Review for the AP Lit Short Stories Test
What is the setting of Hills Like White Elephants?
The story takes place in the mid-1920s at a train station in Zaragoza, a major city in northeastern Spain on the Ebro River. Zaragoza is approximately 170 miles northeast of Madrid. The region around Zaragoza receives scant rainfall. The greenery observed by Jig may have flourished through irrigation.
What is the point of view for Desiree's Baby?
"Désirée's Baby" in omniscient third-person point of view, meaning that the narrator not only describes events as they unfold but also reveals the thoughts of the characters from time to time.
What is the setting of Everyday Use?
"Everyday Use" is set in the late 1960s or early 1970s, a tumultuous time when many African Americans were struggling to redefine and seize control of their social, cultural, and political identity in American society.
What is the point of view of Miss Brill?
"Miss Brill" is written in the third-person limited Omniscient point of view and switches at the story's close to dramatic.
Who are the characters in Desiree's baby?
1. Désirée: A young woman described by the narrator as "beautiful and gentle, affectionate and sincere." When she was a very small child~ez_mdash~of "toddling age," the narrator says~ez_mdash~she was abandoned in front of a plantation home. Its owners adopted her. 2. Armand Aubigny: Young man who inherited his father's plantation, L'Abri. After he marries Désirée, they live at L'Abri. 3. The Baby: Male child of Armand and Désirée. Désirée notices several months after his birth that his physical characteristics are those of a person of mixed racial ancestry. 4. Monsieur and Madame Valmondé: Childless husband and wife who found Désirée when she was a baby. After adopting her, they lovingly reared her. 5. La Blanche: Female slave of mixed ancestry. 6. Zandrine: Female slave who helps Désirée care for her child. 7. Negrillon: Male slave who pretends to have suffered a leg burn in order to be excused from work. 8. Deceased Parents of Armand Aubigny: They lived in Paris with Armand until Madame Aubigny died. Armand was eight years old at the time. His father then brought the boy to Louisiana. Armand inherited L'Abri after Monsieur Aubigny died. 9. Neighbors Who Visit L'Abri
Who are the characters in How I Met My Husband?
1. Edie: She is young and has a soft and meek voice. Innocence is obviously another key trait of Edie in this story. 2. Mrs. Peebles: Mrs. Peebles is like the typical mother figure. She is concerned and protective of Edie when Alice Kelling accuses Edie of being intimate with Chris Watters. 3. Alice Kelling: Alice Kelling is more classy and sophisticated woman. She becomes very jealous of Edie and accuses her of having intimate relations with Chris. 4. Chris Watters: Chris Watters is a very laid back type of guy. He lives each day how he wants. He is very friendly and doesn't really care what people think. 5. Loretta Bird: Loretta Bird is a very gossipy type of woman. She helps move the story along because she is always present during a conflict.
Who are the characters in The Jilting of Granny Weatherall?
1. Ellen (Granny) Weatherall: Feisty woman of about eighty who ruminates about events in her life as she lies dying in the home of her daughter Cornelia. Because of her illness, she is lucid one moment and disoriented the next. A painful memory, one she had repressed for sixty years, surfaces and haunts her at the hour of her death. It is the memory of the day—sixty years before—when her fiancé, George, jilted her. After she later married a man named John, she gave birth to four children. John died young but Granny carried on, rearing the children, working her farmland and orchard, and caring for animals. 2. Cornelia: Daughter of Granny. While her mother is on her deathbed, Cornelia takes care of her. 3. George: Man who abandoned Granny on the day he was to marry her. 4. John: Deceased husband of Granny. 5. Doctor Harry: Granny's physician. 6. Hapsy: Daughter of Granny and, the narration says, the only child Granny "really wanted." The story implies that she has preceded her mother in death. 7. Jimmy: Son of Granny. 8. Lydia: Daughter of Granny. 9. Lydia's Husband: Man whom Granny considers "worthless." 10. Nurse: Person who accompanies the doctor on a nighttime visit to Granny's bedside. 11. Father Connolly: Roman Catholic priest who comes to give Granny the church's last rites. 12. Sister Borgia: Nun whom Granny wants to send six bottles of wine for indigestion. 13. Father of Granny: Man who lived to age 102. He attributed his longevity to his practice of drinking a hot toddy every day.
Who are the characters in I Stand Here Ironing?
1. Emily: A shy nineteen-year-old girl. She is the oldest of five children. Emily had a very difficult childhood, but has recently developed a talent for comedic acting. She is cynical about life, and the world, despite her youth. She believes the atomic bomb will soon destroy everything; so there is no point in caring about anything. 2. Emily's father: Deserted the family so as not to "share poverty with them" less than one year after Emily's birth. 3. Emily's mother: A mother who is filled with regrets and worries about her daughter. She worked hard to support her family and take care of them, but in retrospect she realizes there are many things she would have done differently if she could. 4. Emily's stepfather: Called away to fight in WWII. 5. Susan: The second child, golden and curly haired, chubby, quick, articulate and sure. By the time Susan was born, her mother had remarried and gained enough experience to show more affection than when Emily was born.
Who are the characters in Hills Like White Elephants?
1. Jig: Woman traveling in Europe with a male companion. The author does not disclose whether they are single, engaged, or married; however, it appears likely that they are girlfriend and boyfriend. 2. The American: Man traveling with Jig. 3. The Woman: Waitress at the train station. 4. People in the Barroom
Who are the characters in Everyday Use?
1. Mama: The narrator of the story. Mama describes herself as a big-boned woman with hands that are rough from years of physical labor. She wears overalls and has been both mother and father to her two daughters. Poor and uneducated, she was not given the opportunity to break out of her rural life. A loving mother, her frank, open nature prevents her from deluding herself when it comes to her daughters' weaknesses. Mama has a strong understanding of her heritage and won't allow Dee to take the family quilts. 2. Maggie: The shy, retiring daughter who lives with Mama. Burned in a house fire as a young girl, Maggie lacks confidence and shuffles when she walks, often fleeing or hanging in the background when there are other people around, unable to make eye contact. She is good-hearted, kind, and dutiful. Rather than anger her intimidating sister, she is willing to let Dee have the quilts that had originally been promised to her. 3. Dee: Mama's older daughter, who has renamed herself Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo. Dee wears a brightly colored, yellow-and-orange, ankle-length dress that is inappropriate for the warm weather. Her hair stands up straight on top and is bordered by two long pigtails that hang down in back. Dee is educated, worldly, and deeply determined, not generally allowing her desires to be thwarted. When Mama won't let her have the quilts to display, she becomes furious. She claims that Mama and Maggie don't understand their heritage, but she is the one overlooking the important aspects of her family history. 4. Hakim-a-barber:Dee's boyfriend or, possibly, husband. Hakim-a-barber is a Black Muslim whom Mama humorously refers to as Asalamalakim, the Arab greeting he offers them, meaning "peace be with you." An innocuous presence, he is a short and stocky, with waist-length hair and a long, bushy beard. His desire to make a good first impression makes him seem awkward. He makes Maggie uncomfortable by forcing his attention and greetings on her.
Who are the characters in Miss Brill?
1. Miss Brill: A middle-aged, unmarried English woman who lives alone in a small apartment in France. She teaches English to students and reads the newspaper to an elderly man several times a week. One of her prized possessions is a fur necklet that she wears on a Sunday visit to the town's park.
Who are the characters in The Japanese Quince?
1. Mr. Nilson: London businessman who experiences worrisome symptoms even though he is the picture of good health. 2. Mr. Tandram: Nilson's next-door neighbor. He is also a businessman and experiences symptoms like Nilson's. 3. Wives of Nilson and Tandram: The narrator mentions the spouses, but they have no speaking role in the story.
Who are the characters in The Story of an Hour?
1. Mrs. Louise Mallard: Young, attractive woman who mourns the reported death of her husband but exults in the freedom she will enjoy in the years to come. 2. Brently Mallard: Mrs. Mallard's husband. 3. Josephine: Mrs. Mallard's sister. 4. Richards: Friend of Brently Mallard. 5. Doctors: Physicians who arrive too late to save Mrs. Mallard.
Who are the characters for Araby?
1. Narrator: Boy of about twelve who becomes infatuated with the sister of his friend, Mangan. Although she hardly notices him and converses with him only once, he fantasizes about her and tells her he will buy her a gift if he attends a bazaar called Araby. He seems to regard her as noble and pure of heart, like a maiden in a tale of chivalry. His trip to the bazaar to find her the gift then becomes something of a knight's quest on behalf of his lady fair. 2. Mangan: Boy about the same age as the narrator. He is a companion and neighbor of the narrator. 3. Other Neighbor Boys: Companions of the narrator. 4. Mangan's Sister: Girl to whom the narrator is attracted. 5. Narrator's Uncle, Aunt: Relatives who are rearing the narrator. The uncle, a drinker, addresses the narrator as "boy" (paragraph 14), suggesting that he is not close to his nephew. 6. Mrs. Mercer: Widow of a pawnbroker. She visits the narrator's home to collect used stamps to support what the narrator terms "a pious cause." 7. Schoolmaster: Narrator's teacher. 8. Stall Attendant: Young Englishwoman who sells vases, tea sets, and similar wares at the Araby bazaar. To the narrator, the fact that she is English diminishes the Middle Eastern atmosphere of the Araby bazaar. 9. Two Englishmen: Young men with whom the stall attendant flirts. 10. Dubliners: Pedestrians, shop boys, laborers, drunks. 11. Porters at Train Station 12. Attendant at Bazaar Turnstile
Who are the characters in A Worn Path?
1. Phoenix Jackson: Very old black woman with poor eyesight who walks a long distance through wilderness and fields to obtain medicine for her grandchild. She is the main character. 2. White Hunter: Man who helps Phoenix to her feet after she falls into a ditch. 3. Black Children: Children Phoenix encounters just before she reaches Natchez. 4. Natchez Pedestrian: Woman who ties Phoenix's shoes. 5. Attendant: Receptionist in a physician's office. 6. Nurse: Physician's nurse, who gives Phoenix medicine for her grandchild. 7. Grandson of Phoenix: Child who once swallowed lye. He requires medicine to treat his throat.
Who are the characters in A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings?
1. The Old Man: An old man with wings who appears in Pelayo and Elisenda's yard one day. Filthy and bedraggled, the old man speaks a foreign language that no one can understand. His wings and unintelligible language prompts some people to believe that he's a fallen angel and the church to believe he's a Norwegian, even though he seems oblivious to nearly everything that happens around him. By the end of the story, the old man has recovered enough to fly away, exiting Pelayo's and Elisenda's lives as suddenly as he'd entered. 2. Pelayo: Elisenda's husband and the discoverer of the old man. Pelayo is an ordinary villager, poor but grudgingly willing to shelter the winged old man in his chicken coop. Pelayo guards the old man from harm, humbly consults the village priest, and has the sense to resist the more extravagant advice he receives from the other villagers. Pelayo, however, does not want to take care of the man indefinitely and doesn't feel bad using the old man to get rich. 3. Elisenda: Pelayo's wife. Elisenda convinces Pelayo to charge villagers to see the old man but later considers him to be a nuisance. A practical woman, she primarily concerns herself with the welfare of Pelayo and their child and is therefore relieved when the old man finally leaves. 4. Father Gonzaga: The village priest. As an authority figure in the community, Father Gonzaga takes it upon himself to discern whether the old man is an angel as the townsfolk believe or just a mortal who just happens to have wings. Father Gonzaga is skeptical that the dirty old man could really be a messenger from heaven, but he dutifully reports the event to his superiors in the church. As he waits for the Vatican's reply, he does his best to restrain the enthusiasm and credulousness of the crowd of onlookers. 5. The Neighbor Woman: Pelayo and Elisenda's bossy neighbor. The supposedly wise neighbor woman actually seems more like a silly know-it-all than a true counselor and is the first to suggest that the old man is a crippled angel. She tells Pelayo to club the old man to death to prevent him from taking Pelayo and Elisenda's sick baby to heaven. 6. The Spider Woman: A freak-show attraction who visits the village. Punished for the sin of disobeying her parents, the spider woman now has the body of an enormous spider and the head of a sad young woman. The clear moral of the woman's story draws gawking villagers away from the old man, who is unable to offer the crowds such a compelling narrative.
What is the setting of A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings?
A small town that just went through a bad rain storm. The setting adds to the mood the story because the dreary description of the storm gives a uncertain/mysterious mood to the story.
Who is the author of How I Met My Husband?
Alice Munro.
Who is the author of Everyday Use?
Alice Walker.
What is the point of view of Araby?
An adolescent boy narrates the story in first-person point of view. He does not identify himself. But to readers familiar with the life and works of Joyce, it becomes clear that he represents the author. Joyce based characters, places, and events in the story on recollections from his boyhood, although he altered reality from time to time.
Who is the author of Hills Like White Elephants?
Ernest Hemingway.
What is the point of view of A Worn Path?
Eudora Welty presents the story in third-person point of view. She reveals the thoughts of the main character, Phoenix Jackson, in dialogue in which Phoenix talks to herself.
Who is the author of A Worn Path?
Eudora Welty.
Who is the author of A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings?
Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
What is the setting of Araby?
In "Araby" and other stories in Dubliners, Joyce presents Dublin as a bleak city struggling against oppressive forces. Winter scenes of boys at play take place near the dead end of North Richmond Street and in nearby lanes, as indicated in the first and third paragraphs. The climactic scene takes place in South Dublin, across the River Liffey from central Dublin, at a bazaar in a large building.
What is the point of view of Everyday Use?
In the story "Everyday Use" the point of view is that of first person narrator or major character. The story is told by the mother in the story.
Who is the author of Araby?
James Joyce.
Who is the author of The Japanese Quince?
John Galsworthy.
Who is the author of Desiree's Baby?
Kate Chopin.
Who is the author of The Story of an Hour?
Kate Chopin.
Who is the author of The Jilting of Granny Weatherall?
Katherine Anne Porter.
Who is the author of Miss Brill?
Katherine Mansfield.
What is the point of view for The Jilting of Granny Weatherall?
One of the most striking stylistic aspects of "The Jilting of Granny Weatherall" is its unusual narrative perspective. Though the story is written in the third person, its narrative point of view is extremely close to that of the central character, Granny Weatherall. The story is told through stream-of-consciousness.
What is the setting for Miss Brill?
The Jardins Publiques (Public Gardens) in a French town on an early autumn Sunday afternoon.
What is the setting of A Worn Path?
The action takes place in December, circa 1940, in southwestern Mississippi. The scene begins in the the wilderness and then shifts to the city of Natchez.
What is the setting of The Jilting of Granny Weatherall?
The action takes place in a bedroom in the home of Granny Weatherall's daughter Cornelia. Granny, about eighty, is lying face up in the bed. She is dying of an undisclosed illness. The time is probably the late 1920s. Flashbacks, however, date as far back as the late 1860s, when Granny's fiancé abandoned her on the day they were to be married.
What is the setting of Desiree's Baby?
The action takes place in the United States in the mid-nineteenth century on two Louisiana plantations, one called Valmondé, a family name, and the other called L'Abri (French for shelter). The story begins in the warm-weather months and ends in autumn.
What is the point of view of The Japanese Quince?
The narrator tells the story in third-person point of view. The viewpoint is omniscient only in relation to main character, Nilson—that is, the narrator reveals Nilson's unspoken thoughts but not Tandram's.
What is the point of view of I Stand Here Ironing?
The narrator's stream-of-consciousness narration reflects the free-flowing, unstructured form of her thoughts and reveals her struggle to make sense of her situation and find logic among the fragments of her past. The stream-of-consciousness structure allows the narrator to reveal herself on her own terms, a strategy that gives the narrator a fuller, unfiltered presence in the story. At the same time, this strategy forces us to consider that the narrator may be unreliable.
What is the point of view for A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings?
The point of view is third person limited, sometimes in the view of Pelayo and sometimes in the view of Elisenda, but never the angel.
What is the point of view of How I Met My Husband?
The point of view used in the short story How I Met My Husband was in first person. Edie, the central character, was the narrator for the story. This was very effective because It allowed the reader to channel into her thoughts and feelings.
Describe the setting for The Story of an Hour?
The story is set in the late nineteenth century in the home of Louise Mallard.
What is the setting of I Stand Here Ironing?
The story moves through a fairly long timeframe; although it is set in the early 1950s, it looks back to the 1930s (the time of the Great Depression), and the 1940s (the time of the Second World War). The story is set in the working class home of the narrator, who comments that when her first child was born, they "were poor and could not afford for her the soil of easy growth."
Describe the setting for The Japanese Quince?
The story takes place on Campden Hill in London in the early twentieth century. The main character and his neighbor both work in London's financial district, known as "the city."
What is the point of view in Hills Like White Elephants?
The third-person narrator takes the fly-on-the-wall technique to extremes in "Hills Like White Elephants. The fact that the story is told in the past tense means the narrator is putting it together after the fact, from memory, so to speak, and rendering it in symbolic terms, using simile and metaphor.
What is the setting of How I Met My Husband?
This story took place somewhere out in the country. Mr. and Mrs. Peebles live in a nice home with plenty of empty land around it. The story does not take place anywhere else besides in flashbacks by the narrator.
Who is the author of I Stand Here Ironing?
Tillie Olsen.
