Exploring the Text

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  1. What is the purpose of the opening paragraph of the story?

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    Exploring the Text: - What is the purpose of the opening paragraph of the story?
  2. How does Nathaniel Hawthorne describe the protagonist in the second paragraph? Why does Hawthorne present him this way?

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    Exploring the Text: - How does Nathaniel Hawthorne describe the protagonist in the second paragraph? Why does Hawthorne present him this way?
  3. What might be significant about Robin’s name? Why is it significant that he has come from the country to the town and that he has arrived by ferry, across the water?

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    Exploring the Text: - What might be significant about Robin’s name? Why is it significant that he has come from the country to the town and that he has arrived by ferry, across the water?
  4. At first, Robin seems filled with both self-confidence and uncertainty. Find evidence of both qualities. Identify at least three assumptions that he holds and three misunderstandings that he makes as he wanders through the town in search of his kinsman.

    Question

    ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=
    Exploring the Text: - At first, Robin seems filled with both self-confidence and uncertainty. Find evidence of both qualities. Identify at least three assumptions that he holds and three misunderstandings that he makes as he wanders through the town in search of his kinsman.
  5. In terms of Robin’s understanding of his own identity, what is the significance in paragraph 53 of his question, “Am I here, or there?”

    Question

    ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=
    Exploring the Text: - In terms of Robin’s understanding of his own identity, what is the significance in paragraph 53 of his question, “Am I here, or there?”
  6. How many times in the story is Robin characterized as “shrewd”? Is the characterization ironic? Describe and discuss the significance of each instance.

    Question

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    Exploring the Text: - How many times in the story is Robin characterized as “shrewd”? Is the characterization ironic? Describe and discuss the significance of each instance.
  7. When Robin finally meets his kinsman, Hawthorne describes the encounter: “They stared at each other in silence, and Robin’s knees shook, and his hair bristled, with a mixture of pity and terror” (par. 82). In his Poetics, Aristotle defined tragedy as “an imitation of action” that arouses “pity and terror” in its audience. Why would Hawthorne use those exact words? Does the meeting provide the catharsis that Aristotle discusses? Explain.

    Question

    ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=
    Exploring the Text: - When Robin finally meets his kinsman, Hawthorne describes the encounter: “They stared at each other in silence, and Robin’s knees shook, and his hair bristled, with a mixture of pity and terror” (par. 82). In his Poetics, Aristotle defined tragedy as “an imitation of action” that arouses “pity and terror” in its audience. Why would Hawthorne use those exact words? Does the meeting provide the catharsis that Aristotle discusses? Explain.
  8. What has become of Robin’s kinsman? What is significant in that, as Robin witnesses Major Molineux’s fate, “Robin’s shout was the loudest there” (par. 84)?

    Question

    ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=
    Exploring the Text: - What has become of Robin’s kinsman? What is significant in that, as Robin witnesses Major Molineux’s fate, “Robin’s shout was the loudest there” (par. 84)?
  9. What does Robin learn from his experience about his own identity? Will he return home? Why or why not?

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    ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=
    Exploring the Text: - What does Robin learn from his experience about his own identity? Will he return home? Why or why not?
  10. How does Hawthorne use this story as an exploration of the nature of temptation and guilt? Explain, using the experience of Robin to support your conclusions.

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    Exploring the Text: - How does Hawthorne use this story as an exploration of the nature of temptation and guilt? Explain, using the experience of Robin to support your conclusions.
  11. In The Experience of Literature (1967), acclaimed scholar Lionel Trilling states:

    Regarding “My Kinsman, Major Molineux”: Can we suppose that a man like Hawthorne, a man notable for his gentleness, is saying that the dark and evil impulses of the savage mob have some beneficent part in the young man’s development? Can he be telling us that the experience of evil is necessary to the understanding and practice of good, or that what is thought bad by gentle and pious people is not really, or not wholly, bad? The questions that press upon us cannot be answered with any assurance that we are responding with precise understanding to what the author means.

    Do you agree that these questions cannot be answered? As a symbol, what might the kinsman, Major Molineux, represent? What might be the significance of the grotesque leader of the procession and the kindly stranger? How might Robin’s quest serve as an allegory for the development of the American character?

    Question

    ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=
    Exploring the Text: - In The Experience of Literature (1967), acclaimed scholar Lionel Trilling states:Regarding “My Kinsman, Major Molineux”: Can we suppose that a man like Hawthorne, a man notable for his gentleness, is saying that the dark and evil impulses of the savage mob have some beneficent part in the young man’s development? Can he be telling us that the experience of evil is necessary to the understanding and practice of good, or that what is thought bad by gentle and pious people is not really, or not wholly, bad? The questions that press upon us cannot be answered with any assurance that we are responding with precise understanding to what the author means.Do you agree that these questions cannot be answered? As a symbol, what might the kinsman, Major Molineux, represent? What might be the significance of the grotesque leader of the procession and the kindly stranger? How might Robin’s quest serve as an allegory for the development of the American character?
  12. Professor Agnes Donohue, in her 1962 book, A Casebook on the Hawthorne Question, states:

    The ambiguity in Hawthorne’s stories is at once his triumph and, for some literalist critics, his failure. The tension it creates is a dramatic asset. Many of the tales, or romances as he thought of them, are multi-leveled ironic explorations of the human psyche—capable of endless extensions of meaning and of stimulating repeated analysis and interpretation.

    Do you regard the ambiguity of Hawthorne’s work as a triumph or a failure? Explain.

    Question

    ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=
    Exploring the Text: - Professor Agnes Donohue, in her 1962 book, A Casebook on the Hawthorne Question, states:The ambiguity in Hawthorne’s stories is at once his triumph and, for some literalist critics, his failure. The tension it creates is a dramatic asset. Many of the tales, or romances as he thought of them, are multi-leveled ironic explorations of the human psyche—capable of endless extensions of meaning and of stimulating repeated analysis and interpretation.Do you regard the ambiguity of Hawthorne’s work as a triumph or a failure? Explain.