Be sure to review theModule Response Instructions and Grading Rubric.
Module 4 Response Questions
Select ONE of the following items. Each item may have multiple questions, but keep in mind that you are looking to write 1-2 fluent paragraphs (225-400 words)for this response.
Be sure to follow the rules posted on the handout “Instructions & Grading Rubric for Module Response Questions” found in the Orientation Module. Some key points from this: MLA Heading, Double space, Use a few relevant quotes from the literature to help make your points, do NOT use any outside sources.
Please note that each of these prompts contains multiple questions. You do not necessarily need to answer all of these questions for your response--at least, not specifically and separately. The goal is for you to be able to see the bigger picture with each prompt and to write a fluent paragraph or two paragraphs in one, unified response. (Reminder: Be sure that you begin your response with"Thesis:"and your single sentence thesis.)
Again, select onlyONEof the following. (Pick the one you like the most!)Please identifywhich prompt you are using when you submit your response:
1. At first glance, the unnamed narrator of “Cathedral” seems a simple, perhaps even bigoted, fairly unsympathetic character who, as his wife points out, doesn’t “haveanyfriends” (34). But is he really so irredeemably unsympathetic? Is there anything that might make us see him as a more complex and even sympathetic character, even before we get to the climactic end of the story?
2. What is the narrator’s attitude toward the visit of the blind man? Why is he so threatened by the idea of that visit? What are the narrator’s values and worldview? How might the blind man threaten his worldview and/or values?
3. What is the significance of the fact that the narrator reacts so strongly and so imaginatively to the idea of the death of the blind man’s wife? What does this reaction suggest about him? How and why might it change our view of the narrator?
4. What literally happens in the final section of the story? What happens symbolically? Does the narrator seem to be changed? How and why? What does he mean when he says he feels as if he is not “inside anything”?
5. What does “blindness” symbolize in our culture? How does Carver’s story reinforce or undermine that symbolism?
Submit your response directly toTurnitin.com(Links to an external site.).