Good Morning, Class!

Welcome!  You've come to the right place.

The readings:

1. "New Contemporary Poems: A Hand-picked Anthology" (MacArthur, ed.)
2. A Moon for the Misbegotten / Eugene O'Neill
3. Tess of the d'Urbervilles / Thomas Hardy
4. A Matter of Personal Choice / (You)

As you're reading, go to the appropriate page below.  Log in to leave a thought, a comment or a question.  Maybe you can respond to what someone else has said already.  I'll be eavesdropping from time to time,, but I'm going to keep my comments to myself.  (If you have any particular questions for me, email me at the school email.)

You're expected to leave at least one entry for the three reading.  (Your personal choice reading is optional).  If you do only that, though, expect no more than a "C".  The more entries -- and the more insightful entries -- they better you'll do.)  But really, if you just use this a a forum for discussion, the points will take care of themselves.

There are two additional assignments.  One you'll find on the poem page: read and annotate the twenty poems in the packet.  Due no later  September 4th, to me in my room.

The other will be a traditional "five-paragraph" essay.  (That means an introduction -- one paragraph, the body of the paper -- three, or more, paragraphs, and the conclusion -- one paragraph.)  The key will be coming up with a strong, narrowly defined thesis.  I will be looking for how well you have defended that thesis.  I will be looking for a) a well-defined structure to the paper, and b) evidence of a thorough and thoughtful reading, presented in c) grammatically suitable language.  I'm looking for a topic that can be suitably discussed in 2 - 5 pages.

I would like to to consider both the play and the novel in your paper.  Now, I haven't finished reading Tess, so check back for updated assignments.  But here's what I've got so far.

A)  Self-regard, self-criticism, and self-destruction.  Josie thinks she's too big and ugly for anyone to love (although Jim claims he loves her).  Jim thinks of himself as an alcoholic and irredeemable sinner.  (Well, yes to the first.)  Tess goes along with society's view of her as a fallen woman, and one whom Fate has chosen for sadness.
How accurate are these mirrors in which they see themselves? In what ways do these characters contribute to their own downfalls?

B)  Perception and Reality.  This topic is related to the first, but from a different angle.  How much of the trouble faced by Josie, Jim, and Tess are not their own fault, but strictly due to the way they are viewed by the world (which may be at odds with the person underneath.

C)  Compare and Contrast: Heroines.  Josie Hogan and Tess Durbeyfield.  They are so different in age, beauty, and experience that I can't imagine one actress playing both parts.  On the other hand, they are both farm girls.  They have difficult fathers.  And their love-lives are nothing to write home about.

D)  Compare and Contrast: Heroes.  Jim Tyrone and Angel Clare.  Jim -- basically a good-hearted guy, excepts when he gives into his self-destructive urges.  I don't yet know Angel that well yet.  He seems like a reasonable guy, a man of principles (who, I have reason to believe, will give into hypocrisy -- maybe born of weakness?)

NEW TOPICS!

E)  Compare and Contrast: Departures.  In Act IV of A Moon for the Misbegotten, Jim goes away.  In "Phase the Fifth" of Tess, Clare goes away.  Two different men with two very different reasons leaving two very different women.  What do you make of it all?

F)  Apply the Quotation.  Hardy writes of Clare: "In considering what Tess was not, he overlooked what she was, and forgot that the defective can be more than the entire."  Consider the wisdom behind this quotation in light of certain of the characters in Tess and A Moon.