Discussion Questions:

• To what is Collins comparing a poem when he asks readers to "drop a mouse into a poem/ and watch his probe his way out" (lines 5-6). Does this conflict with other descriptions in the poem?

• What sort of images does Collins use when speaking about a reader encountering a poem?

• To what degree does this poem embody or exemplify what it implies about poetry?

AP Prompt Prep:

1. What is significant about the selection of objects being compared? Which of the comparisons are positive and which are negative? How does this balance or imbalance affect the meaning of the poem?

2. How does Collins' use of enjambment create meaning?

AP Daily Guided Notes

1. AP Daily Unit 2, Video 1.A

"Ulysses" Discussion Questions

1. Who is Ulysses?

2. How does Ulysses define experience? What does this mean?

3. How does the poem characterize its situation and setting?

4. How does Ulysses explain and justify leaving his home? How, in the process, does he characterize the two ways of life associated with staying and leaving?

5. How are Telemachus and Penelope characterized here? What might Ulysses' mode of referencing to these characters tell us about him?

6. What might Ulysses mean when he says, "I am become a name" (line 11)? In what way is that a positive or negative thing?

"Ulysses" AP Prep

1. How does Ulysses characterize Telemachus as a ruler of Ithaca? Identify specific diction to support your answer.

"Ulysses" AP Lit Prompt

1. In lines 56-70 of "Ulysses" by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, the speaker addresses a group of elderly sailors. Read this portion of the poem carefully. Then in a well written paragraph analyze how the speaker uses poetic devices to illustrate the complexity of his message.

Discussion Questions:

1. What is the relationship between the first and second halves of the poem? To what degree does the second half come as a result of the first half? How are the two united?

2. In what ways is humility expressed in this poem? In what ways is a rebuke expressed? How does the poem reconcile sentiments of humility and rebuke?

3. Diction:

   • What words, phrases, or lines in the poem are associated with Africa or Africans? 

   • What words, phrases, or lines are about America? 

   • Based on the way the word is used in context, what does “benighted” probably mean? How do you know? What other words in the poem are synonyms of “benighted”? What about the word “sable”? 

   • Find the verbs in the poem. What verb tenses does Wheatley use? Which verbs are in past tense, and why? Which are in present tense, and why? Does Wheatley use future tense? If so, where, and why? 

4. Line 6 is punctuated with quotation marks. Why? Who is Wheatley quoting? Who is the intended audience for the poem? How do you know? Carefully reread lines 7-8. What does Wheatley want to make sure her audience understands? 

5. What is the central claim of “On Being Brought from Africa to America”? What reason(s) or evidence does the speaker give in support of this claim? 

6. Context: Excerpt from “Phillis Wheatley,” in The Black Presence in the Era of the American Revolution:

 A black voice in the Christian white wilderness cries out in these lines. After all the obvious comments are duly made—she rejects her heritage, she accepts the myth of Cain, she expects her soul to be whitewashed in heaven— there is still much undiminished spirit to be found in this little poem. The charged voice of the outraged girl, defending “our sable race” against a “scornful eye,” is rightfully stored in the mind. 

Modern critics have accused Wheatley, or at least the primary voice in her poem, of rejecting her African heritage and engaging in racial self-hatred. But such critics confuse accommodation with appropriation. Like many authors of African descent who followed her, Wheatley repeatedly appropriates the values of Christianity to judge and find wanting hypocritical self-styled Christians of European descent. Theologically, Wheatley perceives her capture in Africa as leading to a fortunate fall that allows her formerly “benighted soul” to rise to embrace Christianity. […T]he “mercy” acknowledged in “On Being Brought from Africa to America” is granted not only to the speaker of the latter poem. The “Father of mercy,” through her poetry, also grants it to her readers, who must choose between being among the “Some [who] view our sable race with scornful eye” and those who embrace the truth and “Remember [that], Christians, Negros, black as Cain, / May be refin’d, and join th’ angelic train.” Wheatley’s position is completely consistent with belief in an omniscient and benevolent deity, but it does not necessarily imply that she either accepts or endorses slavery. Physical slavery paradoxically leads to the spiritual freedom offered to the servants, slaves, of Christ. 

6. • According to Vincent Carretta, what do “[m]odern critics” say about “On Being Brought from Africa to America”? 

   • Does Carretta agree with them? 

   • According to Carretta, what do “such critics” get wrong about this poem? What, according to Carretta, is Wheatley’s real purpose in addressing Christians? 

   • How does Wheatley use language that will make her Christian audience more likely to listen to what she has to say? 

   • What does Carretta say in this passage about Phillis Wheatley’s religious beliefs? Does this support or conflict with his analysis of the poem? 

7. View this clip from The Greatest African American Authors series. Notice Dr. Dana Williams’s interpretation of “On Being Brought from Africa to America.” 

   • What does Dr. Williams mean when she says that this poem is “ironic”? 

   • What does she say is the central claim of the poem? 

   • What evidence from the poem – or from Phillis Wheatley’s biography – supports that claim? 

Discussion Questions:

• What does the speaker hope to gain by drawing attention to the flea?

• Summarize the speakers argument in each stanza. How does his argument develop, shift, and adapt? Is his argument effective?

• What is notable about the poem's title? How is "The Flea" part of the speaker's argument about love? Does using the flea as a metaphor demean the speaker's argument?

• How does the speaker refer to such serious things as sin, death, and killing in relation to love? Is a deeper relationship between these things implied in the poem?

AP Prompt Prep:

1. Develop a thesis statement that conveys the speaker's use of poetic elements to bolster his argument. 

2. Select specific phrases from the poem as evidence to to support the thesis. 

3. Explain the relationship between the evidence and thesis in writing, taking into consideration the most effective ways to organize ideas and support. 

4. Revise for organization, clarity, and grammar.

Discussion Questions:

• What is the overall message the speaker is trying to convey to the son?

• Based on the details in the poem, how would you characterize the mother?

• The speaker employs an extended metaphor to explain her life to her son. 

  • What does the crystal stair represents? 

  • Why do you think the poet has chosen to repeat this image in the final line? 

  • What might the details of tacks, splinters, landings, and corners represent? 

  • What does the inclusion of these suggest about the mother's relationship with her son?

• What effect do colloquial expressions and dialect have on your understanding of the speaker? What effect do they have on the meaning of the poem?

• How old do you think the son might be? Explain your reasoning.

• Does it seem like the son might be at some kind of crossroads in his life?

• Is the mother in this poem lecturing, advising, apologizing, pleading, showing affection, or criticizing? Does it have to only be one? How would you characterize the tone of the poem?

• Even though there are no stanza breaks, there are definitely shifts or "turns" in the poem. What are these shifts? Reading the poem, where/ how would you emphasize them and why? Does breaking the poem in different places change the menaning of the poem?

AP Prompt Prep:

1. Develop a thesis statement that conveys the speaker's use of poetic elements to bolster his argument. 

2. Select specific phrases from the poem as evidence to to support the thesis. 

3. Explain the relationship between the evidence and thesis in writing, taking into consideration the most effective ways to organize ideas and support. 

4. Revise for organization, clarity, and grammar.

Select one of the songs below, create a slide show to present to the class discussing the main metaphor and then how the extension with details and additional comparisons creates additional meaning. 

• You will have one major tenor and vehicle, like in "The Flea" or "Mother to Son,"  but the additional details will create a rounded out picture of the comparison/ analogy. 

• Be sure you explain how or why you think this extended metaphor is effective

Song Selections: