The A Option

1
The A Option

• An Explanation and Example

2
An Explanation of the Assignment

• For the A Option, you must choose any four (4)
  of the criteria from the list in Unit 9 and use
  them as the basis for comparing any three (3)
  stories from the short story cycle you choose to
  explicate.
• Remember for the A Option, you only need to
  talk about three (3) of the stories in the cycle
  you are writing over. You do not have to talk
  about every story in the cycle.

3
The Structure of Paper 5

• You must use the following structure for Paper 5
• Intro Identify the title of the short story
  cycle and the name of the author. Identify the
  titles of each of the stories that you have
  chosen to write about. Identify each of the four
  criteria that you are using in your explication.
• Body 1 Identify the first criterion. Give at
  least one example of the use of this tool in all
  of the stories you have chosen to write about.
  Discuss how the tool (for example, theme) is
  important in each story.
• Body 2 Identify the second criterion. Give at
  least one example of the use of this tool in all
  of the stories you have chosen to write about.
  Discuss how the tool (for example, characters) is
  important in each story.

4
The Structure of Paper 5, cont.

• Body 3 Identify the third criterion. Give at
  least one example of the use of this tool in all
  of the stories you have chosen to write about.
  Discuss how the tool (for example, conflict) is
  important in each story.
• Body 4 Identify the fourth criterion. Give at
  least one example of the use of this tool in all
  of the stories you have chosen to write about.
  Discuss how the tool (for example, setting) is
  important in each story.
• Conclusion Discuss how the stories you have
  chosen to write about fit together.
• You must have at least one quote in each of your
  body sections. Any explication that does not use
  the structure above, and that does not have at
  least one quote in each of its body sections,
  will not be accepted.

5
A Note on the Sample Essay

• The sample essay that follows is based on a book
  by Kent Harouf entitled Plainsong.
• Plainsong is put together differently from the
  entries on the approved book list in Unit 9.
  None of the tightly-linked stories in this book
  have titles.
• Therefore, I cannot use story titles in my sample
  essay. Instead, I refer to the stories as the
  first story or the third story.
• The books you have to choose from as the target
  of your explication all have titles for the
  stories they contain.
• In your explication, you must use titles in order
  to make your meaning clear.

6
The Sample Explication

• It seems impossible to go wrong when picking
  out pieces of a book like Kent Harufs Plainsong.
  Every single sentence of this book is amazing.
  The stories I have chosen to write about are told
  from the perspectives of Ike and Bobby. I have
  selected four stories in all. Two of the stories
  are from the beginning of the book, one from the
  middle, and one from near the end. All of them
  deal with Ike and Bobbys relationships to
  mothersboth their own mother, Ella, and Mrs.
  Stearnsas well as the relationships of these
  women to their sons. However, as is the case
  with the entire book, the whole web of human
  relations and its importance in making life
  livable is the underlying subject matter of each
  story. The criteria I will use in my explication
  are characters, theme, conflict, and imagery.
• All four of these stories share common
  characters. Ike and Bobby appear in each of the
  sections. In the first story, Ike and Bobby are
  with their birth mother, Ella. In the next two
  stories, they visit Mrs. Stearns. In the last
  story, they see their mother again. This
  succession of mothers is important to all four
  stories. In the first story, Ike and Bobby lose
  their mother when she

7
The Sample Explication, cont.

• leaves their father. They are bitter and
  confused, and they resent their mother for
  breaking up the family. In the second and third
  stories, Ike and Bobby meet Mrs. Stearns, an old
  woman who lost her only son in World War II.
  Through their contact with Mrs. Stearns, Ike and
  Bobby come to understand how important the
  mother-son relationship isnot only to the
  children, but to the mother as well. Seeing Mrs.
  Stearnss grief at having lost her own son gives
  Ike and Bobby an idea of how much their mother is
  suffering because they have been refusing to see
  her. When they do finally see her again, in the
  fourth story, they are ready to forgive her, and
  to make peace. When Bobby says, I love you,
  no matter what (Harouf 106), he means it.
• The second tool I will talk about is theme.
  For me, the most important theme in these four
  stories is that, without meaningful human
  contact, life is too painful to bear. Related to
  this theme is the idea that we should all reach
  out to each other, and be good to one
  anotherbecause when it comes down to the end of
  things, all we have left is each other. For
  example, in the first story I have chosen to
  discuss, the barber is rude to Ike and Bobby for
  no

8
The Sample Explication, cont.

• reason. He makes their lives miserable,
  purposely hurting their feelings by bringing up
  the subject of their mother moving out, and the
  reader cannot help but dislike him for doing
  this. Obviously, Harouf is setting the barber
  before the reader as a negative example of how
  people should treat each other. The barber sees
  human relations as mere financial transactions.
  As the barber himself says, Thats how it
  worksI buy from you and you buy from me. Its
  called commerce (41). When Ike and Bobby first
  go up to Mrs. Stearnss apartment, their
  attitudes toward her are much like the barbers
  attitude toward them. They see her as just a
  source of income and nothing more. All they want
  from her is 2.50. When they start up the
  stairs, Bobby says, I want to get her over with
  (42). However, after Mrs. Stearns forces them to
  sit down and visit with her, the boys find out
  that the three of them actually have something
  very important in commontheyve been left
  behind. Mrs. Stearnss son is dead, while Ike
  and Bobbys mother has moved out of the house and
  abandoned them. From this point on, the
  relationship between Mrs. Stearns and the boys
  grows, culminating in a key scene in which they
  make cookies together. The cookie-making scene,
  where the boys symbolically

9
The Sample Explication, cont.

• become her sons and she becomes their mother,
  just for that moment in time, is so beautifully
  written that it brought tears to my eyes when I
  read it. For me, this is one of the most
  important scenes in the book.
• The next criterion I will discuss is conflict.
  The main conflict in the book, as well as in the
  stories I have chosen, is between people trying
  to live their lives in this world and the world
  that keeps trying to hammer them down. The
  characters never know when or where the hammer
  will fallthey only feel the blows, and try to
  withstand them. For example, in the first story,
  when Ella leaves Guthrie, Ike and Bobby have no
  idea what is going on. All they know is that
  their mother has left and they are hurt (this is
  resolved in story four). In the second and third
  stories, a far worse example of lifes hammer is
  the references to when Mrs. Stearnss son was
  killed in World War II. At least Ike and Bobby
  have Guthrie, and each other, to help them
  withstand the blow. And Ella is still alive,
  even if she is absent. Mrs. Stearns is left to
  face the pain of losing her only son with just a
  box of photographs for company.
• Finally, I will discuss imagery. One of the
  most important images that ties these stories
  together is that of a woman trying to take on
  life alone. It is

10
The Sample Explication, cont.

• the most desolate image in the book. Mrs.
  Stearns is alone every time Ike and Bobby come to
  see herin stories two and three, Harouf shows
  Mrs. Stearns by herself, sitting on that
  couchand she is miserable until they walk in her
  door. And, after leaving in story one, Ella is
  alone when the two boys finally work up enough
  nerve to knock on her door in story four. Their
  visit and the gifts they give her help bring Ella
  back to herself. A crucial related imagewhich
  also happens to be a Biblical allusionis the
  return of the prodigal son(s). Just like in the
  Bible, when Ike and Bobby come to visit the
  lonely mothers, it is a cause for celebration and
  a renewal of family ties. But the most important
  image in all four stories is when the boys reach
  out to touch the body of Mrs. Stearns. This is
  Haroufs objective correlative. The boys reach
  out to literally touch the body of the woman
  whose life they have touched so profoundly by
  becoming her figurative sons. Another key touch
  is when Ella hugs the boys, in the fourth story,
  after they have given her the gifts. It is only
  after this touch that she is able to pray, Oh
  God, what am I going to do about any of this?
  (104). Human contact has made Ellas life worth
  living, in much the same way it has made Mrs.
  Stearnss death easier to bear.

11
The Sample Explication, cont.

• All four of the criteria I have chosen are
  crucial to each of the stories I have written
  about. The stories are bound together by
  Haroufs use of characters, theme, conflict, and
  imagery. I think that the most important of
  these four tools in all four of these stories is
  conflict. However, Harouf does not resolve the
  conflict in any of them. This seems to me to be
  true to life. In life, there are some conflicts
  that can be resolved only by dying. Ike and
  Bobbys discovery of Mrs. Stearnss body brings
  this fact home to both the reader and to them.
  When Ike and Bobby reach out and touch Mrs.
  Stearnss body, it is a sign that they have had
  an epiphany. They have realized that when life
  makes up its mind to hit you, human contact is
  the thing that can soften the blow. The touch of
  a human hand, and the relationship it symbolizes,
  are the only things we have that really matter.