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4.22.7: Reading and Review Questions

  • Page ID
    63817
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    1. In “Benito Cereno,” how do Delano’s self-reassurances about and obliviousness to the black’s mutiny reflect the self-delusions of proslavers to the independent power and nature of blacks?
    2. In ”The Paradise of Bachelors and the Tartarus of Maids,” the women in the factory produce blank notepaper. How might the blank paper represent their lives, especially contrasted with those of the bachelors with their varied stories? What is Melville’s point here?
    3. In the paper factory in “The Paradise of Bachelors and the Tartarus of Maids,” why do you think the narrator’s guide is named Cupid? Why is Cupid innocently cruel?
    4. How does the unnamed narrator of “Bartleby, the Scrivener” fail Bartleby? Does his failure leave the narrator unredeemable? How might the narrator’s treatment of and relation to Bartleby connect with the (possible) meaning of the Dead Letter Office?

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