A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (the rest...)

READ THIS!

Here's what you've already done:
For chapters IV (four) and V (five) you have annotated passages. Some of you have used the enotes link (over there in the right margin) to print out and write on passages. Some of you have written on post-it notes or scraps of paper in your books. Some of you have jotted notes on a separate sheet of paper. Whatever your method you have made observations related to literary elements--narration, style, characterization, imagery, allusions, etc.; the whole landscape of the text--and have speculated on connections between those elements--features of the landscape--and the development, effect, and meaning of the novel as a whole.

Here's what you need to do Wednesday night before pumpkin time:
Now we'd like you to write an explication (also called a "close reading") of a passage from chapter V. (Most of you will write about the passage you have already annotated; though some of you might have been inspired by something you heard in class.)

A friend, Mr. Ryan Gallagher at Malden (MA) High School, writes, "A passage explication is an essay that takes apart the pieces of a prose passage to demonstrate how it creates meaning [on its own and in relation to the rest of the work]. Its main question can be reduced to the simple idea of 'What does the passage mean? What is its purpose? How does it create that meaning and achieve its purpose? How does it fit in with the rest of the text (if available)?'"

A further note on the etymology of explication: in Latin explicare means "to unfold," so it might be useful to imagine Joyce's text as compressed (or folded) into a particularly dense and layered package of potential meaning.

Your job as an explicator is to unfold the densely layered mass, to report on what you discover as you unfold, and to speculate upon the significance of what you discover.

Another friend, Mr. John Brassil, an AP Language teacher in Maine who is active with the College Board, talks about "close reading" as walking through the landscape of a text. What do you notice? (What is odd? What is interesting? What's similar? What's different? What stands out? What blends in?) And then, what might be significant about what you've noticed in relation to the text as a whole (or, to extend the metaphor, the landscape as an ecosystem)? We recommend that you walk through the passage from beginning to end, commenting as you go about what you notice and how it might be significant.

Here's what you'll do next (by Tuesday, November 29):
Write an expository essay that develops your interpretation of how a particular thread that embodies a tension in A Portrait of the Artist is significant to the work as a whole. We'll get the prompt up here tomorrow.

A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (chapter two and three)

Write an analysis of the passage you were given from chapter two or three. Be thoughtful. Be thorough. Be specific. Be resourceful. Be inquisitive. Take intellectual risks. Explore.(Due by pumpkin time Tuesday, November 8.)

Modernist Music (etc.)

By pumpkin time on Monday develop an open response that addresses the relationship between the modernist (and other) music you have been exposed to and modernism (and/or other movements) in other arts (fiction, poetry, film, painting, sculpture, architecture, dance, photography, etc.). Here's a list of some of the composers you have heard: Mozart, Chopin, Liszt, Debussy, Stravinsky, Gershwin, Shostakovic, Ned Rorem (who composed the "Minotaur" and "Acrobat on a Ball"). I look forward to your responses.

[Music played in class: (1) Chopin: Nocturne #2, E flat (1830-40); (2) Liszt: Nuagis Gris (1881); (3) Debussy: from Prelude Book I (1910); (4) Stravinsky: from Rite of Spring (1913); (5) Shostakovic: String Quartet #8 (1960). Music played by the Hausmann Quartet in the auditorium: (1) Debussy: String Quartet in G minor, Op. 10; (2) Stravinsky: Three Pieces for String Quartet; (3) Gershwin: Lullaby. In the library the Hausmann Quartet played pieces of music composed by Mozart and Debussy as well as the "Minotaur" and "Acrobat on the Ball" sections of a piece by Ned Rorem. What have I forgotten?]