1. In what ways do the two waiters differ?
2. What does the title of the story mean?
3. What is the significance of the garbled Lord’s prayer?
4. What is the meaning of “nada”? What is the writer’s intention of replacing many words in theprayers with “nada”?
Week 7:
Emily Dickinson,
“Because I could not stop for Death—”
1. What is the significance of the journey experience (lines 9-12)?
2.
“I heard a Fly buzz—when I died—”
1. How does the description of the harvest season set off the theme of the poem?
2. In what way is this poem similar or different from other literary pieces about the Civil War?
3. How do you understand “Something there is that doesn’t love a wall” (line 1)?
4. How do you understand “Good fences make good neighbors” (lines 27, 45)?
3. What is the significance of the essay against the cultural background of Puritanism?
Benjamin Franklin, The Autobiography:
1. What kind of life style does Franklin advocate? Do you share his principles?
5. How do you understand “He moves in darkness” (line 41)?
6. What do we wall in and what do we wall out?
7. Can we do away with all walls?
8. What is the speaker’s attitude toward mending wall?
1. Why is the last line repeated?
2. In what way does the rhyming scheme add to the lyric quality of the poem?
Week 13:
Ernest Hemingway, “A Clean, Well-lighted Place”:
美国文学思考习题与练习
Week 2:
Jonathan Edwards, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”:
1. What is the purpose of Edwards in delivering the sermon?
2. Who are the sinners?
Week 12:
Robert Frost,
“Mending Wall”:
1. What does the wall possibly symbolize?
2. Why does the poet say that the wall stays always where we do not need it (line 23)?
2. Do you agree with the idea that Franklin’s principles are universal?
3. Why does Franklin NOT list “piety” as one of the virtues?
4. What do you think of Franklin’s emphasis on material success?
7.How does Hawthorne view the relationship between human beings?
Week 6:
Walt Whitman,
“Calvary Crossing the Ford”:
1. What is the significance of the use of colors?
2. What decision does the speaker make at the entrance of the forest?
3. How does the speaker view the choice that he has made?
“Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”:
5. What role does Franklin’s autobiography play in the pioneering experience?
6. How can you translate Franklin’s principles into Chinese?
Week 3:
Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Self-Reliance”:
2. What mood can you find in the poem?
“When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer”:
1. How does the speaker respond to the astronomer’s lecture and the silence of the night?
3. What musical devices does the poet use in the poem?
4. What do you think of Poe’s philosophy of composition?
Week 5:
Nathaniel Hawthorne, “The Minister’s Black Veil”:
1.What does the veil symbolize?
2.Why does the minister wear the veil?
3.Do you think the minister is an evil or good character?
4.How is the theme of the individual’s isolation from society represented in the story?
5.How do you understand the following sentence—“I look around me, and lo! On every visagea black veil!”?
6.What attitude toward religion can you find in the story?
2. How is death represented in the story?
3. How is Darwin’s theory of evolution influence the story?
Week 10:
Ezra Pound, “In a Station of the Metro”:
1. How is the central image in the poem related to the subject the poet intends to present?
2. What role does language play in the story?
3. How is the story narrated?
Week 9:
Jack London, “The Law of Life”:
1. What is the law of life? How does Old Koskoosh view it?
Week 4:
Edgar Allan Poe, “The Raven”:
1. How does the speaker’s mood change throughout the poem?
2. Why is the word “nevermore” repeated again and again?
1. What does the image of the fly signify?
2. How do you understand the two “sees” in the line “I could not see to see”?
“Essential Oils—are Wrung—”
1. Why does Dickinson say that the attar is “the gift of Screws” (line 4)?
9. What does the wall symbolize?
10. What are the outstanding musical devices?
“The Road Not Taken”:
1. What is the significance of the title of the poem?
2. In what way do you think the Imagists learned from the ancient Chinese poetry?