Rebecca Owens
eNotes Educator
Achievements
8
Educator Level
165
Answers Posted
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About
I was born in Madrid, Spain, though a am an American citizen since both of my parents were American-born. I have lived in the US since I was two years old. I graduated Magna Cum Laude in 1999 (GPA of 3.93) from Mississippi University for Women with a degree in English and Education and a minor is Spanish. I have been teaching since 2000. I teach or have taught at every level of high school English, but I love AP Literature the best. I have also been the sponsor of our school's drama club and poetry clubs as well as sponsoring the senior class and Poetry Out Loud. I have three children, all of whom are grown and have left the proverbial nest. I earned my Masters in Literature in 2009 and my National Board Teaching Certification in 2018. I have had several poems and two educational articles published. I have always been a closet poet and writer. I hope to continue writing and maybe someday publish a collection of my work.
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Recent Activity
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Answered a Question in The Myth of Sisyphus
In addition to the comments my colleague has made, I would like to add a couple of rhetorical strategies and expound on one of the aforementioned strategies I noted when reading Camus's "The Myth... -
Answered a Question in Harrison Bergeron
Both of the previous answers are excellent, but I would like to add a bit. Yes, "Harrison Bergeron" is a work of satire. Not only is it pointing out the importance of recognizing the strengths and... -
Answered a Question in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
To add to my colleague's assessment of Gawain as an example of the "ideal Christian knight," I would suggest that while Sir Gawain may see himself as a failure, he is actually considered a success... -
Answered a Question in Dusk
What a great question. I believe the short story "Dusk," by Saki has its title for a two-fold reason. The setting is around 6:30 on a March evening in Hyde Park: dusk. But more importantly, I... -
Answered a Question in Henry David Thoreau
Since the other two answers deal primarily with the similarities between Emerson and Thoreau, I will try to focus on what I think is the most important difference between the two. While it is clear... -
Answered a Question in Wit
This is such a great question! After having read the previous two answers, I think I can add a bit. It's important to note that Vivian is not just a hard-nosed, cold professor, she was specifically... -
Answered a Question in Hamlet
I would argue that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern do not deserve to die. Yes, they chose to work for Claudius, and yes, they were escorting Hamlet to his own death, but one must consider that they... -
Answered a Question in Wuthering Heights
Actually Heathcliff does not name his son. His wife, Isabella, leaves Heathcliff before the baby she is carrying is born and goes into hiding. She names the boy Linton after her maiden name, her... -
Answered a Question in The Necklace
Typically, stories can be divided into sections. Freytag's triangle, or pyramid, illustrates them: The exposition, or the part where all the main characters and the main conflict are introduced. In... -
Answered a Question in Mending Wall
Robert Frost's "Mending Wall" is about two different outlooks on life and relationships. The neighbors, one of whom is the speaker, meet each spring to mend the stone wall between their properties.... -
Answered a Question in The Necklace
According to enotes' page on the historical context of the short story "The Necklace," "Monsieur Loisel is a civil servant under the...'ministre de l'Instruction publique,' or Minister of Public... -
Answered a Question in Theodore Roethke
"My Papa's Waltz" is an intriguing poem, partly because of its ambiguity. It can be read as both a story of a child terrorized by and abusive father and a child having a playful romp with his daddy... -
Answered a Question in Mythology and Censorship
Prometheus was being punished for giving fire to mankind. His punishment was to be chained to a mountain where every day an eagle would come and eat his liver. Every night his liver would grow... -
Answered a Question in Harrison Bergeron
In Kurt Vonnegut, Jr's "Harrison Bergeron," the media, like everything, is meant to promote and ensure equality. There are a couple of instances where the reader can see the media in action. The... -
Answered a Question in The Story of an Hour
Great question! Both Nora and Mrs. Mallard are products of the Victorian Era, a time when women were viewed more as possessions than as people. Both women also come to points of epiphany in their... -
Answered a Question in Julius Caesar
Marc Antony, despite his claims to the contrary, is a very gifted orator. He knows that the way to sway the plebians is to appeal to their emotions. One way to do this is to show them the cloak... -
Answered a Question in A Doll's House
I hadn't really put much thought into the cigar until your question, so I am really pleased you asked. Considering the time period in which "A Doll House" was written, it is probably very unlikely... -
Answered a Question in Dulce et Decorum Est
DULCE ET DECORUM EST are the first words of a Latin saying (taken from an ode by Horace). The words were often used as an oath and were frequently quoted by soldiers at the start of the First World... -
Answered a Question in I Stand Here Ironing
Conflict can be subdivided into two major categories: internal and external. "I Stand Here Ironing" contains both, but the main conflict is internal. The narrator is struggling with herself. She is... -
Answered a Question in Hamlet
I think that yes, Shakespeare does use sin and salvation to add depth of meaning to Hamlet. One could use the character Claudius as an example of this concept. In Act III after the play The... -
Answered a Question in Invisible Man
The students and professors at the black college dislike Trueblood because he is a threat to them. Since its founding, the college has supposedly been an opportunity for black people to break out... -
Answered a Question in The Necklace
According to enotes literary terms guide, hubris can be defined as "arrogance, excessive self-pride and self-confidence." The guide goes on to say, "The word was used to refer to the emotions in... -
Answered a Question in I Stand Here Ironing
That's a pretty intersting question, one the story really doesn't explain. I imagine that Emily has develped this "deadly clowning" as a means of coping with the many difficulties she has faced... -
Answered a Question in Heart of Darkness
The man he replaced was killed by the son of a native cheif. The squabble took place over a disagreement over some chickens, two black hens to be precise. See the excerpt below: Fresleven--that was... -
Answered a Question in The Story of an Hour
This question has been answered recently--see the link: SEE YOUR QUESTION ADDRESSED HERE I guess to make my previous answer more clear, I would say that the conflict is internal because Louise... -
Answered a Question in Macbeth
Lady Macbeth does a couple of things in this scene. Lady Macbeth: That which hath made them drunk hath made me bold: What hath quench'd them hath given me fire.--Hark!--Peace! It was the owl that... -
Answered a Question in The Yellow Wallpaper
Gilman is saying that the subservient, silent role women have been forced to play in Victorian society is not just unfair, but very damaging. The protagonist's husband and other male figures, such... -
Answered a Question in The Story of an Hour
At the end of this story, Louise Mallard drops dead when she sees her husband enter the house. The doctor and other characters presume that she has been overcome with "joy that kills" since she had... -
Answered a Question in Romeo and Juliet
The climax in all Shakespearean tragedy always occurs in Act 3. Climax in this case can be defined as the point at which the initial conflict is resolved and the falling action (the action that... -
Answered a Question in The Outcasts of Poker Flat
I think the central conflict is resolved when the rescuers from Poker Flat arrive and find Piney Woods and the Duchess in a death embrace. The text says that the people who found the two couldn't... -
Answered a Question in Death, be not proud
This is one of my favorite poems by John Donne. It is meant to comfort those facing death. In the poem, Donne makes it clear that death has no real lasting power. It is but a temporary pause... -
Answered a Question in The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
In the short story by Washington Irving, Ichabod Crane is a very strict school teacher and a music instructor. This is very different from the character in Tim Burton's film Sleep Hollow, in which... -
Answered a Question in Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
There is definitely personification in the second and third stanzas. Personification is attributing human charactersitics to the non-human. Enotes specifically defines it as "a figure of speech in... -
Answered a Question in To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time
It is also important to note that the final stanza calls for the virgins to not only live life, but to MARRY: "Then be not coy, but use your time; / And while ye may goe marry" In the early modern... -
Answered a Question in The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County
Three of the animals in this story are named: The Fifteen Minute Nag, Andrew Jackson, and Dan'l Webster; The horse gets her name from being so slow in races--at least at first--but somehow, she... -
Answered a Question in Macbeth
I presume you are referring to these lines from Act 3 scene 4: Blood hath been shed ere now, i' the olden time, Ere humane statute purg'd the gentle weal; Ay, and since too, murders have been... -
Answered a Question in The Giver
Euphemisms are often used to soften the cold truth. In The Giver, the people use euphemisms to hide reality. I don't think that reality is actually altered, but the perception of it certainly... -
Answered a Question in Jane Eyre
Jane Eyre has two love interests in the novel, Mr. Rochester, whom she grows to love after serving as his daughter's governess, and St. John Rivers, a minister and her cousin who repeatedly asks... -
Answered a Question in The Outcasts of Poker Flat
Oakhurst is an interesting character. He is called both the strongest and the weakest of the outcasts. Although he had great leadership qualities, it was he who committed suicide and gave up... -
Answered a Question in Romeo and Juliet
It appears that Lady Capulet was quite young when Juliet was born. When she is introducing the idea of marriage to Juliet before the masque in Act I Scene 3, she mentions that she was already... -
Answered a Question in A Rose for Emily
I believe Emily poisoned Homer in order to keep him from leaving her. By the time she meets Homer, her father has passed. She is left alone because her father drove off any potential... -
Answered a Question in The Scarlet Ibis
That's an interesting question. The story never really says why Brother is cruel to Doodle. We know that he is embarrassed by Doodle's inability to perform physically. We also... -
Answered a Question in Hamlet
Hamlet is commenting on the fact that the Norse and Polack armies are about to fight over a worthless piece of land. Thousands are likely to die in this battle, and the land being fought for isn't... -
Answered a Question in The Devil and Tom Walker
He becomes a "violent churchgoer." He also keeps a large Bible on his desk and carries a small one in his pocket. He becomes very judgmental, keeping track (almost like a ledger) of others' sins.... -
Answered a Question in The Monkey's Paw
Well, since Herbert mentions it in jest, joking about the "curse" he doesn't really believe in, and he is referring to what will accompany the money his father wished for, I'd guess the "horrible... -
Answered a Question in Self-Reliance
This essay is one of my favorites. Emerson claims that "Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members." What he means is that society kills individuality.... -
Answered a Question in Hamlet
Hamlet is saying that man must have a purpose beyond mere existence. He speaks on a literal and metaphorical level. There must be more to living than sleeping (which metaphorically he has been... -
Answered a Question in The Cask of Amontillado
I'd say yes and NO, and this is why: At the beginning Montresor says, "I must not only punish, but punish with impunity. A wrong is unredressed when retribution overtakes its redresser. It is... -
Answered a Question in The Rocking-Horse Winner
There are several themes in this story. Some of them are discussed in the link I am posting below. Probably the most obvious theme deals with greed and generosity. Paul's Mother has... -
Answered a Question in Hamlet
With all the two-faced people in the play, it is ironic that only one is actually pointedly accused of creating a second face. In his tirade against Ophelia near the end of Act III scene 1, Hamlet...
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