A Mild Attack of Locusts

Part 2

Around the World: Extending and Evaluating Traditions

Man’s Natural World, c. 20th century. Sir Peter Scott. Oil on canvas. Private collection.

“The English language is nobody’s special property. It is the property of the imagination: it is the property of the language itself.”

—Derek Walcott

1283 Sir Peter Scott/Private Collection/Bridgeman Art Library

11283283 U7P2-845482.inddU7P2-845482.indd Sec2:1283Sec2:1283 11/29/07/29/07 2:29:552:29:55 PMPM BEFORE YOU READ

A Mild Attack of Locusts

MEET DORIS LESSING

fter visiting South Africa in 1956, Doris Lessing was escorted to the airport by two Apolice officers and told never to return. She was banned for twenty-five years from entering South Africa and Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) because of her political views and her opposition to apartheid, South Africa’s former official policy of racial segregation. Throughout her life, Lessing has caused a stir with her novels and and at age thirty she left her second husband to her clearly articulated political views. live in England with her son. Lessing took with her to England the manuscript An Uncomfortable Childhood Lessing was of her first novel, The Grass Is Singing, and with its born to English parents in Persia (now Iran), publication, she began a successful career as a nov- where her father had been a captain in the British elist. Much of Lessing’s work is autobiographical, Army. In 1924 Lessing’s parents moved to the based upon her experiences in Africa and as a British colony in the African country of Southern mother and wife bound by social expectations. Her Rhodesia, where Lessing would spend the next stories set in Africa chronicle the struggle between twenty-five years of her life. native black Africans and the white colonials who Lessing has described her childhood as a mixture claimed their land. of some pleasure and more pain. Only excursions Critics have tried to label Lessing both a feminist and into the natural world provided Lessing with some a writer about race relations, but Lessing dislikes relief from the strict governance of her mother, such labels. Unlike some of her contemporaries, who who was determined to raise a “proper” daughter. enjoy the fame that accompanies a writing career, As a young adolescent, Lessing was sent to an all- Lessing claims she prefers not to give book tours girls’ school in the nation’s capital, Salisbury. and interviews. She once said to an interviewer, “I Miserable, she dropped out at the age of thirteen, told my publishers it would be far more useful for ending her formal education. everyone if I stayed at home, writing another book.” In addition to her numerous novels (which include a five-volume science fiction series), Lessing has “I wasn’t thinking about being a writer also published several collections of short stories, then—I was just thinking about how as well as poetry, essays, travel writings, and two autobiographical works. In 1995 Lessing visited to escape.” South Africa for the first time since being forcibly removed in 1956. Recognized at last as a signifi- —Doris Lessing cant and revolutionary writer, Lessing was, on this occasion, welcomed with open arms. Doris Lessing was born in 1919. An Unbounded Career Soon after dropping out of school, Lessing left home and began working— first as a nursemaid, then later as a typist. By her AuthorAuthor SearchSearch ForFor more about early twenties, Lessing had been married twice, AuthorDoris Lessing, Name, go to wwwwww.literature.glencoe.com.glencoe.com. .

1284 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE Hulton Getty Images/Tony Stone Images

11284-1294284-1294 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 12841284 66/23/06/23/06 1:17:581:17:58 PMPM LITERATURE PREVIEW READING PREVIEW

Connecting to the Story Reading Strategy Analyzing Conflict All human communities must cope with hazards of Conflict is the central struggle in a story or drama. This nature—earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, and the struggle might be between two or more people, between like. As you read, think about the following questions: people and nature, or between people and their own feelings. To analyze conflict, determine whether a char- What natural hazards do the people of your com- • acter is struggling against something on the outside, munity face? something on the inside, or both. Then watch to see How does your family or school prepare for and • how—or whether—each conflict is resolved. protect against these hazards? Building Background Reading Tip: Identifying Conflict As you read, use a graphic organizer like the one below to identify con- Lessing was five when her father moved the family to flicts in the story. a vast, remote farm in Southern Rhodesia, where he hoped to grow rich by raising maize, or corn. In spite of her mother’s energetic efforts to create a refined life in this rough settlement, the farm did not yield the Outside Force Character Inner Feelings wealth her father had anticipated. One of the many hazards of farming in this region were locusts. The name locust refers to a number of jump- Vocabulary ing insects, including the periodical cicada (sə ka¯ də)— which appears every seven, thirteen, or seventeen acrid (ak rid) adj. burning, biting, or irritating years—and the true locust, a migratory grasshopper. to the taste or smell; p. 1287 Where is that acrid Locusts severely damage crops wherever they swarm. stench coming from? Setting Purposes for Reading irremediable (ir i me¯ de¯ ə bəl) adj. not subject to remedy or cure; p. 1289 The tornado left irre- Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism mediable damage in its wake. Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) declared inde- imminent (im ə nənt) adj. about to happen; pendence from Britain in 1923. As you read “A Mild impending; p. 1291 A clap of thunder told us Attack of Locusts,” look for aspects of British colonial- that a rainstorm was imminent. ism that persist several decades later, when the story takes place. Vocabulary Tip: Word Origins Many words in English derive from, or come from, words in other Literary Element Theme languages. Knowing a word’s origin can help you Theme refers to a central idea about life that is better understand its meaning. expressed in a work of literature. A work can have more than one theme, and these themes may be universal—widely held across human cultures. A theme is different from a topic. A topic is a broad category, such as “hardship,” whereas a theme conveys a complete idea about a topic; for example, “Hardship is best met with a sense of humor.” Interactive Literary Elements Handbook To review or learn more about the literary elements, • See Literary Terms Handbook, p. R18. go to www.glencoe.com.

OBJECTIVES In studying this selection, you will focus on the following: • identifying themes • analyzing genre elements • analyzing conflicts

DORIS LESSING 1285

11284-1294284-1294 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 12851285 11/10/07/10/07 2:46:142:46:14 PMPM DDorisoris LessingLessing

Swarm of desert locusts.

T he rains that year were good; they were they neither went bankrupt nor got very rich. coming nicely just as the crops needed them—or They jogged along doing comfortably. so Margaret gathered1 when the men said they Their crop was maize. Their farm was three were not too bad. She never had an opinion of thousand acres on the ridges that rise up toward her own on matters like the weather, because the Zambesi escarpment2—high, dry wind-swept even to know about what seems a simple thing country, cold and dusty in winter, but now, in like the weather needs experience. Which the wet season, steamy with the heat rising Margaret had not got. in wet soft waves off miles of green foliage. The men were Richard her husband, and old Beautiful it was, with the sky blue and brilliant Stephen, Richard’s father, a farmer from way halls of air, and the bright green folds and hol- back; and these two might argue for hours lows of country beneath, and the mountains whether the rains were ruinous or just ordinarily lying sharp and bare twenty miles off across the exasperating. Margaret had been on the farm rivers. The sky made her eyes ache; she was not three years. She still did not understand how used to it. One does not look so much at the sky they did not go bankrupt altogether, when the in the city she came from. So that evening when men never had a good word for the weather, or Richard said: “The government is sending out the soil, or the government. But she was getting warnings that locusts are expected, coming to learn the language. Farmers’ language. And down from the breeding grounds up North,” her instinct was to look about her at the trees.

1. As it is used here, gathered means “concluded.”

Literary Element Theme What idea about life is 2. The Zambesi escarpment is a series of steep cliffs along the expressed in the opening paragraph? Zambesi River in southern Africa.

1286 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE Ancient Art & Architecture

11286-1291286-1291 U7P2SEL-845482.inddU7P2SEL-845482.indd 12861286 11/29/07/29/07 2:33:422:33:42 PMPM Insects—swarms of them—horrible! But Richard now, to make it acrid and black. Margaret was and the old man had raised their eyes and were watching the hills. Now there was a long, low looking up over the mountain. “We haven’t had cloud advancing, rust-color still, swelling forward locusts in seven years,” they said. “They go in and out as she looked. The telephone was ring- cycles, locusts do.” And then: “There goes our ing. Neighbors—quick, quick, there come the crop for this season!” locusts. Old Smith had had his crop eaten to the But they went on with the work of the farm ground. Quick, get your fires started. For of just as usual until one day they were coming course, while every farmer hoped the locusts up the road to the homestead for the midday would overlook his farm and go on to the next, it break, when old Stephen stopped, raised his was only fair to warn each other; one must play finger and pointed: “Look, look, there they fair. Everywhere, fifty miles over the countryside, are!” the smoke was rising from myriads5 of fires. Out ran Margaret to join them, looking at the Margaret answered the telephone calls, and hills. Out came the servants from the kitchen. between calls she stood watching the locusts. The They all stood and gazed. Over the rocky levels air was darkening. A strange darkness, for the sun of the mountain was a streak of rust-colored air. was blazing—it was like the darkness of a veldt6 Locusts. There they came. fire, when the air gets thick with smoke. The At once Richard shouted at the cookboy. Old sunlight comes down distorted,7 a thick, hot Stephen yelled at the houseboy. The cookboy orange. Oppressive it was, too, with the heaviness ran to beat the old ploughshare3 hanging from a of a storm. The locusts were coming fast. Now tree branch, which was used to summon the half the sky was darkened. Behind the reddish laborers at moments of crisis. The houseboy ran veils in front, which were the advance guards of off to the store to collect tin cans, any old bit of the swarm, the main swarm showed in dense metal. The farm was ringing with the clamor of black cloud, reaching almost to the sun itself. the gong; and they could see the laborers come Margaret was wondering what she could do to pouring out of the compound, pointing at the help. She did not know. Then up came old hills and shouting excitedly. Soon they had all Stephen from the lands. “We’re finished, come up to the house, and Richard and old Margaret, finished! Those beggars can eat every Stephen were giving them orders—Hurry, hurry, leaf and blade off the farm in half an hour! And hurry. it is only early afternoon—if we can make And off they ran again, the two white men enough smoke, make enough noise till the with them, and in a few minutes Margaret sun goes down, they’ll settle somewhere else could see the smoke of fires rising from all perhaps. . . .” And then: “Get the kettle going. around the farmlands. Piles of wood and grass It’s thirsty work, this.” had been prepared there. There were seven So Margaret went to the kitchen, and stoked up patches of bared soil, yellow and oxblood color the fire, and boiled the water. Now, on the tin roof and pink, where the new mealies4 were just of the kitchen she could hear the thuds and bangs showing, making a film of bright green; and of falling locusts, or a scratching slither as one skid- around each drifted up thick clouds of smoke. ded down. Here were the first of them. From down They were throwing wet leaves on to the fires

5. Myriads means “a great or countless number.” 3. A ploughshare is the cutting blade of a plow. 6. The veldt (velt, felt) is a rolling grassland region in southern 4. A mealie is an ear of corn. Africa that has scattered bushes and trees. 7. Here, distorted means “unnatural in appearance.” Reading Strategy Analyzing Conflict What external Reading Strategy conflict does everyone on the farm face? What additional Analyzing Conflict What competing internal conflict does Margaret face? feelings or desires is Margaret struggling with?

Vocabulary Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism What does the locust crisis reveal about the relationship between the acrid (ak rid) adj. burning, biting, or irritating to the landowners and the laborers? taste or smell

DORIS LESSING 1287

1286-1291 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1287 6/23/06 1:21:34 PM thunder. Looking out, all the trees were queer and still, clotted with insects, their boughs weighed to the ground. The earth seemed to be moving, locusts crawling everywhere, she could not see the lands at all, so thick was the swarm. Toward the mountains it was like looking into driving rain— even as she watched, the sun was blotted out with a fresh onrush of them. It was Brown Locust Swarm, South Africa a half-night, a per- verted blackness. on the lands came the beating and banging and Then came a sharp crack from the bush—a clanging of a hundred gasoline cans and bits of branch had snapped off. Then another. A tree metal. Stephen impatiently waited while one down the slope leaned over and settled heavily gasoline can was filled with tea, hot, sweet and to the ground. Through the hail of insects a man orange-colored, and the other with water. In the came running. More tea, more water was needed. meantime, he told Margaret about how twenty She supplied them. She kept the fires stoked and years back he was eaten out, made bankrupt, by the filled cans with liquid, and then it was four in locust armies. And then, still talking, he hoisted up the afternoon, and the locusts had been pouring the gasoline cans, one in each hand, by the wood across overhead for a couple of hours. Up came pieces set cornerwise across each, and jogged off old Stephen again, crunching locusts underfoot down to the road to the thirsty laborers. By now with every step, locusts clinging all over him; he the locusts were falling like hail on to the roof was cursing and swearing, banging with his old of the kitchen. It sounded like a heavy storm. hat at the air. At the doorway he stopped briefly, Margaret looked out and saw the air dark with a hastily pulling at the clinging insects and throw- crisscross of the insects, and she set her teeth and ing them off, then he plunged into the locust- ran out into it—what the men could do, she could. free living room. Overhead the air was thick, locusts everywhere. “All the crops finished. Nothing left,” he said. The locusts were flopping against her, and she But the gongs were still beating, the men still brushed them off, heavy red-brown creatures, look- shouting, and Margaret asked: “Why do you go ing at her with their beady old-men’s eyes while on with it, then?” they clung with hard, serrated8 legs. She held her “The main swarm isn’t settling. They are heavy breath with disgust and ran through into the house. with eggs. They are looking for a place to settle and There it was even more like being in a heavy lay. If we can stop the main body settling on our storm. The iron roof was reverberating,9 and farm, that’s everything. If they get a chance to lay the clamor of iron from the lands was like their eggs, we are going to have everything eaten flat with hoppers10 later on.” He picked a stray locust off his shirt and split it down with his 8. Serrated means “jagged” or “saw-toothed.” thumbnail—it was clotted inside with eggs. 9. Reverberating means “echoing.”

Reading Strategy Analyzing Conflict How does Margaret handle her ignorance and fear? 10. Hoppers are baby locusts.

1288 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE Philip Richardson; Gallo Images/CORBIS

1286-1291 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1288 1/29/07 2:33:52 PM “Imagine that multiplied by millions. You ever seen them touch you?” she asked. He looked at her, dis- a hopper swarm on the march? Well, you’re lucky.” approving. She felt suitably humble—just as she Margaret thought an adult swarm was bad had when he had first taken a good look at her city enough. Outside now the light on the earth was a self, hair waved and golden, nails red and pointed. pale, thin yellow, clotted with moving shadows; the Now she was a proper farmer’s wife, in sensible clouds of moving insects thickened and lightened shoes and a solid skirt. She might even get to let- like driving rain. Old Stephen said, “They’ve got ting locusts settle on her—in time. the wind behind them, that’s something.” Having tossed back a whisky or two, old “Is it very bad?” asked Margaret fearfully, and Stephen went back into the battle, wading now the old man said emphatically: “We’re finished. through glistening brown waves of locusts. This swarm may pass over, but once they’ve Five o’clock. The sun would set in an hour. started, they’ll be coming down from the North Then the swarm would settle. It was as thick over- now one after another. And then there are the head as ever. The trees were ragged mounds of glis- hoppers—it might go on for two or three years.” tening brown. Margaret sat down helplessly, and thought: Well, Margaret began to cry. It was all so hopeless— if it’s the end, it’s the end. What now? We’ll all if it wasn’t a bad season, it was locusts; if it wasn’t three have to go back to town. . . . But at this, she locusts, it was army-worm11 or veldt fires. Always took a quick look at Stephen, the old man who had something. The rustling of the locust armies was farmed forty years in this country, been bankrupt like a big forest in the storm; their settling on the twice, and she knew nothing would make him go roof was like the beating of the rain; the ground and become a clerk in the city. Yet her heart ached was invisible in a sleek, brown, surging tide—it for him, he looked so tired, the worry lines deep was like being drowned in locusts, submerged by from nose to mouth. Poor old man. . . . He had the loathsome brown flood. It seemed as if the lifted up a locust that had got itself somehow into roof might sink in under the weight of them, as if his pocket, holding it in the air by one leg. “You’ve the door might give in under their pressure and got the strength of a steel-spring in those legs of these rooms fill with them—and it was getting so yours,” he was telling the locust, good-humoredly. dark . . . she looked up. The air was thinner; gaps Then, although he had been fighting locusts, of blue showed in the dark, moving clouds. The squashing locusts, yelling at locusts, sweeping them blue spaces were cold and thin—the sun must be in great mounds into the fires to burn for the last setting. Through the fog of insects she saw figures three hours, nevertheless he took this one to the approaching. First old Stephen, marching bravely door and carefully threw it out to join its fellows, as along, then her husband, drawn and haggard if he would rather not harm a hair of its head. This with weariness. Behind them the servants. All comforted Margaret; all at once she felt irrationally were crawling all over with insects. The sound of cheered. She remembered it was not the first time the gongs had stopped. She could hear nothing in the last three years the man had announced but the ceaseless rustle of a myriad wings. their final and irremediable ruin. The two men slapped off the insects and “Get me a drink, lass,” he then said, and she set came in. the bottle of whisky by him. “Well,” said Richard, kissing her on the cheek, In the meantime, out in the pelting storm of “the main swarm has gone over.” insects, her husband was banging the gong, feeding “For the Lord’s sake,” said Margaret angrily, the fires with leaves, the insects clinging to him all still half-crying, “what’s here is bad enough, isn’t over—she shuddered. “How can you bear to let it?” For although the evening air was no longer black and thick, but a clear blue, with a pattern of insects whizzing this way and that across it, Reading Strategy Analyzing Conflict What new insight do we gain about old Stephen’s struggle against the locusts? 11. An army-worm is any of various insect larvae that travel in groups and destroy vegetation. Vocabulary irremediable (ir i me¯ de¯ ə bəl) adj. not subject to rem- Literary Element Theme How does Richard’s attitude edy or cure differ from Margaret’s?

DORIS LESSING 1289

1286-1291 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1289 1/29/07 2:34:01 PM Under the Acacia Tree, 1991. Tilly Willis. Oil on board, 25 x 35 cm. Private collection. Viewing the Art: What sense of the story’s setting do you get from this painting?

everything else—trees, buildings, bushes, earth, new government pamphlet that said how to defeat was gone under the moving brown masses. the hoppers. You must have men out all the time, “If it doesn’t rain in the night and keep them moving over the farm to watch for movement in here—if it doesn’t rain and weight them down with the grass. When you find a patch of hoppers, small water, they’ll be off in the morning at sunrise.” lively black things, like crickets, then you dig “We’re bound to have some hoppers. But not the trenches around the patch or spray them with poi- main swarm—that’s something.” son from pumps supplied by the government. The Margaret roused herself, wiped her eyes, pre- government wanted them to cooperate in a world tended she had not been crying, and fetched plan for eliminating this plague forever. You should them some supper, for the servants were too attack locusts at the source. Hoppers, in short. The exhausted to move. She sent them down to the men were talking as if they were planning a war, compound to rest. and Margaret listened, amazed. She served the supper and sat listening. There is not one maize plant left, she heard. Not one. The men would get the planters out the moment the locusts had gone. They must start all over again. But what’s the use of that, Margaret wondered, Reading Strategy Analyzing Conflict Why do you think if the whole farm was going to be crawling with the men go about resolving their conflict with the locusts in hoppers? But she listened while they discussed the this manner?

1290 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE The Bridgeman Art Library

1286-1291 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1290 1/29/07 2:34:10 PM In the night it was quiet; no sign of the settled the three of them, as the brown crust thinned armies outside, except sometimes a branch snapped, and broke and dissolved, flying up to mass with or a tree could be heard crashing down. the main army, now a brownish-red smear in Margaret slept badly in the bed beside Richard, the southern sky. The lands which had been who was sleeping like the dead, exhausted with filmed with green, the new tender mealie the afternoon’s fight. In the morning she woke to plants, were stark and bare. All the trees yellow sunshine lying across the bed—clear sun- stripped. A devastated landscape. No green, shine, with an occasional blotch of shadow mov- no green anywhere. ing over it. She went to the window. Old By midday the reddish cloud had gone. Only Stephen was ahead of her. There he stood out- an occasional locust flopped down. On the side, gazing down over the bush. And she gazed, ground were the corpses and the wounded. The astounded—and entranced, much against her African laborers were sweeping these up with will. For it looked as if branches and collecting every tree, every bush, them in tins. all the earth, were lit “Ever eaten sun-dried with pale flames. The locust?” asked old locusts were fanning Stephen. “That time their wings to free twenty years ago, when I them of the night dews. went broke, I lived on There was a shimmer of mealie meal and dried red-tinged gold light locusts for three months. everywhere. They aren’t bad at all—rather like smoked fish, if She went out to join the old man, stepping you come to think of it.” carefully among the insects. They stood and But Margaret preferred not even to think of it. watched. Overhead the sky was blue, blue and After the midday meal the men went off to clear. the lands. Everything was to be replanted. With “Pretty,” said old Stephen, with satisfaction. a bit of luck another swarm would not come Well, thought Margaret, we may be ruined, we traveling down just this way. But they hoped it may be bankrupt, but not everyone has seen an would rain very soon, to spring some new grass, army of locusts fanning their wings at dawn. because the cattle would die otherwise—there Over the slopes, in the distance, a faint red was not a blade of grass left on the farm. As for smear showed in the sky, thickened and spread. Margaret, she was trying to get used to the idea “There they go,” said old Stephen. “There goes of three or four years of locusts. Locusts were the main army, off south.” going to be like bad weather, from now on, And now from the trees, from the earth all always imminent. She felt like a survivor after round them, the locusts were taking wing. They war—if this devastated and mangled countryside were like small aircraft, maneuvering for the was not ruin, well, what then was ruin? take-off, trying their wings to see if they were dry But the men ate their supper with good enough. Off they went. A reddish brown steam appetites. was rising off the miles of bush, off the lands, the “It could have been worse,” was what they earth. Again the sunlight darkened. said. “It could be much worse.” And as the clotted branches lifted, the weight on them lightening, there was nothing but the black spines of branches, trees. No green left, nothing. All morning they watched, Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism What message about history itself might Lessing want to convey?

Vocabulary Literary Element Theme How has Margaret’s view of the locusts changed? imminent (im ə nənt) adj. about to happen; impending

DORIS LESSING 1291

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RESPONDING AND THINKING CRITICALLY Respond 6. (a)What words and phrases best help you to picture the locusts fanning their wings in the 1. How might you have felt if you had seen these morning? (b)In your opinion, what do these locusts approaching your home? images add to the story? Recall and Interpret 7. Lessing’s fiction has been called “deeply autobio- 2. (a)Why doesn’t Margaret understand how the farm graphical.” Reread the background information on does not go bankrupt? (b)What can you infer page 1285. What elements of her life might about the nature of “farmer’s language”? Why? Lessing have used in this story? 3. (a)According to Stephen, why do the farmers con- Connect tinue fighting the locusts even after the insects have already destroyed the crops? (b)What does Stephen’s 8. Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism reason for continuing to fight the locusts suggest Lessing writes that “I believe that the chief gift from about his claim that the farmers are “finished”? Africa to writers . . . is the continent itself. . . . Africa gives you the knowledge that man is a small crea- (a)Why does Margaret cry at the end of the first 4. ture, among other creatures, in a large landscape.” day? (b)Why is Margaret so disturbed by the How does Lessing communicate this feeling of locusts? Why aren’t the farmers as upset as she is? smallness in “A Mild Attack of Locusts”? Analyze and Evaluate 5. Why might people who live in the city have a different attitude toward nature than those who live in the country?

PRIMARY VISUAL ARTIFACT

Locust Swarms

The species of locust featured in Lessing’s story is There can be at least 40 million and sometimes as known as the desert locust. Desert locusts are many as 80 million locust adults in each square short-horned grasshoppers (family Acrididae) that kilometer of swarm. A very small part of an aver- are known to change age swarm eats the same amount of food in one their behavior and day as about ten elephants, twenty-five camels, or form swarms of 2,500 people. adults or bands of hoppers. Swarms Group Activity Discuss the following questions typically fly with with your classmates. the wind at a speed of about 16–19 kilo- 1. Find a short passage in “A Mild Attack of meters an hour and Locusts” that this photo might be used to can travel up to illustrate. 130 kilometers a day. 2. How does the photo help you understand Locust swarms can Margaret’s feelings of hopelessness and despair? vary from less than one square kilometer to several hundred square kilometers.

1292 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE Pierre Holtz/Reuters/Corbis

11284-1294284-1294 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 12921292 11/29/07/29/07 2:34:572:34:57 PMPM LITERARY ANALYSIS READING AND VOCABULARY

Literary Element Theme Reading Strategy Analyzing Conflict A story’s theme, or central message about life, is When conflict is external, a struggle occurs between sometimes stated, or expressed directly. More often, a character and some outside force, such as a person though, the theme is implied, or revealed gradually or a group of people, nature, or society. When conflict through events, dialogue, description, or a character’s is internal, a character struggles with two or more actions. Remember, though, that works of literature competing feelings or desires. Review the chart you can have more than one theme. Because of this, a completed on page 1285. story might directly express one theme and then 1. What external force does Margaret struggle against? imply a range of others. 2. With what internal feelings does Margaret struggle? One way to identify a story’s theme is to ask yourself what the main character learns during the course of 3. In your opinion, which of these conflicts is more the story. What does the character think or believe at central to the story? Why? the story’s outset? How, at the end of the story, has this perspective changed? Usually, the lesson learned by the main character has a strong connection to the Vocabulary Practice message the author hopes to send the reader. Practice with Word Origins Match each word 1. What stated theme appears in the first paragraph of below with the correct description of its origin. Use the story? a dictionary to help you. 2. What lesson about farming does Margaret learn 1. acrid a. from a Latin word meaning from her experiences in the story? “to heal” 3. What more general lesson about life—what implied 2. imminent b. from a Latin word meaning theme—can you extrapolate from the lesson “to threaten” Margaret learns? 3. irremediable c. from a Latin word meaning “edge” Review: Title

As you learned on page 1094, the title of a literary work may serve a number of purposes. It may help to explain Academic Vocabulary the setting, provide insight into the theme, or describe the action that will take place in the work. The title “A Here are two words from the vocabulary list on Mild Attack of Locusts” serves several purposes. First, page R82. it describes what will happen in the story—there will kən s¯o¯¯o¯¯m be a swarm of locusts. Second, it describes the farm- consume ( ) v. 1. to destroy completely; ers’ reaction to the attack, which they say was not as to do away with 2. to absorb completely; to bad as it might have been. Lessing‘s title is also an obsess example of understatement, a declaration that pre- overall (o¯´ vər ol ) adj. including everything; sents something as being less important than it really total is, thereby focusing the reader’s attention on something the author wants to emphasize. Practice and Apply Group Activity Discuss the following questions with 1. In your opinion, which is the greater threat to a group of classmates. Margaret: that which is consuming the farm, or that which consumes her thoughts? Explain. 1. In what way is the title “A Mild Attack of Locusts” an 2. How do the initial words and behaviors of the understatement? What idea does Lessing wish to men contradict their overall attitude toward the emphasize? locusts? 2. Come up with another title for this story. Why do you think your alternate title is appropriate?

DORIS LESSING 1293

1284-1294 U7P2APP-845482.indd 1293 6/23/06 1:22:40 PM WRITING AND EXTENDING GRAMMAR AND STYLE

Writing About Literature Lessing’s Language and Style Compare and Contrast Characters “A Mild Attack Comparing with Like and As In “A Mild Attack of of Locusts” can be read as one family’s battle against a Locusts,” Lessing communicates the impact of the natural calamity. Each member of the family, however, locust swarm on the farm by comparing the insects’ responds to the calamity differently. Write a brief essay appearance and movements to other objects or in which you compare and contrast the response of events. Consider, for example, these sentences from Margaret, Richard, and Stephen to the threat—and the the story: reality—of the locust swarm. “The rustling of the locust armies was like a big forest Before you begin, you may want to create a diagram in the storm.” like this one for each character. “It seemed as if the roof might sink in under the weight of them.” Character: Although both sentences make comparisons, the sig- nal words differ according to the sentence structure. Like, a preposition, is used to introduce a prepositional phrase; as and as if, subordinating conjunctions, intro- Words: Actions: duce subordinate clauses. Both forms of comparison help an author describe an experience from a particular character’s point of view. That is, they create subjective images while also com- Overall attitude: municating objective happenings. In the comparisons above, Lessing effectively evokes the claustrophobic feeling Margaret is experiencing—while also communi- cating the literal sound and weight of the swarming After you complete your draft, meet with a peer insects. reviewer to read each other’s work and to offer suggestions for revision. Be sure to proofread your draft Activity Scan the story for other examples of compar- for errors in spelling, grammar, and punctuation. isons using like, as, or as if. Explain whether the linking word in each example introduces a prepositional phrase or a subordinate clause. Then explain which Internet Connection kind of comparison, in your opinion, creates more Locust swarms are a major hazard for farmers in vivid, effective images and why. Africa, the Middle East, and southwest Asia. What other natural hazards threaten farms in southern Revising Check Africa, where “A Mild Attack of Locusts” is set? What are some natural hazards that threaten farms in other Comparing Words Because “A Mild Attack of regions of the world, such as Europe, Central America, Locusts” is told from Margaret’s point of view, many and the South Pacific? Conduct an Internet search to of the comparisons in the story give hints about find answers to these questions. Present your findings Margaret’s attitude toward what is happening. With a to the class in a brief oral report. partner, review your essay comparing and contrasting characters’ responses to the swarm. How might you incorporate one or two comparisons from the story as textual support for your discussion of Margaret’s response? How might you use one or two original comparisons to describe the responses of the men?

Web Activities For eFlashcards, Selection Quick Checks, and other Web activities, go to www.glencoe.com.

1294 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE

11284-1294284-1294 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 12941294 66/23/06/23/06 1:22:511:22:51 PMPM BEFORE YOU READ

The Train from Rhodesia

MEET NADINE GORDIMER

adine Gordimer grew up in a South Africa that was divided along racial lines. Born Nin a mining town near the capital, Johannesburg, Gordimer was the daughter of wealthy parents of European descent. As a member of the white minority—and in the care of an over- protective mother—Gordimer was sheltered from the harsher effects of apartheid, South Africa’s official policy of racial segregation (which was abolished in the early 1990s). During frequent trips to the library, the young Gordimer began reading about the injustices suffered by her black colonialism, and the superficial liberalism of her compatriots, and as her awareness of their prob- privileged peers. lems grew, so did her desire to help. Writing and Politics Gordimer is often praised for her skillful handling of sensitive political and social themes. Her writing is distinguished by a “I did not, at the beginning, expect to dispassionate tone that is free from sentimentality earn a living by being read. I wrote as or bias. To achieve objectivity, Gordimer often presents several different, opposing perspectives a child out of the joy of apprehending on an event or situation in her stories. Gordimer life through my senses—the look and claims that an author can transcend his or her own politics but still remain engaged in the political scent and feel of things.” realities of the time. —Nadine Gordimer Although several of her books were banned in South Africa before the demise of apartheid, Gordimer, unlike many of her contemporaries, In Black and White Gordimer began writing by refused to go into exile. Gordimer has periodically the age of nine, and her first story was published in left South Africa for lecture tours and teaching a Johannesburg magazine when she was only fif- assignments in the United States, but she has teen. Gordimer has referred to herself as a “natural remained a citizen of her native country to this writer”—one who never made a conscious decision day. She is a long-time member of the African to write. National Congress, the nation’s governing political party since 1994, and is a founding member of the As Gordimer matured, her writing became more Congress of South African Writers. Gordimer has consciously concerned with the dehumanizing received many awards for her work, including the effects of racial prejudice. Throughout the 1950s Nobel Prize in Literature in 1991. and 1960s, Gordimer published novels and col- Nadine Gordimer was born in 1923. lections of short stories that explored issues related to apartheid: the narrow-mindedness of small-town life, the psychology of the master/ Author Search For more about servant relationship, the paranoia resulting from Nadine Gordimer, go to www.glencoe.com.

NADINE GORDIMER 1295 Fay Goodwin/Network/SABA

11295-1303295-1303 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 12951295 11/29/07/29/07 2:35:512:35:51 PMPM LITERATURE PREVIEW READING PREVIEW

Connecting to the Story Reading Strategy Visualizing Have you ever traveled someplace where you felt a When you visualize, you form mental pictures of what distinct divide between tourists and local people? As is happening in the story based on the details provided you read “The Train from Rhodesia,” think about the by the narrator. This strategy can be useful when the following questions: narrator presents the story from multiple points of view. Picturing the story’s setting or events in your mind’s eye How should tourists treat local people? • can help you determine when the point of view, or per- How can tourists both help and hurt developing • spective, is shifting from one character to another. nations? Building Background Reading Tip: Taking Notes As you read, note how certain objects or events appear—and who is viewing them. “The Train from Rhodesia” takes place sometime during the early or mid-1900s at an African train station where black merchants have gathered to sell their Appearance wares to white passengers. Under apartheid, blacks in or Effect Observer South Africa could not vote in national elections, own property, or live in areas reserved for whites. Denied “The train came the stationmaster basic rights, many blacks lived in abject poverty, eking out of the red out a living by selling goods to white tourists. The horizon and bore prices of these goods were rarely fixed; instead, buyer down toward them and seller bargained, or haggled, over prices. over the single straight track.” Setting Purposes for Reading

Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism As you read “The Train from Rhodesia,” notice how the physical separation of characters symbolizes a broader Vocabulary social barrier between groups of people. vendor (ven dər) n. one who sells goods; p. 1297 The vendor offered a selection of sandwiches and Literary Element Setting drinks. Setting refers to the time and place in which the career (kə rer¯ ) v. to move or run with a swift events of a story occur. The setting of a story can headlong motion; to rush or dash along; p. 1299 include not only physical surroundings, but also the The children careered toward the playground with ideas, customs, values, and beliefs of the people who squeals of delight. live there. As you read this story, observe the ways in which various characters perceive and interact with wryly (r¯ le¯) adv. in a twisted or distorted man- their surroundings. ner; p. 1301 Her face twisted wryly with displeasure. • See Literary Terms Handbook, p. R16. sinew (sin u¯ ) n. a tendon; p. 1301 The sculpture represented every muscle and sinew in the athlete’s body.

Vocabulary Tip: Context Clues You can figure out the meaning of an unfamiliar word by looking for clues in Interactive Literary Elements Handbook To review or learn more about the literary elements, the surrounding words or sentences. go to www.glencoe.com.

OBJECTIVES In studying this selection, you will focus on the following: • analyzing setting and symbol • connecting literature to historical contexts • visualizing details

1296 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE

11295-1303295-1303 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 12961296 11/10/07/10/07 2:50:322:50:32 PMPM The Refreshment Car. Poster, 1928. Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

Nadine Gordimer

The train came out of the red horizon and well. A stir of preparedness rippled through the bore down toward them over the single straight squatting native vendors waiting in the dust; the track. The stationmaster came out of his little face of a carved wooden animal, eternally sur- brick station with its pointed chalet roof, feeling prised, stuck out of a sack. the creases in his serge1 uniform in his legs as

1. Serge is a twilled cloth. Vocabulary Literary Element Setting In what physical surroundings ven dər is this story set? vendor ( ) n. one who sells goods

NADINE GORDIMER 1297 Victoria & Albert Museum, London/Art Resource, NY

11297-1301297-1301 U7P2SEL-845482.inddU7P2SEL-845482.indd 12971297 11/29/07/29/07 2:38:022:38:02 PMPM The stationmaster’s barefoot children wan- it up to her still smiling, dered over. From the gray mud huts with the not from the heart, but at untidy heads that stood within a decorated the customer. Between its mud wall, chickens, and dogs with their skin Vandyke teeth, in the mouth stretched like parchment over their bones, fol- opened in an endless roar too lowed the piccanins2 down to the track. The terrible to be heard, it had a flushed and perspiring west cast a reflection, black tongue. Look, said the faint, without heat, upon the station, upon the young husband, if you don’t Visual Vocabulary tin shed marked “Goods,” upon the walled mind! And round the neck Vandyke means kraal,3 upon the gray tin house of the station- of the thing, a piece of fur “V-shaped,” as in master and upon the sand, that lapped all (rat? rabbit? meerkat?); a real a Vandyke beard. around, from sky to sky, cast little rhythmical mane, majestic, telling you cups of shadow, so that the sand became the somehow that the artist had delight in the lion. sea, and closed over the children’s black feet All up and down the length of the train in the softly and without imprint. dust the artists sprang, walking bent, like per- The stationmaster’s wife sat behind the forming animals, the better to exhibit the fantasy mesh of her verandah. Above her head the held toward the faces on the train. Buck, startled hunk of a sheep’s carcass moved slightly, dan- and stiff, staring with round black and white gling in a current of air. eyes. More lions, standing erect, grappling5 with They waited. strange, thin, elongated warriors who clutched The train called out, along the sky; but there spears and showed no fear in their slits of eyes. was no answer; and the cry hung on: I’m com- How much, they asked from the train, how ing . . . I’m coming . . . much? The engine flared out now, big, whisking a Give me penny, said the little ones with dwindling body behind it; the track flared out to nothing to sell. The dogs went and sat, quite let it in. still, under the dining car, where the train Creaking, jerking, jostling, gasping, the train breathed out the smell of meat cooking with filled the station. onion. A man passed beneath the arch of reaching Here, let me see that one—the young woman arms meeting gray-black and white in the curved her body further out of the corridor win- exchange of money for the staring wooden dow. Missus? smiled the old boy, looking at the eyes, the stiff wooden legs sticking up in the creatures he held in his hand. From a piece of air; went along under the voices and the bar- string on his gray finger hung a tiny woven bas- gaining, interrogating the wheels. Past the ket; he lifted it, questioning. No, no, she urged, dogs; glancing up at the dining car where he leaning down toward him, across the height of could stare at the faces, behind glass, drinking the train, toward the man in the piece of old rug; beer, two by two, on either side of a uniform that one, that one, her hand commanded. It was railway vase with its pale dead flower. Right to a lion, carved out of soft dry wood that looked the end, to the guard’s van, where the station- like spongecake; heraldic,4 black and white, with master’s children had just collected their impressionistic detail burnt in. The old man held mother’s two loaves of bread; to the engine itself, where the stationmaster and the driver stood talking against the steaming complaint 2. Piccanins is a name some people used for black children in of the resting beast. Africa. 3. A kraal is an enclosure for livestock. The man called out to them, something loud 4. The lion is heraldic because it resembles the rearing lions and joking. They turned to laugh, in a twirl of often found on coats of arms (or family crests). Heraldry is the craft of describing and representing coats of arms. 5. Grappling means “wrestling.” Reading Strategy Visualizing Visualize the arrangement in space of the woman and the old man. What does it tell Literary Element Setting What two worlds, or settings, are you about their relationship? divided by the window? What do these two worlds represent?

1298 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE Hulton Getty/Liaison Agency

11297-1301297-1301 U7P2SEL-845482.inddU7P2SEL-845482.indd 12981298 11/29/07/29/07 2:38:142:38:14 PMPM Compartment C, Car 293, 1938. Edward Hopper. Oil on canvas.

steam. The two children careered over the looked up with their brown eyes, not expecting sand, clutching the bread, and burst through anything. the iron gate and up the path through the gar- —No, leave it, said the girl, don’t take it. . . . den in which nothing grew. Too expensive, too much, she shook her Passengers drew themselves in at the corridor head and raised her voice to the old boy, giving windows and turned into compartments to fetch up the lion. He held it up where she had money, to call someone to look. Those sitting handed it to him. No, she said, shaking her inside looked up: suddenly different, caged faces, head. Three-and-six? 6 insisted her husband, boxed in, cut off, after the contact of outside. loudly. Yes baas! laughed the boy. Three-and- There was an orange a piccanin would like. . . . six?—the young man was incredulous. Oh leave What about that chocolate? It wasn’t very nice. . . . it—she said. The young man stopped. Don’t A young girl had collected a handful of the you want it? he said, keeping his face closed to hard kind, that no one liked, out of the choco- the boy. No, never mind, she said, leave it. The late box, and was throwing them to the dogs, old native kept his head on one side, looking at over at the dining car. But the hens darted in, them sideways, holding the lion. Three-and-six, and swallowed the chocolates, incredibly quick he murmured, as old people repeat things to and accurate, before they had even dropped in themselves. the dust, and the dogs, a little bewildered, The young woman drew her head in. She went into the coupé 7 and sat down. Out of the window, on the other side, there was nothing; Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism How does this sentence portray European colonists in Africa?

6. Three-and-six is three shillings and sixpence, the equivalent Vocabulary today of somewhere between five and twenty American career (kə rer¯ ) v. to move or run with a swift headlong dollars, depending on the exact time the story takes place. motion; to rush or dash along 7. On British trains, a coupé is a half-compartment at the end of a passenger car with only one row of seats.

NADINE GORDIMER 1299 Geoffrey Clements/CORBIS

1297-1301 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1299 6/23/06 1:25:47 PM train, clinging to the obser- vation platforms, or perhaps merely standing on the iron step, holding the rail; but on the train, safe from the one dusty platform, the one tin house, the empty sand. There was a grunt. The train jerked. Through the glass the beer drinkers looked out, as if they could not see beyond it. Behind the fly- screen, the stationmaster’s wife sat facing back at them beneath the darkening hunk of meat. There was a shout. The flag drooped out. Joints not yet coordinated, the seg- mented body of the train heaved and bumped back against itself. It began to move; slowly the scrolled chalet moved past it, the sand and bush; a thorn tree. Back through the yells of the natives, running alongside, jetted open doorway, past the figure of her husband up into the air, fell back at different levels. in the corridor, there was the station, the Staring wooden faces waved drunkenly, there, voices, wooden animals waving, running feet. then gone, questioning for the last time at the Her eye followed the funny little valance of windows. Here, one-and-six baas!—As one scrolled wood that outlined the chalet roof automatically opens a hand to catch a thrown of the station; she thought of the lion and ball, a man fumbled wildly down his pocket, smiled. That bit of fur round the neck. But the brought up the shilling and sixpence and wooden buck, the hippos, the elephants, the threw them out; the old native, gasping, his baskets that already bulked out of their brown skinny toes splaying the sand, flung the lion. paper under the seat and on the luggage rack! The piccanins were waving, the dogs stood, How will they look at home? Where will you tails uncertain, watching the train go: past the put them? What will they mean away from the mud huts, where a woman turned to look, up places you found them? Away from the unreality from the smoke of the fire, her hand pausing of the last few weeks? The man outside. But he on her hip. is not part of the unreality; he is for good now. The stationmaster went slowly in under the Odd . . . somewhere there was an idea that he, chalet. that living with him, was part of the holiday, the The old native stood, breath blowing out the strange places. skin between his ribs, feet tense, balanced in Outside, a bell rang. The stationmaster was the sand, smiling and shaking his head. In his leaning against the end of the train, green flag opened palm, held in the attitude of receiving, rolled in readiness. A few men who had got was the retrieved shilling and sixpence. down to stretch their legs sprang on to the

Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism What is Literary Element Setting What realization about an arti- implied in this passage about the European colonialists’ atti- fact and its setting does the woman have? tude toward, and understanding of, native black Africans?

1300 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE africanpictures.net

1297-1301 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1300 1/29/07 2:38:22 PM The blind end of the train was being pulled Oh you—she said, hopeless and furious. helplessly out of the station. You. . . . She threw the lion on to the seat. He stood looking at her. The young man swung in from the corridor, She sat down again in the corner and, her face breathless. He was shaking his head with laugh- slumped in her hand, stared out of the window. ter and triumph. Here! he said. And waggled Everything was turning round inside her. One- the lion at her. One-and-six! and-six. One-and-six. One-and-six for the wood What? she said. and the carving and the sinews of the legs and He laughed. I was arguing with him for fun, the switch of the tail. The mouth open like that bargaining—when the train had pulled out and the teeth. The black tongue, rolling, like a already, he came tearing after. . . . One-and-six wave. The mane round the neck. To give one- Baas! So there’s your lion. and-six for that. The heat of shame mounted She was holding it away from her, the head through her legs and body and sounded in her with the open jaws, the pointed teeth, the ears like the sound of sand pouring. Pouring, black tongue, the wonderful ruff of fur facing pouring. She sat there, sick. A weariness, a taste- her. She was looking at it with an expression of lessness, the discovery of a void made her hands not seeing, of seeing something different. Her slacken their grip, atrophy8 emptily, as if the face was drawn up, wryly, like the face of a dis- hour was not worth their grasp. She was feeling comforted child. Her mouth lifted nervously at like this again. She had thought it was some- the corner. Very slowly, cautious, she lifted her thing to do with singleness, with being alone and finger and touched the mane, where it was belonging too much to oneself. joined to the wood. She sat there not wanting to move or speak, But how could you, she said. He was shocked or to look at anything, even; so that the mood by the dismay of her face. should be associated with nothing, no object, Good Lord, he said, what’s the matter? word or sight that might recur and so recall the If you wanted the thing, she said, her voice feeling again. . . . Smuts blew in grittily, settled rising and breaking with the shrill impotence of on her hands. Her back remained at exactly the anger, why didn’t you buy it in the first place? If same angle, turned against the young man sitting you wanted it, why didn’t you pay for it? Why with his hands drooping between his sprawled didn’t you take it decently, when he offered it? legs, and the lion, fallen on its side in the corner. Why did you have to wait for him to run after the train with it, and give him one-and-six? The train had cast the station like a skin. It One-and-six! called out to the sky, I’m coming, I’m coming; She was pushing it at him, trying to force him and again, there was no answer. to take it. He stood astonished, his hands hang-

ing at his sides. 8. Here, atrophy means “go slack; weaken.” But you wanted it! You liked it so much? —It’s a beautiful piece of work, she said Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism What fiercely, as if to protect it from him. epiphany, or sudden realization, does the woman experience in this passage? You liked it so much! You said yourself it was

too expensive— Reading Strategy Visualizing What does the body language of each character symbolize?

Vocabulary Vocabulary wryly (r¯ le¯) adv. in a twisted or distorted manner sinew (sin u¯ ) n. a tendon

NADINE GORDIMER 1301

1297-1301 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1301 6/23/06 1:26:13 PM AFTER YOU READ

RESPONDING AND THINKING CRITICALLY Respond Analyze and Evaluate 1. Were you surprised by the woman’s reaction to her 5. The man is confused by the woman’s reaction to husband’s “bargain”? Explain. the purchase. How would you explain to him what she is feeling? Recall and Interpret 6. What might the train from Rhodesia symbolize, or 2. (a)At the beginning of the story, who is waiting for represent, in this story? the train? (b)How do these people differ from the passengers? 7. Gordimer does not use quotation marks to set off the dialogue in this story. How does this aspect of 3. (a)Describe the artifact the old man wants to sell her style affect your reading of the story? to the woman. (b)What does the description of the artifact imply about its value? Connect

4. (a)Why does the woman decide against buying 8. Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism the carved lion? (b)What does her reaction to How might the economics at work in this story be her husband’s “bargain” suggest about her new viewed as a microcosm, or small-scale representa- perspective? tion, of colonial economics?

LITERARY ANALYSIS

Literary Element Setting Review: Symbol In a sense, “The Train from Rhodesia” is a story As you learned on page 1078, a symbol is any about setting itself—and about what happens when object, person, place, or experience that exists on a lit- two very different settings collide. Occupying the eral level but also represents something beyond itself. world inside the train—the European world of tour- Clues to the symbolism in a story can sometimes ism and travel—are the woman who admires the be found in the title. For example, “The Train from merchant’s carved lion and the husband who hag- Rhodesia” suggests that the train itself is a key sym- gles over it “for fun.” Occupying the world outside bol in Gordimer’s story. Stories are not limited to a the train—the African world of hungry dogs and gray single symbol, however. Often, objects and events mud huts—is the vendor himself, and others like that occur around the central symbol extend or him, whose livelihood depends upon the “sport” of deepen the symbolic power of the story as a whole. haggling. As the woman interacts with this foreign Group Activity Read each quotation from the story setting and its inhabitants, she comes to realize that in the three examples below. Then discuss possible she lives in a fantasy world and that the real world symbolic meanings of the boldfaced words. exists outside the train. By juxtaposing these two settings, Gordimer also invites the reader to expand 1. “From a piece of string on his gray finger hung a or revise his or her view of Africa—to consider how tiny woven basket; he lifted it, questioning. No, no, it has been altered, and in some ways infected, by she urged, leaning down toward him, across the its colonial history. height of the train . . . that one, that one, her hand commanded. It was a lion, carved out of soft dry 1. Why do you think Gordimer does not specify the wood . . . “ exact time and place of the story? 2. “All up and down the length of the train in the dust 2. One result of the contact between the two worlds the artists sprang, walking bent, like performing is that the lion carving becomes cheapened. What animals, the better to exhibit the fantasy held else—or who else—becomes cheapened in the toward the faces on the train.” transaction? Explain. 3. “The train had cast the station like a skin.”

1302 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE

11295-1303295-1303 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13021302 11/29/07/29/07 2:36:032:36:03 PMPM READINGLITERARY AND ANALYSISVOCABULARY READINGWRITING AND AND VOCABULARY EXTENDING

Reading Strategy Visualizing Writing About Literature In the same way that an artist arranges people and Analyze Figurative Language Throughout “The objects on a canvas, an author arranges people and Train from Rhodesia,” Gordimer personifies the train. objects in the space of a story’s setting. Visualizing It “calls out,” “gasps,” and “breathes,” among other these spatial arrangements can help you understand actions. In a brief essay, analyze Gordimer’s use of the relationships and conflicts between characters. It personification in the story. Why do you think she can also help you keep track of shifting perspectives, chooses to describe the train this way? What does or points of view. the personification add to the story? How effective is it? As you write, follow the path below. Read each passage from the story below, visualizing the scene being described. Then identify the perspec- START tive or the relationship suggested by the description.

Present your opinion about the 1. “Creaking, jerking, jostling, gasping, the train filled ▲▲ Introduction effectiveness of the personifica- the station.” (page 1298) tion and why Gordimer uses it. 2. “Back through the open doorway, past the figure of ➧ her husband in the corridor, there was the station, the voices, wooden animals waving, running feet.” Body Add supporting evidence. (page 1300) Paragraph(s) ➧ Vocabulary Practice Briefly summarize your Practice with Context Clues For each sentence ▲ Conclusion position and consider offering below, identify the context clues that help you deter- a related insight. mine the meaning of the boldfaced vocabulary word. FINISH 1. The vendor searched through his bag of wares to fi nd the item the shopper requested. After you complete your draft, exchange papers with a a. searched b. bag c. wares peer reviewer. Use your peer’s suggestions to revise 2. The roller coaster crawled up to the peak and your work. Be sure to proofread your final draft for then careered toward the ground with thrilling errors in spelling, grammar, and punctuation. speed. a. crawled b. toward c. speed Interdisciplinary Activity: History 3. The baby screwed his face up wryly and then spat out the spinach. Investigate the major political changes that have a. screwed b. spat c. spinach occurred in Rhodesia during Gordimer’s lifetime. Using 4. The muscles and sinews in the cheetah’s hind a history book, an encyclopedia, or the Internet, find legs fl exed as the large cat prepared to leap. answers to the following questions: a. cheetah’s b. fl exed c. cat • What effects did British rule have on the native people of Rhodesia? • When did Northern Rhodesia and Southern Rhodesia become Zambia and Zimbabwe? • How are these countries governed now? Take notes on your answers and use them to present a brief oral report to your class.

Web Activities For eFlashcards, Selection Quick Checks, and other Web activities, go to www.glencoe.com.

NADINE GORDIMER 1303

11295-1303295-1303 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13031303 11/29/07/29/07 2:36:102:36:10 PMPM BEFORE YOU READ

Dead Men’s Path

MEET CHINUA ACHEBE

igerian author Chinua Achebe (che¯ no¯¯¯¯o ə ə cha¯ ba¯) is considered one of Africa’s fin- Nest fiction writers. A “strange, early trib- ute” helped inspire him to pursue a writing career. When he was a university student in Nigeria, a retired English ambassador visited the school and read aloud an amusing limerick Achebe had written. At the time, Achebe had not thought about effects of African contact with Western ways. The becoming a writer, but he said, “when I heard my protagonist of the novel is a proud village leader name and nonsense poem recited . . . you could who refuses to adopt Western culture. have knocked me over with a feather.” After Nigeria gained independence from England A member of the Ibo (e¯ bo¯) tribe, Achebe grew in 1960, Achebe was one of many who grew disil- up in the village of Ogidi, where his father taught lusioned with the new government, a military dic- at the local missionary school. His parents, who tatorship, and attempted to establish a separate were devout Protestants, gave him the name nation in eastern Nigeria called Biafra. As chair- Albert. While studying at the University College man of the Biafra National Guidance Committee, at Ibadan (which was also the alma mater of prom- Achebe traveled abroad with other writers, seeking inent Nigerian writer Wole Soyinka), Achebe support for the Biafran cause. In the ensuing civil rejected his European name and adopted the war, approximately one million Ibo died fighting African name Chinualumogu, meaning “My spirit for independence, many from disease and starva- come fight for me.” He majored in English litera- tion. The collapse of Biafra and its reunification ture and decided he wanted to become a writer. with Nigeria in 1970 prompted Achebe to retire from political life and live abroad, devoting himself to writing and teaching.

“At the University I read some Acclaimed Novelist In the late 1970s, when appalling European novels about Nigeria once again became a republic, Achebe returned to his native country. A car accident near Africa . . . and realized that our story Lagos in 1990 left him paralyzed below the waist could not be told for us by anyone else.” and confined to a wheelchair. He then accepted a teaching position at Bard College in New York. —Chinua Achebe Achebe’s fiction, remarkable for its psychological depth and social insight, is popular throughout the world. In addition to Things Fall Apart, his novels Crusader for Biafra From 1954 to 1963, include No Longer at Ease (1960), Arrow of God Achebe worked as a producer for the Nigerian (1964), A Man of the People (1966), and Anthills of Broadcasting Company (NBC) in Lagos, the the Savannah (1987). Nigerian capital. While holding this position, he began his career as a writer with the publication of Chinua Achebe was born in 1930. Things Fall Apart (1958), an immediate triumph. In this novel, Achebe explores the traumatic Author Search For more about Chinua Achebe, go to www.glencoe.com.

1304 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE Miriam Berkley

11304-1311304-1311 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13041304 11/29/07/29/07 2:39:082:39:08 PMPM LITERATURE PREVIEW READING PREVIEW

Connecting to the Story Reading Strategy Analyzing History often involves the age-old struggle between Characterization the new and the old, the modern and the traditional. When you analyze characterization, you identify the Achebe’s story reflects this conflict. As you read, think main qualities that make up a character’s personality about the following questions: and then determine how they affect events in the • What do the words modern and traditional suggest story. Characterization refers to the methods that to you? authors use to reveal characters. These methods Is progress always a good thing? include describing a character’s appearance, actions, • speech, and thoughts. Building Background This story is set in a mission school near a small vil- Reading Tip: Mapping Character Use a web to lage in Nigeria in 1949. At that time, Nigeria was map the character of Michael Obi. Create additional still a British colony, and Western ideas were sweep- webs for Obi’s wife and the village priest. ing across Africa. Mission schools sought to give stu- dents a solid academic education and to instruct them in Christian beliefs and traditions so that they other characters’ narrator’s comments comments would put aside the pagan ways of their ancestors. Many of Achebe’s stories depict the effects of Western cultures on African traditions. He wrote: Michael Obi “We have been subjected—and have subjected

ourselves too—to this period during which we have speech and appearance accepted everything alien as good and practically thoughts everything local or native as inferior.” actions Setting Purposes for Reading

Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism As you read “Dead Men’s Path,” consider what hap- Vocabulary pens when old African ways come into conflict with pivotal (piv ət əl) adj. of central or vital impor- new Western ideas. tance; p. 1306 Maria’s experiences in the army were pivotal in developing her character. Literary Element Conflict denigration (den´ i ra¯ shən) n. defamation of A conflict, or struggle between two opposing forces, is one’s character or reputation; slander; p. 1307 central to all plots. In an external conflict, the main The leader suffered ongoing denigration from his character struggles against an outside force. This force enemies and a hostile press. may be another character, society, nature, or fate. As you read, notice the external conflict in this story. superannuated (soo¯¯¯´ pər an u¯ a¯´ tid) adj. out of date; p. 1307 The teenager considered her mother • See Literary Terms Handbook, p. R4. old-fashioned and her taste in clothes superannuated.

Vocabulary Tip: Analogies Analogies are comparisons based on relationships between ideas. Interactive Literary Elements Handbook To review or learn more about the literary elements, go to www.glencoe.com.

OBJECTIVES In studying this selection, you will focus on the following: • understanding conflict • analyzing literary periods • analyzing characterization CHINUA ACHEBE 1305

11304-1311304-1311 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13051305 11/10/07/10/07 2:59:052:59:05 PMPM Chinua Achebe

An Igbo mural painting, c. 1980.

M ichael Obi’s hopes were fulfilled teacher” in the official records and set him apart much earlier than he had expected. He was from the other headmasters in the mission field. He appointed headmaster of Ndume Central School in was outspoken in his condemnation1 of the narrow January 1949. It had always been an unprogressive views of these older and often less-educated ones. school, so the Mission authorities decided to send a “We shall make a good job of it, shan’t we?” young and energetic man to run it. Obi accepted he asked his young wife when they first heard this responsibility with enthusiasm. He had many the joyful news of his promotion. wonderful ideas and this was an opportunity to put them into practice. He had had sound secondary school education which designated him a “pivotal 1. Condemnation means “the act of severely disapproving of something.”

Vocabulary Reading Strategy Analyzing Characterization What pivotal (piv ət əl) adj. of central or vital importance strengths and weaknesses does Obi bring to his job?

1306 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE Margaret Courtney-Clarke/CORBIS

1306-1308 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1306 6/23/06 1:28:13 PM “We shall do our best,” she replied. “We shall “A penny for your thoughts, Mike,” said have such beautiful gardens and everything will Nancy after a while, imitating the woman’s mag- be just modern and delightful . . .” In their two azine she read. years of married life she had become completely “I was thinking what a grand opportunity infected by his passion for “modern methods” and we’ve got at last to show these people how a his denigration of “these old and superannuated school should be run.” people in the teaching field who would be better Ndume School was backward in every sense employed as traders in the Onitsha2 market.” of the word. Mr. Obi put his whole life into the She began to see herself already as the admired work, and his wife hers too. He had two aims. A wife of the young headmaster, the queen of the high standard of teaching was insisted upon, and school. the school compound3 was to be turned into a The wives of the other teachers would envy place of beauty. Nancy’s dream-gardens came to her position. She would set the fashion in every- life with the coming of the rains, and blossomed. thing . . . Then, suddenly, it occurred to her Beautiful hibiscus and allamanda hedges in bril- that there might not be other wives. Wavering liant red and yellow marked out the carefully between hope and fear, she asked her husband, tended school compound from the rank neigh- looking anxiously at him. borhood bushes. “All our colleagues are young and unmarried,” One evening as Obi was admiring his work he he said with enthusiasm which for once she was scandalized to see an old woman from the did not share. “Which is a good thing,” he village hobble right across the compound, continued. through a marigold flower bed and the hedges. “Why?” On going up there he found faint signs of an “Why? They will give all their time and almost disused path from the village across the energy to the school.” school compound to the bush on the other side. Nancy was downcast. For a few minutes she “It amazes me,” said Obi to one of his teachers became skeptical about the new school; but it who had been three years in the school, “that was only for a few minutes. Her little personal you people allowed the villagers to make use of misfortune could not blind her to her husband’s this footpath. It is simply incredible.” He shook happy prospects. She looked at him as he sat his head. folded up in a chair. He was stoop-shouldered “The path,” said the teacher apologetically, and looked frail. But he sometimes surprised peo- “appears to be very important to them. Although ple with sudden bursts of physical energy. In his it is hardly used, it connects the village shrine present posture, however, all his bodily strength with their place of burial.” seemed to have retired behind his deep-set eyes, “And what has that got to do with the giving them an extraordinary power of penetra- school?” asked the headmaster. tion. He was only twenty-six, but looked thirty “Well, I don’t know,” replied the other with a or more. On the whole, he was not unhandsome. shrug of the shoulders. “But I remember there was a big row4 some time ago when we attempted to close it.” 2. Onitsha is a commercial city in Nigeria.

Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism How has modernization affected young Nigerians like Obi’s wife? 3. A compound is a group of buildings. Vocabulary 4. As it is used here, a row (rou) is a noisy disturbance or quarrel. denigration (den´ i ra¯ shən) n. defamation of one’s character or reputation; slander Reading Strategy Analyzing Characterization What superannuated (soo¯¯¯´ pər an u¯ a¯´ tid) adj. out of date does this detail reveal about Obi?

CHINUA ACHEBE 1307

1306-1308 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1307 6/23/06 1:28:34 PM “That was some time ago. But it will not be “The whole purpose of our school,” he said used now,” said Obi as he walked away. “What finally, “is to eradicate just such beliefs as that. will the Government Education Officer think of Dead men do not require footpaths. The whole this when he comes to inspect the school next idea is just fantastic. Our duty is to teach your week? The villagers might, for all I know, decide children to laugh at such ideas.” to use the schoolroom for a pagan5 ritual during “What you say may be true,” replied the the inspection.” priest, “but we follow the practices of our Heavy sticks were planted closely across the fathers. If you reopen the path we shall have path at the two places where it entered and left nothing to quarrel about. What I always say is: the school premises. These were further strength- let the hawk perch and let the eagle perch.” He ened with barbed wire. rose to go. “I am sorry,” said the young headmaster. “But Three days later the village priest of Ani called the school compound cannot be a thoroughfare. on the headmaster. He was an old man and It is against our regulations. I would suggest your walked with a slight stoop. He carried a stout constructing another path, skirting our premises. walking stick which he usually tapped on the We can even get our boys to help in building it. floor, by way of emphasis, each time he made a I don’t suppose the ancestors will find the little new point in his argument. detour too burdensome.” “I have heard,” he said after the usual “I have no more words to say,” said the priest, exchange of cordialities, “that our ancestral foot- already outside. path has recently been closed . . . ” Two days later a young woman in the village “Yes,” replied Mr. Obi. “We cannot allow peo- died in childbed. A diviner6 was immediately ple to make a highway of our school compound.” consulted and he prescribed heavy sacrifices to “Look here, my son,” said the priest bringing propitiate7 ancestors insulted by the fence. down his walking stick, “this path was here Obi woke up next morning among the ruins of before you were born and before your father was his work. The beautiful hedges were torn up not born. The whole life of this village depends on just near the path but right round the school, the it. Our dead relatives depart by it and our ances- flowers trampled to death and one of the school tors visit us by it. But most important, it is the buildings pulled down . . . That day, the white path of children coming in to be born . . . ” Supervisor came to inspect the school and wrote Mr. Obi listened with a satisfied smile on his a nasty report on the state of the premises but face. more seriously about the “tribal-war situation developing between the school and the village, arising in part from the misguided zeal8 of the new headmaster.” 5. Pagan means “relating to a religion that involves many gods.” 6. A diviner is a fortune teller. Literary Element Conflict What conflict does Obi’s 7. To propitiate is to appease. assertion set in motion? 8. Zeal is earnest enthusiasm.

Reading Strategy Analyzing Characterization What Literary Element Conflict How does the Supervisor’s does the village priest value? assessment of the conflict differ from Obi’s?

1308 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE

1306-1308 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1308 1/29/07 2:41:04 PM AFTER YOU READ

RESPONDING AND THINKING CRITICALLY Respond Analyze and Evaluate 1. Were you surprised by the end of the story? Why or 5. (a)What qualities do you think are important in a why not? headmaster? (b)Which of these qualities do you think Mr. Obi possesses? Recall and Interpret 6. How well does Achebe express the differences 2. (a)What do the Obis hope to accomplish when between modern and traditional values? Do you they take charge of the school? (b)How might the think he is fair in his portrayal? Explain. path stand in the way of what Mr. Obi has set out to accomplish? 7. With his training and attitudes, do you think Mr. Obi could have reacted any differently to the problems 3. (a)Why is the path important to the villagers? he encountered? Explain. (b)What can you infer about the villagers’ attitudes toward their ancestors and their heritage? Support Connect your inference with evidence from the story. 8. Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism 4. (a)What proverb, or short saying, does the village What does this story suggest about the way people priest tell Mr. Obi he always says? (b)What mes- should treat another culture’s traditional beliefs? sage is the village priest trying to convey to Mr. Obi through this proverb?

DAILY LIFE AND CULTURE

Life in a Nigerian Village

Achebe does not specify the a different Ibo village. The Ibo view death as the exact location of his story. transition between the human and the spirit world. However, the habits of the After a sojourn in the spirit world, the soul is local villagers—and Achebe’s believed to be reborn into a new life. own background—suggest that it is set in eastern Nige- Each village is served by a priest or priestess who ria, near a traditional Ibo vil- advises in spiritual matters and presides over religious lage. These villages usually rituals and ceremonies. Additionally, people known as consist of several compounds, diviners seek to discern and report the will of the or clusters of huts, each of gods. The diviner’s message from the gods guides deci- which houses a single family. sion-making for the individual and the community. The villages can range in population from several hundred Group Activity Discuss the following questions to several thousand. with your classmates.

Though most Nigerians are 1. Which aspects of traditional Ibo life are Muslims or Christians, ancient reflected in “Dead Men’s Path”? tribal beliefs still persist. The 2. What evidence does the story provide of the Ibo, for example, traditionally importance of the diviner in believed in a god so powerful that village life? he had to be approached through lesser deities, each affiliated with

Igbo mask with knobbed headgear.

CHINUA ACHEBE 1309 Bowers Museum of Cultural Art/CORBIS

11304-1311304-1311 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13091309 11/29/07/29/07 2:39:262:39:26 PMPM LITERARY ANALYSIS READING AND VOCABULARY

Literary Element Conflict Reading Strategy Analyzing In an external conflict, the main character is not Characterization always a “good” character, nor is the outside force As you analyze characterization, remember that by with which he or she struggles always “bad.” carefully selecting details, an author controls the read- 1. What is the outside force with which Obi struggles? er’s impression of a character. Review the character web you completed on page 1305, and then answer 2. How is the external conflict resolved? the following questions. 3. How might the story have ended if Obi had fol- 1. What are Michael Obi’s chief personality traits? lowed the village priest’s advice? 2. Choose one of Obi’s actions listed in your web. How does that action help drive the plot forward? Review: Irony 3. What are Obi’s wife’s main qualities? As you learned on page 851, irony is a contrast or dis- 4. Who is more tolerant, Obi or the village priest? crepancy between expectation and reality. Situational Explain. irony occurs when the outcome of a situation is the opposite of what someone expected.

Partner Activity With a partner, identify and explain Vocabulary Practice the ironies in this story. Use a diagram like the follow- Practice with Analogies Choose the word that ing to record your information. best completes each analogy. 1. extraneous : irrelevant :: pivotal : Situational Irony a. central b. dispensable c. ambiguous 2. explication : interpretation :: denigration : a. integration b. instigation c. defamation

Expectations Outcomes 3. superﬁ cial : shallow :: superannuated : a. desultory b. obsolete c. extensive

Academic Vocabulary

Here are two words from the vocabulary list on page R82.

consequent (kon sə kwent´) adj. following as a result of regulate (re yə la¯t´) v. to rule, control, or direct

Practice and Apply 1. What happens because of the young woman’s death in childbirth and the villagers’ consequent distress? 2. How does Obi attempt to regulate the villagers’ activities?

Igbo mask, Leja Village

1310 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE Christie’s Images/CORBIS

11304-1311304-1311 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13101310 66/23/06/23/06 1:28:511:28:51 PMPM WRITING AND EXTENDING GRAMMAR AND STYLE

Writing About Literature Achebe’s Language and Style Respond to Theme Almost every culture has charac- Punctuating Dialogue Conversation between char- teristic proverbs and other sayings that express rules acters in a literary work is known as dialogue. Authors of conduct or make general observations about life. usually indicate dialogue by placing quotation marks Chinua Achebe is well-known for incorporating Ibo before and after each character’s words. Sometimes, proverbs into his fiction. For example, the proverb spo- though, a character’s words are interrupted with an ken by the village priest, “let the hawk perch and let attribution, or an identifying phrase. Consider, for the eagle perch,” provides the nugget of wisdom that example, this sentence from “Dead Men’s Path”: might have resolved the conflict amicably in this story. “Yes,” replied Mr. Obi. “We cannot allow people Create a brief dialogue between any two characters in to make a highway of our school compound.” this story. In the dialogue, have one of the characters say a proverb. This attribution is a simple one, identifying Mr. Obi as the speaker. Other attributions may provide additional First, brainstorm with a group of classmates a list of information about the speaker’s actions, manner, or themes that the story conveys about topics such as audience, as in the following examples: ambition, tradition, innovation, or compromise. Then, choose one of these themes and discuss images from A: “It amazes me,” said Obi to one of his teachers nature that might help illustrate the message. You who had been three years in the school, “that might want to organize your thoughts in a graphic. you people allowed the villagers to make use of this footpath.” B: “The path,” said the teacher apologetically, Topic “appears to be very important to them.” C: “Look here, my son,” said the priest bringing Images from down his walking stick, “this path was here Theme nature before you were born and before your father was born.” In example A, the prepositional phrase “to one of his Proverb teachers . . .” identifies the person addressed. In example B, the adverb apologetically tells how the teacher speaks. And in example C, the participial Finally, write down several possible proverbs, and then phrase “bringing down his walking stick” describes choose one that is catchy, clear, and concise to incor- the speaker’s accompanying actions. porate into your dialogue. Exchange your completed dialogue with a classmate and offer suggestions for Activity Scan the story for additional examples of revision. Then proofread your work for errors in spell- attributions in the dialogue and explain what each ing, grammar, and punctuation. attribution conveys to the reader.

Learning for Life Revising Check Imagine that you have been asked to write a classified Attributions Using attributions can add clarity and advertisement for Obi’s successor at Ndume Central vividness to your dialogue. With a partner, review the School. What qualifications should the next headmas- dialogue you created for the Writing About Literature ter have? Keep in mind what the mission authorities assignment. Note places where the insertion of an would want for their school as you write your ad. attribution would make the dialogue clearer or provide needed context. Revise your draft accordingly.

Web Activities For eFlashcards, Selection Quick Checks, and other Web activities, go to www.glencoe.com.

CHINUA ACHEBE 1311

11304-1311304-1311 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13111311 66/23/06/23/06 1:29:021:29:02 PMPM Vocabulary Workshop Distinct Meanings

Understanding Homophones º Vocabulary Terms “ ‘What will the Government Education Officer think of this when he comes to Homophones are words inspect the school next week?’ ” that are pronounced the —Chinua Achebe, from “Dead Men’s Path” same yet have completely different meanings and Connecting to Literature In this passage from “Dead Men’s Path,” Chinua spellings. Achebe uses the homophone week. Homophones are words that have different º Test-Taking Tip meanings and spellings yet share the same pronunciation. Week is a homophone because it has two meanings that are spelled differently but pronounced the To decipher the meaning same. For example, week means “a series of seven days” and weak means “frail.” of a homophone, look for context clues. These clues Here is a brief list of homophones: will help you tell what meaning is intended. Word Meaning Example º Reading Handbook bear an animal; to cope The brown bear came dangerously close to camp. For more about vocabulary bare lacking clothing The doctor examined his bare shoulder. development, see Reading Handbook, p. R20. break to crack, split, or smash Enslaved people endeavored to break their bonds. brake to stop a movement The negligent driver failed to brake for the pedestrian.

piece a part of something I completed the last piece of the puzzle.

peace tranquility During war, people long for peace.

stairs a series of steps Take the stairs because it’s quicker than the elevator.

stares fixed gazes The new student was intimidated by the stares of the class.

scent an odor The scent of oranges makes me feel refreshed.

cent a denomination of money I wouldn’t pay one cent to see that movie.

sent shipped off I sent her to the store for some milk. eFlashcards For eFlashcards and other vocabulary activities, When you are unsure about the meaning of a homophone, use context clues to deci- go to www.glencoe.com. pher the meaning or consult a dictionary. Remember, a computer’s spell-check program cannot identify incorrect homophones. Because a computer cannot discern the meaning you intend, it will only tell you whether the word is spelled correctly. By carefully proofreading your work, you will eliminate any mistakes with homophones.

OBJECTIVES • Recognize homophones. • Use homophones correctly Exercise in context. Choose the correct homophone in each sentence. 1. Michael Obi was enthralled with knew / new ways of doing things. 2. Michael Obi did not want to hear / here what the tribal priest had to say. 3. Michael and his wife, Nancy, lost sight / site of the sacred values of African culture. 4. I found “Dead Men’s Path” to be an interesting and thoughtful tail / tale.

1312 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE

11312312 U7P2VW-845482.inddU7P2VW-845482.indd 13121312 11/10/07/10/07 3:00:123:00:12 PMPM BEFORE YOU READ

Telephone Conversation

MEET WOLE SOYINKA

ole Soyinka (wa la¯ sha yin ka) has earned an international reputation as Wone of the most distinguished and powerful voices for social change and human rights. His plays, poetry, novels, and essays have not only helped to introduce the world to the traditions and folklore of Africa, but they have also exposed Nigeria’s struggles with colonial rule, oppression and injustice, dictatorship, modernization, and civil war. As Soyinka has said, “Books and all forms of writing have always been objects of terror to those who seek to suppress the truth.” A Voice of Truth In 1966 a military coup over- threw the freely elected Nigerian government. The next year, a section of the country seceded, form- “I have one abiding religion—human ing the Republic of Biafra, and the Nigerian civil war began. In the same year, Soyinka was falsely liberty . . . my writing grows more accused of helping the Biafrans buy jet fighters and and more preoccupied with the theme was imprisoned for more than two years. The military government kept him in solitary confinement of the oppressive boot, the irrelevance in a four-by-eight-foot cell. To save his sanity and of the color of the foot that wears it communicate with his supporters, Soyinka manu- factured his own ink and began a diary using any- and the struggle for individuality.” thing he could find to write on—toilet paper, —Wole Soyinka cigarette packages, and book pages. These notes were later published in The Man Died: Prison Notes of Wole Soyinka. Although Soyinka was released in 1969, it would not be the last time he found him- Cultural Conflicts Soyinka was born in Nigeria self in legal trouble. More than two decades later, when it was still under British rule. His parents he was charged with treason for criticizing the gov- were educators and were able to provide him with ernment and sentenced to death, forcing Soyinka a strong English education. Soyinka’s grandfather into self-imposed exile for four years. taught him about African tradition and the Yoruba gods and folklore, which influenced his later writ- In 1986 Soyinka became the first African to ing. Thus, from an early age, Soyinka was keenly receive the Nobel Prize in Literature, which was a aware of the cultural conflicts between African mixed blessing for him. He remarked, “It has such tradition and British modernization. Soyinka’s life- a prestige and such a hold on people’s imagination long political activism was inspired during his in all corners and on all levels that you become childhood by the independence movement in the property of the world.” Nigeria and a revolt against a tax on women led by Wole Soyinka was born in 1934. his mother. Soyinka graduated from college in England in 1958 and returned to Nigeria in 1960, shortly after the country gained its independence. Author Search For more about Wole Soyinka, go to www.glencoe.com.

WOLE SOYINKA 1313 Jacques Langevin/CORBIS SYGMA

11313-1317313-1317 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13131313 11/29/07/29/07 2:42:042:42:04 PMPM LITERATURE PREVIEW READING PREVIEW

Connecting to the Poem Reading Strategy Connecting to In the poem, the speaker recounts a conversation in Contemporary Issues which a potential tenant’s race becomes an issue with Connecting means linking what you read to events in a landlord. As you read, think about the following your own life, to world events, or to other selections questions: you have read. To connect to contemporary issues, • Have you ever faced some type of discrimination? compare how issues in a text have been treated over • How did you react to the situation? What emotions time and how they are treated today. did you experience? Reading Tip: Comparing and Contrasting Use a Building Background Venn diagram to compare today’s issues of racism and African tradition was an important part of Soyinka’s prejudice with those in “Telephone Conversation.” childhood and has played an essential and recurring role in his work. In 1960 Soyinka began researching Yoruba drama and folklore, and his novels, plays, and poetry blend these traditions with traditional European Racism and form. “Telephone Conversation” reflects his ability as Racism and Prejudice in Comparison Prejudice a playwright to create dramatic dialogue that uses “Telephone Today irony and humor to satirize an encounter with racial Conversation” prejudice. Setting Purposes for Reading

Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism As you read, notice how Soyinka uses imagery and Vocabulary dialogue to record an encounter with racial prejudice. rancid (ran sid) adj. having an offensive or foul odor or taste; p. 1316 The rancid food Literary Element Free Verse smelled like garbage. Poetry that has no fixed pattern of meter, rhyme, revelation (rev´ ə la¯ shən) n. the act of making line length, or stanza arrangement is called free something known; something that is revealed; verse. As you read Soyinka’s poem, notice how he p. 1316 Her revelation brought attention to the uses techniques such as repetition and alliteration to way society discriminated against women. create lyrical patterns; also note his use of irony and assent (ə sent) v. to agree to something after imagery to emphasize meaning and capture the consideration; concur; p. 1316 He would assent formlessness, prejudice, and discrimination that he only after he carefully analyzed all of his options. perceives in modern life. friction (frik shən) n. the clashing between • See Literary Terms Handbook, p. R7. two people or groups of opposed views; p. 1316 After their argument, the friction between the couple was evident to us all.

Vocabulary Tip: Synonyms Synonyms are words that have the same or nearly the same meaning. Interactive Literary Elements Handbook To review or learn more about the literary elements, go to www.glencoe.com.

OBJECTIVES In studying this selection, you will focus on the following: • analyzing free verse • analyzing genre elements • connecting to contemporary issues

1314 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE

11313-1317313-1317 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13141314 11/10/07/10/07 3:04:503:04:50 PMPM Wole Soyinka

WOLE SOYINKA 1315 Miguel S. Salmeron/FPG International

1315-1316 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1315 1/29/07 2:42:55 PM The price seemed reasonable, location Indifferent. The landlady swore she lived Off premises. Nothing remained But self-confession. “Madam,” I warned, 5 “I hate a wasted journey—I am—African.” Silence. Silenced transmission of Pressurized good breeding. Voice, when it came, Lipstick-coated, long gold-rolled Cigarette-holder pipped. Caught I was, foully.

10 “HOW DARK?” . . . I had not misheard . . . “ARE YOU LIGHT OR VERY DARK?” Button B. Button A. Stench Of rancid breath of public hide-and-speak. 1 Red booth. Red pillar-box. Red double-tiered 1. A pillar-box is a mailbox. Omnibus2 squelching tar. It was real! Shamed 2. A double-tiered omnibus is a 15 By ill-mannered silence, surrender bus that has two levels. Pushed dumbfoundment to beg simplification. Considerate she was, varying the emphasis—

“ARE YOU DARK? OR VERY LIGHT?” Revelation came. “You mean—like plain or milk chocolate?” 20 Her assent was clinical, crushing in its light Impersonality. Rapidly, wavelength adjusted, 3 I chose, “West African sepia” —and as an afterthought, 3. Sepia is a brownish gray to “Down in my passport.” Silence for spectroscopic dark olive brown color. Flight of fancy,4 till truthfulness clanged her accent 4. A spectroscope is an 25 Hard on the mouthpiece. “WHAT’S THAT?” conceding5 instrument scientists use to “DON’T KNOW WHAT THAT IS.” “Like brunette.” examine the spectrum, or range, of colors in white light. “THAT’S DARK, ISN’T IT?” “Not altogether. The phrase “spectroscopic flight of fancy” indicates that

Facially, I am brunette, but madam, you should see the woman has paused to The rest of me. Palm of my hand, soles of my feet consider the range of colors 30 Are a peroxide blond. Friction, caused— she knows. Foolishly madam—by sitting down, has turned 5. Here, conceding means “admitting.” My bottom raven black—One moment madam!”—sensing Her receiver rearing on the thunderclap About my ears—“Madam,” I pleaded, “Wouldn’t you rather 35 See for yourself?”

Literary Element Free Verse How does the beginning of this selection defy traditional poetic conventions?

Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism How does this passage represent the cultural conflict created by colonialism and racism?

Vocabulary rancid (ran sid) adj. having an offensive or foul odor or taste revelation (rev´ ə la¯ shən) n. the act of making something known; something that is revealed assent (ə sent) v. to agree to something after consideration; concur friction (frik shən) n. the clashing between two people or groups of opposed views

1316 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE

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RESPONDING AND THINKING CRITICALLY Respond 5. (a)How would you describe the content of the telephone conversation in lines 18–33? (b)How would 1. (a)What is your opinion of the landlady? (b)How you characterize the speaker and the landlady from might you respond if someone asked you a question their conversation and the speaker’s comments? similar to the one the landlady asks the speaker? Recall and Interpret Analyze and Evaluate 2. (a)What is the “self-confession” the speaker makes 6. Humor often points out human failings and the to the landlady? (b)What does his confession imply irony found in many situations. How effective is about his past experience? Explain. Soyinka’s use of humor in presenting the gravity of racism? Explain. 3. (a)What question does the landlady ask the speaker? (b)Verbal irony occurs when the mean- 7. How does Soyinka’s style help address the sensi- ing of a statement is the reverse of what is meant. tive issue of racism? Consider his use of humor, How is the word “considerate” in line 17 an exam- irony, and imagery. ple of verbal irony? Connect 4. (a)How does the telephone conversation end? (b)What does the speaker’s final plea suggest 8. Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism about his attitude toward the landlady? Soyinka became the ﬁ rst African writer to win a Nobel Prize. How might poems such as “Telephone Conversation” broaden the scope of English literature?

LITERARY ANALYSIS READING AND VOCABULARY

Literary Element Free Verse Reading Strategy Connecting to Many twentieth-century poets, striving to emphasize Contemporary Issues the relationship between form and meaning in a Artists continue to respond to racism and prejudice poem, have written in free verse to capture the form- today. lessness that they perceive in modern life. 1. (a)How does Soyinka address the presence of rac- 1. Why might Soyinka have wanted this poem to fol- ism and prejudice? (b)Do you think this type of low natural speech patterns? Explain. racism still exists? Explain. 2. From what past tradition might Soyinka be trying to 2. (a)How do other contemporary artists, such as writers break? Explain. and musicians, address these issues? (b)How do their views and ideas compare with Soyinka’s work? Writing About Literature Analyze Tone The tone of a text expresses the Vocabulary Practice author’s attitude toward his or her subject and audi- Practice with Synonyms Identify the synonym ence. Tone is conveyed through word choice, punctua- for each vocabulary word below. tion, structure, and figures of speech. Write a brief essay analyzing the tone of “Telephone Conversation.” 1. rancid a. clean b. rotten Consider how the tone of the poem changes as it pro- 2. revelation a. insight b. reality gresses and examine what that change implies. 3. assent a. assure b. agree

Web Activities For eFlashcards, 4. friction a. discord b. harmony Selection Quick Checks, and other Web activities, go to www.glencoe.com.

WOLE SOYINKA 1317

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Two Sheep

MEET JANET FRAME

n 1947 Janet Frame voluntarily checked into a adult, Frame trained mental institution. Mistakenly diagnosed as to become a teacher. Ischizophrenic, she spent the next eight years in But on the morning and out of hospitals. In her autobiography, she she was to receive her describes this dark, bleak existence: “I inhabited a final evaluation for territory of loneliness which I think resembles that certification, she pan- place where the dying spend their time before death, icked. Greeted by the headmaster and inspector at and from where those who do return living to the the start of class, she asked to be excused for a world bring inevitably a unique point of view that moment, and, as she reported in her autobiography, is a nightmare, a treasure, and a lifelong possession.” “I walked out of the room and out of the school, In fact, Frame’s lifelong love of creative writing pro- knowing I would never return.” vided her with an emotional outlet; while hospitalized, she published her first collection of short No “Mad Genius” Frame’s subsequent break- stories, The Lagoon. Amazingly, Frame was scheduled down, which led to her numerous stays in psychi- to receive a frontal lobotomy, an operation in which atric wards, proved to be a turning point in her doctors cut nerve fibers in the brain, potentially life. Following the critical success of The Lagoon, leaving the patient in a permanently vegetative she went on to pursue a productive writing career. state. Just before the procedure, however, Frame’s Readers and critics who knew of Frame’s hospital- doctors informed her that The Lagoon had won a izations dubbed her a “mad genius,” believing that prestigious literary award. They cancelled the sur- her creative powers sprang from mental instability, gery, and Frame was discharged from the hospital. but Frame (and a team of London doctors) proved them wrong. During the late 1950s, while living in London, Frame sought an explanation for the loneliness and depression that plagued her at “It is little wonder that I value writing times. After submitting to several interviews and a as a way of life when it actually saved psychiatric evaluation, she was told that she was my life.” not schizophrenic and was not mentally ill. In her prolific career, Frame published not only —Janet Frame, from An Autobiography short stories but also novels, poetry, and a three-volume autobiography. New Zealand film director Jane Campion adapted Frame’s autobiography into the Family Misfortunes Janet Frame was born in film An Angel at My Table. As her fame increased, Dunedin, a city bordering the Pacific Ocean on the Frame traveled internationally to promote her work, southeastern coast of New Zealand. Her father was and lived for brief periods of time in both England a railroad worker, and her mother wrote poetry, and the United States. She returned permanently to which she sold to neighbors. After several moves, her birthplace, Dunedin, in 1997. the family settled in the small town of Oamaru. A Janet Frame was born in 1924 and died in 2004. shy child, Frame spent her time reading and writing. She became acquainted with illness and tragedy at an early age; her brother had epilepsy, and two of her sisters drowned during childhood. As a young AuthorAuthor SearchSearch ForFor more about AuthorJanet F rName,ame, go go to to www www.literature.glencoe.com.glencoe.com. .

1318 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE Time Life Syndication/Henry Grossman

11318-1325318-1325 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13181318 11/29/07/29/07 2:44:342:44:34 PMPM LITERATURE PREVIEW READING PREVIEW

Connecting to the Fable Reading Strategy Identifying Sequence In the following fable, Frame uses two talking sheep To identify sequence is to recognize the pattern of on their way to a slaughterhouse to teach a life lesson. organization that a writer uses to present information. As you read, think about the following questions: In narrative writing, writers often use chronological, or time, order to present a sequence of events in the If you could see into the future, how do you think it • order in which they happen. would change your life? Do you think that “ignorance is bliss”? • Reading Tip: Making a Sequence Chart As you Building Background read, identify and record the sequence of events. When you finish reading, study the sequence of events Early in her writing career, Frame devoted herself to to help determine the moral or lesson of the story. writing Realist stories. In 1963, however, she turned her attention to allegory. The fable “Two Sheep” was first published in You Are Now Entering the Human Sequence of Events in “Two Sheep” Heart (1983). A fable is a short, often simple story intended to teach a lesson about human behavior. The 1. Two sheep are traveling to the saleyards. moral or lesson is usually implied by the plot of the The first one knows that they are to be story and then stated explicitly at the end. “Two slaughtered. The second does not. Sheep” is an example of a beast fable, in which ani- 2. mals talk and act like representative human types. Like many other fables, “Two Sheep” is not set in any specific time or place. Unlike most fables, the moral or lesson is not stated, leaving the reader to infer it.

Setting Purposes for Reading Vocabulary Big Idea Globalization pall (pol ) n. an atmosphere of dark and gloom; As you read, look for ways in which this story illustrates p. 1321 The rain clouds overhead cast a pall on the rich diversity of contemporary English literature. our picnic. barren (bar ən) adj. having little or no vegeta- Literary Element Anthropomorphism tion; bare; p. 1321 The barren landscape was Anthropomorphism is the practice of ascribing devoid of all plant life. human form or characteristics to nonhuman objects or unperturbed (un pər turbd) adj. undisturbed; animals. This element is often found in fables, where not troubled; p. 1322 Dressed in a warm, furry the main characters are commonly animals that have parka, Tom was unperturbed by the subzero the ability to speak and think. As you read “Two temperature. Sheep,” note the various ways in which the animals behave like humans. Vocabulary Tip: Word Origins A word’s origin explains its history and illustrates how the word See Literary Terms Handbook, p. R1. • relates to other words in English and other languages. In a dictionary, a word’s origin usually appears in brackets. Interactive Literary Elements Handbook To review or learn more about the literary elements, go to www.glencoe.com.

OBJECTIVES In studying this selection, you will focus on the following: • recognizing anthropomorphism • analyzing genre elements • identifying sequence

JANET FRAME 1319

11318-1325318-1325 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13191319 11/10/07/10/07 3:10:573:10:57 PMPM Two Sheep Janet Frame

Two sheep were traveling to the saleyards. from what I see with my small sheep’s eye, has The first sheep knew that after they had been the sky seemed so flawless, without seams or sold their destination was the slaughterhouse tucks or cracks or blemishes.” at the freezing works. The second sheep did “You are crazy,” said the second sheep who not know of their fate. They were being did not know of their approaching death. “The driven with the rest of the flock along a hot sun is warm, yes, but how hot and dusty and dusty valley road where the surrounding heavy my wool feels! It is a burden to go trot- hills leaned in a sun-scorched wilderness of ting along this oven shelf. It seems our journey rock, tussock,1 and old rabbit warrens.2 They will never end.” moved slowly, for the drover 3 in his trap “How fresh and juicy the grass appears on the was in no hurry, and had even taken one of hill!” the first sheep exclaimed. “And not a hawk the dogs to sit beside him while the other in the sky!” scrambled from side to side of the flock, guid- “I think,” replied the second sheep, “that ing them. something has blinded you. Just look up in the “I think,” said the first sheep who was aware of their approaching death, “that the sun has never shone so warm on my fleece, nor, Literary Element Anthropomorphism What human characteristics are attributed to the sheep?

Reading Strategy Identifying Sequence What attitude 1. A tussock is a clump or tuft of grass. does each sheep express toward his surroundings? What 2. Warrens are places where rabbits are kept and bred. seems odd or ironic about their respective attitudes? 3. A drover is one who drives sheep.

1320 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE Adrian Burke/Corbis

1320-1322 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1320 1/29/07 2:45:45 PM sky and see those three hawks waiting to swoop When they were jostled inside their pen the and attack us!” first sheep gave an exclamation of delight. They trotted on further through the valley “What a pleasant little house they have let to road. Now and again the second sheep stumbled. us! I have never seen such smart red-painted “I feel so tired,” he said. “I wonder how much bars, and such four-square corners. And look at longer we must walk on and on through this hot the elegant stairway which we will climb to enter dusty valley?” those red caravans for our seaside holiday!” But the first sheep walked nimbly and his wool “You make me tired,” the second sheep said. felt light upon him as if he had just been shorn. “We are standing inside a dirty pen, nothing He could have gamboled like a lamb in August. more, and I cannot move my feet in their nicely “I still think,” he said, “that today is the most polished black shoes but I tread upon the dirt left wonderful day I have known. I do not feel that by sheep which have been imprisoned here the road is hot and dusty. I do not notice the before us. In fact I have never been so badly stones and grit that you complain of. To me the treated in all my life!” And the second sheep hills have never seemed so green and enticing, the began to cry. Just then a kind elderly sheep jos- sun has never seemed so warm and comforting. I tled through the flock and began to comfort him. believe that I could walk through this valley for- “You have been frightening your companions, ever, and never feel tired or hungry or thirsty.” I suppose,” she said angrily to the first sheep. “Whatever has come over you?” the second “You have been telling horrible tales of our fate. sheep asked crossly. “Here we are, trotting along Some sheep never know when to keep things to hour after hour, and soon we shall stand in our themselves. There was no need to tell your com- pens in the saleyards while the sun leans over us panion the truth, that we are being led to certain with its branding irons and our overcoats are such death!” a burden that they drag us to the floor of our pen But the first sheep did not answer. He was where we are almost trampled to death by the so thinking that the sun had never blessed him dainty feet of our fellow sheep. A fine life that is. with so much warmth, that no crowded pen had It would not surprise me if after we are sold we ever seemed so comfortable and luxurious. Then are taken in trucks to the freezing works and suddenly he was taken by surprise and hustled killed in cold blood. But,” he added, comforting out a little gate and up the ramp into the waiting himself, “that is not likely to happen. Oh no, that truck, and suddenly too the sun shone in its true could never happen! I have it on authority that colors, battering him about the head with gigan- even when they are trampled by their fellows, tic burning bars, while the hawks congregated sheep do not die. The tales we hear from time to above, sizzling the sky with their wings, and a time are but malicious rumors, and those vivid pall of dust clung to the barren used-up hills, dreams which strike us in the night as we sleep and everywhere was commotion, pushing, strug- on the sheltered hills, they are but illusions. Do gling, bleating, trampling. you not agree?” he asked the first sheep. “This must be death,” he thought, and he They were turning now from the valley road, began to struggle and cry out. and the saleyards were in sight, while drawn up The second sheep, having at last learned that in the siding on the rusty railway lines, the red he would meet his fate at the freezing works, trucks stood waiting, spattered inside with sheep and cattle dirt and with white chalk marks, in cipher,4 on the outside. And still the first sheep did not reveal to his companion that they were Reading Strategy Identifying Sequence In what way being driven to certain death. does the arrival of the third sheep advance the plot of the story?

Vocabulary 4. Here, in cipher means “in code.” pall (pol ) n. an atmosphere of dark and gloom bar ən Literary Element Anthropomorphism What human fail- barren ( ) adj. having little or no vegetation; ing is revealed by the second sheep’s denials? bare

JANET FRAME 1321

1320-1322 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1321 6/23/06 1:36:46 PM trotting along with them until they came to a hot dusty road through a valley where the hills leaned in a sun-scorched wilderness of rock, tussock, and old rabbit warrens. By now he was feeling very tired. He spoke for the first time to his new companions. “What a hot dusty road,” he said. “How uncomfortable the heat is, and the sun seems to be striking me for its own burning purposes.” The sheep walking beside him looked surprised. “It is a wonderful day,” he exclaimed. “The sun is warmer than I have ever known it, the hills glow green with luscious grass, and there is not a hawk in the sky to threaten us!” “You mean,” the first sheep replied slyly, “that stood unperturbed now in the truck with his you are on your way to the saleyards, and then to nose against the wall and his eyes looking the freezing works to be killed.” through the slits. The other sheep gave a bleat of surprise. “You are right,” he said to the first sheep. “The “How did you guess?” he asked. hill has never seemed so green, the sun has never “Oh,” said the first sheep wisely, “I know the been warmer, and this truck with its neat red code. And because I know the code I shall go walls is a mansion where I would happily spend around in circles all my life, not knowing the rest of my days.” whether to think that the hills are bare or But the first sheep did not answer. He had whether they are green, whether the hawks are seen the approach of death. He could hide from scarce or plentiful, whether the sun is friend or it no longer. He had given up the struggle and foe. For the rest of my life I shall not speak was lying exhausted in a corner of the truck. another word. I shall trot along the hot dusty And when the truck arrived at its destination, valleys where the hills are both barren and lush the freezing works, the man whose duty it was to with spring grass. unload the sheep noticed the first lying so still in “What shall I do but keep silent?” the corner that he believed it was dead. And so it happened, and over and over again “We can’t have dead sheep,” he said. “How the first sheep escaped death, and rejoined the can you kill a dead sheep?” flock of sheep who were traveling to the freezing So he heaved the first sheep out of the door of works. He is still alive today. If you notice him in the truck onto the rusty railway line. a flock, being driven along a hot dusty road, you “I’ll move it away later,” he said to himself. will be able to distinguish him by his timidity, his “Meanwhile here goes with this lot.” uncertainty, the frenzied expression in his eyes And while he was so busy moving the flock, when he tries, in his condemned silence, to dis- the first sheep, recovering, sprang up and trotted cover whether the sky is at last free from hawks, away along the line, out the gate of the freezing or whether they circle in twos and threes above works, up the road, along another road, until he him, waiting to kill him. saw a flock being driven before him. “I will join the flock,” he said. “No one will notice, and I shall be safe.” While the drover was not looking, the first Literary Element Anthropomorphism Considering the first sheep’s response here, what has he gained from his sheep hurried in among the flock and was soon experiences?

Vocabulary Reading Strategy Identifying Sequence As a result of all the things that have happened to him in the story, what does un pər turbd unperturbed ( ) adj. undisturbed; not the first sheep resolve to do? Why do you think he reaches troubled this conclusion?

1322 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE Shiko Nakano/Photonica

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RESPONDING AND THINKING CRITICALLY Respond sheep traveling to the freezing works? (c)What do these admissions reveal about his attitude toward 1. What aspects of this fable did you enjoy most? what he has learned? Why? Recall and Interpret Analyze and Evaluate 6. (a)What does the first sheep literally mean when 2. (a)At the beginning of the story, what does the first he says, “I know the code”? (b)What might know- sheep know that the second sheep does not? ing the code mean symbolically? (c)In what ways (b)How does the first sheep’s knowledge at the might one’s life be affected by knowing the code? beginning affect his perception of his surroundings? 7. (a)What is the moral of this fable? (b)In your opin- 3. (a)How does the first sheep perceive the sun and ion, how effectively does the author convey this the hawks after he’s been taken by surprise and moral? Explain. hustled into the truck? (b)What accounts for the first sheep’s change in perception as he stands in Connect the truck? 8. (a)Do you think the first sheep would have been 4. (a)How does the first sheep escape “certain death” better off or worse off had he not known his fate? at the freezing works? (a)In what way does he not Explain. (b)How are people affected by knowing really escape? their fate? 5. (a)At the end of the story, what does the first 9. Big Idea Globalization Why might Frame’s fable sheep say his life will be like? (b)How will observ- appeal to a variety of worldwide cultures? ers be able to distinguish him from the other

VISUAL LITERACY: Photography

Against the Flock

The setting and characters of “Two Sheep” share 2. (a)In her fable, how does Frame play with the similarities with Frame’s native New Zealand. New notion that sheep typically symbolize innocence Zealand has a population of 3.5 million people, but and defenselessness? (b)Does the photo rein- 60 million sheep. It is one of the major producers of force or contradict Frame’s understanding of sheep and exporters of wool worldwide. Sheep tend conformity? Explain. to be timid, remain in flocks, and have almost no protection against predators. These characteristics enhance their literary significance and symbolism. Fables often advance the notion that sheep are innocent, defenseless, and easily led astray. The major themes in Frame’s writing, however, compli- cate any simple reading of the sheep in her story.

1. (a)How does this photo fit traditional perceptions of sheep and what they symbolize? (b)How might this photo relate to the message in Frame’s fable?

Flock of sheep in roadway near Naseby, South Island, New Zealand.

JANET FRAME 1323 John Carnemolla/Australian Picture Library/CORBIS

11318-1325318-1325 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13231323 11/29/07/29/07 2:44:542:44:54 PMPM LITERARY ANALYSIS READING AND VOCABULARY

Literary Element Anthropomorphism Reading Strategy Identifying Sequence Assigning human traits to animal characters in a fable The sequence of events in “Two Sheep” tells a decep- allows writers to teach valuable lessons about life in tively simple story about a sheep who escapes the an engaging, entertaining, and inoffensive way. Review slaughterhouse accidentally. The author uses the the behavior of the sheep in the fable you have just events in the story (and the characters’ reactions to read. those events) to reveal lessons about life. Review the sequence of events that you recorded in your 1. What general human traits or characteristics do the sheep possess? sequence chart on page 1319. Identify the three events in the story that trigger sig- 2. What specific attitudes, emotions, and opinions do 1. they express? Support your answer with examples nificant changes in the development or direction of from the fable. the plot. Explain the significance of each of these events. 3. The second sheep convinces himself that being killed at the freezing works “is not likely to happen.” 2. (a)What observations about life are expressed or Does this seem like a typical human reaction to the implied as the story progresses? (b)What morals or concept of approaching death? Explain. lessons are taught through these observations?

Review: Diction Vocabulary Practice As you learned on page 854, diction, an author’s Practice with Word Origins Match each vocabu- choice of words, is an important component of an lary word below with its origin. Use a dictionary if author’s voice or style. (Other components include you need help. sentence structure, choice of sensory details, and use 1. pall a. Middle Welsh brynar, of figures of speech.) In “Two Sheep,” Janet Frame meaning “fallow land” uses simple words and dialogue to tell her story. 2. barren b. Middle English meaning Partner Activity With a partner, answer these “cloak” questions: 3. unperturbed c. root word from Latin perturbare, meaning “to 1. (a)Why is simple language appropriate for a chil- throw into confusion” dren’s fable? (b)In what other ways besides diction does “Two Sheep” resemble a children’s fable? 2. (a)In what significant way is “Two Sheep” more like an adult fable than a children’s fable? (b)Would Academic Vocabulary using more difficult or sophisticated language increase or decrease the effectiveness of “Two Here are two words from the vocabulary list on Sheep”? Explain. page R82.

final (f¯n əl) adj. at the end; last; ultimate potential (pə ten shəl) n. possibility; capability

Practice and Apply 1. What final destination was intended for the sheep? 2. How did the potential for escaping this destination become a reality for the first sheep?

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Writing About Literature Frame’s Language and Style Analyze Genre Elements Think of a useful lesson Using Participles A participle is a verb form that can about life that you would like to teach. Then write your function as an adjective. Present participles end in -ing own fable, constructing a plot that conveys this truth in (traveling), and past participles often end in -ed (trav- a creative way. Your story should be simple and easy eled) or are irregular (breaking, but broken). A parti- to read. Your main characters may be animals or any cipial phrase is a participle and any complements or other nonhumans, but they should possess human modifiers. Participial phrases always act as adjectives. characteristics. End your story by explicitly stating the (Be careful not to mistake gerunds for participles. moral. Use a graphic organizer like the one below to Gerunds end in -ing, but they function as nouns.) plan your story. When a participle is part of a verb phrase, the participle functions as a verb, not an adjective. Examine these examples from the story you have just read. List the characters: 1. • Two sheep were traveling to the saleyards. (verb phrase) 2. • The traveling sheep were hot and tired. (present 3. participle as adjective) ➧ • Having traveled there before, they knew the way. (participial phrase as adjective) Identify the conflict: • Traveling was difficult for the sheep. (gerund as subject)

➧ Note how Frame uses participles and participial phrases as adjectives in “Two Sheep.”

Identify the plot’s sequence of events:

1. Participle Effectiveness

2. freezing works Freezing works is a chilling description. 3.

surrounding hills Surrounding hills creates a claustrophobic feeling. Draft your fable, relating the events of the plot according to the sequence you created. Conclude your fable by explicitly stating the moral. After completing the Activity Write a brief paragraph in which you describe draft, meet with a peer reviewer to evaluate each oth- an activity or event (for example, playing a game or er’s work and to suggest revisions. Then edit and attending a dance) and include participles used as proofread your draft for errors in spelling, grammar, adjectives. Choose participles that help readers picture and punctuation. your description more vividly.

Listening and Speaking Revising Check Readers theater is a presentation in which readers use Participles Work with a partner to revise the word their voices, facial expressions, and controlled gestures choices you made in the fable you wrote. Find places and stances to convey the tone, mood, and action of a to add or substitute participles used as adjectives. work. With a small group of classmates, give a readers theater presentation of “Two Sheep.” Assign solo speaking roles to individual members of the group for each of the four characters who speak dialogue in the story, as well as a narrator. After practicing, perform your pre- Web Activities For eFlashcards, Selection Quick Checks, and other Web activities, go to sentation for the class. www.glencoe.com.

JANET FRAME 1325

11318-1325318-1325 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13251325 11/29/07/29/07 2:45:052:45:05 PMPM Grammar Workshop Mechanics

Using Commas with Nonessential Elements º Understanding “They were turning now from the valley road, and the saleyards were in sight, Nonessential Elements while drawn up in the siding on the rusty railway lines, the red trucks stood wait- Nonessential elements are ing, spattered inside with sheep and cattle dirt and with white chalk marks, in additional information in a cipher, on the outside.” sentence that interrupt the —Janet Frame, from “Two Sheep” flow of thought. Nonessen- tial elements should be Connecting to Literature In her fable “Two Sheep,” author Janet Frame uses separated from the rest of commas to set off nonessential elements, or additional information that inter- a sentence by a comma. rupts the flow of thought in a sentence. The interruption may be an expression, º Test-Taking Tip a comment, a definition, a clarification, supplementary information, or a name. For example, Frame separates “in cipher” in the quotation above, because it is an When looking over a writ- adjective phrase and the rest of the sentence would still make sense without it. ten test, check to see that no commas are missing. In determining whether an element is truly essential to the meaning of the sen- The meaning of a sentence tence, ask yourself if the element fundamentally changes the meaning of the sen- may seem clear to you, but tence. If it does not, then set if off with commas. missing commas can make it unclear to a reader. Problem 1 Missing commas with nonessential participles, infinitives, and their º Language Handbook phrases For more on using com- The second sheep moved slowly for they were in no hurry and mas, see the Language didn’t know what awaited them. Handbook, pp. R54–R55. Solution The second sheep moved slowly, for they were in no hurry and didn’t know what awaited them.

Problem 2 Missing commas with nonessential adjective clauses Janet Frame who was a talented writer published her first short story collection while she was hospitalized. Solution Janet Frame, who was a talented writer, published her first short eWorkbooks To link to story collection while she was hospitalized. the Grammar and Language eWorkbook, go to www.glencoe.com. Problem 3 Missing commas with interjections, conjunctive adverbs, and parenthetical expressions. The sheep in fact is forced to realize the dual nature of reality. Solution The sheep, in fact, is forced to realize the dual nature of reality. OBJECTIVES • Learn how to identify nonessential elements. Exercise • Recognize correct punctuation. Rewrite the following sentences, adding commas where needed. 1. The author of the story Janet Frame led a troubled life. 2. Frame scheduled to have an operation won a literary prize and was released from the hospital. 3. We can however learn from the themes present in “Two Sheep.”

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from Tales of the Islands

MEET DEREK WALCOTT

nspired by their schoolteacher mother, Derek Walcott and his twin brother, Roderick, Ienjoyed reading literature and improvising plays at an early age. Both boys grew up to be writers, following in the footsteps of their father, an amateur poet and artist who died when the boys were only a year old.

“The fate of poetry is to fall in love with the world.” Caribbean Theater Although he continued writing poetry, Walcott soon became involved in —Derek Walcott theater. In 1950 he helped found the Saint Lucia Arts Guild, for which he wrote several plays. He received a fellowship to study theater in New York A Young Poet Derek Walcott grew up in a mid- City in 1958. He continued his involvement with dle-class family on the Caribbean island of Saint Caribbean theater when he moved to Trinidad in Lucia. His father worked for the government and 1959, founding with his brother the Trinidad his mother was an elementary school teacher. The Theatre Workshop. Walcott’s plays often incorpo- arts were valued highly in the Walcott home, and rate Caribbean folktales or local history. About in this enriched environment, Walcott quickly writing these plays, Walcott has said, “The great developed a lasting love of art and language. By challenge for me was to write as powerfully as I the time he was eight years old, he had decided to could without writing down to the audience, so become a poet. In his youth he began a practice of that the large emotions could be taken in by a writing a poem a day in the notebooks his mother fisherman or a guy on the street, even if he didn’t gave him for this purpose. She also guided him by understand every line.” giving him famous poems to copy and imitate. In Walcott has written more than thirty plays; Ti-Jean this way, Walcott began to internalize different and His Brothers (1958) and Dream on Monkey forms of poetry and gain an appreciation of sound Mountain (1967) are two of the most famous. In devices, rhythm, and cadence. addition, he wrote an epic poem, Omeros (1990), As a teenager, Walcott had several of his poems which is based on Homer’s Odyssey. Walcott published in a local newspaper. When he was eigh- received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1992. teen, he borrowed two hundred dollars from his In addition to writing poetry and plays, Walcott mother and used it to publish his first book of paints and teaches, dividing his time between the poetry, which he then sold on the streets of Caribbean and the United States. Castries, his hometown and the capital of Saint Derek Walcott was born in 1930. Lucia. The book, 25 Poems, received good reviews, and Walcott was soon able to pay his mother back for the loan. Author Search For more about Derek Walcott, go to www.glencoe.com.

DEREK WALCOTT 1327 Pressens Bild/Globe Photos

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Connecting to the Poem Reading Strategy Evaluating Sound Leaving a beloved place is the subject of this poem Devices from Walcott’s series of poems entitled “Tales of the Sound devices include a variety of techniques that Islands.” As you read the poem, think about the follow- writers use to appeal to the ear and to add a musical ing questions: quality to their writing. Some common sound devices • What feelings have you had about leaving a place include repetition, rhyme, alliteration, assonance, and that you love? caesura. Use the Literary Terms Handbook to review • What wishes have you had related to the place, its the definition of each of these devices. future, and your relationship to the place? Reading Tip: Taking Notes Use a chart like the one Building Background below to record examples of the different sound Saint Lucia is a small island in the eastern Caribbean. It devices in this poem. was settled by the French in 1635 and was taken over by the British in 1814. The Europeans cut down forests Device Line Example along the coastal plains to cultivate sugar on large plantations. In the 1700s and early 1800s enslaved Assonance Epigraph The vowel sounds in the Africans were brought to work on the plantations. After second syllable of Adieu slavery was outlawed by Great Britain in 1838, planta- and the first syllable of tion owners brought Asians, especially from the sub- foulard are the same. continent of India, to work as indentured servants. The Alliteration island finally gained independence in 1979. Caesura Setting Purposes for Reading Repetition Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism Internal Notice the ways in which Walcott refers to French Rhyme Creole customs and incorporates English literary tradi- End Rhyme tion in this poem.

Literary Element Imagery The word pictures in a work of literature are called Vocabulary imagery. Such images appeal to one or more of the precipice (pres ə pis) n. a very steep or over- five senses and evoke an emotional response in the hanging mass of rock as on a cliff; p. 1329 The reader. Notice the sense that Walcott appeals to the most precipice plunged into the sea, without even a beach with the imagery in this poem. at its base. • See Literary Terms Handbook, p. R9. fidelity (fi del ə te¯) n. the quality or state of being faithful; p. 1329 The fidelity of a true friend is priceless.

OBJECTIVES In studying this poem, you will focus on the following: • analyzing imagery • analyzing genre elements • evaluating sound devices

1328 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE

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“Adieu foulard . . .”1 1. Adieu foulard (ə dyu fo¯¯o¯ lard) is from a folk song I watched the island narrowing the fine traditionally sung on Saint Lucia when friends or family Writing of foam around the precipices then members leave the island. The roads as small and casual as twine Adieu is French for “good-bye,” Thrown on its mountains; I watched till the plane and a foulard is a neckerchief 5 Turned to the final north and turned above worn by the people of Saint Lucia. The open channel with the gray sea between The fishermen’s islets2 until all that I love 2. Islets are little islands. Folded in cloud; I watched the shallow green That broke in places where there would be reef, 10 The silver glinting on the fuselage,3 each mile 3. A fuselage is the central body Dividing us and all fidelity strained of the aircraft. Till space would snap it. Then, after a while I thought of nothing; nothing, I prayed, would change; 4 When we set down at Seawell it had rained. 4 Seawell is a city in Barbados.

Literary Element Imagery From this image, determine where the speaker is in relation to the roads and mountains.

Vocabulary precipice (pres ə pis) n. a very steep or overhanging mass of rock as on a cliff fidelity (fi del ə te¯) n. the quality or state of being faithful

DEREK WALCOTT 1329 Yann Arthus-Bertrand/CORBIS

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RESPONDING AND THINKING CRITICALLY Respond does this poem fit this traditional form? How does it depart from the form? 1. What images did you find to be most powerful? Explain. 5. (a)Near the end of the poem, how does the tone change? (b)Do you think this change adds mean- Recall and Interpret ing to the poem? Explain. 2. (a)What is the setting of this poem? (b)What is the speaker’s attitude toward the subject? What clues Connect helped you figure out the speaker’s attitude? 6. Big Idea Colonialism and Postcolonialism 3. (a)What does the speaker pray for in line 13? Although English is the ofﬁ cial language of Saint (b)What does this prayer imply about his feelings Lucia, many people there also speak French as he leaves the island? Creole. (a)How does the poem pay homage to Saint Lucia’s alternate language? (b)How does the Analyze and Evaluate poem ﬁ t into the tradition of English classics? 4. (a)Count the number of lines and analyze the rhyme scheme of this poem. Use this information to identify the form of the poem. (b)In what ways

LITERARY ANALYSIS READING AND VOCABULARY

Literary Element Imagery Reading Strategy Evaluating Sound Images can appeal to any of the five senses. They can Devices be simple references to color, odor, taste, sound, or Refer to the chart you made on page 1328 for exam- texture. They can also be more complex, incorporating ples of assonance and alliteration from the poem. similes or metaphors. Then answer these questions. 1. Evaluate Walcott’s use of simile in lines 3–4. What 1. How does the use of assonance affect the pace of comparison is being made? Does this simile help the poem? you better envision the scene? Explain. 2. Why do you think Walcott uses alliteration at spe- 2. Evaluate Walcott’s use of metaphor in lines 11–12. cific points in this poem? Do you think these lines Which sense or senses are being appealed to and convey dramatic tension or serve some other pur- what is being likened to what? Does this metaphor pose? Explain. help you better understand the speaker’s feelings? Explain. Vocabulary Practice Interdisciplinary Activity: Art Practice with Synonyms Identify the synonym for each vocabulary word below. Reread the poem from “Tales of the Islands” several times to help you focus on the poem’s tone and 1. fidelity a. faithfulness b. faithlessness mood. Use colored pencils or chalk to illustrate the 2. precipice a. cliff b. valley poem, choosing colors to create a piece of art that depicts both the images in the poem and the tone and the mood of the piece. Share your artwork with the class. Web Activities For eFlashcards, Selection Quick Checks, and other Web activities, go to www.glencoe.com.

1330 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE

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B. Wordsworth

MEET V. S. NAIPAUL

. S. (Vidiadhar Surajprasad) Naipaul chose to become a writer at age eleven because Vhe thought of writing as a noble occupa- tion. However, writing did not come easily for Naipaul. “I do not believe in natural genius. I do not believe in the spontaneous outpouring of the soul. Style is essentially a matter of hard thinking,” Naipaul once told writer and poet Derek Walcott in an interview. Biswas (1961). The novel’s title character is based Early Years and Education Naipaul was born on Naipaul’s father and the work presents a fiction- on the Caribbean island of Trinidad. His grandpar- alized account of Naipaul’s childhood in Trinidad. ents on both sides of his family had come to the West Indies from India as indentured servants. Within a few decades, Naipaul’s mother’s family “A book should speak to you directly. had achieved wealth; his father’s family had not. However, education was important to his father’s You should be able to pick up things in family, and Naipaul’s father completed school and your own experience and if you can’t got a job writing for a Trinidad newspaper. The family moved numerous times, as Naipaul’s father pick things up, then for you, the book changed jobs frequently. has failed, I think.” Despite his disrupted childhood, Naipaul was able to —V. S. Naipaul gain a good education graduating from Trinidad’s most prestigious school. In 1950 he won a government scholarship to attend Oxford University, and he graduated in 1953 with a degree in English. A Cosmopolitan Writer In 1960 the government of Trinidad gave Naipaul a grant to return to the A Literary Life in London After graduating, Caribbean. Based on his travels, he wrote a nonfic- Naipaul moved to London. There he got a part- tion book, The Middle Passage, detailing his views of time job with the British Broadcasting Company the region. This book was the first of many nonfic- (BBC) editing and presenting a weekly radio pro- tion books Naipaul wrote documenting his travels gram about literature that was designed for a through India, the Middle East, Africa, and the Caribbean audience. When Naipaul wasn’t working Caribbean. Many of his novels, too, are set in devel- on his radio program, he worked toward his goal of oping nations struggling to form new national iden- becoming a writer. Naipaul’s first literary works were tities after the end of colonialism. based on memories of his years in Trinidad. The Naipaul has won numerous prizes, including the novels The Mystic Masseur (1957) and The Suffrage Nobel Prize in Literature in 2001. of Elvira (1958) and the short story collection V. S. Naipaul was born in 1932. Miguel Street (which contains the story “B. Wordsworth”) were well-received by critics and readers. But Naipaul’s status as a great author was AuthorAuthor SearchSearch ForFor more about secured with the publication of A House for Mr. AuthorV. S. Naipaul, Name, go go to to www www.literature.glencoe.com.glencoe.com. .

V. S. NAIPAUL 1331 MC PHERSON COLIN/CORBIS SYGMA

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Connecting to the Story Reading Strategy Drawing Conclusions The following story describes a friendship that devel- About Meaning ops between a young boy and an older man who Drawing conclusions about meaning means making claims they both are poets. As you read the story, think a generalization about the main idea, or theme, of a about the following questions: story from the clues supplied by the author. These • To be a good poet, what qualities does a person clues can be found in the dialogue of the characters, need to have? in the narrator’s commentary, and in the specific • Must a poet necessarily write poetry, or are there details used to describe the setting. other ways a person can be a poet? Reading Tip: Taking Notes Use a chart similar to the Building Background one below to write down clues that you think may help “B. Wordsworth” is set in the city of Port-of-Spain, you draw conclusions about the meaning of this story. which is the capital city of the Caribbean island of Trinidad, now known as the Republic of Trinidad and Detail Meaning Tobago. The population of Port-of-Spain is close to 50,000. People of many different backgrounds live in the city, including people of African descent, people of European descent, people of mixed heritage, and people from the subcontinent of India whose families moved to Trinidad in the 1800s as indentured servants. Formerly a British colony, Trinidad and Tobago became an independent republic in 1962. Vocabulary Setting Purposes for Reading hospitable (hos pi tə bəl) adj. offering generous and cordial welcome to guests; p. 1333 A hospi- Big Idea Globalization table person is gracious when people come to visit. As you read, notice details that make this story both specific to a particular place and universal. constellation (kon´ stə la¯ shən) n. any of eighty-eight groups of stars, many of which traditionally represent characters and objects in Literary Element Dialect ancient mythology; p. 1335 We could identify Dialect is a variation of a language that is spoken in a several constellations when we studied the patterns particular region or by a particular group of people. of stars in the night sky. Dialects may differ from the standard form of a lan- patronize (pa¯ trə n¯z´) v. to be a customer of; guage in vocabulary, pronunciation, or grammar. As p. 1336 They preferred to patronize locally owned you read, note how the dialect used by the characters stores rather than large chain stores. differs from Standard English. distill (dis til) v. to extract the essence of; See Literary Terms Handbook, p. R4. • p. 1336 Distilling information means expressing it in as few words as possible.

Vocabulary Tip: Analogies Analogies are compari- Interactive Literary Elements Handbook To review or learn more about the literary elements, sons based on relationships between ideas. go to www.glencoe.com.

OBJECTIVES In studying this selection, you will focus on the following: • analyzing dialect • analyzing genre elements • drawing conclusions about meaning

1332 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE

11331-1339331-1339 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13321332 11/10/07/10/07 3:44:233:44:23 PMPM Landscape, Trinidad, c. 1921. James Wilson Morrice. Oil on canvas, 74 x 92.2 cm. Art Gallery of Toronto.

V. S. Naipaul V. S. Naipaul

T hree beggars called punctually every day at until we had lit it for him. That man never came the hospitable houses in Miguel Street. At about again. ten an Indian came in his dhoti1 and white The strangest caller came one afternoon at jacket, and we poured a tin of rice into the sack about four o’clock. I had come back from school he carried on his back. At twelve an old woman and was in my home- smoking a clay pipe came and she got a cent. clothes. The man said to At two a blind man led by a boy called for his me, “Sonny, may I come penny. Sometimes we had a rogue.2 One day a inside your yard?” man called and said he was hungry. We gave him He was a small man and a meal. He asked for a cigarette and wouldn’t go he was tidily dressed. He wore a hat, a white shirt, and black trousers. 1. A dhoti is a loincloth worn by Hindu men in India. I asked, “What do you 2. One might be described as a rogue if one is somehow want?” different or set apart from a group. Rogue can also mean a He said, “I want to beggar. Visual Vocabulary watch your bees.” Gru-gru palm trees Vocabulary We had four small gru- are spiny-trunked hospitable (hos pi tə bəl) adj. offering generous and gru palm trees and they palms that grow in the West Indies. cordial welcome to guests were full of uninvited bees.

V. S. NAIPAUL 1333 (t) Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Canada/Bridgeman Art Library (b) John N. Trager

1333-1337 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1333 6/23/06 1:48:59 PM I ran up the steps and shouted, “Ma, it have a He said, “You like your mother?” man outside here. He say he want to watch the “When she not beating me.” bees.” He pulled out a printed sheet from his hip- My mother came out, looked at the man, and pocket and said, “On this paper is the greatest asked in an unfriendly way, “What you want?” poem about mothers and I’m going to sell it to The man said, “I want to watch your bees.” you at a bargain price. For four cents.” His English was so good, it didn’t sound natural, I went inside and I said, “Ma, you want to buy and I could see my mother was worried. a poetry for four cents?” She said to me, “Stay here and watch him while My mother said, “Tell that blasted man to he watch the bees.” haul his tail away from my yard, you hear.” The man said, “Thank you, Madam. You have I said to B. Wordsworth, “My mother say she done a good deed today.” ain’t have four cents.” He spoke very slowly and very correctly as B. Wordsworth said, “It is the poet’s tragedy.” though every word was costing him money. And he put the paper back in his pocket. He We watched the bees, this man and I, for about didn’t seem to mind. an hour, squatting near the palm trees. I said, “Is a funny way to go round selling The man said, “I like watching bees. Sonny, do poetry like that. Only calypsonians5 do that sort you like watching bees?” of thing. A lot of people does buy?” I said, “I ain’t have the time.” He said, “No one has yet bought a single copy.” He shook his head sadly. He said, “That’s what “But why you does keep on going round, I do, I just watch. I can watch ants for days. then?” Have you ever watched ants? And scorpions, and He said, “In this way I watch many things, centipedes, and congorees3—have you watched and I always hope to meet poets.” those?” I said, “You really think I is a poet?” I shook my head. “You’re as good as me,” he said. I said, “What you does do, mister?” And when B. Wordsworth left, I prayed I He got up and said, “I am a poet.” would see him again. I said, “A good poet?” About a week later, coming back from school He said, “The greatest in the world.” one afternoon, I met him at the corner of Miguel “What’s your name, mister?” Street. “B. Wordsworth.” He said, “I have been waiting for you for a “B for Bill?” long time.” “Black. Black Wordsworth. White Wordsworth4 I said, “You sell any poetry yet?” was my brother. We share one heart. I can watch a He shook his head. small flower like the morning glory and cry.” He said, “In my yard I have the best mango I said, “Why you does cry?” tree in Port of Spain. And now the mangoes are “Why, boy? Why? You will know when you ripe and red and very sweet and juicy. I have grow up. You’re a poet, too, you know. And waited here for you to tell you this and to invite when you’re a poet you can cry for everything.” you to come and eat some of my mangoes.” I couldn’t laugh. He lived in Alberto Street in a one-roomed hut placed right in the center of the lot. The yard seemed all green. There was the big mango 3. Congorees is a West Indian term for “millipedes” (long, tree. There was a coconut tree and there was a many-legged arthropods). plum tree. The place looked wild, as though it 4. White Wordsworth is a reference to the English poet William Wordsworth (1770–1850). 5. Calypsonians are folk musicians who sing calypso music— Literary Element Dialect How does the boy’s dialect dif- satirical street ballads native to Trinidad and Tobago that are fer from Standard English? List two specific differences. often improvised.

Big Idea Globalization What does this statement tell you Reading Strategy Drawing Conclusions About Meaning about the globalization of English? Why do you think the boy wants to see B. Wordsworth again?

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1333-1337 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1334 6/23/06 1:49:18 PM wasn’t in the city at all. You couldn’t see all the The policeman said, “What you doing here?” big concrete houses in the street. B. Wordsworth said, “I have been asking He was right. The mangoes were sweet and myself the same question for forty years.” juicy. I ate about six, and the yellow mango juice We became friends, B. Wordsworth and I. He ran down my arms to my elbows and down my told me, “You must never tell anybody about me mouth to my chin and my shirt was stained. and about the mango tree and the coconut tree My mother said when I got home, “Where you and the plum tree. You must keep that a secret. If was? You think you is a man now and could go you tell anybody, I will know, because I am a poet.” all over the place? Go cut a whip for me.” I gave him my word and I kept it. She beat me rather badly, and I ran out of the I liked his little room. It had no more furni- house swearing that I would never come back. I ture than George’s7 front room, but it looked went to B. Wordsworth’s house. I was so angry, cleaner and healthier. But it also looked lonely. my nose was bleeding. One day I asked him, “Mister Wordsworth, B. Wordsworth said, “Stop crying, and we will why you does keep all this bush in your yard? go for a walk.” Ain’t it does make the place damp?” I stopped crying, but I was breathing short. He said, “Listen, and I will tell you a story. We went for a walk. We walked down St. Clair Once upon a time a boy and girl met each other Avenue to the Savannah6 and we walked to the and they fell in love. They loved each other so racecourse. much they got married. They were both poets. B. Wordsworth said, “Now, let us lie on the He loved words. She loved grass and flowers and grass and look up at the sky, and I want you to trees. They lived happily in a single room, and think how far those stars are from us.” then one day, the girl poet said to the boy poet, I did as he told me, and I saw what he meant. ‘We are going to have another poet in the fam- I felt like nothing, and at ily.’ But this poet was never born, because the the same time I had never girl died, and the young poet died with her, felt so big and great in all inside her. And the girl’s husband was very sad, my life. I forgot all my and he said he would never touch a thing in the anger and all my tears and girl’s garden. And so the garden remained, and all the blows. grew high and wild.” When I said I was better, I looked at B. Wordsworth, and as he told me he began telling me the this lovely story, he seemed to grow older. I names of the stars, and I understood his story. Visual Vocabulary Orion the Hunter particularly remembered We went for long walks together. We went to is the constellation the constellation of Orion the Botanical Gardens and the Rock Gardens. named for a the Hunter, though I don’t We climbed Chancellor Hill in the late after- mythological really know why. I can spot noon and watched the darkness fall on Port of giant hunter. Orion even today, but I Spain, and watched the lights go on in the city have forgotten the rest. and on the ships in the harbor. Then a light was flashed into our faces, and He did everything as though he were doing it we saw a policeman. We got up from the grass. for the first time in his life. He did everything as though he were doing some church rite.

Savannah 6. is a two-hundred-acre park in Port-of-Spain, 7. George is a character in Naipaul’s book of short stories Trinidad, that includes a racecourse. Miguel Street. Reading Strategy Drawing Conclusions About Meaning Literary Element Dialect What difference do you detect What does the boy learn from B. Wordsworth in this passage? between the speech of the policeman and that of B. Wordsworth? Vocabulary constellation (kon´ stə la¯ shən) n. any of eighty-eight Reading Strategy Drawing Conclusions About Meaning groups of stars, many of which traditionally represent What does this statement indicate about B. Wordsworth’s characters and objects in ancient mythology philosophy of life?

V. S. NAIPAUL 1335 Space Telescope Science Institute/Corbis

1333-1337 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1335 6/23/06 1:49:30 PM He would say to me, “Now, how about having some ice cream?” And when I said yes, he would grow very serious and say, “Now, which café shall we patronize?” As though it were a very important thing. He would think for some time about it, and finally say, “I think I will go and negotiate the purchase with that shop.” The world became a most exciting place. One day, when I was in his yard, he said to me, “I have a great secret which I am now going to tell you.” I said, “It really secret?” “At the moment, yes.” I looked at him, and he looked at me. He said, “This is just between you and me, remember. I am writing a poem.” “Oh.” I was disappointed. He said, “But this is a different sort of poem. This is the greatest poem in the world.” I whistled. He said, “I have been working on it for more than five years now. I will finish it in about twenty-two years from now, that is, if I keep on writing at the present rate.” “You does write a lot, then?” He said, “Not any more. I just write one line a Watching, 1995. Betye Saar. Mixed media on metal, month. But I make sure it is a good line.” 13½ x 9½ in. Courtesy of Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York. I asked, “What was last month’s good line?” He looked up at the sky, and said, “The past is Wordsworth, if I drop this pin in the water, you deep.” think it will float?” I said, “It is a beautiful line.” He said, “This is a strange world. Drop your B. Wordsworth said, “I hope to distill the pin, and let us see what will happen.” experiences of a whole month into that single The pin sank. line of poetry. So, in twenty-two years, I shall I said, “How is the poem this month?” have written a poem that will sing to all But he never told me any other line. He humanity.” merely said, “Oh, it comes, you know. It comes.” I was filled with wonder. Or we would sit on the seawall and watch the liners come into the harbor. Our walks continued. We walked along the But of the greatest poem in the world I heard seawall at Docksite one day, and I said, “Mr. no more.

I felt he was growing older. “How you does live, Mr. Wordsworth?” I asked Reading Strategy Drawing Conclusions About Meaning him one day. What does the reader begin to suspect about B. Wordsworth in this passage? He said, “You mean how I get money?” When I nodded, he laughed in a crooked way. Vocabulary He said, “I sing calypsos in the calypso patronize (pa¯ trə n¯z´) v. to be a customer of season.” distill (dis til) v. to extract the essence of “And that last you the rest of the year?” “It is enough.”

1336 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE Steve Peck/Courtesy of Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York City

1333-1337 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1336 6/23/06 1:49:48 PM “But you will be the richest man in the world He said, “When I have finished this story, I when you write the greatest poem?” want you to promise that you will go away and He didn’t reply. never come back to see me. Do you promise?” One day when I went to see him in his little I nodded. house, I found him lying on his little bed. He He said, “Good. Well, listen. That story I told looked so old and so weak, that I found myself you about the boy poet and the girl poet, do you wanting to cry. remember that? That wasn’t true. It was something He said, “The poem is not going well.” I just made up. All this talk about poetry and the He wasn’t looking at me. He was looking greatest poem in the world, that wasn’t true, either. through the window at the coconut tree, and Isn’t that the funniest thing you have heard?” he was speaking as though I wasn’t there. He But his voice broke. said, “When I was I left the house, and twenty I felt the power ran home crying, like a within myself.” Then, poet, for everything I almost in front of my “When I have saw. eyes, I could see his face growing older and more finished this I walked along tired. He said, “But Alberto Street a year that—that was a long story, I want you later, but I could find no time ago.” sign of the poet’s house. And then—I felt it so It hadn’t vanished, just keenly, it was as though I to promise that like that. It had been had been slapped by my pulled down, and a big, mother. I could see it you will go away two-storied building had clearly on his face. It was taken its place. The there for everyone to and never come mango tree and the plum see. Death on the shrink- tree and the coconut tree ing face. back to see me.” had all been cut down, He looked at me, and and there was brick and saw my tears and sat up. concrete everywhere. He said, “Come.” I went and sat on his It was just as though B. Wordsworth had never knees. existed. He looked into my eyes, and he said, “Oh, you can see it, too. I always knew you had the poet’s eye.” Reading Strategy Drawing Conclusions About Meaning He didn’t even look sad, and that made me In your opinion, what is B. Wordsworth’s motivation for burst out crying loudly. extracting this promise from the boy? He pulled me to his thin chest, and said, “Do you want me to tell you a funny story?” and he Reading Strategy Drawing Conclusions About Meaning smiled encouragingly at me. What lesson has B. Wordsworth taught the boy by denying But I couldn’t reply. the truth of his stories? Why does the boy run home crying?

V. S. NAIPAUL 1337

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RESPONDING AND THINKING CRITICALLY Respond 5. (a)What does B. Wordsworth tell the narrator on his deathbed? How does the narrator respond to B. 1. What was the main emotion you felt at the end of Wordsworth’s revelation? (b)How has the narrator the story? Explain. become “like a poet”? Recall and Interpret Analyze and Evaluate 2. (a)How does B. Wordsworth’s request differ from 6. Is this story unique to Trinidad, or does it contain the requests of the others who visit “the hospitable universal qualities? How might a different setting houses of Miguel Street”? (b)What does this change the story? request suggest about him? How does it set him apart from the others? 7. How would you describe B. Wordsworth’s perspective on poetry? 3. (a)Who does B. Wordsworth say is his brother? What do they have in common, according to Connect B. Wordsworth? (b)In what ways does the thing 8. Naipaul has said that a reader should see elements B. Wordsworth and his “brother” share make them of his or her own experience in a story. Does both poets? B. Wordsworth remind you of anyone you’ve ever 4. (a)What are some of the things B. Wordsworth known? What influence did this person have on and the narrator do together? (b)What does your life? B. Wordsworth teach the narrator to value? 9. Big Idea Globalization How does this story demonstrate that twentieth-century English is a global language?

LITERARY ANALYSIS

Literary Element Dialect Review: Foreshadowing Authors incorporate dialect into their writing for vari- As you learned on page 1123, foreshadowing is an ous reasons. They might include dialect to help con- author’s use of clues to prepare readers for events vey a sense of place or the social context of the that will happen later in a story. character. Review the story, looking for examples of Partner Activity Meet with a classmate and find two dialect, and then answer the following questions. or more examples of foreshadowing in this story. What 1. In terms of grammar and vocabulary, how does do you think each example foreshadows? Working the dialect spoken by some characters in this story with your partner, create a chart similar to the one differ from Standard English? below in which you list the examples of foreshadowing you have found. 2. Which characters in the story use dialect and which use Standard English? What does this speech difference tell you about the characters? Examples of What the Example 3. What difference do you notice between the boy’s Foreshadowing Foreshadows speech when he is narrating the story and when “You will know when After his last meeting he is engaged in dialogue with the other charac- you grow up . . . And with B. Wordsworth, ters? What might account for this difference? when you’re a poet the boy “ran home you can cry for crying, like a poet, for everything.” everything I saw.”

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Reading Strategy Drawing Conclusions Writing About Literature About Meaning Analyze Character Write a character sketch of Authors sometimes state the theme, or meaning, of a B. Wordsworth. Before you begin to write, review the work directly. More often, however, they give readers story, considering the following factors: hints, or clues, and expect them to draw their own • how the narrator describes B. Wordsworth conclusions about the meaning of a work. Review the chart you made on page 1332, and then answer the • how other characters see B. Wordsworth following questions. • the words and actions of B. Wordsworth 1. What conclusions can you draw about the influence • how B. Wordsworth describes himself B. Wordsworth has upon the narrator in the story? • B. Wordsworth’s deathbed confession 2. Why do you think B. Wordsworth confesses to the narrator at their final meeting that his stories about If any of the details you find about B. Wordsworth himself are false? appear contradictory, consider what the contradictions may reveal about his character. Follow the writing path below to help you organize your essay. Vocabulary Practice Practice with Analogies Choose the word that ▲▲ State your overall impression Introduction best completes each analogy. of B. Wordsworth.

1. stars : constellation :: ship : ➧ a. ﬂ eet b. port c. galley 2. kind : good-hearted :: hospitable : Address each of the bulleted Body points above in a separate a. healing b. hostile c. generous Paragraph(s) paragraph.

3. instill : remove :: distill : ➧ a. extract b. dilute c. inject Briefly summarize your 4. patronize : favor :: despise : ▲ Conclusion conclusions about a. humiliate b. hate c. acclaim B. Wordsworth’s character.

When you complete your draft, proofread and edit it to Academic Vocabulary correct any errors in grammar, spelling, and punctuation.

Here are two words from the vocabulary list on page R82. Literature Groups The last line of the story says, “It was just as though no r məl normal ( ) adj. conforming to an B. Wordsworth had never existed.” In a small group, accepted standard, model, or pattern discuss the irony of this statement by addressing occur (ə kur) v. to take place or come to pass the following questions: How does it seem as if B. Wordsworth had never existed? In what ways might Practice and Apply B. Wordsworth have had a lasting effect that he 1. In what way is B. Wordsworth not a normal hadn’t even considered? Share a summary of your visitor to the houses on Miguel Street? ideas with other groups. 2. What occurs in the final paragraph of the story?

Web Activities For eFlashcards, Selection Quick Checks, and other Web activities, go to www.glencoe.com.

V. S. NAIPAUL 1339

11331-1339331-1339 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13391339 66/23/06/23/06 1:50:261:50:26 PMPM LITERARY PERSPECTIVE on Globalization Informational Text The Gateway to India.

Salman Rushdie

Booker Prize Winner

Building Background n old photograph in a cheap frame hangs on a wall of the room where I Indian-born author Salman Rushdie has written some of the most well-regarded works of the past twenty-five work. It’s a picture dating from 1946 of a house into which, at the time of its taking, years. His novel Midnight’s Children was awarded the A prestigious Booker Prize for Fiction in 1981. The follow- I had not yet been born. The house is rather ing excerpt is from Imaginary Homelands, a book of peculiar—a three-storeyed gable affair with criticism and essays. tiled roofs and round towers in two corners, each wearing a pointy tiled hat. “The past is a Set a Purpose for Reading foreign country,” goes the famous opening sen- Read to understand a novelist’s perspective on writing tence of L. P. Hartley’s1 novel The Go-Between, in this new global age. “they do things differently there.” But the photograph tells me to invert this idea; it reminds Reading Strategy me that it’s my present that is foreign, and that Identifying Assumptions and Ambiguity the past is home, albeit a lost home in a lost city in the mists of lost time. An assumption is an idea or a belief that a person A few years ago I revisited Bombay, which is takes for granted without any actual proof. Ambiguity my lost city, after an absence of something like is the state of having more than one meaning. Use a half my life. Shortly after arriving, acting on an two- column chart, like the one below, to help you to impulse, I opened the telephone directory and identify assumptions and ambiguities as you read the looked for my father’s name. And, amazingly, essay. there it was; his name, our old address, the unchanged telephone number, as if we had never Assumptions Ambiguities gone away to the unmentionable country across

1. L. P. Hartley (1895–1972) was an English critic, novelist, and short story writer.

1340 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE Robert Holmes/CORBIS

11340-1343340-1343 U7P2SEL-845482.inddU7P2SEL-845482.indd 13401340 66/23/06/23/06 1:51:431:51:43 PMPM Informational Text the border. It was an eerie discovery. I felt as if I the distortions of memory) what I was actually were being claimed, or informed that the facts of doing was a novel of memory and about memory, my faraway life were illusions, and that this conso that my India was just that: “my” India, a ver- tinuity was the reality. Then I went to visit the sion and no more than one version of all the house in the photograph and stood outside it, hundreds of millions of possible versions. I tried neither daring nor wishing to announce myself to make it as imaginatively true as I could, but to its new owners. (I didn’t want to see how imaginative truth is simultaneously honorable they’d ruined the interior.) I was overwhelmed. and suspect, and I knew that my India may only The photograph had naturally been taken in have been one to which I (who am no longer black and white; and my memory, feeding on what I was, and who by quitting Bombay never such images as this, had begun to see my child- became what perhaps I was meant to be) was, let hood in the same way, monochromatically. The us say, willing to admit I belonged. . . . colors of my history had seeped out of my mind’s So literature can, and perhaps must, give the eye; now my other two eyes were assaulted by lie to official facts. But is this a proper function colors, by the vividness of the red tiles, the yel- of those of us who write from outside India? Or low-edged green of cactus-leaves, the brilliance are we just dilettantes3 in such affairs, because of bougainvillea creeper.2 It is probably not too we are not involved in their day-to-day unfold- romantic to say that that was when my novel ing, because by speaking out we take no risks, Midnight’s Children was really born; when I real- because our personal safety is not threatened? ized how much I wanted to restore the past to What right do we have to speak at all? myself, not in the faded grays of old family-album My answer is very simple. Literature is self- snapshots, but whole, in CinemaScope and glori- validating. That is to say, a book is not justified ous Technicolor. by its author’s worthiness to write it, but by the Bombay is a city built by foreigners upon quality of what has been written. There are ter- reclaimed land; I, who had been away so long rible books that arise directly out of experience, that I almost qualified for the title, was gripped and extraordinary imaginative feats dealing with by the conviction that I, too, had a city and a themes which the author has been obliged to history to reclaim. approach from the outside. It may be that writers in my position, exiles or Literature is not in the business of copyright- emigrants or expatriates, are haunted by some ing certain themes for certain groups. And as for sense of loss, some urge to reclaim, to look back, risk: the real risks of any artist are taken in the even at the risk of being mutated into pillars of work, in pushing the work to the limits of what salt. But if we do look back, we must also do so is possible, in the attempt to increase the sum of in the knowledge—which gives rise to profound what it is possible to think. Books become good uncertainties—that our physical alienation from when they go to this edge and risk falling over India almost inevitably means that we will not it—when they endanger the artist by reason of be capable of reclaiming precisely the thing that what he has, or has not artistically dared. was lost; that we will, in short, create fictions, So if I am to speak for Indian writers in not actual cities or villages, but invisible ones, England I would say this, paraphrasing G. V. imaginary homelands, Indias of the mind. Desani’s4 H. Hatterr: The migrations of the fifties Writing my book in North London, looking and sixties happened. “We are. We are here.” out through my window on to a city scene totally And we are not willing to be excluded from any unlike the ones I was imagining on to paper, I part of our heritage; which heritage includes . . . was constantly plagued by this problem, until I the right of any member of this post-diaspora5 felt obliged to face it in the text, to make clear that (in spite of my original . . . ambition to unlock the gates of lost time so that the past 3. Here, dilettantes means “amateurs” or “those with a reappeared as it actually had been, unaffected by superficial understanding.” 4. G. V. Desani (1909–2000) was an Indian novelist and journal- ist. His best-known work is the novel All About H. Hatterr. 5. Diaspora means “the scattering of a people from their 2. Bougainvillea creeper is a tropical ornamental plant. homeland.”

SALMAN RUSHDIE 1341

1340-1343 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1341 1/29/07 3:00:59 PM Informational Text community to draw on its roots for its art, just as reflection of other struggles taking place in the all the world’s community of displaced writers real world, struggles between the cultures within has always done. ourselves and the influences at work upon our Let me override at once the faintly defensive societies. To conquer English may be to complete note that has crept into these last few remarks. the process of making ourselves free. The Indian writer, looking back at India, does so But the British Indian writer simply does not through guilt-tinted spectacles. (I am of course, have the option of rejecting English, anyway. His once more, talking about myself.) I am speaking children, her children, will grow up speaking it, now of those of us who emigrated . . . and I sus- probably as a first language; and in the forging of pect that there are times when the move seems a British Indian identity the English language is wrong to us all. . . . Sometimes we feel that we of central importance. It must, in spite of every- straddle two cultures; at other times, that we fall thing, be embraced. (The word “translation” between two stools. But however ambiguous and comes, etymologically, from the Latin for “bear- shifting this ground may be, it is not an infertile ing across.” Having been borne across the world, territory for a writer to occupy. If literature is in we are translated men. It is normally supposed part the business of finding new angles at which that something always gets lost in translation; I to enter reality, then once again our distance, cling, obstinately, to the notion that something our long geographical perspective, may provide can also be gained.) us with such angles. Or it may be that that is To be an Indian writer in this society is to simply what we must think in order to do our face, every day, problems of definition. What work. . . . does it mean to be “Indian” outside India? How England’s Indian writers are by no means can culture be preserved without becoming all the same type of animal. Some of us, for ossified?6 How should we discuss the need for instance, are Pakistani. Others Bangladeshi. change within ourselves and our community Others West, or East, or even South African. And V. S. Naipaul, by now, is something else

entirely. This word “Indian” is getting to be a 6. Here, ossified means “rigidly conventional.” pretty scattered concept. Indian writers in England include political exiles, first-generation migrants, affluent expatriates whose residence here is frequently temporary, naturalized Britons, and people born here who may never have laid eyes on the subcontinent. Clearly, nothing that I say can apply across all these categories. But one of the interesting things about this diverse community is that, as far as Indo-British fiction is concerned, its existence changes the ball game, because that fiction is in future going to come as much from addresses in London, Birmingham and Yorkshire as from Delhi or Bombay. One of the changes has to do with attitudes towards the use of English. Many have referred to the argument about the appropriateness of this language to Indian themes. And I hope all of us share the view that we can’t simply use the language in the way the British did; that it needs remaking for our own purposes. Those of us who do use English do so in spite of our ambiguity towards it, or perhaps because of that, perhaps because we can find in that linguistic struggle a

1342 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE Simon Reddy/Alamy

11340-1343340-1343 U7P2SEL-845482.inddU7P2SEL-845482.indd 13421342 66/23/06/23/06 1:51:551:51:55 PMPM Informational Text without seeming to play into the hands of our and fair play, but of my social class, my freak fair racial enemies? What are the consequences, both skin and my “English” English accent. Take away spiritual and practical, of refusing to make any any of these, and the story would have been very concessions to Western ideas and practices? different. Because of course the dream-England is What are the consequences of embracing those no more than a dream. . . . ideas and practices and turning away from the As Richard Wright7 found long ago in ones that came here with us? These questions are America, black and white descriptions of soci- all a single, existential question. How are we to ety are no longer compatible. Fantasy, or the live in the world? mingling of fantasy and naturalism, is one way I do not propose to offer, prescriptively, any of dealing with these problems. It offers a way answers to these questions; only to state that of echoing in the form of our work the issues these are some of the issues with which each of faced by all of us: how to build a new, “modern” us will have to come to terms. world out of an old, legend-haunted civilization, an old culture which we have brought into To turn my eyes outwards now, and to say a little the heart of a newer one. But whatever techni- about the relationship between the Indian writer cal solutions we may find, Indian writers in and the majority white culture in whose midst he these islands, like others who have migrated lives, and with which his work will sooner or into the north from the south, are capable of later have to deal: writing from a kind of double perspective: In common with many Bombay-raised middle- because they, we, are at one and the same time class children of my generation, I grew up with insiders and outsiders in this society. This an intimate knowledge of, and even sense of stereoscopic vision8 is perhaps what we can friendship with, a certain kind of England: a offer in place of “whole sight.” dream-England. . . . I wanted to come to England. I couldn’t wait. And to be fair, England 7. Richard Wright (1908–1960) was an African American has done all right by me; but I find it a little dif- novelist. ficult to be properly grateful. I can’t escape the 8. Stereoscopic vision refers to the combining of two images— often photographs of the same thing taken at slightly view that my relatively easy ride is not the result different angles—into a single three-dimensional image, with of the dream-England’s famous sense of tolerance the aid of a stereoscope.

RESPONDING AND THINKING CRITICALLY Respond Analyze and Evaluate 1. In what ways has this essay changed your under- 5. (a)Rushdie claims that Indian writers cannot use standing of the effects of globalization on literature? English “in the way the British did” and “that it needs remaking.” Why does Rushdie say this? Recall and Interpret (b)Do you agree with this claim? Why or why not? (a)When Rushdie revisited his childhood home in 2. 6. (a)Briefly state the main ideas of this essay. Bombay, what realization did he have? (b)What (b)With which ideas do you agree? With which metaphor does Rushdie use to examine his feel- do you disagree? Explain your reasoning. ings? Explain. 3. (a)According to Rushdie, what “can, and perhaps Connect must,” literature do? (b)In his opinion, what have 7. How is the “stereoscopic vision” described by displaced writers always done? Rushdie at the end of this essay demonstrated by other writers in this unit? 4. How does Rushdie describe England and his life there?

OBJECTIVES • Read to enhance understanding of history and British • Identify and analyze an author’s unstated assumptions culture. based on explicitly stated information.

SALMAN RUSHDIE 1343

1340-1343 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1343 1/10/07 3:50:52 PM BEFORE YOU READ

Games at Twilight

MEET ANITA DESAI

any of Anita Desai’s novels brilliantly she married Ashvin Desai, a businessman; they portray life in India, its past and present, later had four children. and the struggles that many Indians, M In 1963, when she was twenty-six, Desai pub- especially women and children, face. Her novels lished her first novel, Cry, the Peacock, which and short stories are often full of vivid imagery deals with the oppression of Indian women. and ornate detail. As Nobel Prize–winning novel- Where Shall We Go This Summer? also explores ist J. M. Coetzee has stated, “Desai’s strength as a the theme of despairing women. Many of her writer has always been her eye for detail . . . her novels, such as Bye-Bye Blackbird and Fire on the gift for telling metaphor, and above all her feel for Mountain, focus on the profound cultural the sun and sky, heat and dust, for the elemental changes that India has experienced since the reality of central India.” dissolution of the British Empire. A Distinct Genius Desai was born Anita Mazumdar in Mussoorie, India, north of Delhi, to a German mother and an Indian father. Hers “I believe literature and art really was a family of bookworms, and she treasured the amount of time and privacy she had as a contain the essence of life and the child to read and dream. “I grew up in a home world, uncover its innermost secrets where three languages were spoken together— and present those truths that one might Hindi, English, and German—but English was my literary language—the one I read and wrote ordinarily miss or ignore, and so [are] in. I am grateful for that because it opened to closer to the truth than life itself.” me the literature of the world and I made myself at home in it and was not restricted to —Anita Desai any one region.” Desai came to appreciate each language for “its own An International Teacher In addition to sev- distinct genius.” She eral collections of short stories, Desai has pub- found English the most lished some books for children, acquiring a flexible of languages, strong international reputation as a children’s however, and the one writer. In 1987 she came to the United States in which she could best to teach creative writing at Smith College in work “to convey the Massachusetts. Since that time she has alter- rhythms, accents, tones, nated between living and teaching in the and pace of Indian life.” United States and in India. She is also a Fellow Desai began to write in of England’s Royal Society of Literature. English at the age of seven, publishing her first story at Anita Desai was born in 1937. age nine. After graduating with a B.A. in English literature from Delhi Author Search For more about University in 1957, Anita Desai, go to www.glencoe.com.

1344 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE Sophie Bassouls/CORBIS SYGMA

11344-1354344-1354 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13441344 11/29/07/29/07 3:02:143:02:14 PMPM LITERATURE PREVIEW READING PREVIEW

Connecting to the Story Reading Strategy Connecting to Personal What were some of your favorite games as a child? Experience When you played, how important was winning? As you You can bring your own personal experiences and read, think about the following questions: world knowledge to bear on any reading situation to • Who sets rules for children’s games? Can they help you understand and assess what is happening. change? This is especially useful when you read literature in • If you win a game, what, exactly, have you which cultural comparisons are explicit or implicit. achieved? Reading Tip: Taking Notes Use a chart to list simi- Building Background larities and differences you note between your experi- A counting-out game is a simple game, played by an ences and those of characters in the story. indeterminate number of participants, usually for the purpose of choosing a person to be “it” in the playing of Similarities Differences another, different game. Many countries around the world have their own versions of counting-out games, and some games have seemingly endless variations. Some of the most common of these games are Rock, Paper, Scissors; Odd or Even; coin flipping; drawing straws; or counting-out rhymes such as “Eeny, Meeny, Miny, Mo” or (in England) “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Sailor.” The game Vocabulary played by the children near the start of “Games at stridently (str¯d ənt l¯e) adv. in a harsh, grating Twilight” is an example of a counting-out game. manner; p. 1346 Len’s classmates stridently denounced his opinion. Setting Purposes for Reading defunct (di funkt) adj. no longer existing or Big Idea Globalization active; dead; p. 1348 The little mom-and-pop As you read, notice how the Indian culture in the story grocery store that used to be on our corner is now reflects British influences. defunct. temerity (tə mer ə t¯e) n. excessive or reckless Literary Element Point of View boldness; rashness; p. 1348 We were amazed at Point of view is the standpoint from which a story is Linda’s temerity as she faced down the bullies. told. In a first-person story, the narrator is a character fray (fra¯) n. a heated dispute or contest; p. 1349 in the story. In a third-person story, the narrator stands The game of dodgeball had already degenerated into outside the story and describes the characters and a free-for-all before George entered the fray. actions. As you read “Games at Twilight,” consider loo oo¯¯¯ br¯e əs how the narrator’s relationship to the story affects lugubrious ( ) adj. excessively the telling of it. mournful or sorrowful; p. 1351 The little girl’s expression as she held her broken doll was so lugu- • See Literary Terms Handbook, p. R13. brious that I couldn’t help but sympathize.

Vocabulary Tip: Word Parts Knowledge of pre- fixes, suffixes, and roots can help you understand Interactive Literary Elements Handbook To review or learn more about the literary elements, unfamiliar words. go to www.glencoe.com.

OBJECTIVES In studying this selection, you will focus on the following: • evaluating point of view • analyzing literary periods • connecting to personal experiences ANITA DESAI 1345

11344-1354344-1354 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13451345 11/10/07/10/07 3:55:433:55:43 PMPM Anita Desai

Girl on a Swing, India, 2000. Andrew Macara. Oil on canvas, 63.5 x 76.2 cm. Private collection.

It was still too hot to play outdoors. They had They faced the afternoon. It was too hot. Too had their tea, they had been washed and had bright. The white walls of the veranda glared their hair brushed, and after the long day of con- stridently in the sun. The bougainvillea3 hung finement in the house that was not cool but at about it, purple and magenta, in livid balloons. least a protection from the sun, the children The garden outside was like a tray made of strained to get out. Their faces were red and beaten brass, flattened out on the red gravel and bloated with the effort, but their mother would the stony soil in all shades of metal—aluminum, not open the door, everything was still curtained tin, copper, and brass. No life stirred at this arid and shuttered in a way that stifled the children, time of day—the birds still drooped, like dead made them feel that their lungs were stuffed with fruit, in the papery tents of the trees; some squir- cotton wool and their noses with dust and if they rels lay limp on the wet earth under the garden didn’t burst out into the light and see the sun tap. The outdoor dog lay stretched as if dead on and feel the air, they would choke. the veranda mat, his paws and ears and tail all “Please, ma, please,” they begged. “We’ll play reaching out like dying travelers in search of in the veranda and porch—we won’t go a step water. He rolled his eyes at the children—two out of the porch.” white marbles rolling in the purple sockets, “You will, I know you will, and then—” begging for sympathy—and attempted to lift “No—we won’t, we won’t,” they wailed so his tail in a wag but could not. It only horrendously that she actually let down the bolt twitched and lay still. of the front door so that they burst out like seeds Then, perhaps roused by the shrieks of the from a crackling, overripe pod into the veranda, children, a band of parrots suddenly fell out of with such wild, maniacal1 yells that she retreated the eucalyptus tree, tumbled frantically in the to her bath and the shower of talcum powder and the fresh sari2 that were to help her face the summer evening. 3. Bougainvillea is a woody, tropical vine with flowers.

Vocabulary 1. Maniacal means “marked by excessive enthusiasm.” stridently (str¯d ənt le¯) adv. in a harsh, grating manner 2. A sari is an outer garment worn mainly by Hindu women.

1346 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE Private Collection/Bridgeman Art Library

1346-1351 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1346 6/23/06 2:02:57 PM angry grumbling and no one paid attention to the small sleeve hanging loosely off a shoulder. “Make a circle, make a circle!” she shouted, firmly pulling and pushing till a kind of vague circle was formed. “Now clap!” she roared and, clapping, they all chanted in melancholy unison: “Dip, dip, dip—my blue ship—” and every now and then one or the other saw he was safe by the way his hands fell at the crucial moment—palm on palm, or back of hand on palm—and dropped out of the circle with a yell and a jump of relief and jubilation. Raghu was It. He started to protest, to cry “You cheated—Mira cheated—Anu cheated—” but it was too late, the others had all already streaked away. There was no one to hear when he called out, “Only in the veranda—the porch—Ma said—Ma said to stay in the porch!” No one had stopped to listen, all he saw were their brown legs flashing through the dusty shrubs, scrambling up brick walls, leaping over compost heaps and hedges, and then the porch stood empty in the purple shade of the bougainvillea and the garden was as empty as before; even the limp squirrels had whisked away, leaving everything gleaming, Little Indian Girl with a Leaf, 1998. Penelope Anstice. Oil on brassy and bare. canvas. Private collection. Only small Manu suddenly reappeared, as if he had dropped out of an invisible cloud or still, sizzling air, then sorted themselves out into from a bird’s claws, and stood for a moment in battle formation and streaked away across the the center of the yellow lawn, chewing his fin- white sky. ger and near to tears as he heard Raghu shout- The children, too, felt released. They too ing, with his head pressed against the veranda began tumbling, shoving, pushing against each wall, “Eighty-three, eighty-five, eighty-nine, other, frantic to start. Start what? Start their ninety . . .” and then made off in a panic, half business. The business of the children’s day of him wanting to fly north, the other half which is—play. counseling south. Raghu turned just in time to “Let’s play hide-and-seek.” see the flash of his white shorts and the uncer- “Who’ll be It?” tain skittering of his red sandals, and charged “You be It.” after him with such a blood-curdling yell that “Why should I? You be—” Manu stumbled over the hosepipe, fell into its “You’re the eldest—” rubber coils, and lay there weeping, “I won’t be “That doesn’t mean—” It—you have to find them all—all—All!” The shoves became harder. Some kicked out. “I know I have to, idiot,” Raghu said, supercil- The motherly Mira intervened. She pulled the iously kicking him with his toe. “You’re dead,” boys roughly apart. There was a tearing sound of he said with satisfaction, licking the beads of cloth but it was lost in the heavy panting and perspiration off his upper lip, and then stalked off in search of worthier prey, whistling spiritedly so that the hiders should hear and tremble. Reading Strategy Connecting to Personal Experience Based on your memories of childhood, do the children’s pent- Ravi heard the whistling and picked his nose in up energy and eagerness to play seem believable? Explain. a panic, trying to find comfort by burrowing the

ANITA DESAI 1347 Private Collection/Bridgeman Art Library

1346-1351 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1347 1/29/07 3:03:01 PM finger deep-deep into that soft tunnel. He felt Ravi had never cared to enter such a dark and himself too exposed, sitting on an upturned flow- depressing mortuary5 of defunct household goods erpot behind the garage. Where could he bur- seething with such unspeakable and alarming row? He could run around the garage if he heard animal life but, as Raghu’s whistling grew angrier Raghu come—around and around and around— and sharper and his crashing and storming in the but he hadn’t much faith in his short legs when hedge wilder, Ravi suddenly slipped off the flow- matched against Raghu’s long, hefty, hairy foot- erpot and through the crack and was gone. He baller legs. Ravi had a frightening glimpse of chuckled aloud with astonishment at his own them as Raghu combed the hedge of crotons and temerity so that Raghu came out of the hedge, hibiscus,4 trampling delicate ferns underfoot as stood silent with his hands on his hips, listening, he did so. Ravi looked about him desperately, and finally shouted “I heard you! I’m coming! swallowing a small ball of snot in his fear. Got you—” and came charging round the garage The garage was locked with a great heavy only to find the upturned flowerpot, the yellow lock to which the driver had the key in his dust, the crawling of white ants in a mud hill room, hanging from a nail on the wall under his against the closed shed door—nothing. Snarling, work shirt. Ravi had peeped in and seen him he bent to pick up a stick and went off, whack- still sprawling on his string-cot in his vest and ing it against the garage and shed walls as if to striped underpants, the hair on his chest and beat out his prey. the hair in his nose shaking with the vibrations of his phlegm-obstructed snores. Ravi had Ravi shook, then shivered with delight, with wished he were tall enough, big enough to self-congratulation. Also with fear. It was dark, reach the key on the nail, but it was impossible, spooky in the shed. It had a muffled smell, as beyond his reach for years to come. He had of graves. Ravi had once got locked into the sidled away and sat dejectedly on the flowerpot. linen cupboard and sat there weeping for half That at least was cut to his own size. an hour before he was rescued. But at least that But next to the garage was another shed with had been a familiar place, and even smelled a big green door. Also locked. No one even pleasantly of starch, laundry, and, reassuringly, knew who had the key to the lock. That shed of his mother. But the shed smelled of rats, ant- wasn’t opened more than once a year when Ma hills, dust, and spiderwebs. Also of less defin- turned out all the old broken bits of furniture able, less recognizable horrors. And it was dark. and rolls of matting and leaking buckets, and Except for the white-hot cracks along the door, the white anthills were broken and swept away there was no light. The roof was very low. and Flit sprayed into the spiderwebs and rat Although Ravi was small, he felt as if he could holes so that the whole operation was like the reach up and touch it with his fingertips. But he looting of a poor, ruined, and conquered city. didn’t stretch. He hunched himself into a ball The green leaves of the door sagged. They were so as not to bump into anything, touch or feel nearly off their rusty hinges. The hinges were anything. What might there not be to touch large and made a small gap between the door him and feel him as he stood there, trying to and the walls—only just large enough for rats, dogs, and, possibly, Ravi to slip through. 5. A mortuary is a place where dead bodies are kept before burial.

4. Crotons and hibiscus are tropical plants. Literary Element Point of View What have you found out about Ravi in this section so far that you could not learn Literary Element Point of View Note the shift in point of if the story were told from a different point of view? view. What about this new point of view suggests that Ravi has become the main character? Vocabulary di funkt Big Idea Globalization Football, known as soccer in the defunct ( ) adj. no longer existing or active; United States, is a part of British culture that caught on in dead the colonies. Explain why this detail about Raghu might be temerity (tə mer ə te¯) n. excessive or reckless bold- significant. ness; rashness

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1346-1351 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1348 6/23/06 2:03:12 PM around him. He recognized an old bathtub—patches of enamel glimmered at him and at last he lowered himself onto its edge. He contemplated slipping out of the shed and into the fray. He wondered if it would not be better to be captured by Raghu and be returned to the milling crowd as long as he could be in the sun, the light, the free spaces of the garden, and the familiarity of his brothers, sisters, and cousins. It would be evening soon. Their games would become legitimate. The parents would sit out on the lawn on cane basket chairs and watch them as they tore around the garden or gathered in knots to share a loot of mulberries or black, 6 Abstract Day, 2005. Lou Wall. Private collection. teeth-splitting jamun from the garden trees. The gar- dener would fix the hosepipe see in the dark? Something cold, or slimy—like to the water tap and water would fall lavishly a snake. Snakes! He leaped up as Raghu through the air to the ground, soaking the dry whacked the wall with his stick—then, quickly yellow grass and the red gravel and arousing realizing what it was, felt almost relieved to the sweet, the intoxicating scent of water on hear Raghu, hear his stick. It made him feel dry earth—that loveliest scent in the world. protected. Ravi sniffed for a whiff of it. He half rose from But Raghu soon moved away. There wasn’t a the bathtub, then heard the despairing scream sound once his footsteps had gone around the of one of the girls as Raghu bore down upon garage and disappeared. Ravi stood frozen inside her. There was the sound of a crash, and of the shed. Then he shivered all over. Something rolling about in the bushes, the shrubs, then had tickled the back of his neck. It took him a screams and accusing sobs of, “I touched the while to pick up the courage to lift his hand and den—” “You did not—” “I did—” “You liar, explore. It was an insect—perhaps a spider— you did not” and then a fading away and exploring him. He squashed it and wondered how silence again. many more creatures were watching him, waiting to reach out and touch him, the stranger. There was nothing now. After standing in that position—his hand still on his neck, feeling the 6. Jamun is a tropical fruit. wet splodge of the squashed spider gradually Reading Strategy Connecting to Personal Experience dry—for minutes, hours, his legs began to trem- How might these “legitimate” games be different from the ble with the effort, the inaction. By now he game the children have been playing? could see enough in the dark to make out the large solid shapes of old wardrobes, broken buck- Vocabulary ets, and bedsteads piled on top of each other fray (fra¯) n. a heated dispute or contest

ANITA DESAI 1349 Lou Wall/Corbis

1346-1351 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1349 6/23/06 2:03:29 PM Ravi sat back on the harsh edge of the tub, trying to elude9 the seeker. He had done that so deciding to hold out a bit longer. What fun if successfully, his success had occupied him so they were all found and caught—he alone left wholly that he had quite forgotten that success unconquered! He had never known that sensa- had to be clinched by that final dash to victory tion. Nothing more wonderful had ever hap- and the ringing cry of “Den!” pened to him than being taken out by an uncle With a whimper he burst through the crack, and bought a whole slab of chocolate all to him- fell on his knees, got up and stumbled on stiff, self, or being flung into the soda man’s pony cart benumbed legs across the shadowy yard, crying and driven up to the gate by the friendly driver heartily by the time he reached the veranda so with the red beard and pointed ears. To defeat that when he flung himself at the white pillar Raghu—that hirsute,7 hoarse-voiced football and bawled, “Den! Den! Den!” his voice broke champion—and to be the winner in a circle of with rage and pity at the disgrace of it all and he older, bigger, luckier children—that would be felt himself flooded with tears and misery. thrilling beyond imagination. He hugged his Out on the lawn, the children stopped chant- knees together and smiled to himself almost shyly ing. They all turned to stare at him in amaze- at the thought of so much victory, such laurels.8 ment. Their faces were pale and triangular in the dusk. The trees and bushes around them stood There he sat smiling, knocking his heels against inky and sepulchral, spilling long shadows across the bathtub, now and then getting up and going them. They stared, wondering at his reappear- to the door to put his ear to the broad crack and ance, his passion, his wild animal howling. Their listening for sounds of the game, the pursuer and mother rose from her basket chair and came the pursued, and then returning to his seat with towards him, worried, annoyed, saying, “Stop it, the dogged determination of the true winner, a stop it, Ravi. Don’t be a baby. Have you hurt breaker of records, a champion. yourself?” Seeing him attended to, the children It grew darker in the shed as the light at the went back to clasping their hands and chanting door grew softer, fuzzier, turned to a kind of crum- “The grass is green, the rose is red . . . .” bling yellow pollen that turned to yellow fur, blue But Ravi would not let them. He tore himself fur, gray fur. Evening. Twilight. The sound of out of his mother’s grasp and pounded across the water gushing, falling. The scent of earth receiv- lawn into their midst, charging at them with his ing water, slaking its thirst in great gulps and head lowered so that they scattered in surprise. “I releasing that green scent of freshness, coolness. won, I won, I won,” he bawled, shaking his head Through the crack Ravi saw the long purple shad- so that the big tears flew. “Raghu didn’t find me. ows of the shed and the garage lying still across I won, I won—” the yard. Beyond that, the white walls of the It took them a minute to grasp what he was house. The bougainvillea had lost its lividity, saying, even who he was. They had quite forgot- hung in dark bundles that quaked and twittered ten him. Raghu had found all the others long ago. and seethed with masses of homing sparrows. The There had been a fight about who was to be It lawn was shut off from his view. Could he hear next. It had been so fierce that their mother had the children’s voices? It seemed to him that he emerged from her bath and made them change to could. It seemed to him that he could hear them another game. Then they had played another and chanting, singing, laughing. But what about the another. Broken mulberries from the tree and game? What had happened? Could it be over? eaten them. Helped the driver wash the car when How could it when he was still not found? their father returned from work. Helped the gar- It then occurred to him that he could have dener water the beds till he roared at them and slipped out long ago, dashed across the yard to swore he would complain to their parents. The the veranda, and touched the “den.” It was necessary to do that to win. He had forgotten. He had only remembered the part of hiding and 9. To elude is to escape from. Reading Strategy Connecting to Personal Experience Do you think Ravi’s predicament in this passage is believ- 7. Hirsute means “covered with hair.” able? Explain. 8. Laurels means “glory and honor.”

1350 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE

1346-1351 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1350 1/29/07 3:03:11 PM Children’s Play (detail), 1987. Shanti Panchal. Watercolor on paper, 130 x 100 cm. Private collection.

parents had come out, taken up their positions “The grass is green, on the cane chairs. They had begun to play The rose is red; again, sing and chant. All this time no one had Remember me remembered Ravi. Having disappeared from the When I am dead, dead, dead, scene, he had disappeared from their minds. dead . . . ” Clean. “Don’t be a fool,” Raghu said roughly, pushing And the arc of thin arms trembled in the twi- him aside, and even Mira said, “Stop howling, light, and the heads were bowed so sadly, and Ravi. If you want to play, you can stand at the their feet tramped to that melancholy refrain so end of the line,” and she put him there very mournfully, so helplessly, that Ravi could not firmly. bear it. He would not follow them, he would not The game proceeded. Two pairs of arms be included in this funereal game. He had reached up and met in an arc. The children wanted victory and triumph—not a funeral. But trooped under it again and again in a lugubrious he had been forgotten, left out, and he would circle, ducking their heads and intoning10 not join them now. The ignominy11 of being forgotten—how could he face it? He felt his heart go heavy and ache inside him unbearably. He lay down full length on the damp grass, crushing his 10. Intoning is chanting. face into it, no longer crying, silenced by a ter- Reading Strategy Connecting to Personal Experience rible sense of his insignificance. Have you ever experienced this feeling of being “out of sight, out of mind”? Does it seem realistic here? Explain.

Vocabulary 11. Ignominy means “humiliation and dishonor.”

lugubrious (loo oo¯¯¯ bre¯ əs) adj. excessively mournful Literary Element Point of View In what ways does the or sorrowful point of view affect the story’s climax?

ANITA DESAI 1351 Private Collection/Bridgeman Art Library

1346-1351 U7P2SEL-845482.indd 1351 6/23/06 2:04:01 PM AFTER YOU READ

RESPONDING AND THINKING CRITICALLY Respond Analyze and Evaluate 1. What is your overall impression of the children and 5. (a)How do the other children tend to treat Ravi their games throughout the story? Explain. throughout the story? Why do you think this is so? (b)How does the dialogue help to convey Recall and Interpret these relationships? 2. (a)What are the children doing at the beginning of 6. (a)Why does Ravi not win the game? (b)If Ravi the story? (b)What does the children’s behavior at had managed to win the game, do you think he the beginning tell you about the relationships would have received “so much victory, such laurels” among them? as he dreams of? Explain. 3. (a)Where does Ravi hide? Why does he choose 7. (a)How does Ravi react to the other children’s that place? (b)What idea builds in Ravi’s mind as behavior toward him at the end? (b)What seems he hides? to affect him more deeply, not winning or having 4. (a)What does Ravi suddenly realize he must do been forgotten? Explain. to win the game? (b)In your opinion, why is Ravi crying as he leaves his hiding place and heads Connect

for the “den”? 8. Big Idea Globalization Cite elements in this story that demonstrate the effects of globalization. Does any element maintain a uniquely Indian ﬂ avor? Explain.

VISUAL LITERACY: Graphic Organizer

Two Sides of Chi ld hood

Adults often speak fondly of the joys of childhood, Group Activity With a partner, answer these but as Desai’s story demonstrates, childhood has its questions about childhood in relation to “Games share of insecurities and fears as well. How you ulti- at Twilight.” mately view childhood may be determined by how you remember and weigh these ups and downs. 1. Add to the diagram at least one positive and Construct a Venn diagram, like the one shown one negative aspect about childhood based on below. In one circle, jot words and images that the lives of Ravi and the other children in reflect the positive side of childhood; in the other “Games at Twilight.” circle, jot words and images that reflect the nega- 2. In your opinion, is Ravi experiencing a particu- tive side. In the overlap, note anything that seems larly unhappy childhood? Explain. both positive and negative about childhood. 3. Do you think the feelings of isolation and rejec- tion that Ravi experiences are unique to childhood or are they feelings that one experiences throughout life? Explain. How might an adult’s reaction to these feelings differ from that of a Positive Both Negative child?

don’t have to socialize with must do as work other children told

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11344-1354344-1354 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13521352 11/29/07/29/07 3:03:463:03:46 PMPM LITERARY ANALYSIS READING AND VOCABULARY

Literary Element Point of View Reading Strategy Connecting to Personal In a story written from the third-person limited point Experience of view, the narrator stands outside the story and reveals You can use your personal experiences and knowl- the thoughts, feelings, and observations of only one, or a edge of the world to help you understand what you limited number, of characters. In a story written from the read. By relating your own experiences to a text, you third-person omniscient, or all knowing, point of view, can identify more closely with the characters, setting, the narrator knows everything about the characters and or conflicts. Think about your own childhood experi- events and may reveal details that the characters them- ences as you answer the following questions. selves could not reveal. 1. Do you think Desai effectively captures the emo- 1. From which point of view is “Games at Twilight” tions of a child in this situation? Explain. written, third-person limited or omniscient? How can you tell? 2. If you had been one of Ravi’s siblings, what might you have said to him when he reappeared in the yard? 2. How does the point of view affect this story? What might have been different if the story had been told from a different point of view? Vocabulary Practice Practice with Word Parts Based on the defini- Review: Mood tions of the vocabulary words and your knowledge of word parts, answer the questions below. As you learned on page 1090, mood is the emotional quality of a literary work. Choice of language, subject 1. Which word has a negative prefi x? matter, setting, and tone, as well as such sound a. stridently b. defunct c. fray devices as rhyme and rhythm, contribute to the mood 2. Which word has an adverb-forming suffi x? of a work. a. lugubrious b. temerity c. stridently Partner Activity Meet with another classmate and 3. Which word has no added prefi x or suffi x? discuss how the mood changes during the course of a. fray b. temerity c. defunct this story. Construct a graphic organizer like the one 4. Which word has a suffi x that forms an adjective? below, in order to trace the sequence of moods in the a. stridently b. lugubrious c. fray story and to note which events and literary elements create these moods.

MOODS IN “GAMES AT TWILIGHT” Academic Vocabulary

Boisterous Here are two words from the vocabulary list on “The children, too, felt released. They too began tumbling, shoving, page R82. pushing against each other, frantic to start.” ➧ area (¯ar e¯ ə) n. a part of a space; a geographical region conduct (kon dukt) v. to manage, control, or direct ➧ Practice and Apply 1. What area of the property does Ravi hide in? 2. How does Raghu conduct his search for the children during the game?

ANITA DESAI 1353

1344-1354 U7P2APP-845482.indd 1353 6/23/06 2:04:51 PM WRITING AND EXTENDING GRAMMAR AND STYLE

Writing About Literature Desai’s Language and Style Evaluate Author’s Craft Anita Desai uses figurative Comparing by Degrees Most adjectives have three language in this story to create vivid impressions in degrees of comparison. Positive is used to describe the reader’s mind. For example, she uses a simile one person or thing (sweet, wonderful); comparative when she states that the children “burst out [of the is used to describe one of two persons or things door] like seeds from a crackling, overripe pod.” (sweeter, more wonderful); and superlative is used Identify three vivid similes or metaphors in the story. to describe one of three or more persons or things Write several paragraphs in which you explain how (sweetest, most wonderful). Note that the adverbs they make the scene clearer or more interesting. more and most are used with adjectives when the -er Follow the writing path shown below. or -est endings would be cumbersome: wonderfulest. In the passage from the story below, the word eldest START functions as a superlative adjective because it describes one child among several. ▲ Introduction Thesis Statement “‘Let’s play hide-and-seek.’”

➧ “Who’ll be It” Argument: Desai’s use of figu- “You be It.” rative language makes the “Why should I? You be—” actions in the story seem more Body ▲ immediate and real. “You’re the eldest—’” Paragraph(s) Evidence: “burst out [of the Activity In this chart are a number of adjectives used door] like seeds from a crack- ➧ by Desai in “Games at Twilight.” Complete the chart, ling, overripe pod.” filling in the degrees that are missing. Then, add three adjectives of your own choosing from “Games at ▲ Conclusion Twilight” and fill in the missing degrees.

FINISH Positive Comparative Superlative

wilder After you complete your draft, meet with a peer reviewer to evaluate each other’s work and to suggest angrier revisions. Then proofread and edit your draft for errors terrible in spelling, grammar, and punctuation. luckier

necessary Literature Groups better In a small group, discuss the role of the games in this loveliest story. How do the children interact as they play? What social skills do they practice and learn? As a group, decide if the games have a positive or a negative influence on the children in the story. Share your Revising Check group’s opinion with the class. Degrees of Comparison It is important to be specific and avoid common traps when you’re making comparisons. For example, the sentence “She was the best of the two,” should be “She was the better of the two.” With a partner, go through your evaluation of Desai’s figurative language and note where more precise comparisons would make your meaning clearer. Web Activities For eFlashcards, Selection Quick Checks, and other Web activities, go to Then revise your draft accordingly. www.glencoe.com.

1354 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE

11344-1354344-1354 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13541354 11/29/07/29/07 3:04:133:04:13 PMPM BEFORE YOU READ

Elegy for the Giant Tortoises

MEET MARGARET ATWOOD

“ began as a profoundly apolitical writer,” Canadian poet and novelist Margaret I Atwood once told Ms. magazine, “but then I began to do what all novelists and some poets do: I began to describe the world around me.” Over the course of her more than forty years as an author, Atwood’s unblinking description of the world as she sees it has won her legions of fans all over the College in Massachusetts. She was only in her mid- globe. twenties when her poetry collection The Circle Game won the prestigious Governor General’s A Split Personality Atwood was born in Ottawa, Literary Award for Poetry. Perhaps as a result of her Ontario, the daughter of an entomologist. She spent early years in the bush, many of Atwood’s poems, the better part of her first seven years in the forested including those in The Circle Game, explore themes bush of northwestern Quebec, where her father was of humankind’s precarious relationship with the doing research on insects. The family lived far from natural world. She published a number of volumes civilization for much of each year, which meant of poetry in the years that followed, as well as sev- Atwood grew up without many playmates, movies, eral collections of short stories. It has been as a nov- or even a consistently working radio. As a result she elist, however, that Atwood has made her greatest learned to read at an early age, and she has been a mark upon the literary world. voracious reader ever since. During the coldest months of the year, the family packed up and moved to various cities. This trun- “I hope that people will finally come to dling back and forth between forest solitude and realize that there is only one ‘race’— the bustle of the city, Atwood would later claim, endowed her with the split personality necessary to the human race—and that we are all become a poet. Even as a very young child she members of it.” wrote stories, comic books, and plays, but it wasn’t until years later that she decided to dedicate her —Margaret Atwood life to writing. When she was seven years old, Atwood and her family relocated to Toronto, Ontario, where she spent her entire adolescence. Atwood’s Women Margaret Atwood’s novels are She had a rather normal high school experience peopled with strong women who have complicated, until her fourth year when she suddenly and with- and often troubled, emotional lives. Much of her out warning transformed into a poet. As she work dissects modern life through a frankly feminist describes it, she was walking home from school lens. Atwood’s probing insights into human behav- one day when, “a large invisible thumb descended ior have made her one of the most popular and crit- from the sky and pressed down on the top of my ically acclaimed writers of her time. head. A poem formed. . . . It was a gift, this Margaret Atwood was born in 1939. poem—a gift from an anonymous donor.” Atwood studied at the University of Toronto and went on to get her master’s degree from Radcliffe Author Search For more about Margaret Atwood, go to www.glencoe.com.

MARGARET ATWOOD 1355 Anthony Loew/Time Life Pictures/Getty Images

11355-1359355-1359 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13551355 11/29/07/29/07 3:04:493:04:49 PMPM LITERATURE PREVIEW READING PREVIEW

Connecting to the Poem Reading Strategy Interpreting Imagery What is our responsibility to the environment? As you Imagery refers to the word pictures that writers create read the poem, think about the following questions: to evoke an emotional response. In creating effective images, writers use sensory details, or descriptions Why do you think people, businesses, and govern- • that appeal to one or more of the five senses. ments might ignore the potential long-term implica- tions of pollution, habitat destruction, and other Reading Tip: Focusing on Images As you read, environmental problems? note the images in the poem and what they might What are some activities people can do on a daily • mean. basis to improve the environment? Building Background Vocabulary Her early experiences in the Canadian wilderness focused Atwood’s attention on nature. “Later on I stud- withering (with ər in) v. becoming dry; shriv- ied chemistry and botany and zoology,” she recalls, eling from lack of moisture; p. 1357 The bunch “and if I hadn’t been a writer I’d have gone on with of grapes I left on the picnic table were withering that.” Atwood believes that the struggle to survive in from the heat. nature is a theme that runs throughout Canadian litera- periphery (pə rif ər e¯) n. the outward or far- ture. She sees herself as a strongly nationalistic thest boundary; p. 1358 The girls were dancing Canadian writer and views Canadian literature as dis- together in the middle of the room while the boys tinct from its American and British counterparts. She hung back on the periphery. believes that a single unifying and defining symbol or plod din theme identifies each country or culture. For the plodding ( ) v. walking heavily and/or United States, it is the frontier, and for England, it is slowly; p. 1358 The tired mule was plodding the island. For Canada, Atwood believes, this defining through the yard dragging the broken plow behind theme is survival. him. lumbering (lum bər in) v. moving heavily and Setting Purposes for Reading clumsily; p. 1358 The old dog came lumbering up Big Idea Globalization the steps. Atwood’s work reflects a global perspective, an obsolete (ob´ sə le¯t) adj. no longer in use; out- acknowledgment of the many nations and cultures dated; p. 1358 The new computers made the old that make up the modern world. As you read “Elegy ones obsolete. for the Giant Tortoises,” consider the serious global issues at the poem’s core. Vocabulary Tip: Synonyms Synonyms are words that have the same or similar meanings. Note that Literary Element Alliteration synonyms are always the same part of speech. Alliteration is the repetition of consonant sounds at the beginnings of words. It can be used to reinforce meaning or create a musical effect. As you read “Elegy for the Giant Tortoises,” listen for the sounds of repeated consonants and try to figure out the poet’s intention in using them. Interactive Literary Elements Handbook To review or learn more about the literary elements, • See Literary Terms Handbook, p. R1. go to www.glencoe.com.

OBJECTIVES In studying this selection, you will focus on the following: • analyzing alliteration • analyzing genre elements • interpreting imagery

1356 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE

11355-1359355-1359 U7P2APP-845482.inddU7P2APP-845482.indd 13561356 11/10/07/10/07 4:03:034:03:03 PMPM Fantaise, 1975. Peter Kinsley. Private collection.

Margaret Atwood

Let others pray for the passenger pigeon, the dodo,1 the whooping crane, the eskimo: everyone must specialize

I will confine myself to a meditation 5 upon the giant tortoises withering finally on a remote island.

1. A dodo was a heavy flightless bird, now extinct.

Big Idea Globalization What might the passenger pigeon, dodo, whooping crane, and Eskimo (Inuit) have in common?

Vocabulary withering (with ər in) v. becoming dry; shriveling from lack of moisture

MARGARET ATWOOD 1357 Private Collection, Bonhams,London,UK/Bridgeman Art Library

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10 but on the last day they will be there; already the event like a wave travelling shapes vision:

on the road where I stand they will materialize, plodding past me in a straggling line 15 awkward without water

their small heads pondering from side to side, their useless armor sadder than tanks and history,

in their closed gaze ocean and sunlight paralyzed, 20 lumbering up the steps, under the archways toward the square glass altars

where the brittle gods are kept, the relics of what we have destroyed, our holy and obsolete symbols.

Reading Strategy Interpreting Imagery What does the speaker mean by the statement that the ocean and sunlight are “paralyzed” in the tortoise’s closed gaze?

Vocabulary periphery (pə rif ər e¯) n. the outward or farthest boundary plodding (plod din) v. walking heavily and/or slowly lumbering (lum bər in) v. moving heavily and clumsily obsolete (ob´ sə le¯t) adj. no longer in use; outdated

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RESPONDING AND THINKING CRITICALLY Respond Analyze and Evaluate 1. What was your emotional response to the poem’s 5. (a)What emotions do you think Atwood wanted to ending? Why? evoke in readers with this poem? (b)What might have been her purpose in writing the poem? Recall and Interpret 6. (a)To what does the poet compare the museum 2. (a)Where does the speaker go to concentrate on in the final two stanzas? (b)Why do you think the tortoises? (b)Are these appropriate places to Atwood uses this particular comparison? go? Explain. 3. (a)To what does the speaker compare the tor- Connect toise’s shell? (b)What point does the speaker 7. Big Idea Globalization How might the theme seem to be making with this comparison? of this poem be said to reﬂ ect global concerns? 4. Where does the speaker imply we will have to go to see tortoises in the future? Why?

LITERARY ANALYSIS READING AND VOCABULARY

Literary Element Alliteration Reading Strategy Interpreting Imagery Alliteration is the repetition of consonants or conso- By interpreting the imagery in the poem, you may nant sounds at the beginnings of words in close prox- note that the speaker suggests a person should not imity to one another. In “Elegy for the Giant Tortoises,” pray for all species; it is necessary to specialize. Atwood uses alliteration to reinforce rhythm and musi- 1. Why do you think Atwood uses the images of cality and to emphasize particular points. prayer and church to make her point? 1. Listen to the way the phrase “subway station” 2. (a)Identify three images in the poem that relate to sounds in line 7. What does this sound reinforce war. (b)How do you interpret the significance of given the context of the stanza? these images? 2. What sort of rhythm do the phrases “plodding past” (line 14) and “side to side” (line 17) create? Vocabulary Practice Reading Further Practice with Synonyms Identify the synonym for each vocabulary word below. If you would like to read more by Margaret Atwood, you might enjoy these works: 1. lumbering a. shambling b. sidling • In the novel The Blind Assassin (winner of the pres- 2. plodding a. stuttering b. laboring tigious Booker Prize), Atwood uses multiple story 3. periphery a. border b. center lines to take readers on a complicated and often hilarious journey. 4. withering a. festering b. wilting • The poems in The Circle Game look at human 5. obsolete a. out-dated b. new beings against the backdrop of the natural world.

Web Activities For eFlashcards, Selection Quick Checks, and other Web activities, go to www.glencoe.com.

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Media Link to Globalization

Preview the Article “Music Goes Global” examines the rise of global music, a kind of music that has no Music language barriers. 1. Examine the title. What might “global” Goes mean in this context? 2. Read the deck, or the sentence in large type that appears underneath the headline. What connection might From KingstonGlobal to Cape Town, from New Delhi to New the writer make between music and York, musicians are rocking old traditions. Your world traditions? will never be the same. Set a Purpose for Reading BByy CHRISTOPHER JOHN FARLEY

Read to learn how music can establish T’S EARLY EVENING IN KINGSTON. THE SLUMBERING HILLS cultural identity and serve as a universal that surround the capital of Jamaica are covered in warm language. blankets of shadows. It has been a season of heat—the sugarcane crop is shriveling for lack of rain and the streets Reading Strategy are dusty and dry. The heat makes tensions rise. Activating Prior Knowledge I When you recall information and personal Independence Day is coming, the “Won’t you help me sing these songs experiences that are uniquely your own, anniversary of Jamaica’s emergence of freedom?” Music can be a tool: you are activating prior knowledge. from the control of Britain. Outside for relaxation, for stimulation, for As you read “Music Goes Global,” ask club Asylum, one of the city’s most communication—and for social yourself how the article relates to your popular night spots, young Jamaicans change. In fact, it is often a rhythm prior knowledge and experiences. Create have begun to gather. Inside, things of resistance: against war, against a chart like the one below. are slow as the drone of foreign social injustice, against government acts—Britney Spears, Whitney corruption. Houston, ’N Sync—echoes across The U.S., in this one-superpower Questions Prior the empty dance floor. But out on age, has perhaps never been so Knowledge the streets, kids are making their dominant—economically, militar- How does the topic own scene, to their own sounds. ily, culturally. That strength of the article relate Ragga (a rap-influenced form of attracts immigrants, who bring to my personal reggae) booms out of parked cars. with them new forms of music. interests? Young Jamaican men with white That strength also inspires compe- scarves tied around their heads tition. Musicians and performers vibrate to the music—some of which in other countries, mindful of are songs of protest. American influence, assert their It is a scene like those that national identities and culture and nowadays are taking place in cities create new musical genres they can all over the planet—in Tokyo, in call their own: garage in Britain, Cape Town, in Reykjavik. In such kwaito in South Africa, ever evolv- OBJECTIVES ways, in such places, a fresh sound ing forms of reggae in Jamaica. • Make connections between prior in global music is being born. It’s America may be the world’s police- knowledge and a text. the beating heart of a new world. man, but citizens of the world— • Explore life experiences related to subject Bob Marley, the great Jamaican and the New Americans who have area content. reggae star, once posed the question come here—have turned up their

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car stereos and are dancing like never before. The quest for change has often been a family affair: many top global-music performers, including Nigeria’s Femi Kuti (son of Fela), Jamaica’s Ziggy Marley (son of Bob) and Brazil’s Max de Castro (son of Wilson Simonal), are the children of musical pioneers. In recent years around the world, old traditions have been revived, remolded, and returned to prominence by a new generation and new technology. In Tijuana, Mexico, young DJs have crossed traditional norteno (a polka- like music) with not-at-all- traditional techno to create a fresh genre, Nortec. In Bogota, Colombia, the rock duo Aterciopelados mixed old-time accordion-driven vallenato with clubland drum-’n’-bass beats. In Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, the great chanteuse Marisa Monte smoothly WYCLEF JEAN blended samba and art-pop. Centuries of customs have changed in just decades. In the 1940s and ’50s, radio brought the music of the outside world to much of Africa for the first time. In the DE CASTRO Paulo Fridman/TIME 1970s, audiocassette tapes made it possible for Third World musicians to spread their own music quickly, languages other than English often cheaply, and profitably. Acts like wasn’t considered universal; it was the Congo’s Papa Wemba became controversial. continent-wide superstars. Richie Valens hit it big with “La In the 21st century, the Internet Bamba” in 1959. The music industry odd France/CORBIS has opened up the world to itself. In T didn’t wholeheartedly embrace the distant past—say, a decade another Latin rocker until Santana’s ago—global-music fans had to wait SHAKIRA late-in-life success in 1999. After for a record label to decide whether that, tongues became untied. Wyclef to distribute a foreign artist in their Jean’s platinum hip-hop CDs, The country. A few years later, Internet Carnival and The Ecleftic, mixed file-sharing services were allowing English and Haitian Creole. users to listen to whatever they Christina Aguilera, who launched wanted, anywhere they chose, her career singing English-language anytime they pleased. Today, online teen pop, recorded a CD entirely in music stores tend to have wider and Spanish. Increasingly, world-beaters

more diverse inventories than their een People are collaborating and connecting bricks-and-mortar counterparts. with one another. Colombian rocker The we-are-the-world maxim is Shakira had a CD executive- this: music is the universal language. produced by Cuban-American For the mainstream record industry Emilio Estefan Jr. that drew from in the U.S., however, music in Nick Baratta for T Argentine tango.

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11360-1363360-1363 U7P2TIME-845482.inddU7P2TIME-845482.indd 13611361 11/29/07/29/07 3:05:503:05:50 PMPM MIKE D Informational Text SHIRLEY MANSON Musicians performing in different languages often strike similar chords. Listen to the intense, undulant wail of Assane Ndiaye on the song “Nguisstal,” a track on Streets of Dakar: Generation Boul Fale, a compilation of young Senegalese acts. Boul fale is a Wolof phrase Phil Knott/Camerapress/Retna that means, loosely, “Never mind.” The American punk group Nirvana’s great album of teen angst was also titled Nevermind. Alienation, Michael Lavine/CORBIS it seems, is a nation without borders. The new global music doesn’t Lyrics are important, but they exclude America. After all, one of don’t have to matter. Even when America’s biggest rock stars of the Bob Dylan, arguably America’s finest past few years was Dave Matthews, lyricist, mumbles through a number, a white African; the Japanese pop the poetry of his words comes out in star Utada Hikaru hailed from the phrasing. “How does it feel?” Manhattan. The old-school term Dylan famously asked on “Like a MARC ANTHONY world music is a joke, a wedge, a way Rolling Stone.” We may not have of separating English-language known exactly what he meant, but

Niels Van Iperenn/Retna Niels Van performers from the rest of the we knew how it felt. Today’s musi- planet. But there has always been cians have taken that lesson to heart. ZIGGY MARLEY crossover. In 1958 Dean Martin Thom Yorke of the British band scored a hit with the Italian tune Radiohead wrote some songs for his “Volare”; in 1967 Frank Sinatra classic album Kid A by cutting up recorded an album of songs by lyric sheets and pulling lines out of a Brazilian composer Antonio Carlos top hat. The Icelandic band Sigur (Tom) Jobim. Elvis Presley’s “Can’t Ros sang some songs in a made-up Help Falling in Love” is based on tongue it called Hopelandic. the 18th century French ballad Many of today’s global musicians “Plaisir d’amour.” move back and forth from their

Fred Prouser/Reuters Pop music and global music native tongues to English, on the aren’t mutually exclusive catego- same album, sometimes on the HIKARU ries. In the 1980s Paul Simon, same song. There’s a sense that David Byrne, and Peter Gabriel geography doesn’t have to equal blended world beats. Later, Sting destiny. The Tokyo-based rock trio scored a hit with Algerian rai star the Brilliant Green produced a CD Cheb Mami, Lauryn Hill covered almost entirely in Japanese. It was Bob Marley on MTV Unplugged, recorded in Tokyo. The CD’s title? and Britney Spears made a habit Los Angeles. of working with Swedish song- Listening to music in an unfa- writer Max Martin. Over the miliar tongue can be more thrilling years, Madonna’s sound—and than listening to a song whose lyr- style—has been inspired by many ics are instantly understandable. cultures. That’s because if you can connect Michael Halsband/TIME

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FASSIE DAVE MATTHEWS ATERCIOPELADOS Robert Delahanty/CORBIS Thai/TIME Ted Michael Halsband/TIME

with another person beyond lyrics, inflection; his eloquence is in his Brazilian LPs at some of his con- beyond language, then you have emotion. Boundaries fall away. certs to remind audiences of his engaged in a kind of telepathy. You Is a sense of cultural uniqueness country’s heritage. Many new have managed to escape the every- lost in the global-pop blender? If global artists have the curiosity to day realm of ordinary communica- they are grooving to America’s lat- wander the earth with their music tion and entered a place where est pop star in Kingston, is there and the integrity to stay connected souls communicate directly. It’s anywhere to hide? The first years of to their homelands. This is the cooler than instant messaging. the 21st century have been haunted help Marley asked for. These are Cherif Mbaw is a Senegalese singer- by the specter of globalization. Our freedom songs. guitarist living in Paris; the songs star-spangled world with its parade It’s getting hot in club Asylum, on his brilliant CD Kham Kham are of powerful letters—the U.N., the but the dancers just keep on going. in his native Wolof. But when WTO, the IMF—hammers the At this club and ones like it Mbaw, with his beatific tenor, soars diversity of the planet into homog- around the world—in Sao Paulo, into a passage of staccato vocals enized goop. But the Colombian in Dakar, in Havana, in New York and jittery guitar work on “Saay duo Aterciopelados insists on City—Independence Day is every Saay,” you know exactly what he recording its CDs in its hometown night. means even if you don’t know what of Bogotá. And Max de Castro — Updated 2005, he’s saying. His intent is in his projects blown-up images of old from TIME (Special Issue), Fall, 2001

RESPONDING AND THINKING CRITICALLY

Respond Analyze and Evaluate 1. What was your reaction to the music described in 5. (a)What similarities does the writer point out the article? How is it different from or similar to between American and world music? (b)What the music you listen to? effect does this point have on his argument? 6. (a)How did your prior experiences and personal Recall and Interpret interests relate to the article? (b)Explain whether 2. (a)What is “global music”? (b)Why do you think the writer assumes readers have a prior knowledge this kind of music has become popular? of music. Cite specific examples from the text. 3. (a)How is music a tool? (b)How does it allow musicians to “assert their national identities”? Connect 7. How does this article connect global music to 4. (a)How did technology inspire a global music some of the themes in contemporary British revolution? (b)How has technology continued to literature? make access to music easier?

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Critical Review

➥ Evaluating a Literary Work The Writing Process

In this workshop, you will “The real risks of any artist are taken in the work, in pushing follow the stages of the the work to the limits of what is possible. . . . Books become writing process. At any stage, you may think of new ideas good when they go to this edge and risk falling over it.” to include and better ways to express them. Feel free to —Salman Rushdie, from Imaginary Homelands return to earlier stages as you write. Connecting to Literature In this passage, Salman Rushdie discusses what, in his Prewriting opinion, an artist must successfully attempt in order to create great literature. More Drafting narrowly, in a critical review you examine what an artist has attempted to achieve in a particular work and evaluate his or her relative success, citing specific strengths Revising and weaknesses to support your opinion. To write a successful critical review, learn the goals of critical writing and the strategies for achieving those goals. ➥ Focus Lesson: Adding Evidence to Support a Rubric: Features of Critical Reviews Viewpoint

Editing and Proofreading Goals Strategies ✓ ➥ Focus Lesson: Correcting To make a statement about a Develop a thesis for expressing your Verb Tense story’s literary merits overall critical judgment of the story Presenting ✓ To support with evidence a Analyze and assess important literary personal evaluation of the story elements in the story to show that your thesis is valid ✓ Include direct evidence from the story, such as examples and quotations, to support your evaluation Writing Models For models and other writing activities, go to ✓ www.glencoe.com. To present a logically organized Summarize the basic plot and state your critical review of the story thesis in the introduction ✓ OBJECTIVES State your reasons and supporting • Write a critical review to ana- evidence in your body paragraphs lyze the literary merits of a ✓ Restate your thesis and make a short story and to persuade a reader to accept your evalua- recommendation about the story tion of the story. ✓ • Develop a thesis and support To persuade the reader to accept In the conclusion, consider readers’ it with reasons and direct evidence. your evaluation of the story expectations and address opposing viewpoints

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º Assignment Real-World Connection Write a critical review in which you analyze the literary merits of a short In the real world, critics of story and make a critical evaluation of the story. As you move through the the arts have earned praise stages of the writing process, keep your audience and purpose in mind. and scorn in equal mea- sure. Both attitudes reflect Audience: peers and others who may be interested in the story the amount of power critics hold in determining the Purpose: to evaluate a story and convince an audience of the validity of success of a work. As you your evaluation write your own review, make sure that your judgment is as fair, honest, and informed as possible. Analyzing a Professional Model

In this critical review, New York Times writer Selden Rodman reviews V. S. Naipaul’s collection of short stories Miguel Street, praising the story “B. Wordsworth” in particular. As you read the review, notice how Rodman makes a critical evaluation and supports it with examples and evidence from the text. Pay close attention to the comments in the margin. They point out features that you may want to include in your own critical review.

from “Catfish Row, Trinidad” by Selden Rodman

Conversational Tone The mystifying things about Trinidad writers—most recently Samuel Share your opinions using Selvon, Geoffrey Holder, and the present author—is why they ever leave a natural voice and a con- the island. Existence in this corner of the British West Indies may not be versational tone. paradise, but compared with the slums of London or New York, this is life among those who know how to live it. Certainly it has never a dull moment. Introduction V. S. Naipaul, born in Trinidad of Hindu parents and educated at Oxford, In your introduction, include proved he knew the region in his novel, “The Mystic Masseur.” He proves the author and the title of the it again with these short, delightful sketches of Miguel Street, the Catfish work you are to review, as well as your thesis, or overall Row of Port of Spain. . . . critical judgment of the work. The finest of this really fine collection of portraits is the one entitled “B. Wordsworth.” B stands for Black, and it is about a poet who wanders Plot Summary Give a brief plot summary so in one day just to “watch the bees” and who answers a policeman who asks that readers unfamiliar with what he’s doing lying on his back in a public place, “I have been asking the work will understand your myself the same question for forty years.” The young narrator takes this review. character to meet his mother:

WRITING WORKSHOP 1365

11364-1371364-1371 U7WW-845482.inddU7WW-845482.indd 13651365 66/23/06/23/06 2:25:322:25:32 PMPM Direct Quotations “He pulled out a printed sheet from his hip-pocket and said, ‘On this Support your evaluation with critical evidence, paper is the greatest poem about mothers and I’m going to sell it to you at a including examples and bargain price. For four cents.’ direct quotations. “I went inside and I said, ‘Ma, you want to buy a poetry for four cents?’ “My mother said, ‘Tell that blasted man to haul his tail away from my yard, you hear?’ “I said to B. Wordsworth, ‘My mother say she ain’t have four cents.’ “B. Wordsworth said, ‘It is the poet’s tragedy.’” He put the paper back in his pocket. He didn’t seem to mind. The ending of this little classic is a sad one. But the prevailing mood of the stories is comic, Opposing Viewpoints and most of the characters fulfill themselves through their idiosyncrasies— Answer possible objec- tions to your evaluation a fact which brings us back to the original question. to persuade your reader In the final chapter the narrator is about to join his fellow story-tellers that your opinion is abroad (“The Americans gave me a visa after making me swear I wouldn’t balanced. overthrow their government by armed force”). In the airport lounge, filled Conclusion Sum up your review and with haughty tourists in sun-glasses looking “too rich, too comfortable,” give your recommenda- he wishes he had never got a scholarship. Wouldn’t it be interesting now to tion in your conclusion. have a novel about one of these children of nature in our frigid cities—and then, the native’s return?

Reading-Writing Connection Think about the writing techniques that you have just encountered and try them out in the critical review you write.

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Prewriting Review the Reviews Sharpen your critical sense Choose a Story Choose a story from Unit Seven that left you with a strong positive or negative impression. by reading book and film reviews published in cur- Examine and Evaluate Your Story After you choose a story, reread it several rent newspapers and mag- times. Try to determine the author’s purpose for writing the story and which liter- azines. Notice the voice ary elements are used to achieve the desired effects. Ask yourself: and tone of the reviews, the evaluations presented, º What is the author trying to achieve? Did he or she meet this goal? How? and how those evaluations are suppor ted. º What is the theme of the story and how is it conveyed? º What is the plot like? Is it believable? Is it engaging or suspenseful? Why? º How does the setting affect the story? º How are the characters developed? Are they believable? Do they undergo significant change? º In your opinion, what element is most important to the overall success or failure of the story? Agree to Disagree Develop a Thesis What is your overall opinion of the story? Distill that opin- Your opinions about a story ion into a clear, one- or two-sentence thesis statement that presents and explains will probably be different your overall critical judgment of the story. from those of others. Use the variance to your advan- Identify Critical Evidence Remember that a critical review involves more tage. A second opinion than just stating your opinion; you need to give logical reasons why your opinion may cause you to consider is valid and deserves your audience’s consideration. aspects of a story you had overlooked. Outline Your Review Create an outline to organize your ideas. Follow the basic structure of an essay and include any background information your audience may need.

Discuss Your Ideas Once you finish organizing your ideas, share your evaluation and outline with a partner. Partners should also help each other clarify their theses, organize their reasons, and identify additional supporting evidence from the story.

Introduction Give the story’s title and author. “The Train from Rhodesia” by Nadine Gordimer Summarize the plot briefly. State Thesis: Through realistic description and full your overall critical judgment in characterization, Gordimer shows how the complex your thesis. and pervasive force of racism damages the victim, the oppressor, and those caught in between.

Body Focus on the major elements that Gordimer uses vivid descriptions and a detached Paragraphs contribute to the story’s success voice to suggest the existence of racism, using rich or failure. State your opinions, characterization to powerfully show how it affects the support them with reasons. characters.

Conclusion Restate your evaluation and make Although Gordimer’s subtlety and complex characters a recommendation to the reader. may be frustrating at first, most readers will find her story powerful and almost haunting.

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Stay Flexible As you draft your review, use your outline as a guide but be flexible as your evaluation evolves. You may change your opinion about the story as you explore it on a deeper level and the author’s purpose and effects become clearer. Analyzing a Workshop Model

Here is a final draft of a critical review. Read the review and answer the questions in the margin. Use the answers to these questions to guide you as you write your own review.

“The Train from Rhodesia”: A Subtle but Powerful Message Introduction “The Train from Rhodesia” by South African writer Nadine Gordimer is What makes this a strong introduction? a haunting story that explores the damaging effects of racism in a subtle but powerful way. Gordimer begins the story with a rich description of an African train station just as a train pulls in. The story revolves around a Plot Summary seemingly trivial event: a young woman is interested in buying a carved Does this plot summary provide enough infor- lion from a native artist but decides it is too expensive. Without her knowl- mation for the reader? edge, her husband bargains with the artist and buys the carving at a much Explain. cheaper price. He then gives the carving to his wife, pleased with his success. Through realistic description and full characterization, “The Train Thesis from Rhodesia” shows how the complex and pervasive forces of colonial- What details make this an appropriate thesis for ism and racism damage the victim, the oppressor, and those caught in a critical review? between. Tone It is easy to get caught up in Gordimer’s vivid images. From the very first How would you describe the tone of the review? line, we are there, feeling the train bearing down on the station, seeing and hearing it “creaking, jerking, jostling, gasping.” Through the precise descriptions, we also see and hear the evidence of blatant racial tension at the station and on the train, without any mention of it directly. At the station, the Example native vendors are “squatting” and “waiting in the dust.” The stationmaster’s Why might the writer include this example but “barefoot” children approach the train, where they are enclosed in shadows. not quote the passage These images focus on the low, almost hidden, position of the native directly here? Africans and hint at an unspoken divide between the black natives and the white travelers on the train. On the train, we hear needier native children begging the travelers for a penny, an orange, or a chocolate; a moment later we see a young girl throwing a handful of unwanted chocolates to the dogs

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WRITING WORKSHOP 1369

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Use the rubric below to help you evaluate and strengthen your review.

Traits of Strong Writing Rubric: Writing an Effective Critical Review Ideas message or ✓ Do you make a statement about your overall judgment of a story’s literary merits? theme and the details ✓ that develop it Do you support your evaluation with reasons, examples, and direct quotations? ✓ Organization arrange- Do you present a logically organized critical review of the story? ment of main ideas and ✓ Do you address readers’ expectations and opposing viewpoints and persuade supporting details the reader to accept your evaluation of the story?

Voice writer’s unique way of using tone and º style Focus Lesson

Word Choice vocabulary Adding Evidence to Support a Viewpoint a writer uses to convey To persuade your audience that your viewpoint is valid, check to be sure that you meaning fully support your viewpoint with reasons and that you back up those reasons with Sentence Fluency examples and direct quotations. rhythm and flow of sen- Draft: tences

Conventions correct Perhaps the most compelling aspect of Gordimer’s story, though, is her spelling, grammar, usage, and mechanics sharp characterization of people, both black and white, who encounter the complex but familiar issue of racism in one way or another. As a Presentation the way words and design ele- contrast to the girl with the candy, the wife is sympathetic and self-aware. ments look on a page

For more information on using the Traits of Revision: Strong Writing, see pages R33–R34 of the Writing Handbook. Perhaps the most compelling aspect of Gordimer’s story, though, is her sharp characterization of people, both black and white, who encounter the complex but familiar issue of racism in one way or another. As a contrast to the girl with the candy, Gordimer paints the wife as sympathetic and self-aware. When she examines the carving, the wife is able to see past the object to the artistry of the “heraldic” lion and the dignity and satisfaction of the artist.1 The wife sees the lion’s mouth “opened in an endless roar too terrible to be heard” and its fur mane, “a real mane, majestic, telling you somehow that the artist had delight in the lion.”2 Here, again, Gordimer’s realistic details suggest much more than they actually describe.3 1: Add examples from the text. 2: Add direct quotations. 3: Show how your evidence supports your thesis.

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Get It Right When you have completed the final draft of your review, proofread it for errors in grammar, usage, mechanics, and spelling. Refer to the Language Handbook, pages R46–R60, as a guide.

º Focus Lesson

Correcting Verb Tense Citing Titles When you write a critical review—or when you write about a literary work When you edit your in general—use the present tense. This is called the literary present tense. review, check to be Although the story you are reviewing was written in the past, the text will be sure that the title of new for unfamiliar readers, and it will reveal new ways of looking at the story your text is properly for those who are familiar with it. spelled, capitalized, and punctuated.

Original: The statement describing the story uses the past tense. • Stories and poems are in quotation As a contrast to the girl with the candy, Gordimer painted the wife as marks: sympathetic and self-aware. “The Train from Improved: Even when the literary action you describe technically happened Rhodesia” in the past, use the literary present tense. “Wind”

As a contrast to the girl with the candy, Gordimer paints the wife as • Novels, books, plays, sympathetic and self-aware. movies, and art- works are italicized Original: The statement about the story, like the quotation, is in the past (or underlined): tense. Miguel Street

One of the first images occurred at the station, where the stationmaster’s That’s All barefoot children watched the train and wandered over as shadows “closed over the children’s black feet softly and without imprint.” Improved: Do not change the tense of the quoted material but write your own material in the present tense.

One of the first images occurs at the station, where the stationmaster’s barefoot children watch the train and wander over as shadows “closed over the children’s black feet softly and without imprint.”

Writer’s Portfolio Place a clean copy of Presenting your critical review in your portfolio to review later. Take One Last Look Before you turn in your critical review, take one last look to make sure that it is free of errors. Give it an interesting title and check to be sure that you have followed your teacher’s guidelines regarding length, spacing, and content.

WRITING WORKSHOP 1371

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Critical Review

Delivering a Critical Review

Connecting to Literature A critical review is a way to share your impressions about a work of literature. When you deliver a critical review, you evaluate what a writer attempted to achieve and whether you feel he or she succeeded. You encounter different kinds of critical reviews nearly every day, sometimes without even realizing it. A critical review can take the form of a newspaper editorial, a book review in a magazine, or a commentary on a radio or news broadcast. ▲ Assignment In groups, plan and deliver a critical review in the style of a television or radio broadcast.

Using a Model Planning Your Presentation Watch an evening newscast There are a variety of ways you can arrange to record the audio and visual for examples of critical elements of your review. For example, you can use a home video camera to create reviews. These may be a talk show–style newscast or a hand-held tape recorder to develop a radio reviews of movies, sporting broadcast. However, your radio or television broadcast does not have to be events, or public policy. Pay complicated. You might simply pretend to have an “on-air” set and present your attention to tone, pacing, and review to an audience of your classmates. gestures. What do you find effective about the journalists’ presentation? What do you think could be improved? Preparing to Present Make a note of these findings for your own presentation. • Decide which parts of your critical review you want to share with your audience. In a radio or television format, you may not have enough time to cover everything. Therefore, limit your presentation to your most important points. • Before presenting, read your critical review several times to remember the key events in the order they appear. Don’t try to memorize the words verbatim; avoid simply reading the review aloud. • Experiment with gestures, facial expressions, and postures to show excitement, dismay, and other emotions. Try practicing in front of a mirror before you record your presentation. • Consider playing background music as part of your presentation. If you are planning a television broadcast, incorporate sound effects, graphics, or additional visual media.

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11372-1373372-1373 U7SLV-845482.inddU7SLV-845482.indd 13721372 11/29/07/29/07 3:08:063:08:06 PMPM Technology Skills If you decide to record your presentation, there are many resources available to provide technology assistance. Both the Internet and the library are valuable resources for Presenting technology help. Additionally, your school may have an Begin by giving your audience a brief synopsis of what you are reviewing, but audio-visual department that don’t give away the entire plot. You may want to grab the attention of your can provide assistance. audience by asking a question, for example, “Do you ever wonder what would have happened if you had to move to another country? The boy in this story found out.”

Most importantly, relax and enjoy yourself. If you’re tense, your audience will sense it. If you forget an important detail, add it later, simply saying, “There’s something else you need to know.”

Techniques for Delivering a Critical Review

Verbal Techniques Nonverbal Techniques ✓ ✓ Volume Speak loudly and Eye Contact Make direct eye clearly. contact with the audience. When other group members are speaking, make eye contact with them. ✓ ✓ Pace You will need to speak Gestures Use gestures to slowly enough for your emphasize important ideas in audience to understand you, your critical review. especially when pronouncing unfamiliar words. ✓ ✓ Tone Vary the tone of your Visual Aids Use photographs or voice to keep your audience drawings related to your critical interested, particularly if you’re review. If presenting a radio OBJECTIVES presenting a radio recording. broadcast, describe these • Deliver an oral critique of a photographs or other visual literary work. media to listeners. • Develop appropriate speaking ✓ strategies in the classroom. Emphasis Stress important • Use a variety of media to share ideas and information. points of your review, perhaps by using transitional phrases such as most importantly.

SPEAKING, LISTENING, AND VIEWING WORKSHOP 1373 Nancy Sheehan/Photo Edit

1372-1373 U7SLV-845482.indd 1373 1/15/07 12:54:26 PM LITERATURE OF THE TIME

For Independent Reading

NGLISH LITERATURE IN THE LATTER HALF OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY BECAME increasingly global and far more inclusive. Women and minority writers—groups Ethat had been largely excluded from critical examination—produced acclaimed works of fiction, poetry, and drama. Through literature, colonized peoples began to find a means by which to explore issues related to colonialism, such as race and cultural identity. Also, writing became increasingly experimental and innovative, as genres, traditions, and national boundaries blurred or were abandoned altogether.

Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie (1981) Declared by the Booker Prize committee the best British novel to win the Booker Prize in the last twenty-five years, Midnight’s Children begins in 1947, on the first night of India’s independence. At the stroke of midnight, 1,001 children are born with unusual gifts and a deep connection to their new nation. This controversial and often difficult novel combines elements of magical realism, myth, family drama, and the modern history of India in the postcolonial period. The novel follows the life of midnight’s child Saleem Sinai, whose strange Waiting for Godot and difficult life is inextricably bound to the by Samuel Beckett (1952) history of India and Pakistan. This play, which is Beckett’s most well known, is one of the leading works of the twentieth- century dramatic movement known as the theater of the absurd. Structured in two acts, Waiting for Godot is stripped bare of theatrical pretense; the stage is empty during much of the play except for four characters and a leafless tree. The main characters, Vladimir and Estragon, are unsure of their purpose but are convinced that they are waiting for an unseen, possibly nonexistent character named Godot.

1374 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE (t)Thierry Orban/CORBIS SYGMA (c)Aaron Haupt (b)Colin McPherson/Corbis

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“The literary map of India is about to be redrawn. . . . Serious English- language novelists from India (often called Indo-Anglians), or those from abroad who use Indian material, have steered a steady course between . . . two vast, mutually obliterating realities. . . . What this fiction has been missing is a different kind of ambition, something just a little coarse, a hunger to swallow India whole and spit it out. . . . Now, in Midnight’s Children, Salman Rushdie has realized that ambition. . . . This is a book to accept on its own terms, and an author to welcome into world company.”

—Clark Blaise, The New York Times, April 19, 1981

From the Glencoe Literature Library Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe As Britain’s imperial ambitions extend into Africa, a centuries-old way of life vanishes and Okonkwo, a figure of heroic proportions, meets his moving, tragic end.

Nectar in a Sieve by Kamala Markandaya Nectar in a Sieve explores painful and disturbing Possession: A Romance aspects of poverty and a village’s transformation by A. S. Byatt (1990) from agriculture to industry. Brilliantly weaving together multiple story- lines and genres, Byatt’s novel explores the relationships between the past and the present, A House for writers and their readers, and women and men. Mr. Biswas Possession, which won the Booker Prize in 1990, by V. S. Naipaul focuses on two young literary scholars, Roland Michell and Maud Bailey, who uncover a secret Set in Trinidad, this novel romance that existed between two poets from the draws largely from the Victorian age. Through letters and manuscripts, author’s own childhood Michell and Bailey piece together this hidden experiences as a Hindu history, which forces them to reevaluate the Indian living in what was meaning of their own lives and scholarship. then a British colony.

LITERATURE OF THE TIME 1375 (t)Bettmann/CORBIS (l)BASSOULS SOPHIE/CORBIS SYGMA, (rt)file photo (rc)file photo (rb)file photo

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English–Language Arts

Reading: Poetry

Carefully read the following poem. Use context clues to help you define any words with which you are unfamiliar. Pay close attention to the poem’s form, use of figurative language, and sound devices. Then, on a separate sheet of paper, answer the questions on pages 1377–1378.

“Winding Up” by Derek Walcott line I live on the water, alone. Without wife and children, I have circled every possibility to come to this:

5 a low house by grey water, with windows always open to the stale sea. We do not choose such things,

but we are what we have made. We suffer, the years pass, 10 we shed freight but not our need

for encumbrances. Love is a stone that settled on the sea-bed under grey water. Now, I require nothing

from poetry but true feeling, 15 no pity, no fame, no healing. Silent wife, we can sit watching grey water,

and in a life awash with mediocrity and trash live rock-like.

20 I shall unlearn feeling, unlearn my gift. That is greater and harder than what passes there for life.

1376 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE

11376-1381376-1381 U7TPP-845482.inddU7TPP-845482.indd 13761376 11/29/07/29/07 3:09:573:09:57 PMPM 1. From which point of view is this poem written? 7. Which of the following two sound devices (A) first person appear in line 12? (B) second person (A) consonance and onomatopoeia (C) third-person limited (B) consonance and personiﬁ cation (D) third-person omniscient (C) alliteration and consonance (E) third-person expansive (D) assonance and meter (E) meter and rhyme 2. Which of the following literary elements is Walcott using in lines 5 and 6? 8. What does the phrase silent wife, in line 15, (A) personification refer to? (B) idiom (A) the speaker (C) foreshadowing (B) the sea (D) imagery (C) freight (E) epiphany (D) poetry (E) mediocrity 3. What sound device are the words stale sea, in line 7, an example of? 9. The end words in lines 17 and 18 are an (A) consonance example of which of the following sound (B) assonance devices? (C) rhyme (A) alliteration (D) onomatopoeia (B) onomatopoeia (E) alliteration (C) meter (D) rhythm 4. The pronoun we, in lines 7–10, refers to the (E) slant rhyme speaker and what or whom else? (A) the sea 10. What does the phrase my gift, in line 21, (B) all humanity refer to? (C) poetry (A) feeling (D) the speaker’s wife and children (B) mediocrity (E) the speaker’s home (C) poetry (D) life 5. From the context, what do you conclude that the (E) loneliness word encumbrances, in line 11, most nearly means? (A) movements 11. Which of the following best describes the form (B) changes of this poem? (C) burdens (A) sonnet (D) graces (B) blank verse (E) exchanges (C) terza rima (D) free verse 6. Which of the following literary elements is Walcott (E) villanelle using in the clause Love is a stone, in line 11? (A) metaphor 12. Which of the following describes the majority of (B) simile this poem’s stanzas? (C) personification (A) couplets (D) flashback (B) tercets (E) paradox (C) quatrains (D) octaves (E) sestets

TEST PREPARATION AND PRACTICE 1377

1376-1381 U7TPP-845482.indd 1377 6/23/06 2:33:50 PM 13. Which of the following best describes the 15. Which of the following statements best describes conflict that appears in this poem? the theme of this poem? (A) internal (A) It is best to avoid committing oneself (B) external emotionally to other people. (C) man versus nature (B) Peace of mind is available only to those (D) man versus fate who have no hope. (E) man versus man (C) Life is awash in mediocrity. (D) Sometimes it is best to resign oneself to life 14. Which of the following best describes the overall and accept it as it is. mood of this poem? (E) Fame is not worth pursuing. (A) hopeful (B) resigned (C) desperate (D) comic (E) ironic

Unit Assessment To prepare for the unit test, go to www.glencoe.com.

1378 UNIT 7 AN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE

11376-1381376-1381 U7TPP-845482.inddU7TPP-845482.indd 13781378 11/29/07/29/07 3:10:193:10:19 PMPM Vocabulary Skills: Sent ence Completion

For each item in the Vocabulary Skills section, choose the word or words that best complete the sentence. 1. As English became a global language, those groups 6. When England’s economic woes threatened to that had been on the of the British Empire cause the country to , the government began to create influential and widely read works. established a modern welfare state that provided, (A) temerity among other things, universal health care. (B) periphery (A) distill (C) friction (B) patronize (D) sinew (C) career (E) denigration (D) lumber (E) ﬂ ounder 2. After the war, many young people opposed Britain’s cultural traditions, which they felt were 7. Although many writers in the postwar generation both and out of touch. rejected the past, some demonstrated a great (A) hospitably . . . envious to traditional forms, topics, and techniques. (B) wryly . . . explicit (A) fray (C) stridently . . . luminous (B) vendor (D) hospitably . . . radiant (C) precipice (E) stridently . . . superannuated (D) ﬁ delity (E) revelation 3. The collapse of the British Empire was a/an event in the development of English literature in 8. Economic and social problems caused a deep the postwar period. to be cast across postwar Britain. (A) acrid (A) friction (B) unperturbed (B) assent (C) pivotal (C) temerity (D) defunct (D) pall (E) barren (E) fray

4. By the middle of the twentieth century, it was 9. As the Cold War deepened and the threat of a clear that the faults of the British Empire were nuclear disaster seemed , Britain, the , and its collapse was likely. United States, and other Western European (A) rancid nations formed NATO. (B) withering (A) imminent (C) envious (B) radiant (D) plodding (C) luminous (E) irremediable (D) withering (E) lugubrious 5. Although many effects of the British Empire’s collapse were , there were also some serious 10. To many critics, the appearance of a global negative consequences, such as the rise of postcolonial body of English literature was a apartheid in South Africa. that radically altered their previously (A) benign held assumptions. (B) imminent (A) temerity (C) compulsory (B) revelation (D) lugubrious (C) vendor (E) plodding (D) sinew (E) denigration

TEST PREPARATION AND PRACTICE 1379

1376-1381 U7TPP-845482.indd 1379 6/23/06 2:34:03 PM Grammar and Writing Skills: P aragraph Improvement

Carefully read the opening paragraphs from the first draft of a student’s critical review. Pay close attention to verb tense, punctuation, and organization. Then, on a separate sheet of paper, answer the questions on pages 1380–1381.

(1) Doris Lessing’s “A Mild Attack of Locusts” is a smartly constructed fable that explores the ability of some people to survive in the face of nature’s unforgiving and often destructive power. (2) Lessing who spent much of her young life on a farm in Africa begins by describing the story’s three principal characters, the farm on which they live, and their struggles against bankruptcy. (3) This struggle is thrown into high relief by a government announcement that swarms of locusts were expected. (4) With strong character development, compelling dialogue, and vivid sensory details, Lessing illustrates how personal histories affect individual perceptions of nature’s threat. (5) The story’s three main characters—Margaret; her husband, Richard; and Richard’s father, old Stephen—all had different perceptions. (6) Each character bases their perceptions on their own experiences. (7) For example, Margaret, who is not from a farming background, is horrified by the swarming locusts. (8) On seeing her husband covered in locusts, she asks, “How can you bear to let them touch you?” (9) Later Margaret is shown crying, thinking that “it was all so hopeless—if it wasn’t a bad season, it was locusts.” (10) This was not the response, though, of either her husband or old Stephen. (11) Throughout A Mild Attack of Locusts, Richard and old Stephen waver between statements of total despair and actions that suggest hope. (12) While this might create the impression that these characters are inconsistent, their behavior is actually the result of something altogether different. (13) In particular, old Stephen who has been bankrupted twice in the past acts hopeful but sounds despairing.

1. Which is the best way to revise sentence 2? 3. Which is the best revision of sentence 5? (A) Insert commas after life and after Africa. (A) All three main characters—Margaret, her (B) Delete both commas in the sentence. husband Richard, and Richard’s father, old (C) Delete who spent much of her young life on Stephen—had different perceptions. a farm. (B) The story’s three main characters—Margaret; (D) Insert commas before who and after Africa. her husband, Richard; and Richard’s father, (E) Insert a comma after begins. old Stephen—all have different perceptions. (C) The story’s three main characters: Margaret; 2. Which is the best way to revise sentence 3? her husband, Richard; and Richard’s father, (A) Change were to are. old Stephen, all had different perceptions. (B) Change is to was. (D) Margaret, her husband Richard, and Richard’s (C) Delete that swarms of locusts were expected. father, old Stephen, had different perceptions. (D) Insert to come after expected. (E) Make no change. (E) Make no change.

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11376-1381376-1381 U7TPP-845482.inddU7TPP-845482.indd 13801380 66/23/06/23/06 2:34:182:34:18 PMPM 4. Which is the best revision of sentence 6? 8. Which persuasive technique appears in (A) Each character bases their perceptions on sentence 12? personal experience. (A) rhetorical question (B) Each character bases their perceptions on his (B) thesis statement or her experience. (C) evidence from the text (C) Each character’s perceptions are based on (D) addressing opposing viewpoints their experience. (E) plot summary (D) Each character bases his or her perceptions on personal experience. 9. Which is the best revision of sentence 13? (E) All characters base their perceptions on his or (A) In particular, old Stephen who has been her experience. bankrupted twice in the past acted hopeful but sounded despairing. 5. Which persuasive technique appears in sentences (B) In particular; old Stephen who has been 8 and 9? bankrupted twice in the past acts hopeful (A) rhetorical question but sounds despairing. (B) thesis statement (C) In particular, old Stephen who has been (C) evidence from the text bankrupted twice in the past. (D) addressing opposing viewpoints (D) In particular, old Stephen: who has been (E) plot summary bankrupted twice in the past acts hopeful but sounds despairing. 6. Which is the best revision of sentence 10? (E) In particular, old Stephen, who has been (A) This is not the response, though, of either her bankrupted twice in the past, acts hopeful husband or old Stephen. but sounds despairing. (B) This was not the response though of either her husband or old Stephen. 10. Which of the following should the author (C) This was not the response—though—of present next in this essay? either her husband or old Stephen. (A) examples of how dialogue illustrates each (D) Old Stephen, though, did not respond this character’s perception of nature way. (B) details from Lessing’s time spent on an (E) Though this was not the response of either African farm her husband or old Stephen. (C) a comparison between the setting in this story and those in similar works 7. Which error appears in sentence 11? (D) an analysis of the rhetorical devices used in (A) A Mild Attack of Locusts does not have this story quotation marks around it. (E) an evaluation of Lessing’s use of sound (B) This is a run-on (comma splice) sentence. devices in this story (C) The subject and verb disagree. (D) This is a sentence fragment. (E) No error appears.

Essay

Write a critical review of one selection from this unit. Analyze how imagery, rhetorical devices, and figurative language function in the work and what ideas these devices help convey. As you write, keep in mind that your essay will be checked for ideas, organization, voice, word choice, sentence fluency, conventions, and presentation.

TEST PREPARATION AND PRACTICE 1381

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