Suggested Essay prompts for Macbeth

1. 1972
In retrospect the reader often discovers that the first chapter of a novel
or the opening scene of a drama introduces some of the major themes of the
work. Write an essay about the opening scene of a drama or the first
chapter of a novel in which you explain how it functions in this way. In
your essay do not merely summarize the plot of the work you are
discussing.

2. 1974
    Choose a work of literature written before 1900. Write an essay in which
you present arguments for and against the work's relevance for person in 1997.
Your own position should emerge in the course of the essay. You
may refer to works of literature written after 1900 for the purpose of
contrast or comparison.

3. 1988
Choose a distinguished novel or play in which some of the most
significantevents are mental or psychological; for example, awakenings,
discoveries,changes in consciousness. In a well-organized essay, describe how
the authormanages to give these internal events the sense of excitement,
suspense, andclimax usually associated with external action. Do not merely
summarize the plot

Preparing for the AP Exam

GOALS:

- Study 30 literary elements per week

- Review vocabulary from last semester and previous years

- Do at least one practice essay per week

- Do at least one  practice multiple choice tests per week

- Organize a study session the weekend before the test to get last minute practice and help from peers

Macbeth Test Answers

1. A
2. B
3. A
4. C
5. A
6. B
7. B
8. B
9. A
10.C


1. A
2. B
3. C
4. A
5. A
6. A
7. C
8. C
9. A
10. B

Continued Reading Notes: Macbeth

Opening Scene:
-witches- gross, ugly, beards, gossipy
- practice witch-craft
- symbolize 3 fates of mythology
-Banquo- friend of Macbeth
- related to King James I
-witch foretells that Macbeth will come into power
-Macbeth gets a promotion to Cawdor
-King Duncan- King of Scotland
- great ruler
- impressed by Macbeth because of his success in battle
-witches tell Macbeth he will become king of Scotland
-Macbeth is named Cawdor (original Cawdor sentenced to death for treason)
-Macbeth will meet with the King
- Lady Macbeth- ambitious, wants power
- she wants the witches fortune to come true, power hungry
- wears the pants in the relationship, very masculine
- tell Macbeth to kill King Duncan to become king
- strong, bossy
-Macbeth doesn't want to kill the king, but does want power
-Macbeth stabs the king in his sleep
-He becomes king of Scotland
-Malcom- Duncan's son
- flees to England
- fears that whomever killed his father will kill him next
-Witches' prophecy- Banquo's sons will become powerful
- Banquo doesn't really believe them and doesn't take action like Macbeth
-Macbeth fears that the witches were right and kills Banquo to keep his sons from getting power
-Fleance- Banquo's son, survives
-Banquo's ghost haunts Macbeth at the dinner party
-symbolizes Macbeth's guilt
- Banquo was a good man and his friend
-Macbeth goes to the witches for help
-they say demons are after him
-Mcduff- Scottish nobleman
- knows Macbeth is bad
- wants Malcom to become King
-Lady Mcduff- opposite of Lady Macbeth
- kind, maternal
-Macbeth orders Macduff's wife and children to be killed
- Mcduff is devistated
- Lady Macbeth dies and Macbeth doesn't really care
-"She should have died hereafter, signifying nothing"
-Mcduff, Malcom, and English army invade Scotland
-Lennox, Ross- Scottish nobles
- support English invasion
- hate Macbeth
-Mcduff kills Macbeth at the end of the battle
-Malcom become King of Scotland
- Witches wait in the background

Macbeth Reading Notes

-Evil, dark

-Macbeth- cynical, evil, brutal

-Shakespeare's darkest play

-Written between 1605 ads 1606

-Globe Theater, Black Friar's Theater

-Macbeth- political play

-Changed history to add suspense

-Must understand background and history

-Macbeth- genius, ambitious

-Macbeth- supposed to evoke emotion
- upset people

-Super natural forces

Literary Analysis ReMiX: Wuthering Heights

Literature Analysis #5

Wuthering Heights-Emily Bronte

-Wuthering Heights is a love story about a man and woman names Heathcliff and Catherine. This is another classic story about forbidden love. Heathcliff was a weathly man. He was adopted into the Earnshaw family. Catherine makes her relationship with Heathcliff extremely complicated when she became infatuated with Edgar. Catherine became engaged to Edgar (despite her burning love for Heathcliff) because Catherine wanted to climb the social status ladder. After Heathcliff ran away in anger; when he arrived back in Wuthering Heights, he came back for revenge on everyone who had done him wrong. Catherine ends up dying before Heathcliff ever had a chance to be with her. They are only reunited once he dies too.

-The theme of Wuthering Heights is the power of an undying love. Love can make people do stupid and irrational things. Catherine and Heathcliff's love is the source of the major conflicts and contains the most emotion throughout the entire novel. It is unclear to me though, how Bronte wants the reader to view love. After reading this novel, my opinion of it could be swayed either a positive or negative way.

-The author's tone is basically passionate.

*"He's more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same, and Linton's is as different as a moonbeam from lightning, or frost from fire."

*That is not my Heathcliff. I shall love mine yet; and take him with me: he's in my soul."

*"Well, if I cannot keep Heathcliff for my friend--if Edgar will be mean and jealous, I'll try to break their hearts by breaking my own. That will be a prompt way of finishing all, when I am pushed to extremity!"

-Diction, tone, symbolism, repitition, and imagery helped me understand the theme and tone. Imagery, diction and tone go hand in hand. Bronte's use of diction created the imagery. The way she used settings and descriptions made a clear visual of everything that was happening throughout the story. The constant emphasis on the settings throughout the story was symbolic. The scenery was always a gloomy kind of weather and just always related to the different moods given off. Repetition was a technique in this novel.Time ran in cycles and bad things from the past continued to repeat themselves in this story.

Poem Interpretation

Your Whispered Secret
You Told it to your friend,
his oath was deep.

Now here's a question
for your wisdom shelf.

Why did you hope
some other one would keep

The secret that you
could not keep yourself.

-Beverly Marble-Farley


Dramatic situation: This person is expecting someone else to keep a secret that they couldnt even keep themselves.
Structure of Poem: The Rhymes are alternating every other stanza.
Theme: Trust; Self control
Grammar & Meaning: The Grammar is neither skewed nor odd.
Figures of Speech: "his oath was deep" - meaning he was serious about keeping the secret just as the other was. "wisdom shelf"- meaning another circumstance to add to your gain of wisdom.
Tone: the author's tone is a little harsh and in your face.
Repitition: There is no repetition.

Dr. Tony William's Gresham College Lecture Notes

Main idea- acting with children and friends in drama, The Frozen Deep. (personal significance) In 1857, assisted friend in writing the play, The Frozen Deep. He played the noble hero that sacrificed himself.

-Met Ellen Turner during the production of the play, played lucy and then separated with his wife. Dickens wrote about a character named lucie, and gives her some appearance of lucy.

-Parallelism by the the names from the play and the book.
-1858- Public readings for profit instead of charity readings. 
-1859- 75% ownership, chapter 1-3 of the novel was published.

-London and Paris;London's significance: 
As a child, 10 yrs. old, Dickens was brought there by his father because of workings due. 
 A place of unsettling sights and darkness. 
But also as great fascination, later as an adult he saw it as vile.

-Paris; 
1844: first impressions- Extraordinary place, perfectly and distinct character. Half the size of London. 
-He visited 14 times between 1844 to 1856. 
-Vibrant and modernized city. 

-Fascinated by the darker side of the city, calling it wicked. Drawn to see the morgue.
-Uses Historical setting for a clear parrell.
-English setting basis; timeline 1757 1793-4
-Reveals the outbursts and the poverty of the Revolution era
-Similarities of France and Britain.
-One or two chapters a week were published. Cliff hangers and wrote as he went along.

-Suspense and tension; form of writing 
-Carlye's history of the french revolution was splendid and symbolic; insights and events happening at nights with torch lights. 
-Dickens approach to those events and insights; example:  storming of the Bastille, the chapter called echoing footsteps; he builds up the momentum.
-Dickens own experiences

Title Meaning: A Tale of Two Cities

"A Tale of Two Cities" by Charles Dickens

The novel A Tale of Two Cities starts in the year 1775, during the French Revolution. Charles Dickens chose to name the novel "A Tale of Two Cities" because it was the closest contact of European life at the time. Dickens' other novels were based in one city and this novel takes place in two of the great cities.  Therefore, I think that the novel’s title fits it very well.

Literature Analysis #4 The Sun Also Rises

 "The Sun Also Rises"

1. Jake Barnes and his friends live in the contreversial, self-indulgent world of post-World War I Paris. There, they occasionally work, but spend most of their time partying, drinking, and arguing. From Jake’s perspective, we meet the cast of characters that populates his story: the most important among them are Robert Cohn who is down-on-his-luck, a Princeton grad and unsuccessful writer. We are also introduced to Lady Brett Ashley, an exciting, beautiful, and unpredictable British divorcee.  Although Jake and Brett are actually in love, they aren’t together, presumably because a mysterious war wound has rendered Jake impotent. Cohn falls in love with Brett as well and, despite the fact that she’s not terribly impressed with him, she secretly goes on a trip with him to San Sebastian. Cohn is smitten, truly, madly, deeply in love. Unfortunately for Cohn (and for everyone, for that matter), Brett is engaged to a wealthy, charming, and drunkard man named Mike. Jake’s other friend Bill returns to Paris from a trip and a plan is derived, everyone agrees to go to Spain for some fishing and the running of the bulls in Pamplona. On their fishing trip, Bill and Jake have a splendid time with each other, but the relaxation quickly comes to an end. They return to civilization and meet up with Brett, Mike, and Cohn in Pamplona for a weeklong activities of bullfights, alcohol, and high drama. Jake has a true passion for bullfighting, but everyone else is simply there to have a good time. Brett begins a rather scandalous affair with a young bull-fighter, Pedro Romero. Jake feels terrible for many reasons one being the fear that he has corrupted Romero in some way by introducing him to Brett. Cohn’s infatuation with Brett leads to arguments with everyone and, finally, he beats the unfortunate Romero to a bloody pulp. As the fiesta winds down, everyone leaves Pamplona in various states of anxiety, depression and frustration. Jake heads to San Sebastian, where he intends to be alone for a while. Unfortunately, desperate telegrams from Brett arrive immediately. He goes to her in Madrid, where she is alone, having sent Romero away. For the first time, we see Brett truly vulnerable, afraid, and guilty. The future looks just as bad, Jake and Brett agree again that, even though they love each other, they can’t be together.

2. The main theme I recognized in the novel was that of love. This is the best theme that i could find because of Brett. Everyone is so infatuated with her and multiple people "fall in love" with her. Yes, love is corrupted in the novel and usually triggered with the idea of sex behind it, but although this is so I still feel as if the whole them revolves around love because even the environment is romanticized; it's in Paris.

3. The tone of the novel is sort of somber, and detached from reality.  

Examples of this are through these three quotes:

•"I mistrust all frank and simple people, especially when their stories hold together"

•"I was a little drunk. Not drunk in any positive sense but just enough to be careless."

•"'Listen, Jake,' he leaned forward on the bar. "Don’t you ever get the feeling that all your life is going by and you’re not taking advantage of it? Do you realize you’ve lived nearly half the time you have to live already?"

All of these examples show how the author has an odd kind of negative outlook on life, which makes him tone almost depressing.

4. Literary elements that portrayed the tone and theme were not very hard to spot through out the novel.  The symbols were the first thing that i recognized with in the novel, one being the bull fighting. The fighting of the bulls symbolized that some kind of drama was going to show up with Jake and his friends, whether it be a casual argument or a controversy about Brett. Another two literary techniques I saw in the novel that led me into what the authors tone was through diction and syntax.  Hemingway would right with very sophisticated language with a lot of detail and he would make very wise, but somewhat whimsical statements. For example, "Caffeine puts a man on his horse and a woman in his grave." The structure of the sentences were kind of condensed which also led to the depressing or conservative tone. Another literary technique that I could identify was that the author used a lot of comparison within his writing, especially those that portray women as almost scandalous. "And with them was Brett. I was very angry. Somehow they always made me angry. I know they are supposed to be amusing, and you should be tolerant, but I wanted to swing on one, any one, anything to shatter that superior, simpering composure."  The last literary technique I saw with the novel is the allusions that are seen such as the references to greek mythology.

Your Whispered Secret

Your Whispered Secret

You Told it to your friend,
his oath was deep.

Now here's a question
for your wisdom shelf.

Why did you hope
some other one would keep

The secret that you
could not keep yourself.

-Beverly Marble-Farley

I chose this poem because my Nana, Beverly, wrote it. It hangs in my living room for everyone who enters  my home to see. It reminds me how wise she is, and how much she inspires me day by day.