Review for Test on Short Stories-GT

1
Review for Test on Short Stories-GT
2
Literary Terms

• Conflict is a struggle between opposing forces.
• An internal conflict takes place in the mind of a
  character.
• An external conflict is one in which a character
  struggles with an outside force or another
  person.
• Plot is the sequence of events in a short story.

3
Literary Terms

• Parts of the plot are exposition, rising action,
  climax, falling action, and resolution.
• Setting is the time and place of the action of a
  story.
• Characters are the people or animals that take
  part in the action.
• Character traits are the qualities, attitudes,
  and values a character possesses.
• Motives are the reasons for a characters actions.

4
Literary Terms

• Theme is the central message expressed in a
  story.
• Point of view is the perspective from which a
  story is told.
• First person, third person limited, and
  omniscient are the most commonly used points of
  view.
• Foreshadowing is the use of clues in a story to
  hint at events to come.

5
Literary Terms

• Flashback is the use of scenes in a story that
  interrupt the sequence of events to reveal past
  occurrences.
• Irony is the contrast between what happens and
  what the reader or the characters expect.
• When you compare, you tell how things are alike.
  When you contrast, you tell how they are
  different.

6
Literary Terms

• Round characters are complex, showing many
  different traits.
• Flat characters are one-sided, showing just one
  trait.
• A summary is a statement of the main ideas and
  major details of a written or dramatic work.
• A dynamic character grows and changes because of
  events in the story.
• A static character does not change.

7
An Hour with Abuelo

• Arturos mother asks him to go to visit his
  grandfather in the nursing home, but Arturo
  thinks he has better things to do.
• Arturo is reluctant to go because he thinks it
  will be boring, but he says he will go for just
  one hour.
• Arturos grandfather is writing the story of his
  life, and he has led a very interesting one.
• Arturo realizes he has a lot in common with his
  grandfather.
• When the hour is up, it is ironic that Abuelo has
  been watching the time because he has other
  things to do, too.
• Although this is not a memoir, the story is based
  on the authors memories of her grandfather and
  childhood visits to Puerto Rico.

8
Charles

• A boy brings home startling stories about a
  classmate named Charles from his first few weeks
  in kindergarten.
• Lauries behavior changes after he starts
  kindergarten.
• When Lauries mother goes to PTA, she finds that
  there is no one named Charles in the
  kindergarten.
• The ending is a surprise.

9
The Adventure of the Speckled Band

• A young woman comes to Sherlock Holmes and his
  assistant Dr. Watson to ask for their help.
• She believes that her stepfather is trying to
  murder her just as he did her sister.
• Dr. Roylott will lose her income if she marries.
• Sherlock Holmes sets a trap for him.
• The speckled band is a deadly snake. When Holmes
  frightens it, it returns to Roylotts room and
  bites him instead.

10
A Retrieved Reformation

• The main character, Jimmy Valentine, has just
  been released from prison where he has been
  serving time for robbing safes.
• He plans to resume his old way of life and does
  for a while after he gets out of prison.
• Then he meets Annabelle, falls in love, goes
  straight, and opens a successful business.
• Annabelles father is the president of a bank,
  and a child is accidentally locked in his new
  safe.
• Jimmy has to use his old safecracking skills to
  free the child.
• Ben Price, the policeman who has been following
  Jimmy, sees this happen and decides to let Jimmy
  go free. He pretends not to know who Jimmy is.
• O. Henry, the author of the story, is known for
  his surprise endings like the one in this story.

11
Raymonds Run

• A girl who is a fast runner is planning to
  compete in a race. She faces competition from a
  new girl.
• She is responsible for taking care of her
  mentally handicapped brother.
• She is smart and sassy and doesnt take any lip
  from anyone about her brother.
• The race is almost too close to call, but she
  wins.
• She discovers a new respect for her opponent, and
  she finds out that her brother is a good runner,
  too.

12
Fox Hunt

• A boy meets a mysterious girl who helps him study
  for the SAT.
• His mother tells him a story about a fox
  disguised as a girl who helped one of his
  ancestors.
• He learns that the girl who has been helping him
  is also a fox.

13
Thank You, Mam

• The story is by Langston Hughes, who was an
  important part of the Harlem Renaissance.
• A boy tries to steal a womans purse as she is
  going home from her job one night.
• Instead of taking him to the police, Mrs. Jones
  takes Roger home, feeds him, and then give him
  money to buy the shoes he wanted.
• The story is about forgiveness.
• The title is ironic-Roger never actually says
  thank you.

14
The Storyteller

• A bachelor is traveling in a train car with an
  aunt and three children.
• The children are noisy and are bored by the
  moralistic story the aunt tells them to try to
  keep them quiet.
• They like the story the bachelor tells because it
  is entertaining.

15
Tears of Autumn

• This story is about a picture bride who journeys
  from Japan to the United States for an arranged
  marriage to a man she hasnt met.
• Hana wants to go to America to escape the
  restriction of her family and her small village.
• She is sick and miserable on the voyage, and
  remembers the beauty of her home in Japan.
• When she finally meets Taro, though, she is glad
  that she has come to America.
• This story illustrated how the customs of a
  particular culture can be an important part of
  the setting of a story.

16
The Tell-Tale Heart

• Edgar Allan Poe wrote this story which gives a
  look inside a madmans mind.
• A man kills his elderly neighbor because he is
  offended by the old mans eye.
• He boasts that he has executed and covered up the
  crime very carefully.
• When the police come, he thinks he hears the old
  mans heart beating and confesses.
• The story establishes a mood of madness and
  horror.
• The author has a formal style with long sentences
  and advanced vocabulary.

17
The Finish of Patsy Barnes

• A young African-American boy struggles with
  poverty, racism, and his mothers serious
  illness.
• He doesnt like to go to school he likes to
  spend his time hanging around the stables.
• Patsys father is dead.
• Patsy volunteers to ride a difficult horse to
  earn money for a doctor and medicine for his
  mother.
• The horse is the same one which had killed his
  father years before.
• Patsy wins the race and gets a doctor for his
  mother, but he never tells his mother the horses
  name.
• Patsy is affected by the historical time in which
  he lives. There is racism, and medicine wasnt as
  advanced as it is today. Rich and poor people
  received very different medical care.

18
The Drummer Boy of Shiloh

• A young drummer boy is nervous and tearful the
  night before the Battle of Shiloh.
• Joby is only fourteen, and he has run away form
  home to enlist in the army as a drummer boy.
• Joby is scared because unlike the other soldiers,
  he has no weapon with which to defend himself.
• The general stops to talk to Joby and encourage
  him by telling him how important his job as a
  drummer is.
• Joby can influence the men by beating a brisk,
  steady rhythm.
• The general tells Joby that he is the heartbeat
  of the army. Why is this an appropriate metaphor?
• We only know Jobys first name. We dont know his
  last name, the generals name, or even which side
  theyre fighting for. Why did the author make
  this choice?