We're all still doing well here on the Island, and I trust you are too. In this time when so many of our daily routines are upset, be faithful in your prayers and in your reading of God's Word. "God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble" (Psalm 46:1). All of Psalm 46 is worth your reading and reflection; it is a beautiful song of confidence in the Lord in times when the world seems turned upside down.
Regarding homework, some students have been photographing their hand-written work and attaching the picture. It is OK for you to do this, but I prefer typed responses. If you do use a photo, make sure your work is clearly written, that the paper is flat, and that the photo is taken directly from above and not at an acute (or obtuse) angle. I have a lot of papers to read every day, so please help me out on this. Thanks!
Literature 7-8
On p. 434 is "Blue-Butterfly Day" by Robert Frost. Read it aloud and answer the questions below.
Study Questions for "Blue-Butterfly Day"
Due no later than 5:00 pm on Friday, March 20.
1. Click on the link for a photo: blue butterfly edited
2. How many accented beats are in each line?
3. What is the rhyme pattern for the whole poem?
4. In what way are the butterflies "sky-flakes"?
5. How are the butterflies like flowers?
6. According to the poem, how are they different from flowers?
7. What does it mean that they have "ridden out desire"?
8. Where do the butterflies land?
9. How is the last line a contrast with the rest of the poem?
10. Write out and mark 3 lines that use alliteration or assonance.
11. Click on the photo link again. Come up with 3 different, original metaphors or similes for the blue butterfly. For extra credit, write your own original, rhymed poem about it.
American Literature
For Friday: Write an original 100-word summary of chapter 1. Include any questions you may have, and I will respond to them.
Also for Friday: Read ch. 2 and do a similar summary. Include a sparkle.
Both assignments are due no later than 5:00 pm on Friday, March 20.
Here are a few background notes that may be helpful:
1. In the time of the Civil War, battles were rarely fought in the winter. Muddy winter roads made traveling difficult. You see, they really wanted to kill each other, but it was hard. Disease took many lives, however. Henry and the others have been encamped much of the winter. He's been in the army for a few months, but he has never shot at anyone or been shot at. The same is true of the others in the regiment--the veterans consider them "fresh fish."
2. Henry's regiment was recruited locally, so he knew a number of the other men before he enlisted.
3. They are fighting somewhere in the South, quite possibly Virginia, which saw scores of battles in the course of the war, many of them very bloody. The North usually lost, and lost big. Robert E. Lee and "Stonewall" Jackson had a lot to do with that. They were both brilliant Confederate generals.
4. Notice the unusual way Crane uses color and metaphor to making his writing sharp and memorable. And don't miss his snarky humor either!
5. Since Henry is the viewpoint character, our vision of the outside world is very limited. He doesn't know much. He's a buck private with little understanding of strategy and troop movements. He sees only what is right in front of his face, and even then he doesn't always understand. However, we know a lot about what he is thinking and feeling.
British Literature
1. Keep reading 1984. Finish by Tuesday.
2. Read following comments on "Kubla Khan." Make a fairly-detailed sentence outline of it. Write out any questions or comments you have below the outline.
Due no later than 5:00 pm on Friday, March 20.
Writers of the Romantic period, like Coleridge, often saw poetry as the fruit of inspiration rather than of traditional wisdom and technical skill. (See the handout "Neoclassicism and Romanticism" for other common tendencies.) "Kubla Khan," though it is clearly within the Romantic mode, is not simply a effusion of feelings without regard to traditional prosody. Coleridge borrows much from the past while at the same time espousing a Romantic view of poetical inspiration. He uses old tools like meter, rhyme, repetition, alliteration, and assonance--but creates something that was modern for his time.
One central feature of "Kubla Khan" is its oneiric (or dreamlike) quality. Coleridge claimed that he had dreamed the whole poem. I'm a little skeptical about that (writers and other creative people sometimes exaggerate such things), but for various reasons, the poem does have an oneiric feel. We can hear its dreamy, chant-like quality when we read it aloud or hear it read. Watch this video of the poem being dramatically read by Benedict Cumberbatch!: video Even if you don't understand every word, the mystical feeling of the poem comes through very well.
The mysterious sound of the poem is reinforced by the geographical references, which are exotic even confusing. Xanadu is a region of Mongolia north of the Great Wall of China, where Kubla Khan built his "stately pleasure dome." So far, so good. But what about "Alph, the sacred river"? If it is a reference to the river Alpheus, it is a river in Greece, not Mongolia. However, as you know from your background reading, Coleridge does have an Alpheus in mind; according to mythology, it was a river that flowed under the sea and erupted in a freshwater fountain, Arethusa (also the names of deities). Geographically, it is a bit confused; symbolically, it works just fine. Add to this the similarity of the name "Alph" to elf ( a mysterious, magical being) and aleph (the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet, associated in folklore with magical practices. For an (optional) oneiric short story on the subject, read "The Aleph" by Jorge Luis Borges: The Aleph.)
Other oneiric geographical references are found in Section 3 of the poem, which (get this) is a vision within a dream! The Abyssinian maid is singing and playing a dulcimer. Abyssinia, as you already know, is an old name for Ethiopia; more than that, it connects to the word "abyss," a region deep underground or deep beneath the ocean. (Remember where the sacred river flows?) The girl functions like one of the Muses (muses). She is singing of Mount Abora, which may or may not be a reference to Mount Amara in Ethiopia, near a source of the Nile River. It may function as an equivalent to Mount Helicon, where the Muses were wont to dwell.
Am I making sense?
Another oneiric quality besides the sound of the poem and its hazy, shifting geography is the other references to magic. Section 2 calls the chasm of the river "romantic...savage...holy and enchanted" and recalls ancient ballads of ghosts in the moonlight. In Section 3,the Abyssinian maid, as a Muse or a witch might do, puts a spell on the speaker. If he could only recapture her song, he thinks (summoning it up like a fountain from the stream of his subconscious self), he could become another Kubla Khan, but creating his pleasure dome and caves of ice out of air (the words of this poem!) rather than solid building materials. Enchanted by her magical music, he would in turn become the magical enchanter. The "normals," though, would see him as a threat. Flashing eyes might suggest a kind of spiritual possession, and his hair would be "floating" because of the winds of inspiration. He has eaten magical food (honeydew, suggestive of manna and bread from heaven). He has drunk "the milk of Paradise"--not chiefly opium, but the sacred drink of divine inspiration.
Now we are in a position to see more clearly the structure and the meaning of the poem. Section 1 sets the scene, showing us the contrasting images of the pleasure dome and its sunny grounds with the sunless course of the Alph. The former is marked by Edenic beauty, a temple-garden. But it is also circumscribed--the dome itself and the carefully-measured square ground surrounded by walls and towers. The latter is sunless, hidden, unmeasured. Section 2 focuses almost exclusively on the chasm, the river, and the fountain that springs from it. It goes against the grain of the ground, moving at a slant, not right angles, "athwart a cedarn cover," and later has a "mazy motion." This water makes its own path and does not follow a neat path prescribed by Kubla Khan and his sort. It is moreover powerful enough to make rocks dance and can prophesy the future. Released for a time by the fountain, it interacts with the surface: the shadow of the dome floats halfway over it, and the sound of the water echoes in the artificial caves of ice. But these surface features cannot control this mysterious water; it has a path and destiny of its own.
Section 3 takes us into the personal realm. We understand that the Abyssinian maid corresponds to the subterranean river--powerful, mysterious, seldom seen, but capable of transforming people and even the way they see the world. The speaker-poet is the fountain--the mediator between the savage, sunless world of below and the and beautiful but circumscribed world of the surface. Enchanted himself, he takes the power of the depths and uses it in his poetry to enchant others to see things that aren't there, but could be. The poem corresponds to the pleasure dome and the grounds--beautiful, organized, somewhat circumscribed, but with a power and magic that cannot be fully explained.
C.S.Lewis
Now that you have finished Out of the Silent Planet, write a standard three-paragraph essay exploring the various ways in which language and languages are used in the novel. Also, if you have any questions, email them to me.
The essay is due no later than noon on Saturday, March 21.
Bible 7-8
Do the following review questions.
Due no later than 5:00 pm on Friday, March 20.
Review Questions on Acts 6 & 7
Ch. 6
1. Explain the problem that developed in the church.
2. Describe the solution to the problem.
3. What got Stephen into trouble?
4. What 2 accusations were made against him?
Ch. 7
5. Why did Joseph's brother turn against him?
6. How did Joseph help them?
7. How did the Hebrews in Egypt oppose Moses?
8. How did he help them then?
9. How did the Hebrews turn against Moses and the Lord in the wilderness?
10. Why is Joshua mentioned?
11. Why is David mentioned?
12. Why is Solomon mentioned?
13. In what sense is the temple inadequate?
14. How did Stephen accuse his accusers?
15. The Stoning of Stephen
a. What did Stephen see in a vision?
b. What were 2 Christlike things that Stephen said?
c. Why is Saul mentioned?
Bible 11-12
Write and answer 10 thoughtful questions based on Isaiah 9A and 11.
Due no later than 5:00 pm on Friday, March 20.
Introduction to French
Read ch. 7 and answer the following questions in French in complete sentences.
Due no later than 5:00 pm on Friday, March 20.
Study Questions for Fama ch. 7
1. Qu'est-ce se passe au gymnase?
2. Un "cougar," qu'est-ce que c'est?
3. Comment est le football au match de football americain?
4. Qui gagne le match?
5. Apres le match, qu'est-ce se passe au restaurant?
6. Fama et ses amies quittent le restaurant. Ou est-ce qu'elles vont?
7. Fama parle de la Mauritanie. Qu'est-ce qu'elle dit?
8. Selon Diane, les Etats-Unis a des problemes. Par exemple, quoi?
9. Fama ecrit une letter a sa famille. Qu'est-ce qu'elle ecrit de Debbie?
Intermediate French
Read the Revision. Write and answer in French 10 questions based on it.
Due no later than 5:00 pm on Friday, March 20.
Advanced French
Commencez a lire L'Etranger--chapitre 1. Communiquons par email, d'accord?
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