Questions over My Wood:Purpose

1. Why does Forster write about the effects that buying a piece of land has on a person’s character instead of writing about the effects that making money has on a person’s character? How are the two different?

2. Why does Forster apologize for the effects of owning his property?

Questions about My Wood:Audience

1. What kind of people does Forster seem to think might criticize him for owning property?

2. How do you think people who own a large amount of property would react to this essay? Would they understand Forster’s concerns?

Questions about My Wood:Strategies

1. Using his own experience as a basis, Forster generalizes about the effects on a person of owning property. Do you think he is justified in making his generalizations?

2. How does he use the bird and the blackberries to illustrate how his property makes him feel possessive?

Satire vs. Parody

• With your group:– Define Satire – Define Parody– Identify what is different about the two of them

Satire versus Parody

• Satire: a piece of writing in which the subject is exposed to ridicule of some kind, in an attempt to provoke or prevent a change; generally political, social, or moral, rarely humorous

• Parody: a form of satire that mimics another piece of work in order to ridicule it; generally humorous

Goya’s The Inquisition

Monty Python’s Inquisition

• Netflix: (you will need to install their instant play software, should not be a problem)

• Search: Monty Pythons Flying Circus

• Click on first result (should have Instant Play as an option)

• #15 on right hand side list: The Spanish Inquisition

• Time: 1:25-6:30

Theodore Geisel, on American Involvement in WWII

Unknown Artist, Punch magazine

1941• Netflix: search 1941 Time: 1:16 to 1:20 or so.• Setup: December, 1941, two weeks after the attack on Pearl

Harbor, America is still reeling from the unexpected blow. Cities around the country have set up militias or have called in military groups and are preparing for the full-scale invasion most Americans believe is coming.

• In this film, Los Angeles hosts several units of soldiers. A new commander is trying to impress his airplane-crazy girlfriend and commandeers a plane- a captured Japanese plane, to be exact. He, however, does not know how to fly and soon ends up over Los Angeles. The units stationed in LA respond, thinking the plane is a Japanese scout, mobilize, throwing the town into a panic. (what they don’t know is that there is, indeed, a Japanese submarine off the coast preparing to fire on LA)

The Simpsons

Assignment:

• Explain, in a brief paragraph with a clear main idea, how Forster uses satire in his piece, My Wood.