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Choose one of the stories to apply feminist criticism to the reading. Identify the protagonist and antagonist and describe their relationship as it relates to the theme. How does the relationship to the foil, if there is one, reflect the theme? Identify whether the protagonist is round or flat, dynamic or static. Support your response with examples from the text.
 * Chopin’s “Story of and Hour” and Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper”**

 Chopin’s “Story of an hour” Louise would be the protagonist because she is the main character. The antagonist is her husband because would not only be her husband but society itself...patriarchy…Louise’s life was basically ran by her husband and she wasn’t able to do the things she wanted in life…she had no freedom, no say in anything. A loss of freedom can bring you and your spirit down… Louise ….to me she would be considered to be a round character because throughout the story I saw many different sides and emotions. One minute she was very sad to hear that her husband died, then the next minute she felt like a burden was lifted off her shoulders feeling more free, then when she found out her husband didn’t die she became disappointed and died from shock. Mrs. Mallard was a dynamic character because she changed throughout the story not just by her having an emotional rollercoaster but all the different thoughts she had running in and out of her head about her husband’s supposal death. She thought that she could finally do what she wanted to do in life without some man blocking her way. Only feeling freedom for a couple of minutes, it was snatched away from her as soon as her eyes seen her husband…it was all over. In Wharton’s “April Showers” the father shows dialect in when he states “ Who was to take it, I should like to know? The girls came down so late that I had to hustle them off before they'd finished breakfast, and Johnny's hands were so dirty that I sent him back to his room to make himself decent. It's a pretty thing for the doctor's children to be the dirtiest little savages in Norton!" This shows that Theodora was clearly distracted with writing her novel, that she wasn’t keeping up with her mother’s wishes to help with her younger siblings. This influences her id because obviously she just wanted to write and it was very distracting. Theodora’s ego was influenced by her secretly writing her novel and trying to take care of her family at the same time. Superego was influenced by deciding whether to take care of her family or just to continue writing her novel, but she realized the right decision in the end. In Stephen Crane’s “Mystery of Heroism” describes a young man named Fred Collins who is in a battlefield at war. Later in the story Collins keeps nagging about how he really wishes he had a drink but he knew the drinking wale was one the other side of the field with his enemies. His friends basically dared him and kept going on about how he wouldn’t even think about going to the other side because chances are he would be killed. Taking the dare Collins started making his way to the other side while getting shot at and almost killed. While ducking and diving from the flying bullets he saw a man hung over with a messed up arm who was begging for water but Collins was on a mission to fill up the bucket he had been carrying to the wale, once he got the bucket filled up he started to do this silly run because the bucket was so heavy full of water. Once again he saw the man who had begged him for water… the mood the author sets the mood in this story to be a life threatening moment for Collins, you can almost feel his anxiety. Collins tried to get the unconscious man to drink the water but was running out of time so he splashed the water on the mans face and kept it moving to where he needed to be. By the time he got back, his bucket was empty and everyone laughed at him…But yet in a way he was a hero…even though he never even got a drank. In the story there are some very strong images given that created the mood for the story. At the beginning I could hear the sounds of cannons and guns going off from the opposite sides, people yelling in pain and in curse words. You can see injured men laying in the once pretty field but now slaughtered dirt. Picture the man begging for water while he was in such pain almost on his death bed and the only thing he had left for to make him feel somewhat better is that last drank of water. The mood of the setting reflects Collins motivations driven by his id, ego, and superego… His id wanted to prove his friends wrong by taking the dare to get the water even though he knew the negative chances he was facing. The ego wanted him to hurry up and give the man the water that he begged for and to get out of there before he got killed, even though he just actually splashed the water on him and went on. Collins superego was deciding on wether or not to stop and get this random man on the opposite side of his team some water even if it was risking his life. He had to chosen right from wrong. The conclusion of the story to me is that Collins is proven to be a hero, even though he never accomplished to get what he wanted which was a cool refreshing drink of water. At first he really just wanted to prove his friend’s wrong that doubted him so much, but when he crossed that mans path that was dying begging for water he found a truer meaning to why he left for this water in the first place. He risked his life for a man that he should’ve been fighting but he knew right from wrong in his heart and chose the perfect decision, forgetting about what his friends thought or even his own desire…

In Twain’s “ The Invalid’s Story” Thompson shows very strong dialect when he states ”Twould 'a' ben a dum sight better, all around, if they'd starved him along last summer." Basically it tells that the narrators dead friends smell was so horrible and Thompson was stating that maybe if the dead friend would’ve starved they’re situation wouldn’t be so bad because he wouldn’t of smelled so bad. This influenced the narrators and Thompson’s id by wanting to get rid of the smell. The ego was influenced was when both characters gathered a ton of random things and lit them on fire trying to overpower the smell of the body. Superego was influenced by the narrator wanting to give his dead friend a proper burial and not to just dump his body somewhere.

Select an example of imagery that creates the mood of the story? How does the mood of the setting reflect the character’s motivations driven by their id, ego, and superego?
 * Crane’s “Mystery of Heroism”**

How does the author indirectly characterize the protagonist through the use of dialect? What does this tell us about the character? How are they influenced by their id, ego, or superego? In Mark Twain’s “The Invalid’s Story,” the protagonist is traveling to Wisconsin to return his dead friend’s body home. Somehow a box of rifles gets switched with his dead friends body, unaware to the protagonist. While on the train we meet an express man, named Thompson, who has brought a package of Limburger cheese with him. As the train ride continued so did the stench of the cheese, mistaken for a dead corpse. The protagonist wants to follow his id by tossing the body out of the train, but was stopped by his duty to protect his friend’s body, his superego. To please both (ego), Thompson and the protagonist try everything they can think of to mask the smell, but end up riding on the platform in a winter storm. “Twould ‘a’ been a dum sight better, all around, if they’d started him along last summer,” Thompson said. You can tell Thompson is southern by the way he speaks. You can also tell that he knows a lot about the military because he promotes the invalid to a higher ranking the smellier he gets. In Edith Wharton’s “April Showers,” the protagonist is a young girl named Theodora Dace. All Theodora wants is to become a writer and follows her id by making that happen. She writes a story and sends it into a magazine that misprints her name and story. Theodora’s mother is sick so she has left most of the responsibilities of the house to Theodora. Her superego is to take care of her family which forces her to write secretly. Sometimes Theodora gets too caught up in writing she lacks on her responsibilities. To balance it out she thinks that she will become a famous writer and spend her earnings on her family.
 * Wharton’s “April Showers” and Twain’s “The Invalid’s Story”**