Nobody Knows... (p 1119 Question 4)

In her play A Raisin in the Sun, Lorraine Hansberry builds dramatic suspense through slightly unconventional methods. Normally, suspense is developed due to an inconsistency between the audience's knowledge of a situation and a character's knowledge of that situation. Suspense occurs because a character is acting upon knowledge that the audience is not privy to, creating intrigue and curiosity from the members of the audience who seek to find out what that unknown knowledge is. However, in A Raisin in the Sun, Hansberry causes the audience to feel suspense for the exact opposite reason.

The suspense in this play resolves around Walter's decision of whether or not to sell their newly purchased house. The audience is held in suspense as they wonder whether Walter will maintain his pride or accept a less fortunate fate. The key to this suspense, however, is that no one else, Walter included, knows which Walter will choose. Indeed, it is not until he mentions his own father and realizes his father's sacrifice that Walter realizes that he "come[s] from people who had a lot of pride" (p 148). Up until that moment, no one knows what Walter will choose, creating an increasingly suspenseful buildup to the plot's climax and denouement.

Man of Mystery (Handout Question 6)

In Herman Melville's "Bartleby the Scrivener," Bartleby, fittingly, is the protagonist. Bartleby is the one who provides the main force of action throughout the story; without Bartleby's presence, the narrator's law firm would not be forced to relocate, nor would the narrator and his employees' working habits and tendencies be changed. The entirety of the plot action revolves around Bartleby; without him, no conflict concerning his quirks would arise. Bartleby seems to be a tragic hero more than any other type. His flaw is hard to pin down, yet it seems that it is the fact that he simply cannot adjust to his new life within the law firm. His refusal to adapt creates friction among the other characters, leading to Bartleby's abandonment, arrest, and death.

Despite the fact that Bartleby is the protagonist, the meaning of the story would definitely be different if it had been Bartleby's story. Although it may have focused on Bartleby at times, the story truly was about the narrator, the head of the law firm. The mystery around the reason for Bartleby's odd behavior creates the primary feeling of suspense throughout the story. If Melville had written from the focal point of Bartleby, the story would have lost the large portion of its power that had derived from the story's emotional suspense. Yet by making the story the lawyer's, and not Bartleby's, Melville heightens suspense and mystery surrounding the enigma of Bartleby.

Murder, She Wrote

I admit, I rather enjoyed "Edward." The two speakers--Edward and his mother--use repetition of each other's names and of their initial comments. This repetition serves two purposes. Superficially, the repetition emphasizes each individual question or responses, forcing the reader to read each comment twice in order to feel its power more strongly. On a deeper level, though, this repetition increases suspense as Edward's mother constantly pressures Edward to reveal his troubles. This buildup of pressure and suspense occurs twice within the poem. Each time, Edward finally reveals what is troubling him, and each time, the answer is slightly shocking. In the first climactic moment, the reader learns that Edward has killed his father. This murder is revealed as the reason for his guilt and for his decision to leave the land he knows.

Yet the second climax is even more surprising. After building up the emotion of the poem by asking her son what will happen to those he will leave behind, Edward's mother finally asks him what he will leave for her. Yet instead of a heartfelt token of his lover for her, Edward replies with a rather unexpectedly bitter "curse of hell" for her. At first, the reader is shocked at Edward's reply, yet in the very last line of the poem, Edward finally reveals the reason for his loathing: his mother gave him "such counsels" to kill his father. Despite his guilt, Edward's hatred for his mother is stronger, for though he committed the crime, she devised it in the first place. A rather interesting--and by interesting, I of course mean grossly dysfunctional--mother-and-son relationship, don't you think?