World Literature

Week Ten Assignment

11/13/2007

1.  Read and Respond: Read Sound and Sense, chapters 1, 2, and 3.  Choose one of the following poems to memorize and recite in class (Thursday, 11/ 29).  Copy three of the other poems exactly as you find them in the book, and provide some sort of illustration that interprets their sense (due Thursday, 11/29).

2.  Vocabulary:

1.  Suffragist:  An advocate of the extension of voting rights, especially to women.

2.  Supercilious:  Feeling or showing haughty disdain.

3.  Tautology:  Needless repetition of the same sense in different words; redundancy.

4.  Taxonomy:  The classification of organisms in an ordered system that indicates natural relationships.

5.  Tectonic:  Of or relating to the forces involved in forming the geological features, such as mountains, continents, and oceans, of the earth’s lithosphere.

6.  Tempestuous:  Of, relating to, or resembling a tempest; characterized by violent emotions.

7.  Thermodynamics:  The branch of physics that deals with the relationships and conversions between heat and other forms of energy.

8.  Totalitarian:  Of, relating to, or imposing a form of government in which the political authority exercises complete control over all aspects of life, the individual is subordinated to the state, and opposing political and cultural expression is suppressed.

9.  Unctuous:  Characterized by affected, exaggerated, or insincere earnestness.

10.  Usurp:  To seize and hold by force and without legal authority.

3.  Write: 

A.  Go outside and sit placidly under a tree (or, if you prefer, draped over a branch like a possum).  Write an account of what transpires around you—use action verbs, juicy nouns, and at least two appositives and two absolute phrases.  Be inspiring or witty or incisive or scientific or introspective or all of the above.  Most important—be happy as you write (500 words; due Thursday, November 15).

B.  Write a paper in which you discuss what the “good” people in Dickens’ Oliver Twist have in common with each other—and, conversely, what the “bad” people share (750 words; outline due November 27; paper due December 4).

4.  A Lark, a lark!!!  I will be traveling back in time to visit the Dickens Faire at the Cow Palace in San Francisco on Saturday, December 8.  You are most cordially invited to join me there—I will be dressed in Victorian costume—you may do likewise…or not, as you please.  For information on the event, go to www.dickensfair.com.  Please let me know if this appeals to you!