Comp II Short Stories Chapters 3, 4, & 5 Professor Vicky Neal

Comp II Short Stories Chapters 3, 4, & 5

Professor Vicky Neal

Comp II Chapters 3, 4, & 5Chapter Three (142) Characterization

“Everyday Use” (147) “Good Country People”

(457)Chapter Four (192)

Theme “Babylon Revisited”

(199) “A Worn Path” (221)

Chapter Five (235) Point of View

“The Lottery” (259) “The Jilting of Granny

Weatherall” (267) “Hills Like White

Elephants” (275)

Characterization The various literary means by which characters are presented

Chapter Three

The method of characterization in which the author, by exposition or analysis, tells us directly what a character is like, or has someone else in the story to do so.

Direct Presentation

Literary FictionMethod of characterization in which the author shows us a character in action, compelling us to infer what the character is like from what is said or done by the character

Indirect Presentation

Commercial FictionCharacters are shown speaking & behaving as in a stage play

Dramatized

First Characters are consistent in their behavior

SecondCharacters words and actions spring from motivations the reader can understand and believe

Three Principles of Characterization

ThirdCharacters must be plausible or lifelike.

Three Principles of Characterization

• A character who has not been fully developed

• A two- ‐dimensional character • A simple character; a character who is too obviously all good or all bad

Flat Characters- distinguishing moral qualities or personal traits are summed up in one or two traits

Round Character – distinguishing moral qualities or personal traits are complex and many-sided

• A character who has been fully developed by the author• A three-dimensional

character; a realistic character• A complex character, a

character with strengths and weaknesses

Stock CharacterSpecial kind of

flat character- like interchangeable parts

Stereotyped figures who have recurred so often in fiction that we recognize them at once.

Strong, silent sheriff, the brilliant detective with eccentric habits, the mad scientist, glamorous international spy, cruel stepmother, etc.

Static Character

Character remains essentially the same person from the beginning of the story to the end

Dynamic or Developing Character

Character undergoes some distinct change of character, personality, or outlook.

The change may be large or small; positive or negative; significant and basic; not minor change of habit or opinion

Epiphany

Moment of spiritual insight into life, or into the character’s own circumstances.

The “ah-ha” moment

1. It must be consistent with the individual’s characterization as dramatized in the story

2. It must be sufficiently motivated by the circumstances in which the character is placed

3. The story must offer sufficient time for the change to take place and skill be believable

Change in Character Three Conditions

ThemeThe central idea or unifying generalization implied or stated by a literary work

To derive the theme - determine what its central purpose is: what view of life it supports or what insight into life it reveals

Chapter Four

ThemeNot all stories have a significant themeTheme exists in virtually all literary fiction,

but only in some commercial fiction. In literary fiction, it is the primary purpose

of the story; in commercial fiction, it is usually less important than such elements are plot and suspense.

Whatever central generalization about life arises from the specifics of the story constitutes the theme.

May be stated very briefly or at greater length

Is what gives a story its unity Is sometimes explicitly stated or can be

impliedThe function of literary writers

is not to state a theme but to vivify it They wish to deliver it not simply to our

intellects but to our emotions, our senses, and our imaginations.

Theme

1. when an author has seriously attempted to record life accurately or to reveal some truth about it or

2. when an author has deliberately introduced as a unifying element some concept or theory of life that the story illuminates

Theme Exists Only:

First – it is less likely to obscure the fact that a story is not a preachment or a sermon: a story’s first object is enjoyment

Second – it should keep us from trying to wring from every story a didactic pronouncement about life

Term “Theme”

Of literacy story writers is to give us a greater awareness and a greater understanding of life, not to incluate a code of moral rules for regulating daily conduct.

Purpose

Ask NOT:What does this story teach?

Ask:What does this story reveal?

To Get at Theme of a Story

Confirm their reader’s prejudices, endorse their opinions, ratify their feelings, and satisfy their wishes.

Represent life as we would like it to be.

Commercial Story Themes

Are likely to question these beliefs and often to challenge them.

Represent rather somber truths.

Literary Story Themes

We do not have to accept the theme of a story.

The ability to state theme is a test of our understanding of a story.

There is no prescribed method for discovering theme.What way the main character has changedExplore the nature of the central conflict

and its outcomeSometimes the title will provide a clue

Discovering Theme

1Theme should be expressible

in the form of a statement with a subject and a predicate.

Principles to Discovering Theme

2.The theme should be stated

as a generalization about life.


3.Be careful not to make the

generalization larger than is justified by the terms of the story.


4.Theme is the central and

unifying concept of a story.


5.There is no one way of stating

the theme of a story.


6.We should avoid any

statement that reduces the theme to some familiar saying that we have heard all our lives.


Chapter FivePoint of View The angle of

vision from which a story is told

Four Basic Points of View

OmniscientThird-person Limited

First PersonObjective

The author tells the story using the third person, knowing all and free to tell us anything. Including what the characters are thinking or feeling and why they act as they do.

Omniscient

The author tells the story using the third person, but is limited to a complete knowledge of one character in the story and tells us only what that one character thinks, feels, sees, or hears.

Third-Person Limited

The story is told by one of its characters, using the first person.

First-Person

Or Dramatic point of viewThe author tells the story using the third person, but is limited to reporting what the characters say or do; the author does not interpret the characters’ behavior or tell us their private thoughts or feelings.

Objective

CharacterizationMrs. JohnsonDeeMaggie

By- Alice Walker

“Everyday Use”

Characterization Joy/HulgaMrs. HopewellMrs. Freeman

By- Flannery O’Connor

“Good Country People

Theme Inescapability of the pastPurity of paternal love

By- F. Scott Fitzgerald

“Babylon Revisited”

ThemeLove – perseveranceRedemptionRacial prejudiceBy – Eudora Welty

“A Worn Path”

Point of View3rd Person Objective

By – Shirley Jackson

“The Lottery”

Point of View3rd Person

By – Katherine Anne Porter

“The Jilting of Granny Weatherall”

Point of View3rd Person

Fly-on-the-wallBy – Ernest Hemingway

“Hills Like White Elephants”

Documents

Comp II Short Stories Chapters 3, 4, & 5 Professor Vicky Neal