English 123—Yanover
Discussion of
Shirley Jackson’s short story “The Lottery”
W.H. Auden’s poem “Musée des Beaux Arts”
Philip Levine’s poem “They Feed, They Lion”
Deborah Pope’s poem “Getting Through”
Katharyn Howd Machan’s poem “Hazel tells LaVerne”
David Ives’ play “Words, Words, Words”
Elect a person in your group to fill each of the following roles:
 A leader to keep everyone on task and to make sure everyone participates fully and
equally,
 A notetaker to take notes for the group which the reporter can refer to when presenting
your findings to the class,
 A reporter to present your findings to the class,
 A researcher to help find evidence in the texts.
Discuss each of the above works in relation to the four prompts below. Notetaker, write your
notes on a separate piece of paper, and include all group members’ names at the top left.
1. What is each writer is saying about human nature or what it means to be human?
2. How and why does each text manipulate the reader’s feelings?
3. How and why does each writer play with language?
4. How and why does each writer use repetition?
5. What prompts would your group add that could be applied meaningfully and specifically to
each of the works above?
6. Finally, what questions does your group have about the works and/or prompts that you would
like clarified?