me under the clock

in the terminal at 2:45, and you weren't there, so I had to go on. You're always late, Fred. If you'd been

there, we could have sewed it up together, but as it was, well, I took the order alone . . ." And so it goes.

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Atterley: in reference to your son Gerold's constant tardiness, I am afraid we will have

to suspend him from school unless some more reliable method can be instituted guaranteeing he will

arrive at his classes on time.

Granted he is an exemplary student, and his marks are high, his constant flouting of the schedules of this

school makes it impractical to maintain him in a system where the other

39

children seem capable of getting where they are supposed to be on time and so it goes.

YOU CANNOT VOTE UNLESS YOU APPEAR AT 8:45A.M.

"I don't care if the script is good, I need it Thursday!"

CHECK-OUT TIME IS 2:00 P.M.

"You got here late. The job's taken. Sorry."

YOUR SALARY HAS BEEN DOCKED FOR TWENTY MINUTES' TIME LOST.

"God, what time is it, I've gotta run!"

And so it goes. And so it goes. And so it goes. And so it goes goes goes goes goes tick tock tick tock tick

tock and one day we no longer let time serve us, we serve time and we are slaves

of the schedule, worshippers of the sun's passing, bound into a life predicated on restrictions because the

system will not function if we don't keep the schedule tight. 6

Until it becomes more than a minor inconvenience to be late.

It becomes a sin. Then a crime. Then a crime punishable by this: EFFECTIVE 15 JULY 2389, 12:00:00

midnight, the office of the Master Timekeeper will require all citizens to submit their time-cards and

cardioplates for processing. In accordance with Statute 555-7-SGH-999 governing the revocation of time

per capita, all cardioplates will be keyed to the individual holder and What they had done, was devise a

method of curtailing the amount of life a person could have. If he was ten minutes late, he lost ten minutes

of his life. An hour was proportionately worth more revocation. If someone was consistently tardy, he

might find himself, on a Sunday night, receiving a communiqué from the Master Timekeeper that his time

had run out, and he would be "turned off" at high noon on Monday, please straighten your affairs, sir.

And so, by this simple scientific expedient (utilizing a scientific process held dearly secret by the

Ticktockman's of-fice) the System was maintained. It was the only expedient thing to do. It was, after all,

patriotic. The schedules had to be met. After all, there was a war only But, wasn't there always?

"Now that is really disgusting," the Harlequin said, when pretty Alice showed him the wanted poster.

"Disgusting and highly improbable. After all, this isn't the days of desperadoes.

A wanted poster!"

"You know," Alice noted, "you speak with a great deal of inflection."

"I'm sorry," said the Harlequin, humbly.

"No need to be sorry. You're always saying I'm sorry.' You have such massive guilt, Everett, it's really

very sad."

"I'm sorry," he repeated, then pursed his lips so the dimples appeared momentarily. He hadn't wanted to

say that at all. "I have to go out again. I have to do something."

40

Alice slammed her coffee-bulb down on the counter. "Oh for God's sake, Everett, can't you stay home just

one night! Must you always be out in that ghastly clown suit, running around axunoying people?"

"I'm" he stopped, and clapped the jester's hat onto his auburn thatch with a tiny tingling of bells. He

rose, nnsed out his coffee-bulb at the tap, and put it into the drier for a moment.

"I have to go."

She didn't answer. The faxbox was purring, and she pulled a sheet out, read it, threw it toward him on the

counter. "It's about you. Of course. You're ridiculous."

He readit quickly. It said the Ticktockman was trying to locate him. He didn't care, he was going out to be

late again. At the door, dredging for an exit line, he hurled back petulantly, "Well, you speak with

inflection, too!"

Alice rolled her pretty eyes heavenward. "You're ridiculous."

The Harlequin stalked out, slamming the door, which sighed shut softly, and locked itself.

There was a gentle knock, and Alice got up with an exhalation of exasperated breath, and opened the

door. He stood there. "I'll be back about ten-thirty, okay?"

She pulled a rueful face. "Why do you tell me that? Why?

You know you'll be late! You know it! You're always late, so why do you tell me these dumb things?"

She closed the door.

On the other side, the Harlequin nodded to himself. She's right. She's always right. I'll be late. I'm always

late. Why do /tell her these dumb things?

He shrugged again, and went off to be late once more.

He had fired off the firecracker rockets that said: I will attend the 115th annual International Medical

Association Invocation at 8:00 P.M. precisely. I do hope you will all be able to join me.

The words had burned in the sky, and of course the authorities were there, lying in wait for him. They

assumed, naturally, that he would be late. He arrived twenty minutes early, while they were setting up the

spiderwebs to trap and hold him, and blowing a large bullhorn, he frightened and unnerved them so, their

own moisturized encirclement webs sucked closed, and they were hauled up, kicking and shrieking, high

above the amphitheater's floor. The Harlequin laughed and laughed, and apologized profusely. The

physicians,' gathered in solemn conclave, roared with laughter, and accepted the Harlequin's apologies

with exaggerated bowing and posturing, and a merry time was had by all, who thought the Harlequin was

a regular foofaraw in fancy pants; all, that is, but the authorities, who had been sent out by the office of

the Ticktockman, who hung there like so much dockside cargo, hauled up above the floor of the

amphitheater in a most unseemly fashion.

(In another part of the same city where the Harlequin carried on .his "activities," totally unrelated in every

way to what concerns here, save that k illustrates the Ticktockman's power and import, a man named

41

Marshall Delahanty received his turn-off notice from the Ticktockman's office. His wife received the

notification from the gray-suited minee who delivered it, with the traditional "look of sorrow" plastered

hideously across his face. She knew what it was, even without unsealing it. It was a billet-doux of

immediate recognition to everyone these days. She gasped, and held it as though it were a glass slide

tinged with botulism, and prayed it was not for her. Let it be for Marsh, she thought, brutally, realistically,

or one of the kids, but not for me, please dear God, not for me. And then she opened it, and it was for

Marsh, and she was at one and the same time horrified and relieved. The next trooper in the line had

caught the bullet. "Marshall," she screamed, "Marshall! Termination, Marshall! OhmiGod, Marshall,

whattiwe do, whatti we do, Marshall omigodmarshall . . ." and in their home that night was the sound of

tearing paper and fear, and the stink of madness went up the flue and there was nothing, absolutely

nothing they could do about it. (But Marshall Delahanty tried to run. And early the next day, when turn-

off time came, he was deep in the forest two hundred miles away, and the office of the Ticktockman

blanked his cardioplate, and Marshall Delahanty keeled over, running, and his heart stopped, and the

blood dried up on its way to his brain, and he was dead that's all. One light went out on his sector map in

the office of the Master Timekeeper, while notification was entered for fax reproduction, and Georgette

Delahanty's name was entered on the dole roles till she could re-marry. Which is the end of the footnote,

and all the point that need be made, except don't laugh, because that is what would happen to the

Harlequin if ever the Ticktockman found out his real name. It isn't funny.) The shopping level of the city

was thronged with the Thursday-colors of the buyers. Women in canary yellow chitons and men in

pseudo-Tyrolean outfits that were jade and leatherand fit very tightly, save for the balloon pants.

When the Harlequin appeared on the still-being-constructed shell of the new Efficiency Shopping Center,

his bullhorn to his elfishly-laughing lips, everyone pointed and stared, and heberated them:

"Why let them order you about? Why let them tell you to hurry and scurry like ants or maggots? Take

your time! Saunter a while! Enjoy the sunshine, enjoy the breeze, let life carry you at your own pace!

Don't be slaves of time, it's a helluva way to die, slowly, by degrees . . . down with the Ticktockman!"

Who's the nut? most of the shoppers wanted to know. Who's the nut oh wow I'm gonna be late I gotta run.

. .

And the construction gang on the Shopping Center received an urgent order from the office of the Master

Timekeeper that the dangerous criminal known as the Harlequin was atop their spire, and their aid was

urgently needed in apprehending him.

The work crew said no, they would lose time on their construction schedule, but the Ticktockman

managed to pull the proper threads of governmental webbing, and they were told to cease work and catch

that nitwit up there on the spire with the bullhom. So a dozen and more burly workers began climbing into

their construction platforms, releasing the a-grav plates, and rising toward the Harlequin.

After the debacle (in which, through the Harlequin's attention to personal safety, no one was seriously

injured), the workers tried to reassemble, and assault him again, but it was too late. He had vanished. It

had attracted quite a crowd, however, and the shopping cycle was thrown off by hours, simply hours.

The purchasing needs of the system were therefore falling behind, and so measures were taken to

accelerate the cycle for the rest of the day, but it got bogged down and speeded up and they sold too many

float-valves and not nearly enough wegglers, which meant that the popli ratio was off, which made it

necessary to rush cases and cases of spoiling Smash-0 to stores that usually needed a case only every three

or four hours. The shipments were bollixed, the trans-shipments were misrouted, and in the end, even the

swizzleskid industries felt it.

42

"Don't come back till you have him!" the Ticktockman said, very quietly, very sincerely, extremely

dangerously.

They used dogs. They used probes. They used cardioplate crossoffs. They used teepers. They used

bribery. They used stiktytes. They used intimidation. They used torment. They used torture. They used

finks. They used cops. They used search&seizure. They used fallaron. They used betterment incentive.

They used fingerprints. They used Bertillon. They used cunning. They used guile. They used treachery.

They used Raoul Mitgong, but he didn't help. much. They used applied physics. They used techniques of

criminology.

And what the hell: they caught him.

After all, his name was Everett C. Marm, and he wasn't much to begin with, except a man who had no

sense of time.

"Repent, Harlequin!" said the Ticktockman.

"Get stuffed!" the Harlequin replied, sneering.

"You've been late a total of sixty-three years, five months, three weeks, two days, twelve hours, forty-one

minutes, fifty-nine seconds, point oh three six one one one microseconds.

You've used up everything you can, and more. I'm going to turn you off."

"Scare someone else. I'd rather be dead than live in a dumb world with a bogeyman like you."

"It's my job."

"You're full of it. You're a tyrant. You have no right to order people around and kill them if they show up

late."

"You can't adjust. You can't fit in."

"Unstrap me, and I'll fit my fist into your mouth."

"You're a non-conformist."

"That didn't used to be a felony."

"It is now. Live in the world around you."

"I hate it. It's a terrible world."

"Not everyone thinks so. Most people enjoy order."

"I don't, and most of the people I know don't."

"That's not true. How do you think we caught you?"

43

"I'm not interested."

"A girl named pretty Alice told us who you were."

"That's a lie."

"It's true. You unnerve her. She wants to belong, she wants to conform, I'm going to turn you off."

"Then do it already, and stop arguing with me."

"I'm not going to turn you off."

"You're an idiot!"

"Repent, Harlequin!" said the Ticktockman.

"Get stuffed."

So they sent him to Coventry. And in Coventry they worked him over. It was just like what they did to

Winston Smith in "1984," which was a book none of them knew about, but the techniques are really quite

ancient, and so they did it to Everett C. Marm, and one day quite a long time later, the Harlequin appeared

on the communications web, appearing elfish and dimpled and bright-eyed, and not at all brainwashed,

and he said he had been wrong, that it was a good, a very good thing indeed, to belong, and be right on

time hip-ho and away we go, and everyone stared up at him on the public screens that covered an entire

city block, and they said to themselves, well, you see, he was just a nut after all, and if that's the way the

system is run, then let's do it that way, because it doesn't pay to fight city hall, or in this case, the

Ticktockman. So Everett C. Marm was destroyed, which was a loss, because of what Thoreau said earlier,

but you can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs, and in every revolution, a few die who

shouldn't, but they have to, because that's the way it happens, and if you make only a little change, then it

seems to be worthwhile. Or, to make the point lucidly:

"Uh, excuse me, sir, I, uh, don't know how to uh, to uh, tell you this, but you were three minutes late.

The schedule is a , little, uh, bit off."

He grinned sheepishly.

"That's ridiculous!" murmured the Ticktockman behind his mask. "Check your watch." And then he went

into his office, going mrmee, mrmee, mrmee, mrmee.

44

“The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

It is very seldom that mere ordinary people like John and myself secure ancestral halls for the summer.

A colonial mansion, a hereditary estate, I would say a haunted house, and reach the height of

romantic felicity--but that would be asking too much of fate!

Still I will proudly declare that there is something queer about it.

Else, why should it be let so cheaply? And why have stood so long untenanted?

John laughs at me, of course, but one expects that in marriage.

John is practical in the extreme. He has no patience with faith, an intense horror of superstition, and

he scoffs openly at any talk of things not to be felt and seen and put down in figures.

John is a physician, and perhaps--(I would not say it to a living soul, of course, but this is dead paper

and a great relief to my mind)--perhaps that is one reason I do not get well faster.

You see he does not believe I am sick!

And what can one do?

If a physician of high standing, and one's own husband, assures friends and relatives that there is

really nothing the matter with one but temporary nervous depression--a slight hysterical tendency-- what

is one to do?

My brother is also a physician, and also of high standing, and he says the same thing.

So I take phosphates or phosphites--whichever it is, and tonics, and journeys, and air, and exercise,

and am absolutely forbidden to "work" until I am well again.

Personally, I disagree with their ideas.

Personally, I believe that congenial work, with excitement and change, would do me good.

But what is one to do?

I did write for a while in spite of them; but it does exhaust me a good deal--having to be so sly about

it, or else meet with heavy opposition.

I sometimes fancy that in my condition if I had less opposition and more society and stimulus--but

John says the very worst thing I can do is to think about my condition, and I confess it always makes me

feel bad.

So I will let it alone and talk about the house.

The most beautiful place! It is quite alone standing well back from the road, quite three miles from

the village. It makes me think of English places that you read about, for there are hedges and walls and

gates that lock, and lots of separate little houses for the gardeners and people.

There is a delicious garden! I never saw such a garden--large and shady, full of box-bordered paths,

and lined with long grape-covered arbors with seats under them.

There were greenhouses, too, but they are all broken now.

There was some legal trouble, I believe, something about the heirs and coheirs; anyhow, the place

has been empty for years.

That spoils my ghostliness, I am afraid, but I don't care--there is something strange about the house--

I can feel it.

I even said so to John one moonlight evening but he said what I felt was a draught, and shut the

window.

I get unreasonably angry with John sometimes I'm sure I never used to be so sensitive. I think it is

due to this nervous condition.

But John says if I feel so, I shall neglect proper self-control; so I take pains to control myself-- before

him, at least, and that makes me very tired.

I don't like our room a bit. I wanted one downstairs that opened on the piazza and had roses all over

the window, and such pretty old-fashioned chintz hangings! but John would not hear of it.

He said there was only one window and not room for two beds, and no near room for him if he took

another.

45

He is very careful and loving, and hardly lets me stir without special direction.

I have a schedule prescription for each hour in the day; he takes all care from me, and so I feel basely

ungrateful not to value it more.

He said we came here solely on my account, that I was to have perfect rest and all the air I could get.

"Your exercise depends on your strength, my dear," said he, "and your food somewhat on your appetite;

but air you can absorb all the time. ' So we took the nursery at the top of the house.

It is a big, airy room, the whole floor nearly, with windows that look all ways, and air and sunshine

galore. It was nursery first and then playroom and gymnasium, I should judge; for the windows are barred

for little children, and there are rings and things in the walls.

The paint and paper look as if a boys' school had used it. It is stripped off--the paper in great patches

all around the head of my bed, about as far as I can reach, and in a great place on the other side of the

room low down. I never saw a worse paper in my life.

One of those sprawling flamboyant patterns committing every artistic sin.

It is dull enough to confuse the eye in following, pronounced enough to constantly irritate and

provoke study, and when you follow the lame uncertain curves for a little distance they suddenly commit

suicide--plunge off at outrageous angles, destroy themselves in unheard of contradictions.

The color is repellent, almost revolting; a smouldering unclean yellow, strangely faded by the slow-

turning sunlight.

It is a dull yet lurid orange in some places, a sickly sulphur tint in others.

No wonder the children hated it! I should hate it myself if I had to live in this room long.

There comes John, and I must put this away,--he hates to have me write a word.

----------

We have been here two weeks, and I haven't felt like writing before, since that first day.

I am sitting by the window now, up in this atrocious nursery, and there is nothing to hinder my

writing as much as I please, save lack of strength.

John is away all day, and even some nights when his cases are serious.

I am glad my case is not serious!

But these nervous troubles are dreadfully depressing.

John does not know how much I really suffer. He knows there is no reason to suffer, and that

satisfies him.

Of course it is only nervousness. It does weigh on me so not to do my duty in any way!

I meant to be such a help to John, such a real rest and comfort, and here I am a comparative burden

already!

Nobody would believe what an effort it is to do what little I am able,--to dress and entertain, and

order things.

It is fortunate Mary is so good with the baby. Such a dear baby!

And yet I cannot be with him, it makes me so nervous.

I suppose John never was nervous in his life. He laughs at me so about this wall-paper!

At first he meant to repaper the room, but afterwards he said that I was letting it get the better of me,

and that nothing was worse for a nervous patient than to give way to such fancies.

He said that after the wall-paper was changed it would be the heavy bedstead, and then the barred

windows, and then that gate at the head of the stairs, and so on.

"You know the place is doing you good," he said, "and really, dear, I don't care to renovate the house

just for a three months' rental."

"Then do let us go downstairs," I said, "there are such pretty rooms there."

Then he took me in his arms and called me a blessed little goose, and said he would go down to the

cellar, if I wished, and have it whitewashed into the bargain.

But he is right enough about the beds and windows and things.

It is an airy and comfortable room as any one need wish, and, of course, I would not be so silly as to

46

make him uncomfortable just for a whim.

I'm really getting quite fond of the big room, all but that horrid paper.

Out of one window I can see the garden, those mysterious deepshaded arbors, the riotous old-

fashioned flowers, and bushes and gnarly trees.

Out of another I get a lovely view of the bay and a little private wharf belonging to the estate. There

is a beautiful shaded lane that runs down there from the house. I always fancy I see people walking in

these numerous paths and arbors, but John has cautioned me not to give way to fancy in the least. He says

that with my imaginative power and habit of story-making, a nervous weakness like mine is sure to lead

to all manner of excited fancies, and that I ought to use my will and good sense to check the tendency. So

I try.

I think sometimes that if I were only well enough to write a little it would relieve the press of ideas

and rest me.

But I find I get pretty tired when I try.

It is so discouraging not to have any advice and companionship about my work. When I get really

well, John says we will ask Cousin Henry and Julia down for a long visit; but he says he would as soon

put fireworks in my pillow-case as to let me have those stimulating people about now.

I wish I could get well faster.

But I must not think about that. This paper looks to me as if it knew what a vicious influence it had!

There is a recurrent spot where the pattern lolls like a broken neck and two bulbous eyes stare at you

upside down.

I get positively angry with the impertinence of it and the everlastingness. Up and down and sideways

they crawl, and those absurd, unblinking eyes are everywhere There is one place where two breaths didn't

match, and the eyes go all up and down the line, one a little higher than the other.

I never saw so much expression in an inanimate thing before, and we all know how much expression

they have! I used to lie awake as a child and get more entertainment and terror out of blank walls and

plain furniture than most children could find in a toy-store.

I remember what a kindly wink the knobs of our big, old bureau used to have, and there was one

chair that always seemed like a strong friend.

I used to feel that if any of the other things looked too fierce I could always hop into that chair and be

safe.

The furniture in this room is no worse than inharmonious, however, for we had to bring it all from

downstairs. I suppose when this was used as a playroom they had to take the nursery things out, and no

wonder! I never saw such ravages as the children have made here.

The wall-paper, as I said before, is torn off in spots, and it sticketh closer than a brother--they must

have had perseverance as well as hatred.

Then the floor is scratched and gouged and splintered, the plaster itself is dug out here and there, and

this great heavy bed which is all we found in the room, looks as if it had been through the wars.

But I don't mind it a bit--only the paper.

There comes John's sister. Such a dear girl as she is, and so careful of me! I must not let her find me

writing.

She is a perfect and enthusiastic housekeeper, and hopes for no better profession. I verily believe she

thinks it is the writing which made me sick!

But I can write when she is out, and see her a long way off from these windows.

There is one that commands the road, a lovely shaded winding road, and one that just looks off over

the country. A lovely country, too, full of great elms and velvet meadows.

This wall-paper has a kind of sub-pattern in a, different shade, a particularly irritating one, for you

can only see it in certain lights, and not clearly then.

But in the places where it isn't faded and where the sun is just so--I can see a strange, provoking,

47

formless sort of figure, that seems to skulk about behind that silly and conspicuous front design.

There's sister on the stairs!

----------

Well, the Fourth of July is over! The people are all gone and I am tired out. John thought it might do

me good to see a little company, so we just had mother and Nellie and the children down for a week.

Of course I didn't do a thing. Jennie sees to everything now.

But it tired me all the same.

John says if I don't pick up faster he shall send me to Weir Mitchell in the fall.

But I don't want to go there at all. I had a friend who was in his hands once, and she says he is just

like John and my brother, only more so!

Besides, it is such an undertaking to go so far.

I don't feel as if it was worth while to turn my hand over for anything, and I'm getting dreadfully

fretful and querulous.

I cry at nothing, and cry most of the time.

Of course I don't when John is here, or anybody else, but when I am alone.

And I am alone a good deal just now. John is kept in town very often by serious cases, and Jennie is

good and lets me alone when I want her to.

So I walk a little in the garden or down that lovely lane, sit on the porch under the roses, and lie

down up here a good deal.

I'm getting really fond of the room in spite of the wall-paper. Perhaps because of the wall-paper.

It dwells in my mind so!

I lie here on this great immovable bed--it is nailed down, I believe--and follow that pattern about by

the hour. It is as good as gymnastics, I assure you. I start, we'll say, at the bottom, down in the corner over

there where it has not been touched, and I determine for the thousandth time that I will follow that

pointless pattern to some sort of a conclusion.

I know a little of the principle of design, and I know this thing was not arranged on any laws of

radiation, or alternation, or repetition, or symmetry, or anything else that I ever heard of.

It is repeated, of course, by the breadths, but not otherwise.

Looked at in one way each breadth stands alone, the bloated curves and flourishes--a kind of

"debased Romanesque" with delirium tremens--go waddling up and down in isolated columns of fatuity.

But, on the other hand, they connect diagonally, and the sprawling outlines run off in great slanting

waves of optic horror, like a lot of wallowing seaweeds in full chase.

The whole thing goes horizontally, too, at least it seems so, and I exhaust myself in trying to

distinguish the order of its going in that direction.

They have used a horizontal breadth for a frieze, and that adds wonderfully to the confusion.

There is one end of the room where it is almost intact, and there, when the crosslights fade and the

low sun shines directly upon it, I can almost fancy radiation after all,--the interminable grotesques seem to

form around a common centre and rush off in headlong plunges of equal distraction.

It makes me tired to follow it. I will take a nap I guess.

----------

I don't know why I should write this.

I don't want to.

I don't feel able. And I know John would think it absurd. But I must say what I feel and think in

some way--it is such a relief!

But the effort is getting to be greater than the relief.

Half the time now I am awfully lazy, and lie down ever so much.

John says I mustn't lose my strength, and has me take cod liver oil and lots of tonics and things, to

say nothing of ale and wine and rare meat.

Dear John! He loves me very dearly, and hates to have me sick. I tried to have a real earnest

48

reasonable talk with him the other day, and tell him how I wish he would let me go and make a visit to

Cousin Henry and Julia.

But he said I wasn't able to go, nor able to stand it after I got there; and I did not make out a very

good case for myself, for I was crying before I had finished .

It is getting to be a great effort for me to think straight. Just this nervous weakness I suppose.

And dear John gathered me up in his arms, and just carried me upstairs and laid me on the bed, and

sat by me and read to me till it tired my head.

He said I was his darling and his comfort and all he had, and that I must take care of myself for his

sake, and keep well.

He says no one but myself can help me out of it, that I must use my will and self-control and not let

any silly fancies run away with me.

There's one comfort, the baby is well and happy, and does not have to occupy this nursery with the

horrid wall-paper.

If we had not used it, that blessed child would have! What a fortunate escape! Why, I wouldn't have

a child of mine, an impressionable little thing, live in such a room for worlds.

I never thought of it before, but it is lucky that John kept me here after all, I can stand it so much

easier than a baby, you see.

Of course I never mention it to them any more--I am too wise,--but I keep watch of it all the same.

There are things in that paper that nobody knows but me, or ever will.

Behind that outside pattern the dim shapes get clearer every day.

It is always the same shape, only very numerous.

And it is like a woman stooping down and creeping about behind that pattern. I don't like it a bit. I

wonder--I begin to think--I wish John would take me away from here!

----------

It is so hard to talk with John about my case, because he is so wise, and because he loves me so.

But I tried it last night.

It was moonlight. The moon shines in all around just as the sun does.

I hate to see it sometimes, it creeps so slowly, and always comes in by one window or another.

John was asleep and I hated to waken him, so I kept still and watched the moonlight on that

undulating wall-paper till I felt creepy.

The faint figure behind seemed to shake the pattern, just as if she wanted to get out.

I got up softly and went to feel and see if the paper did move, and when I came back John was

awake.

"What is it, little girl?" he said. "Don't go walking about like that--you'll get cold."

I thought it was a good time to talk, so I told him that I really was not gaining here, and that I wished

he would take me away.

"Why darling!" said he, "our lease will be up in three weeks, and I can't see how to leave before.

"The repairs are not done at home, and I cannot possibly leave town just now. Of course if you were

in any danger, I could and would, but you really are better, dear, whether you can see it or not. I am a

doctor, dear, and I know. You are gaining flesh and color, your appetite is better, I feel really much easier

about you."

"I don't weigh a bit more," said 1, "nor as much; and my appetite may be better in the evening when

you are here, but it is worse in the morning when you are away!"

"Bless her little heart!" said he with a big hug, "she shall be as sick as she pleases! But now let's

improve the shining hours by going to sleep, and talk about it in the morning!"

"And you won't go away?" I asked gloomily.

"Why, how can 1, dear? It is only three weeks more and then we will take a nice little trip of a few

days while Jennie is getting the house ready. Really dear you are better!"

"Better in body perhaps--" I began, and stopped short, for he sat up straight and looked at me with

49

such a stern, reproachful look that I could not say another word.

"My darling," said he, "I beg of you, for my sake and for our child's sake, as well as for your own,

that you will never for one instant let that idea enter your mind! There is nothing so dangerous, so

fascinating, to a temperament like yours. It is a false and foolish fancy. Can you not trust me as a

physician when I tell you so?"

So of course I said no more on that score, and we went to sleep before long. He thought I was asleep

first, but I wasn't, and lay there for hours trying to decide whether that front pattern and the back pattern

really did move together or separately.

----------

On a pattern like this, by daylight, there is a lack of sequence, a defiance of law, that is a constant

irritant to a normal mind.

The color is hideous enough, and unreliable enough, and infuriating enough, but the pattern is

torturing.

You think you have mastered it, but just as you get well underway in following, it turns a back

somersault and there you are. It slaps you in the face, knocks you down, and tramples upon you. It is like

a bad dream.

The outside pattern is a florid arabesque, reminding one of a fungus. If you can imagine a toadstool

in joints, an interminable string of toadstools, budding and sprouting in endless convolutions--why, that is

something like it.

That is, sometimes!

There is one marked peculiarity about this paper, a thing nobody seems to notice but myself, and that

is that it changes as the light changes.

When the sun shoots in through the east window--I always watch for that first long, straight ray--it

changes so quickly that I never can quite believe it.

That is why I watch it always.

By moonlight--the moon shines in all night when there is a moon--I wouldn't know it was the same

paper.

At night in any kind of light, in twilight, candlelight, lamplight, and worst of all by moonlight, it

becomes bars! The outside pattern I mean, and the woman behind it is as plain as can be.

I didn't realize for a long time what the thing was that showed behind, that dim sub-pattern, but now I

am quite sure it is a woman.

By daylight she is subdued, quiet. I fancy it is the pattern that keeps her so still. It is so puzzling. It

keeps me quiet by the hour.

I lie down ever so much now. John says it is good for me, and to sleep all I can.

Indeed he started the habit by making me lie down for an hour after each meal.

It is a very bad habit I am convinced, for you see I don't sleep.

And that cultivates deceit, for I don't tell them I'm awake--O no!

The fact is I am getting a little afraid of John.

He seems very queer sometimes, and even Jennie has an inexplicable look.

It strikes me occasionally, just as a scientific hypothesis,--that perhaps it is the paper!

I have watched John when he did not know I was looking, and come into the room suddenly on the

most innocent excuses, and I've caught him several times looking at the paper! And Jennie too. I caught

Jennie with her hand on it once.

She didn't know I was in the room, and when I asked her in a quiet, a very quiet voice, with the most

restrained manner possible, what she was doing with the paper--she turned around as if she had been

caught stealing, and looked quite angry-- asked me why I should frighten her so!

Then she said that the paper stained everything it touched, that she had found yellow smooches on all

my clothes and John's, and she wished we would be more careful!

50

Did not that sound innocent? But I know she was studying that pattern, and I am determined that

nobody shall find it out but myself!

----------

Life is very much more exciting now than it used to be. You see I have something more to expect, to

look forward to, to watch. I really do eat better, and am more quiet than I was.

John is so pleased to see me improve ! He laughed a little the other day, and said I seemed to be

flourishing in spite of my wall-paper.

I turned it off with a laugh. I had no intention of telling him it was because of the wall-paper--he

would make fun of me. He might even want to take me away.

I don't want to leave now until I have found it out. There is a week more, and I think that will be

enough.

----------

I'm feeling ever so much better! I don't sleep much at night, for it is so interesting to watch

developments; but I sleep a good deal in the daytime.

In the daytime it is tiresome and perplexing.

There are always new shoots on the fungus, and new shades of yellow all over it. I cannot keep count

of them, though I have tried conscientiously.

It is the strangest yellow, that wall-paper! It makes me think of all the yellow things I ever saw--not

beautiful ones like buttercups, but old foul, bad yellow things.

But there is something else about that paper-- the smell! I noticed it the moment we came into the

room, but with so much air and sun it was not bad. Now we have had a week of fog and rain, and whether

the windows are open or not, the smell is here.

It creeps all over the house.

I find it hovering in the dining-room, skulking in the parlor, hiding in the hall, lying in wait for me

on the stairs.

It gets into my hair.

Even when I go to ride, if I turn my head suddenly and surprise it--there is that smell!

Such a peculiar odor, too! I have spent hours in trying to analyze it, to find what it smelled like.

It is not bad--at first, and very gentle, but quite the subtlest, most enduring odor I ever met.

In this damp weather it is awful, I wake up in the night and find it hanging over me.

It used to disturb me at first. I thought seriously of burning the house--to reach the smell.

But now I am used to it. The only thing I can think of that it is like is the color of the paper! A

yellow smell.

There is a very funny mark on this wall, low down, near the mopboard. A streak that runs round the

room. It goes behind every piece of furniture, except the bed, a long, straight, even smooch, as if it had

been rubbed over and over.

I wonder how it was done and who did it, and what they did it for. Round and round and round--

round and round and round--it makes me dizzy!

----------

I really have discovered something at last.

Through watching so much at night, when it changes so, I have finally found out.

The front pattern does move--and no wonder! The woman behind shakes it!

Sometimes I think there are a great many women behind, and sometimes only one, and she crawls

around fast, and her crawling shakes it all over.

Then in the very bright spots she keeps still, and in the very shady spots she just takes hold of the

bars and shakes them hard.

And she is all the time trying to climb through. But nobody could climb through that pattern--it

strangles so; I think that is why it has so many heads.

51

They get through, and then the pattern strangles them off and turns them upside down, and makes

their eyes white!

If those heads were covered or taken off it would not be half so bad.

----------

I think that woman gets out in the daytime!

And I'll tell you why--privately--I've seen her!

I can see her out of every one of my windows!

It is the same woman, I know, for she is always creeping, and most women do not creep by daylight.

I see her on that long road under the trees, creeping along, and when a carriage comes she hides

under the blackberry vines.

I don't blame her a bit. It must be very humiliating to be caught creeping by daylight!

I always lock the door when I creep by daylight. I can't do it at night, for I know John would suspect

something at once.

And John is so queer now, that I don't want to irritate him. I wish he would take another room!

Besides, I don't want anybody to get that woman out at night but myself.

I often wonder if I could see her out of all the windows at once.

But, turn as fast as I can, I can only see out of one at one time.

And though I always see her, she may be able to creep faster than I can turn!

I have watched her sometimes away off in the open country, creeping as fast as a cloud shadow in a

high wind.

----------

If only that top pattern could be gotten off from the under one! I mean to try it, little by little.

I have found out another funny thing, but I shan't tell it this time! It does not do to trust people too

much.

There are only two more days to get this paper off, and I believe John is beginning to notice. I don't

like the look in his eyes.

And I heard him ask Jennie a lot of professional questions about me. She had a very good report to

give.

She said I slept a good deal in the daytime.

John knows I don't sleep very well at night, for all I'm so quiet!

He asked me all sorts of questions, too, and pretended to be very loving and kind.

As if I couldn't see through him!

Still, I don't wonder he acts so, sleeping under this paper for three months.

It only interests me, but I feel sure John and Jennie are secretly affected by it.

----------

Hurrah! This is the last day, but it is enough. John to stay in town over night, and won't be out until

this evening.

Jennie wanted to sleep with me--the sly thing! but I told her I should undoubtedly rest better for a

night all alone.

That was clever, for really I wasn't alone a bit! As soon as it was moonlight and that poor thing

began to crawl and shake the pattern, I got up and ran to help her.

I pulled and she shook, I shook and she pulled, and before morning we had peeled off yards of that

paper.

A strip about as high as my head and half around the room.

And then when the sun came and that awful pattern began to laugh at me, I declared I would finish it

to-day!

We go away to-morrow, and they are moving all my furniture down again to leave things as they

were before.

Jennie looked at the wall in amazement, but I told her merrily that I did it out of pure spite at the

52

vicious thing.

She laughed and said she wouldn't mind doing it herself, but I must not get tired.

How she betrayed herself that time!

But I am here, and no person touches this paper but me,--not alive !

She tried to get me out of the room--it was too patent! But I said it was so quiet and empty and clean

now that I believed I would lie down again and sleep all I could; and not to wake me even for dinner--I

would call when I woke.

So now she is gone, and the servants are gone, and the things are gone, and there is nothing left but

that great bedstead nailed down, with the canvas mattress we found on it.

We shall sleep downstairs to-night, and take the boat home to-morrow.

I quite enjoy the room, now it is bare again.

How those children did tear about here!

This bedstead is fairly gnawed!

But I must get to work.

I have locked the door and thrown the key down into the front path.

I don't want to go out, and I don't want to have anybody come in, till John comes.

I want to astonish him.

I've got a rope up here that even Jennie did not find. If that woman does get out, and tries to get

away, I can tie her!

But I forgot I could not reach far without anything to stand on!

This bed will not move!

I tried to lift and push it until I was lame, and then I got so angry I bit off a little piece at one corner--

but it hurt my teeth.

Then I peeled off all the paper I could reach standing on the floor. It sticks horribly and the pattern

just enjoys it! All those strangled heads and bulbous eyes and waddling fungus growths just shriek with

derision!

I am getting angry enough to do something desperate. To jump out of the window would be

admirable exercise, but the bars are too strong even to try.

Besides I wouldn't do it. Of course not. I know well enough that a step like that is improper and

might be misconstrued.

I don't like to look out of the windows even-- there are so many of those creeping women, and they

creep so fast.

I wonder if they all come out of that wall-paper as I did?

But I am securely fastened now by my well-hidden rope--you don't get me out in the road there !

I suppose I shall have to get back behind the pattern when it comes night, and that is hard!

It is so pleasant to be out in this great room and creep around as I please!

I don't want to go outside. I won't, even if Jennie asks me to.

For outside you have to creep on the ground, and everything is green instead of yellow.

But here I can creep smoothly on the floor, and my shoulder just fits in that long smooch around the

wall, so I cannot lose my way.

Why there's John at the door!

It is no use, young man, you can't open it!

How he does call and pound!

Now he's crying for an axe.

It would be a shame to break down that beautiful door!

"John dear!" said I in the gentlest voice, "the key is down by the front steps, under a plantain leaf!"

That silenced him for a few moments.

Then he said--very quietly indeed, "Open the door, my darling!"

"I can't," said I. "The key is down by the front door under a plantain leaf!"

53

And then I said it again, several times, very gently and slowly, and said it so often that he had to go

and see, and he got it of course, and came in. He stopped short by the door.

"What is the matter?" he cried. "For God's sake, what are you doing!"

I kept on creeping just the same, but I looked at him over my shoulder.

"I've got out at last," said I, "in spite of you and Jane. And I've pulled off most of the paper, so you

can't put me back!"

Now why should that man have fainted? But he did, and right across my path by the wall, so that I

had to creep over him every time!

Charlotte Perkins Gilman, The Yellow Wallpaper, first published 1899 by Small & Maynard, Boston, MA.

el paso community college syllabus part i instructor’s

Documents