Happy Christmas

A one-subject post today since I’m busy, you’re busy, we had a fairly one-subject class and you’re probably not even reading this.

We discussed critical (literature) essays and I tried to impress on you the idea that you must:

* Answer the question (both bits – there are usually two parts)
* Bear in mind that the whole point of the essay is to show HOW the writer has written the text
* Show that you’re doing this by using terms that describe techniques (theme etc)
* Write as fluently and correctly as possible.

Most of what we call “questions” don’t actually have a question in them at all. They’re really arguments – you’re arguing that the author has indeed done what’s mentioned in the description, and showing how he/she has done it.

The “questions” will be in the form:

Description of text: “Choose a novel which is influenced by the presence of a powerful or overbearing character.”
Instruction: “Show how the writer creates the impression of this character and discuss to what extent you felt you could sympathise with him/her.”

And at the top of each section of the exam you’ll also find a little box reminding you to write about the literary techniques.

So you might like to think of the question as if it said:

“Show how (ie by his/her use of theme, language, setting, characterisation) the writer creates the impression of this character and discuss to what extent you felt (through his/her use of theme, characterisation, structure) you could sympathise with him/her.”

You don’t need to discuss all the techniques. You do need to discuss some. But there’s no point in just regurgitating the notes. You need to discuss literary techniques only as far as they’re relevant to the particular argument of the essay.

You can assume that the marker will have read the text, but – as far as the exam is concerned – may have a hazy memory of it, so do tell little bits of the story to make points about them. Don’t tell bits of the story merely to fill up the page.

You MUST quote to back up some of your points. In a exam, five quotes would be the minimum for novels and plays – lots of quotes needed for poems. Using direct evidence (ie things that happen or a paraphrase of what people say) is good too.




While answering these “questions”, it’s useful to keep a little formula in mind and to follow it – not necessarily slavishly and not necessarily in this order, but as a possible approach if you feel yourself waffling off the topic – as is so easy to do:

SECT – this means

Statement – say something about the text
Evidence – give evidence from the text to back up what you say
Comment – say a bit more about your evidence if necessary
Technique – try to link this to a literary technique.

Eg

S. Anne Tyler shows us that Barnaby is unsure about his trustworthiness.
E On the very first page, he mentions that his customers see him as “a man you can trust”, while he himself is not so sure.
C This shows the lack of self esteem which troubles him throughout the novel
T and introduces the theme of trust, which is a central issue.

Certainly a lot of unsupported statements will not gain very many marks.

I then showed you a sample essay on “A Patchwork Planet” and asked you to write in class (how cruel! in the last class before Christmas!) the following essay:

Choose a novel in which a central character’s experiences lead to a deeper understanding not only of others but also of himself or herself.

Discuss the ways in which the character is made to attain self-knowledge and a better understanding of other people.



There’s no homework other than to do this essay if you weren’t there, to redo it if you feel you want to and to raise a glass to the SQA on January 1. Think about Barnaby and his year of change…

If you want the SECT handout, the “PP” notes or the sample essay, please email me: pdonaldson@stevenson.ac.uk

See you on January 6, clutching in your hands a copy of Miller’s “A View from the Bridge” and your past papers. Santa will provide, I trust. Hope he brings you lots of other good things too.

The four ages of Santa
1. You believe in Santa
2. You don’t believe in Santa
3. You are Santa.
4. You look like Santa.

Finishing off "A Patchwork Planet"

Tonight we again had a shortened class because of the Textual Analysis reassessment at the beginning. Do remember that next week is the last class before Christmas; we meet again on January 6.

First we looked at a sample essay on “Museé des Beaux Arts” by WH Auden, which I wrote while the reassessment was going on. I’ll have copies available next week. The main thing to remember for any literature essay is to answer the question VERY OBVIOUSLY – which sounds self-evident, but in fact it isn’t so easy to stick to when things get stressful.

We then finished going over “A Patchwork Planet”. In chapter 13, the Gaitlins have a Thanksgiving dinner during which Pop-Pop tells everyone how well they’re doing, including Barnaby: “He’s a good, good boy”. Barnaby is tempted to put his hands on his sister-in-law’s bottom – you should recognise his tendency to do inappropriate things and cause needless offence on social occasions – but is interrupted by his mother, who gives him the money back and tells him how she really felt about having to pay off his burglary victims: totally humiliated because she feels they looked down on her socially. He doesn’t really take this in at the time and tears up the cheque. His mother then tells his father about Barnaby’s refusal to take the money and he once again snubs her – “… your tiresome fishwife act”. What other comment of Father's does this remind you of? Should he have said this?

Sparked off by Sophia’s mentioning her “ne’er-do-well” cousin-in-law, Barnaby produces a huge list of synonyms for scoundrels – presumably because he’s been storing them up in his mind as descriptions of himself. Does he say them as a sort of apology to his mother, maybe? Is he admitting that he was wrong? Or is he just saying that he feels he’s been made to feel like this?

His father tells Pop-Pop about the Corvette. Pop-Pop is shocked but nobly says that the car “was yours to do what you liked with”.

On the way home in the car, Sophia brings up the question of money again – she’s unhappy that he tore up his mother’s cheque, but refuses to discuss the question of her (flour bin) money. All at once, Barnaby finds her irritating: her fluffy face, her bossy hands, her silly voice, her Crock-Pot dinners and general predictability; her lack of curiosity about the passport. This is really the end for their relationship.

There is then a flashback to the circumstances of Pop-Pop’s giving Barnaby the Corvette: after he locked the family out of the house and set fire to the curtains. He gave it because “I can’t think of anyone better, son” – and this act of trust appears to have reformed Barnaby as far as burgling is concerned, anyway. We now see why the car was so important to him.

In chapter 14 Barnaby goes to Mrs Alford’s and finds that she has died. He is shown her patchwork which is “makeshift and haphazard, clumsily cobbled together, overlapping and crowded and likely to fall into pieces at any moment” but also “pretty, in an offbeat, unexpected way”. Since this is the title of the book, we have to assume that Barnaby sees this as a symbol of his life – ramshackle but all right really. (Possibly the same could be said of most of our lives?) Barnaby realises that he has come to value people like Mrs Alford who “keep their good humour and gracious manners”.

He doesn’t invite Sophia to the Gaitlin Christmas dinner and declines his mother’s suggestion that he should give Sophia a family ring, but he and his mother have reached a better understanding and he muses that “it hadn’t been much fun loving someone as thorny as me”.

He and Martine are getting on better too and when he tells her about Sophia’s money being in the flour bin, she says, “What: is she out of her mind?” She trusts him completely; in fact it turns out that it was she who alerted Barnaby’s clients to the original accusation so that they asked him to do extra work for them. Martine then takes the initiative to go and collect the money. Mrs Glynn surprises them and Martine, thinking quickly, pretends that she has asked them to come and then forgotten.

Mrs Glynn must have phoned Sophia, because she then phones Barnaby, highly indignant. He puts the phone down – almost without meaning to, “my body proceeding without me again”. You should remember other times when he mentions such tendencies.

He doesn’t invite Sophia to the Gaitlin Christmas dinner and declines his mother’s suggestion that he should give Sophia a family ring, but he and his mother have reached a better understanding and he muses that “it hadn’t been much fun loving someone as thorny as me”.

He and Martine are getting on better too and when he tells her about Sophia’s money being in the flour bin, she says, “What: is she out of her mind?” She trusts him completely; in fact it turns out that it was she who alerted Barnaby’s clients to the original accusation so that they asked him to do extra work for them. Martine then takes the initiative to go and collect the money. Mrs Glynn surprises them and Martine, thinking quickly, pretends that she has asked them to come and then forgotten.

Mrs Glynn must have phoned Sophia, because she then phones Barnaby, highly indignant. He puts the phone down – almost without meaning to, “my body proceeding without me again”. You should remember other times when he mentions such tendencies.

In chapter 15, he takes Sophia’s money to the station (where he knows she’ll be) and gives her a packet for Natalie (which he knows she’ll take) with a piece of paper tucked inside (which is supposed to contain Natalie’s phone number but which is actually a message). This mirrors the station scene at the beginning and shows us the Anne Tyler’s careful structuring of the novel: this last scene wouldn’t work without the first scene having happened.

Then he goes to Mrs Alford’s to help clear up and to collect the Twinform, which Mrs Alford has willed to him. He imagines it (himself?) dressed in a suit – smartly. Is this his future self?

The novel ends just after he unscrews a figure-of-eight mounting plate from the wall. This reminds him of Martine’s dungaree clasps and when she comes in he says (quoting from the Shakespeare sonnet) “Haply I think on thee”. Remember that this means “Perhaps I’m thinking about you” – which suggests that Martine may in fact be the one for him. She seems to understand; on the whole she does understand him (and she trusts him) though she can’t possibly be recognising the quotation. Notice the structuring of the novel, though: the sonnet clue was planted some time ago, though possibly only alert readers would actually realise what happens here.

At the station (Barnaby assumes) Sophia reads the message: “Sophia, you never did realise. I am a man you can trust”. At last he feels sure of this, and doesn’t want the woman in his life to be someone who doesn’t trust him.

I will supply you with copious notes next week, but before then, please write (for homework) some notes of your own on one or two themes of this novel. The ones I suggest are trust, change, money/possessions/class, age and love, but feel free to think of other themes that you feel you could substantiate by textual reference (ie mentioning how the themes emerge in the plot / language).

Sorry this was so long. Reward me by leaving a comment! (You could answer some of the questions or say anything else that occurs to you about the novel. Or tell us a joke.)