Honors English II

Honors English II: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald *** This novel is filled with motifs, keep a lookout while reading! Characters ● Jay Gatsby - mysteriously rich man who owns a mansion in West Egg (the poorer town), infatuated with Daisy Buchanan, throws parties every Saturday ● Nick Carraway - narrator of the novel, lives right next to Gatsby, moved to join the bond business, went to Yale, served in war ● Daisy Buchanan - Gatsby’s old lover, Nick’s cousin, when Gatsby was at war she didn’t wait for him, troubled by Tom’s infidelity, socialite ● Tom Buchanan - Daisy’s husband, old money, arrogant, cheating with Myrtle, went to Yale with Nick ● Jordan Baker - pro-golfer, Nick’s love interest, boyish Plot Summary Nick Carraway came back from war and was looking for something to do, so he took upon the bond business. He moved to a small house in West Egg, right next to Gatsby. Gatsby owns the largest mansion in town, and he has everything man can construct at his fingertips. After being invited to Gatsby’s party, he learns that wealth is meaningless to him. What he wants is Daisy Buchanan, and he is throwing these marvelous parties with the hopes that Daisy will show up. Being cousins with Daisy, Nick sets up a drink for them at his house. At this point, Nick didn’t know much about the history between the two of them, but Jordan tells him that Daisy and Gatsby were lovers before he went to war. She promised him to stay loyal while he was gone, but when he came back she was with Tom. Gatsby would tell Nick stories about his past, that his name was actually James Gatz. These stories were extremely inconsistent and often not true. What Nick does know is that Gatsby was involved in criminal acts to get his money. Through their conversations, Daisy and Gatsby fell back in love. They start spending great amounts of time together and decide they are going to run away and live together forever. All Daisy has to do is tell Tom that she loves Gatsby. Tom, Gatsby, and Daisy are in the room and Gatsby declares that Daisy loves him, and is waiting for her to tell her husband. She can’t. Gatsby realizes that he doesn’t love Daisy, he loves the idea of Daisy. She has turned into a shallow, cold woman. Daisy drives Gatsby’s car back to New York, and Myrtle thinks it’s Tom’s car. She runs in front of the car and Daisy kills her. Gatsby takes all the blame for Daisy, and Myrtle’s husband George kills Gatsby right before he killed himself. James Gatz and his legacy were now dead. Nick realizes that he was Gatsby’s only friend. He tries to arrange a funeral, but no one comes except Gatsby’s dad. Even with the countless house parties consisting of hundreds of guests, not one “friend” could come to the wedding. The green light at the end of the dock was Gatsby’s hope that he would get Daisy back one day. Nick ended up leaving the east for his original home of the Midwest. Useful Quotes (All are directly from The Great Gatsby) “And I like large parties. They’re so intimate. At small parties there isn’t any privacy.” ￫ Paradox “And so with the sunshine and the great bursts of leaves growing on the trees, just as things grow in fast movies,” ￫ Visual Imagery & Simile “At his lips’ touch she blossomed like a flower and the incarnation was complete.” ￫ Simile “Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that's no matter - tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther” ￫ Symbolism “Her face was sad and lovely with bright things in it, bright eyes and a bright passionate mouth,” ￫ Symbolism The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain Characters ● Huck Finn - narrator, 13 year old boy, father is a drunk, Widow Douglas and Miss Watson adopt him, escapes for adventure, curious, open-minded ● Widow Douglas & Miss Watson - two sisters that live together and adopted Huck, do good for him and wish him the best ● Jim - was a slave for Douglas and Watson before he decided to run away with Huck ● Tom Sawyer - Huck’s friend, close-minded, looking for adventure ● Duke and dauphin - Huck and Jim meet these two men who claim to be a duke and a dauphin but find out they are conmen, have no consideration for others ● Pap - Huck’s dad who is an alcoholic, abuser and makes fun of Huck for his education Plot Summary Huck Finn is friends with Tom and lives in St. Petersburg, Mississippi. After finding a lot of gold, Huck’s dad comes back to claim his son’s money. Huck had been living with two women and was getting tired of going to school, church, and being formal all the time. Nonetheless, when Judge Thatcher didn’t give Huck to Pap, Pap kidnapped him and brought him to a cabin in the woods. Pap went out in the day to drink and would lock Huck in the house, when he came back, he would abuse Huck. Eventually, Huck found it necessary to fake his death and go across the river. Huck found Jim there running away from the Widow who was going to sell him. Everyone was looking for Huck, but after a big storm, they got on a raft and floated away from the island. Huck is debating whether he should be helping a runaway slave, but he gets over it as they find a dead body that Jim won’t let Huck look at. Huck finds a woman who helps him, but with a money reward for Jim and her suspicions rising, he is forced to leave. Huck and Jim encounter robbers, but end up leaving safely with their loot. Huck and Jim miss the entrance to the Ohio River and instead run into men looking for slaves. Huck lies and says his dad has smallpox to get past the security. They get hit by a steamboat and separated. The Grangerfords, Southern aristocrats, take Huck. There is a deadly fight that happens between them and the Shepherdsons when son and daughter from each family elope. Jim finds Huck just in time for them to leave. Then, they run into a supposed duke and dauphin group who want to pretend to be the Wilk brothers and accept their inheritance that the real brothers haven’t received yet. Their “nieces” believe them, but Huck grows close to them and feels bad lying. He hides the money in the coffin, tells one of the sisters, and tries to leave with Jim. As the two actual brothers come into town, the duke and dauphin can make it to the raft before Jim and Huck. The duke and dauphin sell Jim to a family, which turns out to be Tom’s aunt and uncle, the Phelps. Huck pretends to be Tom to get Jim back and gets Tom to be his younger brother Sid. Tom comes up with an overly extravagant plan to save Jim, and in the process gets shot in the leg. Jim saves Tom even though it means he is risking his freedom. It turns out Miss Wilson had died and put in her will for Jim to be freed. Tom knew this and considered the plan a game. Aunt Polly of Tom came and told the Phelps who Huck really was. Jim tells Huck that the dead body from earlier was his dad, and even though Aunt Polly offers to adopt him, he decides his next move is to go out West. Useful Quotes (all are directly from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn) “Hain’t we got all the fools in town on our side? And hain’t that a big enough majority in any town?” ￫ Anaphora, Repetition “Sometimes you gwyne to git hurt, en sometimes you gwyne to git sick; but every time you’s gwyne to git well agin.” ￫ Anaphora, Repetition “He was sunshine most always-I mean he made it seem like good weather.” ￫ Symbolism (Grangerford) “There warn't no colour in his face, where his face showed; it was white; not like another man's white, but a white to make a body's flesh crawl -a tree-toad white, a fish-belly white.” ￫ Metaphor “lovely crockery basket…had apples and oranges and peaches and..” ￫ Polysyndeton A Raisin in the Sun Characters ● Walter Lee Younger - boy with big investment and business dreams, son of a poor family, wants to open a Liquor store, married to Ruth, son Walter, Ruth lives with his family ● Lena Younger (Mama) - the mom of Walter and Beneatha wants to use the money to buy a house in a nice neighborhood, wants best for her children, religious ● Bennie Younger - 20 yrs old, wants to be a doctor, educated and in college, a go-getter, has big potential ● Ruth Younger - Walter’s wife, mother to Travis, get pregnant again ● Willy Harris - Walter’s deceitful friend who ends up stealing his money and running away Plot Summary In the 1950s, the Younger family lived in a small apartment on the South Side of Chicago. Walter and his friend Willy had always talked about investing money into liquor stores. When Mr. Younger dies, his wife and kids receive insurance worth $10,000. With this money, Mama wants to buy a nice house in a white neighborhood and give the rest of the money to her kids. Walter wants to buy a liquor store because he believes this will solve their money problems for the long term. Bennie wants to use the money to help cover her medical school fees and doesn’t want to get involved in the world of white people. Ruth agrees with Mama, as she would love more room for her and Travis in the house. When Mama finds out that Ruth is pregnant and considering an abortion because she doesn’t want to be even more of a burden to her family, Mama spends $3,500 on a house so that they can have enough room for everyone. The neighborhood that they choose is called Clybourne Park, and the neighbors do not like the idea of a black family living in their town. In response, they send Mr. Lindner to offer the family money in return for leaving the neighborhood. The Younger family declines. Meanwhile, Willy Harris convinces Walter to invest the money in the liquor store and then runs away with the cash, leaving Walter with nothing. Beneatha is dealing with her own problems, as a wealthy, African-American man wants to be in a relationship with her. She can’t comply as she believes he is giving too away too much of his African culture to be more like white people. Joseph gives her a marriage proposal, and his wishes are for her to get her medical degree and to move back to Africa. She does not decide before the book ends. Although Walter is working towards getting that money back for his family, the Youngers choose to stick together and take on life hand-in-hand. Useful Quotes (all directly from A Raisin in the Sun) “Good night Prometheus!” ￫ Allusion “New Neighbor Orientation Committee” ￫ Irony (trying to kick Youngers out) “All tied up in a race of people that don’t know how to do nothing but moan, pray and have babies” ￫ Irony “Got to admit they got spirit...like this old plant that ain’t ever had enough sunshine or nothing” ￫ Symbolism "What kind of fool do you think I am?" ￫ Rhetorical Question