
Corinne Smith
eNotes Educator
Achievements
8
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451
Answers Posted
46
Answers Bonused
About
I'm a writer and an outdoor educator who worked as a librarian for more than 30 years. I know a little bit about a lot of subjects ... and I know where to find the answers for the rest.
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Recent Activity
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Answered a Question in The Way to Rainy Mountain
Sometimes the image of a house can be used as a metaphor for the human body. For instance: Have you ever heard of an older person with white hair being described as having “snow on the roof?” This... -
Answered a Question in My Side of the Mountain
In fact, the sixteenth chapter is titled “In Which Trouble Begins.” Sam refers here to his interactions with people in the nearby town. When he walks into a store wearing his deerskin clothing, a... -
Answered a Question in The Catbird Seat
A foil is a person who sets off or enhances another by contrast. Because Erwin Martin and Ulgine Barrows have such opposite personalities and conflicting work ethics for F & S, they make... -
Answered a Question in Into the Wild
The story of Ron Franz’s interaction with Chris McCandless is told in Chapter Six, “Anza-Borrego,” of Into the Wild. (Ronald A. Franz is not his real name. When he asked for anonymity, author Jon... -
Answered a Question in The Way to Rainy Mountain
This quotation comes from the Introduction of The Way to Rainy Mountain. Here, we are introduced not only to the author’s grandmother, Aho, but also to her native people, the Kiowa. The text... -
Answered a Question in Whale Talk
Your choice of pinpointing the climax scene of Whale Talk may change as you finish reading the book and as you think more about what happens in the last two chapters. T. J.’s main goal in his... -
Answered a Question in The Way to Rainy Mountain
Momaday does indeed use a unique structure to convey the story of his grandmother Aho and to explore the history of his ancestors, the Kiowa people. The Way to Rainy Mountain is not a book that... -
Answered a Question in Civil Disobedience
Compare Henry David Thoreau’s essay “Resistance to Civil Government” (now known as “Civil Disobedience”) with Ralph Waldo Emerson’s essay “Self-Reliance.” While Emerson speaks in more general terms... -
Answered a Question in The Way to Rainy Mountain
What you have quoted are the last five sentences of the Introduction’s first paragraph. Momaday sets the trend at once by using specific descriptive language so that readers can imagine or picture... -
Answered a Question in Sid Fleischman
By the Great Horn Spoon! is a humorous tale of travel by a twelve-year old boy named Jack Flagg and his butler, Praiseworthy. It takes them from Boston to the gold fields of California in 1849.... -
Answered a Question in Literature
In the YA novel Being Henry David, a teen wakes up in New York City’s Penn Station without any clue of who he is and how he got there. Since all he has is a copy of Thoreau’s Walden, he calls... -
Answered a Question in My Side of the Mountain
In the eleventh chapter of My Side of the Mountain, titled “In Which Frightful Learns her ABC’s,” Sam Gribley teaches himself the process of making acorn pancakes. By this time, Sam has become... -
Answered a Question in The Way to Rainy Mountain
At its core, The Way to Rainy Mountain serves as a way for the author to answer the questions “Who am I?” and “Where did my people come from?” He is in search of his ancestors, in search of his own... -
Answered a Question in My Side of the Mountain
These are the last three chapters of the book. By now, the seasons have turned to Spring. Teenager Sam Gribley has been living by himself in the Catskills for almost a year. And for most of this... -
Answered a Question in The Night Thoreau Spent in Jail
The play The Night Thoreau Spent in Jail is a fictionalized account of an actual day in July 1846, when Henry David Thoreau was kept in jail overnight for nonpayment of the annual poll tax. In... -
Answered a Question in Civil Disobedience
Ironically, even though popular culture now firmly associates Henry David Thoreau with the concept of “civil disobedience,” the truth is that the author never used this phrase in his famous essay.... -
Answered a Question in A Sound of Thunder
The first time we hear this phrase is when the dinosaur crashes into the jungle. The noise it creates is like the roar of thunder during a tremendous storm. It scares Eckels enough that he has to... -
Answered a Question in Outliers: The Story of Success
Malcolm Gladwell ends the book Outliers with his own origin story. He describes how his mother, Joyce Nation, grew up in Jamaica as one of a pair of twin sisters. The two girls were lucky enough to... -
Answered a Question in A River Runs Through It
This is the final sentence of the book. The author uses this memoir to recount how important the activity of fly fishing was to him, his brother Paul, and his father. In fact, Maclean opens the... -
Answered a Question in Environment
This advice prods us to consider the future, and not to focus on the present or on the past. Instead of living just for today and gratifying our own immediate needs, we should think about how our... -
Answered a Question in Civil Disobedience
This reference comes right away, in the first paragraph of Thoreau’s essay “Civil Disobedience.” The full sentence reads: Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually,... -
Answered a Question in A Sound of Thunder
“The Sound of Thunder” is a cautionary tale of the power of cause and effect. It serves as a stark reminder to us that each and every single one of our acts has the ability to impact our own... -
Answered a Question in Literary Terms
Let’s backtrack a bit. A story told in first person is narrated by one character; or perhaps by a series of characters in separate chapters. The person uses the word “I” and talks to us as if we... -
Answered a Question in Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
When snow falls on the landscape, it softens sharp edges and hides some things from view. It can add beauty to something usually seen as ugly, like a junkyard or an abandoned and ramshackle... -
Answered a Question in Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog)
If you look closely enough, you realize that most of the pages are taken up by stories of past events, as related by the narrator, J. He tells more about what happened on other trips, during other... -
Answered a Question in Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog)
The narrator tells the story of his Uncle Podger at the beginning of Chapter III because he is reminded of the man sometimes when he deals with his friend Harris. J. relates the time his uncle... -
Answered a Question in Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog)
The narrator is referred to as “J.” in the book. In real life, Mr. Jerome and two of his friends did take extended trips along the River Thames. But this account is fictitious, even though it may... -
Answered a Question in My Side of the Mountain
Young Sam Gribley has been living off the land for more than a year, in the Catskill Mountains north of New York City. He initially ran away from home and his large family so he could live on his... -
Answered a Question in The Help
At its core, The Help is a book about a book. The three main characters – Aibileen Clark, Minny Jackson, and Eugenia “Skeeter” Phelan – are compiling a book about the lives of the black maids of... -
Answered a Question in Literature
The Help is a novel of historical fiction, set in Jackson, Mississippi, in the early 1960s. Its main idea is to show the racial divide between the white and black people who live in this community... -
Answered a Question in Into the Wild
The short answer is not much, and sadly, not enough for him to survive. He had basic clothes, personal care items, camping supplies, and a tent with him before he hitchhiked from Carthage, South... -
Answered a Question in The Help
Here are six significant scenes in The Help. Whether they are the biggest ones or the most meaningful ones is a matter of personal perspective. The first two actually happen off-camera, so to... -
Answered a Question in The Help
Some time after we read a book or watch a movie, we find ourselves recalling certain scenes or dialogues that resonated with us. The “most memorable” ones are a matter of personal perspective and... -
Answered a Question in The Help
The Help is set in Jackson, Mississippi, in the early 1960s. The author has to convey the times and the settings through descriptions that the readers will understand; and she also has to be true... -
Answered a Question in Walden
Henry Thoreau doesn’t specifically offer advice to anyone already living in dire poverty, per se. Instead, in the “Economy” chapter of Walden, he recommends simplifying one’s life as much as... -
Answered a Question in Henry David Thoreau
As a Transcendentalist, Henry Thoreau believed in the power of the individual; and that everyone has an internal “higher law” that successfully guides them through life. In the fourth paragraph of... -
Answered a Question in Life on the Mississippi
Mark Twain tells this story in Chapter IX, “Continued Perplexities.” Having grown up along the Mississippi River, Twain had always found beauty in it. He remembered a specific sunset that was... -
Answered a Question in Into the Wild
Chris may not have known for sure what he was looking for, but he did know what he wanted to escape from: a life in the suburbs with people he could not trust. (His parents, for example.) He wanted... -
Answered a Question in Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog)
The three friends—J., George, and Harris—and the dog Montmorency have embarked on a boating trip along the River Thames. They planned to take two weeks to go upriver from Kingston to Oxford, and... -
Answered a Question in My Side of the Mountain
Sam Gribley has successfully run away from home and is living off the land in the Catskill Mountains. He trains a falcon to help him hunt small animals for food. He names her Frightful. In the 13th... -
Answered a Question in Into the Wild
During the course of his research, Jon Krakauer was able to track down a number of primary sources of Chris McCandless’s writings. These included: (1) Chris’s main journal, which he left behind... -
Answered a Question in Civil Disobedience
As a Transcendentalist, Henry Thoreau believed in the power of the individual, and that people hold their own “higher laws” in their hearts and minds and souls, independent of any man-made... -
Answered a Question in Transcendentalism
The concept of Transcendentalism defies easy description or definition. Even among the major figures of the movement in its day (Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Margaret Fuller, etc.) and... -
Answered a Question in The Story of My Life
I believe the theme of this chapter in Helen Keller’s memoir is “Triumph over many challenges.” Here she tells the story of how difficult it was for her to complete her college preparatory work.... -
Answered a Question in The Story of My Life
Merton Spencer Keith (1851-1920) became Helen’s tutor after she left the Cambridge School for Young Ladies and its principal, Arthur Gilman. She still had much studying to do before she could take... -
Answered a Question in The Story of My Life
Joseph Jefferson (1829-1905) was an American actor, well known and widely acclaimed in his time. In Chapter 22, Helen talks about going to his plays and meeting him in person. She and Anne Sullivan... -
Answered a Question in Walk Two Moons
We know from the beginning of the book that Sal’s mother left their home in Bybanks, Kentucky, and has not come back. As we keep reading, we learn bits and pieces of the back story. It seems as... -
Answered a Question in Walk Two Moons
This happens in Chapter 20, “The Blackberry Kiss.” It seems as though Phoebe’s mother has left the family, at least for a short time. She left notes for Phoebe, Prudence, and their father. Phoebe’s... -
Answered a Question in Walk Two Moons
Earlier in the book, the whispers Sal heard were telling her to “hurry, hurry,” or “rush, rush,” as she and her grandparents drove from Ohio to Idaho to visit Sal’s mother. Sal had wanted to get... -
Answered a Question in The Help
Aibileen is one of the black maids in Jackson. In the first chapter here, she tells the story of how she lost her 24-year-old son, Treelore. He had been killed on a lumber-loading night job when he...
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