ENGL3300 – Final Exam Review

  1. Cover 6 Methods
    1. Structuralism
    2. Formalism
    3. Reader Response
    4. Psychological
    5. Deconstruction
    6. Feminism
    7. Political et al (Culture: gender, class, ethnicity)
  2. Texts
    1. Theoretical: Scholes, Lynn, Eagleton, Moi
    2. Kate Chopin, "Ripe Figs"
  3. Kinds of Questions
    1. Summaries of methods
      1. In the spirit of the "précis," though perhaps with a bit more focus
        1. eg. Explain the basic emphasis of structuralism, and in particular the importance of the "binary opposition"
    2. Applications of one (or more) of the six methods, to Chopin.
      1. ex. Reader Response –

 

Sample Question and Answer:

Write a reader response analysis of this poem, taking perhaps the position of its addressee (assumed to be a woman). Articulate in detail the process of making meaning of this poem.

Robert Creeley’s poem, "The Warning," takes the reader through a series of twists. The title itself perhaps gives some of this away, yet it hardly makes clear the seriousness of the "risk." Thus, the poem begins "For love," which may allow the reader to take it as a traditional love poem. Perhaps it will promise some sacrifice or gift. As it continues, however, the traditional gesture of love towards the lover is perverted

---I would
split open your head and put
a candle in
behind the eyes.

As the reader encounters these lines, the nature of the warning comes clear. The gift will be a kind of Jack-0-lantern, but the most frightening kind. How is the lover supposed to respond. Perhaps the psychotic "threat" would be a more accurate title. The violence of the image is quite shocking and completely disrupts the intimacy of the poem

Reading the second stanza however, the reader’s attitude may shift:

Love is dead in us
if we forget

The return of love confuses the reader. Perhaps the stanza above is a joke. Love is certainly dead if we convert our lovers into pumpkins! What is it that will preserve love, and life? The poem continues, "if we forget…":

the virtues of an amulet
and quick surprise

Suddenly we realize that perhaps the poem is not such a threat after all. The poem itself is the "quick surprise," it wakes us up – and perhaps tells the reader something about the strength of the speaker’s emotion—that it goes far enough to take a life (though that’s not the intention at all). Finally, we realize that the amulet is an important word, for the poem isn’t a threat but a charm or protective device, aimed at keeping love alive not killing it. Don’t forget.