《英语短篇小说教程》练习参考答案unit11、12
《英语短篇小说教程》练习参考答案
Keys to Unit Eleven
James Thurber: The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
1)Opinions of Understanding:
(1) Which of the following adjectives best describes Walter Mitty’s real life?
A. Colorful.
B. Uneventful.
C. Noble.
D. Exciting.
(2) Which of the following is an unsuitable adjective to describe Walter Mitty’s wife?
A. Fussy.
B. Bossy.
C. Considerate.
D. Unsympathetic.
(3) What sort of “secret life” of Walter Mitty does the “hospital operation room” episode reveal to us?
A. He desires for a life of romance and excitement.
B. He wishes to make glorious contributions to the nation.
C. He yearns to be an important and respected person.
D. He would rather be a heroic victim than a nobody.
(4) What sort of “the secret life” of Walter Mitty do the “courtroom trial” and the “execution by a firing squad” episodes reveal to us?
A. He desires for a life of romance and excitement.
B. He wishes to make glorious contributions to the nation.
C. He yearns to be an important and respected man.
D. He would rather be a heroic victim than nobody.
(5) What is the author’s attitude to the character he portrays?
A. Critical.
B. Mocking.
C. Sympathetic.
D. Scornful.
2) Questions for discussion:
(Suggested answers for reference)
(1) How are reality and fantasy associated in this story? Give examples.
(Usually it is in this way: something in the real life, for example, doing, seeing or hearing something, would triggers off some fantasy. Driving a car leading to the fantasy of piloting a hydroplane; putting on gloves and hearing the name of Dr. Renshaw leading to the operation episode; hearing a newspaper boy shouting something about the trial leading to the courtroom
episode; sitting in the lobby and reading news about Second World War leading to the bomber-pilot episode and standing against the wall of a drug-store leading to the episode of facing a firing squad.)
(2) Does Mitty appear to be a comic, grotesque, and ridiculous person?
(It is not the author’s intention to show the ridiculous side of Mitty’s life. Through creation of such a character, the writer intends to reveal the unfortunate life of some city dwellers. Their lives, like that of Mitty’s, are suffocated by the monotony and triviality of the modern middle-class life. The daydreams seem to be the only escape from the meaning less repetition of the day-to-day existence.)
(3) Find out what is in common in the five pieces of Mitty’s daydream: the hydroplane, the medical operation, the trial, the bomber and the execution. What do these fantasies reveal to you about Walter Mitty?
(These pieces of daydreams have one thing in common in which life is more adventurous, more heroic or more exciting than the actual existence, and in which he is a brave, respected or even a tragic central figure, rather than a nobody dominated by an bossy wife.)
(4) How do you like the ending of the story? What is your interpretation?
(There is a tragic sense in the last episode – the man being executed. This may reveal the inner wish of the protagonist that he would rather be a heroic victim than a person of no significance. And also, there is a hint of tragedy in his life.)
(5) Compare Walter Mitty with Cervantes’Don Quixode (唐·吉诃德). What similarities and differences do you find in the two characters?
(Mitty’s daydreams embody the clichés of adventure or war fiction and movies. While Cervantes’ Don Quixode is also influenced by the popular romance of his time and ridiculously acts out his fantasies, Mitty does not even have courage to do that and seems satisfied with dreaming about a sort of heroism as an escape from the imprisonment in triviality. In this sense, he is a modern Don Quixode)
3) Explanation and interpretation:
(Explain the implied meaning of the following sentences, and point out their significance in the context of the story.)
(1) He looked at his wife, in the seat beside him, with shocked astonishment. She seemed grossly unfamiliar, like a strange woman who had yelled at him in a crowd.
(Mitty was lost in his daydream, and was suddenly awakened from it and the world around him seemed rather unfamiliar.)
(2) "You're tensed up again," said Mrs. Mitty. "It's one of your days. I wish you'd let Dr. Renshaw look you over."
(“Tensed up” refers to Mitty’s state of fantasizing. His wife’s words indicate that Mitty had a habit of falling into daydreams and had once consulted a doctor for this problem.)
(3) He put them (gloves) on, but after she had turned and gone into the building and he had driven on to a red light, he took them off again.
(He obeyed to his wife humbly, but when she did not see him, he book them off as and act of rebellion.)
(4) "Back it up, Mac! Look out for that Buick!" Walter Mitty jammed on the brakes. "Wrong lane, Mac," said the parking-lot attendant.
(He didn’t seem to be able to do anything well and even a parking lot attendant could order and criticize him. This adds to his sense of depression, of being nobody.)
(5) Then, with that faint, fleeting smile playing about his lips, he faced the firing squad; erect and
motionless, proud and disdainful…
(The last episode of the fantasy reveals the mixed feelings of being a victim and being a hero. The end seems inevitably tragic but to Mitty’s imagination, maintaining a sort of heroism is possible. Mitty felt that he was beaten down by life, but in his heart he still kept high aspirations.)
Suggested Homework
Allow Walter Mitty to continue his fantasy once he arrived home from the shopping trip with his wife. Using your imagination and write a paragraph that may begin like this:
He parked his car. In a few quick steps, he rushed to the door and pushed it open with determined suddenness. “Hands up, gentlemen!” he said.
For reference only:
He parked his car. In a few quick steps, he rushed to the door and pushed it open with determined suddenness. “Hands up, gentlemen! ” he said, pointing his gun at the three men sitting there. “FBI. We have been following you for quite some time.” The men in the room were totally unprepared. Two raised their hands over their heads, one hesitated and quietly moved his right hand to a pistol on the coffee table. He aims his gun at that man, “push that pistol to me, slowly. That’s right. It’s no use trying to do anything funny, let me warn you.”
“Why do walk so quickly and push open the door like this? Go back to get the things in the car!” his wife said angrily.
《英语短篇小说教程》练习参考答案
Keys to Unit Twelve
Donald Barthelme: The Glass Mountain
1) Questions for Discussion:
(Suggested answers for reference)
(1) Do you find anything unusual about the structure of the story? Why do you think the writer chooses this manner of narration?
(Firstly, the title sounds strange – there is no “glass mountain” in the real world. Secondly, the short story is made up of 100 sentences and each sentence is numbered. The title, if one is familiar with European fairy tales, reminds one of a popular story. The structure is very unusual, subverting the established form of fiction writing and creating a false perfection with the story beginning at Sentence One and ending at Sentence One Hundred. The author seems to being mocking at the literary convention by inventing a form that looks grotesque. )
(2) What sort of person is the narrator, the first-person “I” who tries to climb the glass mountain?
(Judging from what goes on in his mind, we find that the climber might be an intellectual, or a writer, as he is familiar with fairy tales and talks about the definition of “symbol” etc. So, the climbing can be seen not as actual, but as imagined and psychological. He is very much dissatisfied with the reality down “at the bottom of the mountain,” but the fanciful “golden castle”is unattainable. He finds himself stranded in the middle. He represents the spiritual plight of the “Modern Man.”)
(3) There are a lot of symbols in the story such as the glass mountain, the golden castle, the dead knights, the enchanted princess, the climber and the act of climbing. Can you try to explain their symbolic meanings?
(The glass mountain: the modern city life, or the impossible process of achieving meaning The golden castle: an ideal goal that is nothing but illusion
The fallen knights: the dead or dying tradition
The enchanted princess: aim or reward of hard endeavor
The climber: a modern man in predicament, trying to achieve self-realization
The climbing: the difficult and impossible process toward the goal
The street scene: the real city life of confusion and chaos
The climbing irons and plumber’s friends: the ridiculous means for the “grand” task
The “acquaintances”: the uncultured, unmannered generation of people. )
(4) How do you interpret the ending of the story?
(Through imagination, with the eagle carrying him to up to the palace, the climber finally reaches the castle. But with his “golden touch,” the symbol changes into a princess, like cliché in old stories, and the climber is disappointed and disillusioned. He seems to have realized that the whole thing is nothing but fairy-tale fantasy.)
(5) The whole story appears to be very absurd. What sort of reality can you see behind the apparent absurdity?
(Despite the absurdity in the form and contents, we can find in the short story a lot of things that are related to the reality in the West, as the writer sees it:
1. the narrator/climber’s sense of frustration and alienation
2. the life of confusion and disorder in the city
3. people’s inability to achieve a state of glory
4. the loss of tradition
5. the replacement of culture by hooliganism.
6. the loss of aim and meaning in life with only imagined idealism which one knows is unrealizable.)
2) Explanation and Interpretation:
(Explain the implied meaning of the following sentences, and point out their significance in the context of the story.)
(1) 18. The mountain towers over that part of Eighth Avenue like some splendid, immense office building.
(“Eighth Avenue” suggests the location is a city, possibly New York, and the glass mountain is a glass-surfaced modern skyscraper. It indeed is an office building.)
(2) 78. My acquaintances were debating the question, which of them would get my apartment?
(They were certain that the climber “I” would inevitably fall and die in the end, like all the “knights.”)
(3) 80. “At the same moment a door opened, and he saw a courtyard filled with flowers and trees, and there, the beautiful enchanted princess.” (The Yellow Fairy Book)
96. At the same moment a door opened, and I saw a courtyard filled with flowers and trees, and there, the beautiful enchanted symbol.
(In the popular fairy tale, the ultimate aim of the hero is to rescue the “princess,” but the modern climber found it to be no more than a mere “symbol,”– something abstract, remote, and devoid of solid meaning.)
(4) 97. I approached the symbol, with its layers of meaning, but when I touched it, it changed into only a beautiful princess.
(A symbol can be interpreted differently – with its layers of meaning, but the popular culture points to only one direction of interpretation. The symbol of happy ending, as in numerous tales, is represented by the union of the brave and the beautiful: “the youth married the princess and lived happily ever after.” The climber seems to dislike this kind of wishful fantasy.)
(5) 98. I threw the beautiful princess headfirst down the mountain to my acquaintances.
(Obviously, this is an act of great disappointment. The climber seems to be totally disillusioned at the outcome, having realized the impossibility and futility of such an attempt. He
subverts his own purpose of trying to achieve something heroic or glorious.)