Charlotte Perkins Gilman, "The Yellow Wallpaper"
1. Do you conclude that the story's narrator displays herself as being legitimately psychotic, or do you think her "treatment" by her physician-husband has made her so? Explain.
2. Discuss how the woman behind the paper can be considered a metaphor for the narrator. What similarities do they share? How are they different?
3. What makes the narrator unreliable (difficult to believe or take seriously)? On the other hand, what makes her words quite reliable and full of integrity?
4. How would you explain the narrator's final actions at the story's end?
5. In a way similar to Sammy from "A&P," how does this narrator show herself as being quite concerned with how people view her actions?
James Joyce, "Araby"
1. What seems to attract the narrator to the girl?
2. Why is getting her a gift so important?
3. Why does the narrator feel he has been "driven and derided by vanity"?
4. What, if anything, do you think he has learned about himself and the people around him at the story's end?
5. Who or what finally makes the narrator feel "anguish and anger"?
6. How do you compare this boy and Sammy with regard to the difference between what they think they're trying to accomplish (explicit goal) versus what we believe they're each really trying to accomplish (implied goal)?