TBT

Suggested Essay Topics

1. Questions of legality surface many times in this novel. How does the novel regard the law? If the law cannot act as an authority, what dictates right and wrong in its place?

2. Compare the experiences of Esperanza and Estevan, who are of the Mayan people, to the experiences of Turtle, and the Cherokee people in general.

3. Think of the bird imagery in this novel. What do the birds symbolize? How are different kinds of birds used to represent different ideas?

4. The Bean Trees is a novel about refugees. Identify the characters in the novel who have left or been driven from their homelands. What differentiates their experiences, and what commonalities bind them together?

5. What is the significance of the many different forms of violence referred to in this novel?

Key Facts

full title · The Bean Trees

author · Barbara Kingsolver

type of work · Novel

genre · Journey or quest novel

language · English

time and place written · Tucson, Arizona; 1986–1987

date of first publication · 1988

publisher · HarperCollins

narrator · Most of the chapters are narrated by Taylor Greer, but Chapters Two and Four, which introduce Lou Ann, are narrated by an anonymous, omniscient narrator

point of view · For the most part, the story is told from Taylor’s point of view, and we are privy to her thoughts and feelings. Chapters Two and Four are written from a limited omniscient perspective, from which the narrator explains Lou Ann’s thinking.

tone · Folksy, poetic, humorous

tense · Immediate past

setting (time) · Early 1980s

setting (place) · The novel opens in rural Kentucky. Taylor travels across the country to Tucson, Arizona, where she settles. At the end of the novel, she takes a trip to Oklahoma before returning to Tucson.

protagonist · Taylor Greer

major conflict · Taylor tries to accept the responsibility of caring for another person and to understand the plight of political refugees

rising action · Taylor receives Taylor, grows close to Mattie and Lou Ann, and learns the story of Estevan and Esperanza

climax · Taylor decides to fight to keep Turtle and to risk her own safety for Estevan and Esperanza

falling action · Estevan and Esperanza pretend to be Turtle’s biological parents so that Taylor may adopt the little girl legally; Taylor delivers Estevan and Esperanza to their new home; Taylor and Turtle head back home to Tucson.

themes · The shared burden of womanhood; the plight of illegal immigrants; respect for the environment

motifs · Rebirth; motherhood

symbols · Beans and bean trees; Ismene; birds

foreshadowing · The postcard with two Indian women on it, which Taylor sends to her mother, foreshadows Taylor and Turtle’s relationship. The snake in the desert foreshadows the prowler that attacks Turtle. The survival of the bird that is trapped in the house foreshadows Turtle’s recovery.

SH5

Suggested Essay Topics

1. Many Vonnegut novels deal with traffickers of “useful lies.” Are the lessons of Tralfamadore useful lies? Why or why not?

2. Is Billy Pilgrim sane or insane? Does it matter?

3. Discuss the use of irony or black humor in Slaughterhouse-Five.

4. What does Vonnegut achieve by placing himself as a character in the story?

Key Facts

full title · Slaughterhouse-Five; or, The Children’s Crusade: A Duty-Dance with Death

author · Kurt Vonnegut

type of work · Novel

genre · Antiwar novel; historical fiction; science fiction; semi-autobiographical fiction

language · English

time and place written · Approximately 1945–1968, United States

date of first publication · 1969

publisher · Dell Publishing

narrator · The author; or arguably, sometimes an anonymous narrator with a similar point of view

point of view · The author narrates in both first and third person. The first-person sections are confined mainly to the first and last chapters. The narration is omniscient: it reveals the thoughts and motives of several characters, and provides details about their lives and some analysis of their motivations. The narrator primarily follows Billy Pilgrim but also presents the point of view of other characters whom Billy encounters.

tone · The narrator’s tone is familiar and ironic, and he uncovers touches of dark humor and absurdity that do not diminish the lyrical and emotional power of the material. His portrayal of Billy is intimate but ambivalent, and he occasionally emphasizes the diction of reported speech (prefacing a passage with “He says that” or “Billy says”) to draw a distinction between reality and Billy’s interpretation of events.

tense · The majority of the book is written in the past tense, but the narrator occasionally uses the present tense—especially in the first and last chapters—when speaking from a personal point of view as Kurt Vonnegut. The reporting of Billy’s speech is in the present tense (for example: “Billy Pilgrim has come unstuck in time. Or so he says.”) Occasionally the tense switches to future, as when Billy describes his future death.

setting (time) · The narrative provides a detailed account of Billy’s war experiences in 1944–1945, but it skips around his entire life, from his early childhood in the 1920s to his death in 1976. The author’s narration is set in 1968.

setting (place) · The narrative thread of 1944–1945 concerns Billy’s army service in Germany and briefly in Luxembourg, where he is captured after the Battle of the Bulge. Most of the rest of Billy’s life takes place in Ilium, New York. He also travels to the planet Tralfamadore and lives there in a zoo.

protagonist · Billy Pilgrim

major conflict · Billy struggles to make sense out of a life forever marked by the firsthand experience of war’s tragedy.

rising action · Billy and his fellow prisoners are transported across Germany and begin living in a slaughterhouse prison and working in the city of Dresden.

climax · Dresden is incinerated in a deadly firebomb attack. But Billy misses the moment of destruction, waiting out the attack in a well-protected meat locker. Psychologically, Billy does not come to terms with this event until nearly twenty years later, when the sight of a barbershop quartet on his wedding anniversary triggers his suppressed sense of grief.

falling action · The falling action occurs in the realm of Billy’s later life as he progresses toward a newfound consciousness and an increasingly tenuous mental state. Billy experiences alien abduction and prepares to share his new insights with the world.

themes · The destructiveness of war; the illusion of free will; the importance of sight

motifs · “So it goes”; the presence of the narrator as a character

symbols · The bird who says “Poo-tee-weet?”; the colors blue and ivory

foreshadowing · The narrative convention that Vonnegut dispenses with most thoroughly in this book is foreshadowing. He outlines all the events of Billy’s life before proceeding with the story.

FFA

Suggested Essay Topics

1. How does the diary or journal-entry form of the novel affect the emphasis of the narrative? Is Charlie dependable as a narrator as he progresses through his various stages? Is Charlie capable of providing insight into the other characters, or is he too preoccupied with himself?

2. How has Charlie changed at the end of the novel? Is he different from the person he is at the beginning of the novel, and if so, how? Do you consider the novel’s ending to be tragic or inspiring?

3. Does the novel make a definitive statement about the role of intelligence in human life, or does it simply explore this idea as an open-ended question?

4. Compare and contrast the characters of Professor Nemur and Dr. Strauss. How do their reactions to Charlie’s intelligence differ? How do their approaches to science differ?

5. How does Algernon function as an alter ego for Charlie? How does Algernon’s condition represent Charlie’s condition?

Key Facts

full title · Flowers for Algernon

author · Daniel Keyes

type of work · Novel

genre · Science fiction

language · English

time and place written · Original short story written in 1959, in New York City; expanded novel version written from 1962 to 1965 in New York and Ohio.

date of first publication · Short story published in 1959; expanded novel form first published in 1966

publisher · Harcourt Brace Jovanovich

narrator · Charlie Gordon, a mentally disabled man who undergoes experimental surgery to increase his intelligence

point of view · The novel is told in the form of first-person “progress reports” Charlie keeps throughout the course of the experiment. Everything is filtered through Charlie’s mind, the capacities of which change drastically over the course of the novel, as Charlie’s IQ triples and then plummets back to its original level.

tone · The tone of the novel varies with Charlie’s mental acuity. Sometimes, however—particularly when Charlie is writing as a retarded man at the beginning and end of the novel— Keyes allows him to provide hints in his narration that allow us to grasp the significance of events that Charlie cannot himself understand.

tense · Past; Charlie is always writing about the days he has just lived through. Charlie experiences numerous flashbacks to his childhood, which are usually narrated in the present tense.

setting (time) · There are no direct references to time period in the novel, but we can assume the events take place around the time the novel was written, the mid-1960s.

setting (place) · New York City; one chapter takes place in Chicago

protagonist · Charlie Gordon

major conflict · Charlie struggles to reach emotional maturity and feel like a whole person before his skyrocketing intelligence reverses course and returns him to his initial mentally disabled state.

rising action · Dr. Strauss performs an experimental surgery on Charlie that catapults his intelligence to genius levels; Charlie falls in love with Alice but finds he is unable to consummate their relationship because he feels unresolved childhood shame about his sexuality.

climax · Charlie asserts his independence by running away from the scientists who are observing him; Alice tells Charlie that his work at the laboratory is more important than his relationship with Fay; Charlie realizes in this moment that he can no longer run from his fate or the seriousness of his emotional journey.

falling action · Charlie discovers the flaw in Nemur’s hypothesis that proves that he will soon lose his intelligence; Charlie locates his mother and sister and is able to find forgive them for how they treated him as a child; Charlie has a brief, fulfilling romantic affair with Alice; Charlie returns to his original mentally retarded state and checks himself into the Warren State Home.

themes · Mistreatment of the mentally disabled; the tension between intellect and emotion; the persistence of the past in the present

motifs · Changes in grammar, spelling, and punctuation; flashbacks; the scientific method

symbols · Algernon; Adam and Eve and the tree of knowledge; the window

foreshadowing · Professor Nemur tells Charlie at the outset of the experiment that his gains in intelligence may not be permanent, which turns out to be the case. Later, Charlie has a memory of his young sister, Norma, obnoxiously threatening to lose her own intelligence, another reference to Charlie’s eventual downfall. Finally, Algernon’s decline, beginning in Progress Report 13, is a reliable predictor of Charlie’s impending deterioration.