English/FYE 101 
Fall 2004
Professor:  Jefferson Hendricks

Study Guide for Final Exam (200 points) 

Texts on which you'll be examined: 

• Plato, "The Allegory of the Cave" -- from The Republic
  
• Homer, The Odyssey
  
• Shakespeare, Measure for Measure
• Hawthorne, "Young Goodman Brown"
  
• Poe, "The Tell-Tale Heart"
• Gilman, "The Yellow Wall Paper"
• James, "The Real Thing"
• Chopin, "A Pair of Silk Stockings"
• London, "To Build a Fire"
• Cather, "Paul's Case"
• Fitzgerald, "Bernice Bobs Her Hair"
• Anderson, "The Egg"
• Hemingway, "The Killers"
• William Logan, poems from Night Battle:  "Florida in January," "Sundays in the South," "Blues for Penelope,"  "Bad Dream"
  
• Debra Greger, poems from Desert Fathers, Uranium Daughers:  "The Landscape of Memory," "Adam's Daughter,"  "The Age of Reason," "Lives of the North American Martyrs"
  
• Edwin Rolfe, poems from Trees Became Torches:   "Asbestos,"  "Season of Death,"  "Epitaph,"  "Elegy for Our Dead,"  "First Love,"  "Now the Fog,"  "The Poisoned Air Befouled the Whole Decade,"  "Little Ballad for Americans -- 1954" 
  
• Ethan and Joel Coen,  O Brother, Where Art Thou?

Part I:  Twenty (20) short answer items (names, places, terms, quotes) worth 4 points each (80 points total)

• You will be asked to write 2-3 sentences in which you not only identify and/or define, but also give the thematic significance of each item, relating it when possible to one of the works read this semester.   

Part II:   Three 500-word essays worth 40 points each (120 points total) 

1.     You will need to write a 500-word essay on poetry by Edwin Rolfe (you might want to compare and contrast two Rolfe poems or you might want to focus on just one; your choice of any Rolfe poem or poems).  This part of the exam may be written outside of class – before the exam – if you choose, on a Rolfe poem(s) of your choice.  Obviously, if you write this part of the exam out of class it is open-book, open-note.  If you choose to wait until you get to the exam to write your essay on Rolfe, you will be asked to write a comparison/contrast essay on either "Asbestos" and "Season of Death"  or "Epitaph" and "Elegy for Our Dead."   I will indicate which pair to write about when you pick up your exam. 

2.   You will be asked to write on two (2) of the following questions below.  This is not an open book or open note exam; therefore, you are not allowed to use books or notes during the exam.  The best essays on this exam will have a clear and focused thesis that develops a compelling argument supported by vivid and relevant details from this semester's texts.   Note a change from what I said in class:  it's possible that you may not be asked to write about texts from the first half of the class, that is Homer or Shakespeare.  You might, but it's not definite as I stated in class.   I may ask you to write about just texts from the second half of the semester. 

1            A.   Compare and contrast Odysseus in The Odyssey and  Everett in O Brother, Where Art Thou? as hero figures.   What seems to have happened to the "hero" in moving from the heroic epic of classical Greece to our own contemporary culture? 

        B.  Compare and contrast the mental condition of the lead characters in Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart" and Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper."      What are the reasons these characters seem to go "mad"?   What ideas are Poe and Gilman examining in portraying these extreme states of mind.

        C.   Compare and contrast the social context of Cather's "Paul's Case" and Anderson's "The Egg."  Both stories deal with aspects of "making it" in American society and the problems that occur when a character doesn't completely fit in with the ideology of this "making it." 

        D.    Compare and contrast the view of human nature that's presented in Hawthorne's "Young Goodman Brown" and Hemingway's "The Killers."  Be sure to distinguish between the views of characters and the views that the stories themselves seem to articulate. 

        E.     William Logan and Debra Greger live and work together.  Do you find more similarities or differences in their poetry?  Consider not only subject matter but the tone and the atmosphere of their poetry.