Litr 277: Introduction to Short Fiction
Bucks County Community College, Fall 2002
Section 83: W 7:00-10:00, Penn 216

Please note that this syllabus is available on the web at the address in the upper right-hand corner.  Your essay topics, and other course materials I'll distribute in class, will be posted to that address as the semester goes on.

Instructor: Dr. Stephen doCarmo
Office: Penn 131
Hours: MWF 11:00-12:00, 1:00-2:00
Phone: 8267
E-mail: docarmos@bucks.edu

Required Texts
The Story and Its Writer.  Edited by Ann Charters.  5th ed.
Where I'm Calling From.  By Raymond Carver.

Format
Classes will consist of lectures, small-group workshops, class discussions, individual presentations, occasional film viewings, and one-on-one conferences with me, your instructor.

Course Objectives
We've got two chief objectives in this course.  They are:

1.  To help you gain an appreciation for the short story form as it's been adopted by writers from various times, various nations, and various cultures; and
2.  To give you ample opportunity to improve your reading, writing, speaking, and critical thinking skills, which are vital, of course, to all academic and professional pursuits, not just those associated with English class.

Course Requirements
1.  You'll need to write two non-researched essays, about 3 pages each, in response to prompts I'll give you once the semester is underway.  These prompts may invite you to compare and contrast two or more stories.  They may invite you to explain why one particular aspect of narrative -- e.g. setting, theme, or narrative perspective -- is especially important to a particular story.  They may invite you to think about why readers from different cultural backgrounds might read a story in very different ways.  One way or the other, the prompts will grow out of topics and issues that will be familiar to you from our class discussions.  But they'll also be broad and interpretable enough to allow for your own sophisticated, individualized thinking -- which is what you'll have to demonstrate to earn high grades on these assignments.

The first essay is due just before midterm; the second is due a couple weeks before the end of the semester.  Both should be thesis-driven.  Both should demonstrate unity, coherence, good organization, good support, good sentence structure, plus proper punctuation, diction, and grammar.  You'll have time to work with me and/or offical Bucks tutors on these essays before they're due.

I'll put written comments on both of these essays while grading them on an A-F scale, with +'s and -'s possible.  Due dates are on the schedule at the end of this syllabus.

2. You'll need to write a 4-6 page researched essay on the work of a short-story writer of your choosing.  I'll tell you more later about what I'll expect of you in this assignment, but I can go ahead and tell you now it will need to

a.  be thesis-driven and well written, just like your non-researched essays due eariler in the semester;
b.  demonstrate interesting ideas of your own, not just parrot mine or other scholars';
c.  incorporate ideas from no more than four or five good outside sources (and we'll talk about what "good" means);
d.  follow MLA style (we'll discuss this, too).
As with your non-researched essays, you'll have time to conference with me and/or Bucks tutors on this assignment before it's due.

I'll grade your researched essay on an A-F scale, with +'s and -'s possible.  The due date is on the course schedule below.

3.  You'll need to take an in-class final exam.  It will be short-essay based, will take about two hours to complete, and will ask you to demonstrate your grasp of critical terms we'll have been using in class as they pertain to important passages from stories we've read.

The final exam will be graded on an A-F scale, with +'s and -'s possible.  We'll talk more about what you can expect to see on it before you take it.

4.  You'll need to take about ten unannounced reading quizzes on the assigned stories.  They'll be short (seven questions each), will be given at the very start of class meetings, and will focus on important information from the stories rather than on abstract matters like theme or symbolism.  (In other words, I might ask you how a certain character dies at the end of a story; I won't ask what her death "means" within the work as a whole.  That's the sort of thing we'll sort out together in class.)  Since these quizzes are information driven, you need only read, reasonably carefully, for each and every class meeting to do well on them.

I'll grade each of your quizzes on a 1-7 scale.  If you get a "7," you answered all seven questions correctly; if you get a "6," you got six right.  And so on.  At the end of the semester I'll average those numbers (after dropping your lowest) and convert them to a letter grade.  It'll work this way:

6.0-7.0 = A.  5.7-5.9 = A-.  5.4-5.6 = B+.  4.6-5.3 = B.  4.3-4.5 = B-.  4.0-4.2 = C+.  3.2-3.9 = C.  2.9-3.1 = C-.  2.6-2.8 = D+.  1.8-2.5 = D.  1.5-1.7 = D-.  .1-1.4 = F.

5.  You'll need to write a short story of your own -- a 5-7 pager, due shortly after midterm.

This isn't, of course, a creative-writing class.  And so I'll tell you right up front that this is an effort grade!  My strong, strong conviction is that you can't really appreciate an art form until you've tried it out yourself.  So I'm going to ask you to try out fiction writing.

I'll grade your short story on an A-F scale, with +'s and -'s possible.  The due date is on the course schedule below.

6.  You'll need to participate during class meetings.  This means coming to class consistently and on time, being considerate of me and your classmates, speaking up intelligently in both small-group and large-group discussions, and pulling your weight in whatever other in-class activities I ask you to take part in.  Do all these things for me and I'll happily give you an "A" for the participation segment of your grade.

Grading
Your two non-researched essays will be worth 15% each of your final grade.
Your researched essay will be worth 30%.
Your final exam will be worth 10%.
Your short story will be worth 5%.
Your reading quizzes will be worth 15%.
Your class participation will be worth 10%.

Attendance
You get two free skips -- "excused" or "unexcused" doesn't matter.  After that, your final grade for the course starts falling two thirds of a letter grade (from a C+ to a C-, for instance) per absence.

Since I don't distinguish between excused and unexcused absences, you shouldn't burn up your skips thinking it'll be okay to miss more classes later should you get sick or have an emergency.  Your five skips are for sickness and emergencies.  So budget them wisely.

Please note that no one who misses more than five class meetings, no matter how extraordinary the circumstances, will be able to pass this course.

Late Work
You may turn in late either of your two non-researched essays at a penalty of one third of a letter grade per day.  I know we only meet once a week, but in the event you need to turn an assignment in late, e-mailing it to me will be perfectly acceptable.

You can't turn in your in-class midterm or final exams late; they're due at the end of that class period, no matter what.

You can't make up missed reading quizzes.

You also can't turn in your researched essay late, since it's not due till after our last day of class.  If for any reason you're not going to be able to meet the research-paper deadline specified on the course schedule, it's imperative you talk to me well beforehand.

Skipping Assignments
Sorry, but you can't. All of the writing assignments (the two unresearched essays, the researched one, your short story, and the final exam) must be submitted to me; otherwise you won't receive a passing grade for the course.

Tutoring
If you need help with a writing assignment for this course, please work either with me or with someone in the Tutoring Center (Library 121).

If you'd like to listen to the advice of a friend, family member, or classmate who's read a draft you're working on, that's fine -- great, even.  But nobody besides me or a Bucks tutor should be helping you actually write sentences for an essay for this course, okay?  Please talk to me if you're confused about what constitutes too much help.

Plagiarism
This is from the College Catalogue:

The expectation at Bucks County Community College is that the principles of truth and honesty will be rigorously followed in all academic endeavors.  This assumes that all the work will be done by the person who purports to do the work without unauthorized aids.  In addition, when making use of language, information and some ideas not his or her own, whether quoting them directly or paraphrasing them in his or her own words, the student must attribute the source of the material in some standard form, such as naming the source in the text or offering a footnote.
There's the school's official line.  Let me add this: it's almost always comically easy to recognize plagiarized writing.  And there's no easier way to catch it than when it's taken from the web.

I've been teaching writing and lit courses in college for eight years now.  And I've met very, very few students who weren't able to get through a course simply by doing their own work.  You don't need to cheat to get through English 277.  But you may need help.  I expect to give lots of it, as do the people in the Tutoring Center.  So please come put us to work.

Course Schedule
All readings are in your Story and Its Writer anthology, unless otherwise specified.

Wednesday Aug. 28: Introduction to the course.  I'll ask you to read a short story during class time; we'll then discuss it and get a handle on some important critical terms.  I may also collect a writing sample from you.

Wednesday Sept. 4: Discussion of Chekov's "The Darling" (293-301), Hurston's "The Gilded Six-Bits" (670-677), Hemingway's "Hills Like White Elephants" (653-657), and Mason's "Shiloh" (964-975).

Wednesday Sept. 11: Discussion of Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart" (1151-1155), Ellison's "Battle Royal" (449-459), Cheever's "The Swimmer" (283-292), and DeLillo's "Videotape" (429-433)

Wednesday Sept. 18: Discussion of de Maupassant's "The Necklace" (976-983), Fitzgerald's "Babylon Revisited" (490-506), and Oates' "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" (1052-1064).  I'll also bring you the topic question for Non-Researched Essay #1 on this night.

Wednesday Sept. 25: Discussion of Hawthorne's "My Kinsman, Major Molineux" (620-632), Chopin's "The Story of an Hour" (333-36), O'Connor's "A Good Man Is Hard to Find" (1106-1117), and Mukherjee's "The Management of Grief" (1022-1034).

Wednesday Oct. 2:Non-Researched Essay #1 due.  Also, discussion of London's "To Build a Fire" (910-922), Anderson's "Hands" (57-61), Malamud's "The Jewbird" (933-940), and Tan's "Two Kinds" (1264-1273).

Wednesday Oct. 9: Discussion of Kafka's "A Hunger Artist" (788-793), Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily" (469-489), Walker's "Roselily" (1338-1341), and Calvino's "If on a winter's night a traveler" (198-207).

Wednesday Oct. 16: Short Story due.  Also, discussion of Welty's "Why I Live at the P.O." (1342-1350), Baldwin's "Sonny's Blues" (83-107), and Updike's "A&P" (1321-1326).

Wednesday Oct. 23: Discussion of Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper" (577-589), Silko's "Yellow Woman" (1214-1223), Achebe's "Civil Peace" (19-22), and LeGuin's "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" (889-894).

Wednesday Oct. 30: Discussion of Barth's "On with the Story" (114-128), Borges' "The Garden of Forking Paths" (170-178), and Cather's "Paul's Case" (267-82)

Wednesday Nov. 6: Discussion of the following stories from Raymond Carver's Where I'm Calling From: "The Student's Wife" (34-43), "They're Not Your Husband" (44-52), "Fat" (64-69), "What's in Alaska?" (70-85), "One More Thing" (147-151), and "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love" (170-185).

Wednesday Nov. 13: Non-Researched Essay #2 due.  After that...I'll do one-on-one conferences with folks on their upcoming researched essays.

Wednesday Dec. 4: Discussion of the following stories from Raymond Carver's Where I'm Calling From: "Where I'm Calling From" (278-296), "Feathers" (332), "Cathedral" (356), and "A Small Good Thing" (376).

Wednesday Dec. 11: Final Exam.  We'll take it on this, our last night of class.  Also...course wrap-up and instructor evaluation.

Your Researched Essay will be due to my office (Penn 131) by 4:00 p.m. on Monday Dec. 16!
 

A Few Terms Useful for Describing How a Short Story Works

A story’s plot is its sequence of events.  (First this happens, then this, then this….)

A flashback is a chronological leap backwards to some earlier event in the story’s timeline.

The narrator is the person who “tells” the story.  And there are several major types of narrator you can have.

A first-person narrator is a character in the story.  S/he speaks to us as an “I,” and can only know for certain his or her own thoughts.

A third-person narrator is not a character in the story.  S/he (though it’s often tough to discern the gender of this type of narrator) describes the action from afar, never presenting him- or herself as an “I.”  If the third-person narrator is privy to the thoughts and feelings of any character in the story, s/he is said to be omniscient.  If s/he can only get into a certain character’s head (or a certain group of characters’ heads), s/he is said to be limited.  And if the third-person narrator can’t know any characters’ thoughts, but just records events the way a camera and microphone would, s/he is said to be objective.

One last type of narrator: it’s possible to have an unreliable one.  A speaker of this sort basically can’t be trusted: s/he might be childish and naïve; s/he might be stupid; s/he might be a compulsive liar; s/he might have some agenda that prevents the whole truth from coming out….  One way or the other, a well-written story will make it clear to you if it features this type of speaker.  And most unreliable narrators, incidentally, are first-person ones.

The setting is where and when a story takes place.  (And a story, of course, can have more than one.)

A story will inevitably have a mood, or an overall emotional feel.  It might be light or dark, warm or chilly, earnest or sarcastic, optimistic or pessimistic, airy or claustrophobic, inviting or foreboding….  Whatever you’re left feeling at the end of the story, though, is a function of its mood.

The Protagonist is the story’s most important character.  S/he may be a hero – that is, a good and admirable person – but doesn’t necessarily have to be.

The Antagonist is the protagonist’s nemesis – the person who tries to thwart his or her desires and ambitions.

Next, we’ve got several types of ironyVerbal irony happens when a character (or the narrator) says one thing but means another.  (Sarcasm is classic verbal irony.)

Dramatic irony happens when a character (or narrator) says something but doesn’t grasp the deeper implications of his or her own words.  (Think of Fortunato saying, “I won’t die of a cough.”)

Next, situational irony occurs when a story’s events take some turn we didn’t anticipate – or that runs contrary, even, to what we might’ve thought should happen.

And lastly, we should know from the outset about theme.  This is a story’s Big Idea – the Universal Human Truth (though such things get problematic, of course) its overall design is meant to communicate to us.

Frietag’s Triangle is a diagram that shows how a story typically progresses.  It looks like this:

                                                               c
 

               b                                               d
  a

The A-B segment of the “triangle” (it isn’t one at all, clearly) represents a story’s exposition – the beginning part where we get all the information we’ll need to follow the rest of the story.  We find out who’s who, what the characters’ relationships are, what the situation or “conflict” is, etc.

The B-C line represents the “rising action,” the segment of the story where the situation (or conflict, maybe) gets intensified and complicated.

Point C represents the story’s climax, or its most intense, most emotionally charged moment – the “head,” you might say, to which all the other events in the story have been building.

Lastly, the C-D line represents the resolution, or (borrowing a French term) the denouement.  The climax has passed, and now we learn, as the story winds down, how the characters have changed and what new shape their lives will take.

Next we’ve got a few character types.  A round character is one who’s fully “fleshed out” – that is, one who comes across on the page as a real person.  S/he is psychologically complex, has a good bit of history or background, plays many different roles in life, and may even sometimes contradict him- or herself, the same way we real folks do.

A flat character, by comparison, is simple.  S/he is in the story to do only one thing, play only one role, represent only one idea.  Even if s/he is in the story a lot.

A dynamic character is one who changes – and by “changes” I mean s/he learns something important or comes to some realization about either the world or him- or herself.  S/he leaves the story thinking differently than when s/he came in.

A static character, on the other end of the spectrum, doesn’t change – i.e. doesn’t learn anything new and doesn’t leave with a different outlook on life.

Then we’ve got the stereotype.  Which is just what you’d expect: a character who plays right into dull – possibly stupid – cultural expectations about what his or her “type” person should be like.

A couple more things.  A symbol is a person, place, thing, or event in a story that’s “charged up,” if you like, with meaning beyond its literal meaning.

And lastly, an allegory is a story that in its entirety – top to bottom – is a “symbol” for some principle, idea, or situation.  In order to “get” this type of story, you pretty much have to identify the principle, idea, or situation it’s representing: if you don’t, the whole point may be lost.
 

Topic for the First Essay

Please write a three- to four-page essay explaining to me (a) what your criteria are, at this point, for a good short story, and (b) which of the stories we’ve read so far this semester best fulfills those criteria.  Be sure to make good use of at least some (not necessarily all!) of the “formalist” critical terms we’ve been learning.

Additional Requirements and Pointers

I have no problem at all with your writing in the first person – or with your recounting personal experiences, if they’ll help you make a point.  You can even consider yourself encouraged to do these things.

You should absolutely, positively quote whatever story you’re writing about.  If you’re simply quoting its narrator’s words, please use regular quotation marks.  (This, for example, from Fitzgerald’s “Babylon Revisted”: “He woke up feeling happy.  The door of the world was wide open again” (500).)  If you’re quoting dialogue, though, please use single quotation marks within regular quotation marks.  (Also from “Babylon Revisted”: “’There’s nothing quite like your own child,’ Lincoln said” (501).)

Also, after any direct quotation you use, please put the page number it appears on in parentheses at the end of the quote, before the period that ends the sentence – just like I’ve done in the examples above.

Please don’t use exorbitantly long quotes.  Use just what you need to help you make your point.  If you want to cut stuff out of the middle of a long quote, show that you’ve done so by inserting ellipses (…) at the point where words have been excised.

For this essay, please don’t use any sources beyond the story you’re writing about – unless you talk to me about it first.

If briefly discussing a second (or even third or fourth) short story will help you illuminate some aspect of the primary one you’ve chosen, please feel free to do so.  (Don’t feel obliged to do this, however.)

Your essay should be double-spaced.  It should be written in twelve-point font.  It should have one-inch margins on all its pages, top and bottom, left and right.  It should also have a good title!

I think that’s it.  If you’ve got questions…DON’T BE SHY!  Get in touch with me.  This essay is due at the start of class on Wednesday, Oct. 2nd.
 

Topic for the Second Essay
(Due Wednesday Nov. 13th)

Please write a 3-4 page essay in response to the following prompt:

Compare and contrast two short stories we’ve read for class that beg, for whatever reason(s), to be compared and contrasted.

Additional Requirements and Pointers
As you ponder which two stories to work with, try to find sophisticated similarities and differences between texts.  The fact that two stories both have teenage protagonists isn’t going to give you a whole lot to build an essay on.  Nor will the fact that they both happen to be set in New York City.  Two stories about teenagers who “come of age,” as they say, in very different ways, though, might be interesting – as might two stories that take big cities as symbols for very different ideas or conditions.

Try to make good use of the critical vocabulary we’ve been learning in class.

You should absolutely quote the stories you’re writing about.  Just don’t do it at inordinate length.

Always introduce your quotes – that is, let your reader know who they’re about to hear speaking, and in what context.

You’re welcome, as with your last essay, to write in the first person and to relay personal stories if they’ll help you illustrate an idea.

Though this isn’t a comp class, you should still make an effort to produce clear, well-organized, thesis-driven writing.  And while I won’t flip out about a few spelling/punctuation/grammatical mistakes, your essay shouldn’t be a disaster on these counts.  Please take a little time to proofread and edit.

Please don’t use any sources besides the stories themselves for this essay unless you talk to me about it first.

Your essay should be double-spaced, in twelve-point font, with one-inch margins all around.  And it should have a good title!

I think that’s it.  Let me know if I can help you out with the assignment.  Make me proud!
 

Topic for the Researched Essay
(Due Dec. 16th, 2002)

Please write a 4-6 page essay in response to the following question:

If you could make everyone in the United States read either one short story or some small number of related stories – and this for the purpose of elevating the national character – what story (or stories) would you choose, and why?

Additional Requirements and Pointers
You should incorporate ideas from four to five “secondary” sources into your essay.  These might be books, articles from either scholarly journals or popular-press magazines, good websites, or published interviews with authors you’re writing about.

Remember that the college library’s website offers several first-rate resources for doing research.  You can use its online card catalogue to find books; the LION database will help you find good “scholarly” articles; the Ebscohost database will help you find good “popular-press” articles and interviews; and the “short story criticism” link (under “electronic resources”) will help you find good websites.

Please don’t use more than one website as a source.

Whatever sources you use, please be sure they’re analyses of the actual short story (or stories) you’re writing about – not discussions of an author’s life, a story’s publication history, or anything else.

After any quote or paraphrase of a secondary source, please put both the source’s author’s last name and the page number on which the quote appeared in parentheses.

Please include a “works cited” page at the end of your essay.

It’s fine if between ten and fifteen percent of your essay is quotations from outside sources – the short story (or stories) you’re writing about and secondary sources combined.

Don’t forget to quote important passages from the story (or stories) you’re writing about.  Just don’t do it at inordinate length.

Always introduce your quotes – that is, let your reader know who they’re about to hear speaking, and in what context.

Try, as always, to make good use of the critical vocabulary we’ve been learning in class.

You’re welcome, yet again, to write in the first person and to relay personal stories whenever they’ll help you illustrate an idea.

Though this isn’t a comp class, you should still make an effort to produce clear, well-organized, thesis-driven writing.  And while I won’t flip out about a few spelling/punctuation/grammatical mistakes, your essay shouldn’t be a disaster on these counts.  Please take a little time to proofread and edit.

Your essay should be double-spaced, in twelve-point font, with one-inch margins all around.  And it should have a good title!

I think that’s it.  Let me know if/how I can help you out.