You don’t have to answer all of the questions, just keep them in mind while you are reading and if something strikes you- take notes!
Questions for Banner:
When I read this, I thought about PTSD (Post-traumatic Stress Disorder) and I felt as if I were in the mind of Captain Willard. Does this give you a better understanding of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder?
The war the veteran has come from is Vietnam, do you think it can be connected to the current wars in the middle east? Why or why not?
Do you think the distance of time away from the Vietnam war has an effect on how we are reading this?
If this were about the wars in the Middle East, how would you read it differently?
Is there any significance around the fact that we do not learn this man’s name until he is called back for duty 3/4th of the way through the reading? Also, we learn his title of captain before learning his name? How do you interpret this?
Questions for Mohammad
How do you feel about Mohammad’s technique of creation for “Spooked” and “Considering how spooky deer are”?
Did these poems make you look at the word spooky differently? Also, did “Considering how spooky deer are” make you look at deer, a rather common animal, differently?
Look at Mohammad’s “Sonnograms” – Mohammad uses a very interesting technique to create new art from Shakespeares sonnets. My question is, are they adaptations of the sonnets or are they new art all together?
In your opinion, is there literary value in the Sonnograms or is it purely artistic?
Questions for Phillip
Without reading further down this page and before reading the explanation of Phillips work, go through the poem which starts on page 3 of the PDF file. What do you get from this without the context of the explanation before the poem starts?
How important is context in understanding this poem and the message it is trying to convey?
How do legal documents play a role in this piece? Have you ever thought about legal documents being used creatively?