use of violence

4. Analyze the power of human nature to destroy in Poe’s “The Cask of Amontillado” and “The Tell Tale Heart.” Where does this power come from-Anger? Revenge? Fear? Evil?

5. Analyze the results of human failure to accept imperfection in Hawthorne’s “The Birthmark,” Rappaccini’ s Daughter,” and “The Minister’s Black Veil.” Can the exercise of “self-improvement” go too far? What part does science play in the drama of these three stories?

6. Compare the way the “wilderness” or the frontier is treated in the writings of Thomas Jefferson, James Fennimore Cooper, and Henry David Thoreau. How are their attitudes similar?-Do not contrast them; just compare.

7. Analyze the use of violence in “Sicily Bum’s wedding” and Frederick Douglass’s Narrative. What makes one humorous and the other abominable? How does a disparity of social power between individuals play a part in whether or not we laugh at or cry about violence against others?