Unit 6: American Short Stories

The short story is a breed of its own, not just a cut down version of a novel. The author often must compel the reader within the first paragraph, the first words even, to earn an audience. Even when this is accomplished, even when the audience listens, they often do not hear well enough and end up remarking, "That's all?" when they reach the end of the story. Yet no story is complete. There are always moments left out from before and after the story; the storyteller, then, simply choses when to pick up and when to leave off. The point or purpose is not always as clear as the novel, but that ambiguity is part of what allures a certain type of reader.



Assignment #1: Read "L. Debard and Aliette" by Lauren Groff. Write a one page essay answering the following: How is the theme of illness significant to the story?




Assignment #2: Read Jhumpa Lahiri's "When Mr. Pirzada Came to Dine" (PDF sent by email). Choose one symbol from the text to analyze in a one page essay.

Assignment #3: Your final assignment for this course is creative. The course emphasized identifying, interpreting, and analyzing texts. However, stories exist in many formats, including television, film, painting, and sculpture. Your assignment is to create a photographic story . Do this by registering with a blog server (www.blogger.com is free), using a photo editing application, building a web site, or using some other method. Take photographs and arrange them on the blog or slideshow to create a photographic story. Narrate your story only as far as you must. See here for an example of an effective photographic story. You must submit a draft of this for review before submitting the final draft--so leave enough time for you to submit it twice with revisions in between.