Explícate a short story in your own words
Answer the following prompt:
Select ONE of the short stories that we have read (“Do Not Go Gentle,” “Woman Hollering Creek,” “Speech Sounds,” or “Exhalation”). Select a passage (a quote) from the story and explicate it. To explicate a passage means to explain what it means and why it is important for understanding the meaning of the story. The object is not only to explain what the quote means in your own words, but to demonstrate why this could be the most important quote in the story. Why does this quote have so much meaning and importance in the story as a whole?
Note: pick a quote that is NO LONGER than THREE sentences long. The purpose of this paper is NOT to fill it with a large quote, but to find a brief passage to analyze. The focus should be on the analysis.
Follow these steps in your explication:
1. In your first sentence/paragraph, include the full title of the story and the author’s full name (after this, refer to the author by his or her last name only). Write a topic sentence that explains what you think is the larger idea or theme of the story.
2. Introduce the quote (make sure to cite and quote it thoroughly), and then explain in your own words what the story is saying.
3. Pull back and put the quote in the larger context of the story. Who is saying it? Why? What does it show us about the character, theme, setting, meaning of the story, etc? So what?
4. Is there any other place in the story where we can see the meaning of the quote really shining through? Why is this a quote that could give us access to understanding the story as a whole? Explain.
