Berkeley. — 312 pages.Exercises to every story:
First Reading.
Thinking About the Story.
Understanding the Plot.
Second Reading.
Exploring Themes.
Analyzing the Author's Style.
Judging for Yourself.
Making Connections.
Debate.Contents:Preface.
How to Use This Book.Husbands, Wives, and Lovers.Can-can by Arturo Vivante.
A husband arranges a secret meeting with a woman and is surprised by the outcome.
Literary Elements: Irony, Symbol.
Language Elements: Gerunds and Present Participles, Short Expressions Using And, Definitions.The Story of an Hour by Kate Chopin.
A wife has a startling reaction to the news of her husband’s death.
Literary Elements: Epiphany, Metaphor and Simile, Personification.
Language Elements: Suffixes, Prepositions.Epicac by Kurt Vonnegut.
A young mathematician uses unorthodox methods to win a woman’s heart.
Literary Elements: Personification, Colloquialism and Humor.
Language Elements: Lie/Lay, Two-Word Verbs, Idioms Containing Body Parts.The Legacy by Virginia Woolf.
When a well-known politician’s wife dies, her husband finds that she has left him an unusual legacy.
Literary Element: Point of View.
Language Element: Adjectives Describing Character.The Kugelmass by Woody Allen.
A New York professor has his deepest wish granted, after which his life takes an unexpected turn.
Literary Elements: Dialogue, Characterization: Flat Characters, Anachronism and Humor.
Language Elements: Verbs that Introduce Dialogue, Idioms.An Intruder by Nadine Gordimer.
A home is invaded under mysterious circumstances, an event which changes the lives of its occupants.
Literary Elements: Imagery: Simile and Metaphor.
Language Elements: Adjective Clauses, Adjectives in Context.Parent and Child.Power by Tobias Wolff.
A boy and his father bond in an unexpected way.
Literary Elements: Repetition and Alliteration.
Language Elements: Participial Phrases, Dangling Modifiers, Sentence Fragments, Alliteration, Prepositions.Mother by Grace Paley.
Years after her death, a mother is remembered by her child.
Literary Element: Flashback.
Language Elements: Past Tenses, Synonyms.A Short Digest of a Long Novel by Budd Schulherg.
A father watches helplessly as his young daughter learns about betrayal.
Literary Elements: Imagery: Simile and Metaphor.
Language Elements: Prefixes, Similes and Metaphors, Word Sets.lThe Rocking-Horse Winner by D. H. Lawrence.
A young boy is determined to solve his mother’s financial problems. The method he chooses defies human logic and is ultimately dangerous.
Literary Elements: Symbol, Fable.
Language Elements: Proverbs, Idioms.The Boarding House by James Joyce.
A domineering mother watches her daughter flirt with a young man and plots their future.
Literary Elements: Tone: Irony and Humor, Imagery. Adjectives, Oxymorons.
Language Elements: Oxymorons, Adjectives, Antonyms, Idioms.My Oedipus Complex by Frank O'Connor.
A small boy’s world is turned upside down when his father returns home from the war.
Literary Element: Humorous Effects.
Language Elements: Denotation and Connotation, Idioms.Loneliness and Alienation.The Model by Bernard Malamud.
An old man asks an agency to send him a model so that he can revive his painting skills, but the sitting does not go as planned.
Literary Element: Inference.
Language Elements: Euphemism, Using About in Different Ways, Expressions with Two Meanings.Disappearing by Monica Wood.
Her obsession with swimming radically changes the life of a severely overweight woman.
Literary Elements: Ellipsis, Imagery.
Language Elements: Vocabulary, Definitions.Miss Brill by Katherine Mansfield.
A lonely woman enjoys her Sunday afternoon outings to the park until her encounter with a thoughtless young couple.
Literary Elements: Synecdoche, Simile.
Language Elements: Verbs of Movement, Adjectives.Teenage Wasteland by Anne Tyler.
A teenage boy withdraws from his family and comes under the influence of an unconventional tutor whose methods have questionable results.
Literary Elements: Point of View: Third-Person Narration, Inference.
Language Elements: Conditionals, Idioms.Social Change and Injustice.Like a Winding Sheet by Ann Petry.
The accumulated stress o f living in a racist society takes a terrible toll on a factory worker.
Literary Elements: Colloquialism and Dialect, Imagery.
Language Elements: Adverbial Clauses, Synonyms.The Lily-White Boys by William Maxwell.
A couple receives an unpleasant surprise when they return home after a party on Christmas Day
Literary Elements: Allusion and Connotation, Setting and Atmosphere.
Language Elements: Appositives, Placement of the Subject, Irregular Verbs.The Carbird Seat by James Thurber.
A head filing clerk whose jo b is threatened takes drastic and ingenious measures to protect himself.
Literary Elements: Understatement and Humor.
Language Elements: Noun Clauses, Two-Word Verbs, Expressions Using Color, Legal Expressions.Everyday Use by Alice Walker.
Family tensions come to a head in a dispute over the ownership of some quilts.
Literary Elements: Characterization: Round Characters, Point of View: First-Person Narration.
Language Elements: Prepositional Phrases, Verbs of Movement, Two-Word Verbs, Used To Explanation of Literary Terms.
