Choices

In The Highest Tide, Florence tells Miles O’Malley, “This is your summer, Miles. This is the summer that defines you.” (47)

Assuming her prophecy is right, how has Miles defined himself by the end of the summer? Or, put another way, at the critical defining moments of the summer, Miles makes choices that can be viewed in terms of loyalties or betrayals. How do these critical choices indicate the person that he is choosing to become?

Imagine

Snowman and the Crakers...plus maybe 3 more people. What will he choose to do? At the end of the novel, is Snowman a phoenix rising from the ashes and is there a hope for rebirth? Can he "Imagine"?

Margaret Atwood was in the process of writing Oryx and Crake, had mapped out the novel and reached the end of Part 7 by September 11, 2001. She recalls, "It's deeply unsettling when you're writing about a fictional catastrophe and then a real one happens."

She classifies Oryx and Crake as "speculative fiction" rather than "science fiction," since it "invents nothing we haven't already invented or started to invent....It's not a question of our inventions - all human inventions are merely tools --but of what might be done with them; for no matter how high the tech, homo sapiens sapiens remains at heart what he's been for tens of thousands of years - the same emotions, the same preoccupations."

Ultimately, "We are betrayed by what is false within."

The novel ends with Chapter 15. Post in your response what you think Snowman will do and what will happen in the next chapters.

Sideman

Many of our novels tell the story of loyalty/betrayal between two close friends. This relationship is often quite complex, but frequently one person emerges as the leader, while the other is the "sideman." Listen to Paul Muldoon reading his poem "Sideman," and post your response about how this poem might shed light on the changing nature of the relationship of the dyad in "Absolutely True Diary" or even in our current novel. (I do not have the text of the poem at this point, so you may have to listen to it several times.) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvnlgjsXJ28

Character Foils

In a literary work, a minor character, often known as a foil, possesses traits that emphasize, by contrast or comparison, distinctive characteristics and qualities of the main character. For example, the ideas or behavior of the minor character might be used to highlight the weaknesses or strengths of the main character.

In The Kite Runner, analyze the ways that the character Hassan functions as a foil to Amir, and the ways that their relationship illuminates the meaning of the work.