agenda | 12 june 2009

Agenda

• Attendance Quiz
• Group Preference Forms
• Discuss "Paul's Case"
• Instructions on writing an Author's Note
  

Discussion Questions (remember that you don't have to answer all of them)

• After you have finished reading, consider the opening two paragraphs of the story (on p. 235) in the same close reading manner we have used in class this week. What words does Cather use to describe Paul, the setting, the situation, etc? What is significant about that word choice?
• After his hearing at the school, Paul's feelings greatly differ from those of his teachers. Contrast Paul's attitude with that of his teachers after the interview is over. How do they feel? How does he feel?
• What do you think it is about Paul's job at Carnegie Hall that completely changes his attitude about life?
• Consider the description of Paul's bedroom (on p. 239) through a close reading. What here is significant about the room? about Paul?
• Why do you think Paul decides to steal the money and flee town? What is the final cause in this situation?
• What is different for Paul in New York City? Why do you think he likes it so much there?
• After what he learned from the newspaper, Paul made a decision about what to do. Why do you think he chose this? Instead of being arrested, what was going to happen to Paul if he were taken back to Pittsburgh? Why did he consider this "worse than jail"?
• Vassar College professor and author Paul Russell has written:
  

  "Paul's Case" [is] a story often taught in American...schools as the tale of a sensitive, artistic young man who flees the constrictions of provincial life in order to experience in New York city all his pent-up aesthetic longings for art, beauty, and the artificial world of the theatre. But closer inspection reveals Paul to be steeped in the coded signs of the homosexual, from his red carnation to his apparent fling with a wild boy from San Francisco. … Cather herself would define as one of the principal qualities of her fiction "the inexplicable presence of the thing not named."

  Where are some of the other signs in the story, besides the ones Russell has written above, that Paul's "case" is that of having a minority sexual orientation, or at least exhibiting gender non-conformity? Think about the words Cather uses to describe Paul's actions, thoughts and personality.

Homework due 6/15

• Submit your Film Adaptation Proposal Essay to me as an attachment via email (april.patrick@tcu.edu)
• Read "The Man Who Was Almost a Man" and "The Conscience of the Court"
• Blog the Author's Note for your Film Adaptation Proposal Essay. Instructions for Author's Notes are HERE.