Reading a Novel

1
Reading a Novel

• Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry
• by
• Mildred D. Taylor

2
Read with a Purpose

• Who is telling the story? (point of view)
• Who are the main characters, and what are they
  like? (characters)
• Where and when does the story take place? What
  is this place, culture, or historical period
  like? (setting)
• What happens? (plot)
• What is the authors central idea or message?
  (theme)
• How does the author express his or her ideas?
  (style

3
Point of View

• No two people tell a story in exactly the same
  way.
• Each person picks different things to emphasize.
• The person who tells the story in a novel is
  called the narrator.
• Look at the beginning of Roll of Thunder, Hear My
  Cry. What can you tell about the narrator?

4
from Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry
Narrator has Three brothers

• Little Man, would you come on? You keep it up
  and youre gonna make us late.
• My youngest brother paid no attention to me.
  Grasping more firmly is newspaper-wrapped
  notebook and his tin-can lunch of cornbread and
  oil sausages, he continued to concentrate on the
  dusty road. He lagged several feet behind my
  other brothers, Stacey and Christopher-John, and
  me, attempting to keep the rusty Mississippi dust
  from swelling with each step

First- Person pronouns
5
Point of View

• You keep it up and make us late for school,
  Mamas gonna wear you out, I threatened, pulling
  with exasperation at the high collar of the
  Sunday Dress Mama had made me wear for the first
  day of school as if that event were something
  special.

Narrator is a girl
6
Point of View

• Youve learned a lot about the storys point of
  view.
• A girl (named Cassie) is telling the story.
• The pronouns (I, me, us, my) are clues that the
  point of view is first person.
• Cassie has three brothers (Little Man, Stacey,
  and Christopher-John.
• As a reader, you will experience the story from
  Cassies viewpoint.

7
Characters

• To understand a novel, you need to keep track of
  the characters.
• A novelist gives clues about the characters by
  describing how they look, act, speak, think, and
  feel.
• A novelist also gives clues by revealing how
  other characters react to them.

8
Characterization
Cassie bosses her brothers.

• You keep it up and make us late for school,
  Mamas gonna wear you out, I threatened, pulling
  with exasperation at the high collar of the
  Sunday dress Mama had made me wear for the first
  day of school as if that were something special.
  It seemed to me that showing up at school at all
  on a bright August-like October morning made for
  running the cool forest trails and wading
  barefoot in the forest pond was concession
  enough. Sunday clothing was asking too much.

She likes to be outdoors.
9
Characterization
She listens to her Mother.

• I betcha Mamas gonna clean you, you keep it
  up, I grumbled.
• Ah, Cassie, leave him be, Stacey admonished,
  frowning and kicking intensely at the road.
• I aint said nothing but
• Stacey cut me a wicked look, and I grew silent.
  His disposition had been irritatingly sour
  lately. If I hadnt known the cause of it, I
  could have forgotten very easily that he was, at
  twelve, bigger than I, and that I had promised
  Mama to arrive at school looking clean and
  ladylike. Shoot, I mumbled finally, unable to
  restrain myself from further comment, it aint
  my fault you gotta be in Mamas class this year.

Cassie is younger than twelve
Cassie cant keep from speaking her mind.
10
Family Tree Web
Grandparents (Big Ma and Grandpa)
Hired Hand
Mr. Morrison
Parents Papa (David) Mama (Mary)
Uncle Hammer
Children
Stacey 12
Cassie
Christopher-John 7
Little Man 6
Friends T.J. Avery and his Brother Claude Jeremy
11
Character Map

• WHAT SHE SAYS AND DOES
• Bosses Little Man
• talks back to Stacey

• WHAT SHE THINKS AND
• FEELS
• Hates dresses and shoes
• prefers woods and pond to school

Cassie

• HOW OTHERS REACT TO HER
• Stacey tells her to leave Little Man
• alone.

• WHAT I THINK ABOUT HER
• Understand why she likes to be
• outdoors.
• Glad shes outspoken.

12
Setting

• Time and place in which the action of the story
  takes place is called its Setting.
• A novel typically has one general setting and a
  number of immediate settings.
• The general setting is the overall location and
  time period of the entire story.
• An immediate setting is the exact place and time
  in which an individual event happens.

13
General Setting Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry

• Chapter 1 describes the general setting.
• From the opening passage, you learn that the
  Logans live in Mississippi.
• The highlighting and the notes in the following
  passage point out other important details about
  the general setting of the novel.

14
Setting Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry

• Before us the narrow, sun-splotched road wound
  like a lazy red serpent dividing the high forest
  bank of quiet, old trees on the left from the
  cotton field, forested by giant green and purple
  stalks on the right. A barbed-wire fence ran the
  length of the deep field, stretching eastward for
  over a quarter of a mile until it met the sloping
  green pasture that signaled the end of our
  familys four hundred acres.

Logan land and surrounding area
Amount of land
15
Immediate Settings -- Details

• Individual events in the novel take place in a
  number of immediate settings
• The descriptions of particular places can tell
  you a lot.
• Read the description of one bedroom in the Logan
  house and note the details that help paint the
  picture of the scene.

16
from Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry

• It was a warm, comfortable room of doors and
  wood and pictures. From it a person could reach
  the front or side porch, the kitchen, and the two
  other bedrooms. Its walls were made of smooth
  oak, and on them hung gigantic photographs of
  Grandpa and Big Ma, Papa, and Uncle Hammer when
  they were boys, Papas two eldest brothers, who
  were now dead, and pictures of Mamas family.

Pleasant room
Pictures of family
17
Immediate Settings ImportanceNow look at this
description of one of the spots on the family
farm.

• As we neared the pond, the forest gapped open
  into a wide, brown glade, man-made by the felling
  of many trees, some of them
• still on the ground
• Big Ma surveyed the clearing without a word,
  then, stepping
• around the rotting trees, she made her way to
  the pond and sat down on one of them. I sat
  close beside her and waited for her to speak.
  After a while she shook her head And said Im
  sho glad your grandpa never had to see none of
  this. He dearly loved these here old trees. Him
  And me, we used to come down here early mornins
  or just fore the sun was about to set and just
  sit and talk. He used to call this place his
  thinkin spot and he called that old pond there
  Caroline, after me.

Trees cut down
Grandfathers love for trees
Special names for special places
18
Plot

• A plot is a series of events that makes up a
  story.
• In a novel, the plot often centers around a
  conflict, or struggle, between opposing forces.
• In Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, the Logans
  struggle against the racial attitudes in the
  South.

19
Summary Notes

• Decide on a way to help you keep the plot of a
  novel clear in your head as you read.
• On method is to write brief Summary Notes of what
  happens in each chapter
• Chapter I
• Cassie and Little Man get whipped at school for
  refusing to accept books that whites hand down to
  blacks. Mama stands by them.

20
Timeline

• Another great way to help you remember the events
  in a plot is to create a timeline of whats going
  on when.
• October 1933 Cassie and Little Man get
• whipped at school. Papa
• brings Mr. Morrison
• home.
• November 1933 Logan children stop school
• bus. T. J. lets Stacey take
• punishment for cheating and Stacey
• beats up T. J.

21
Plot Diagram

• Often, but not always, the events that make up a
  novels plot are presented in chronological
  order.
• That means the same order in which they happened
  in time.
• Like many short stories, novels often follow the
  traditional plot structure or something close to
  it.

22
Traditional Plot Diagram
23
Theme

• A novels theme is a message about life from
  author to reader.
• Its a statement that makes clear what the book
  means.
• The theme or themes may be stated directly.
• Other times, youll need to do some digging
  around to come up with a theme.

24
Finding the Theme of a Novel

• What big idea is the novel about?
• What do characters do or say that relates to that
  topic?
• What important lessons about life do readers
  learn?

25
Style

• Style refers to the way an author expresses his
  or her ideas.
• An authors style is marked by the kinds of
  words, sentence structure, and literary devices
  he or she uses.

26
Analyzing an Authors Style

• To analyze an authors style, ask yourself
  questions like these
• Does the author use mostly short, simple words
  and sentences or long, complex ones?
• What sort of feeling do I have about the writing?
  Is it loose and casual, formal and proper, or
  something else?
• Do the characters speak in dialect? Does their
  language seem realistic and believable?
• Does the author use sensory language, or words
  that appeal to the five senses?
• Is there a lot of imagery?

27
Double-Entry JournalQuotes My Reactions
Uncle Hammer speaking to T.J If you want
something and its a good thing and you got it
in the right way, you better hang on to it and
dont let nobody talk you out of it. You care
what A lot of useless people say bout You,
youll never get anywhere

• I love all the dialect and slang that
• characters use
• I can hear how Uncle Hammer
• speaks.
• The long sentences make me take
• time reading it.
• Its a very informal feeling.

Little Man at school Then his eyes grew wide
and sudden- ly he sucked in his breath and sprang
from his chair like a wounded animal, flinging
the book onto the floor and stomping Madly upon
it.

• Taylor uses a lot of descriptions the
• sights and sounds.
• Simile of Little Man being like an
• animal is a strong image.