Literary
Elements #1 When the Legends Die
Name:
Chapters 1-6:
Part 1 Bessie
1. What 2 inferences can you make from the underlined passages below? (An inference
is a conclusion/guess you make from evidence. The information is not directly stated.)
(page 4 R, 4 W)
(page 4 R, 4 W)
Blue Elk rubbed his hands together.
They were the soft hands of a man who has not worked in a long
time. He said, “Bessie! Stop the wailing. The wailing is for another woman. Let her make the mourning.”
2. What inference can you make about Blue Elk
from the underlined passage below? (An inference is a
conclusion/guess you make from evidence.
The information is not directly stated.)
(page 5 R, 5 W)
(page 5 R, 5 W)
Blue Elk said to her (Bessie), “For the cost of two horses I could settle
this.”
“I have not the cost of two horses.”
“One horse,” Blue Elk offered.
“I have not the cost of one goat.
3. Metonymy =
a word or phrase is used to stand in for another word. Examples: The office called.
Please lend a hand. The White House issued a statement.This new dish is delicious.
Find an example of metonymy on page 5R/5W.
Please lend a hand. The White House issued a statement.This new dish is delicious.
Find an example of metonymy on page 5R/5W.
4. What literary element is this?
Blue Elk says, “My people do not lie,” but when the Sheriff asks what Bessie said, Blue Elk tells him, “She says her husband did not come here.” She had actually said, “I have not the cost of one goat.” [p 5 R, 5W]
Blue Elk says, “My people do not lie,” but when the Sheriff asks what Bessie said, Blue Elk tells him, “She says her husband did not come here.” She had actually said, “I have not the cost of one goat.” [p 5 R, 5W]
5. What evidence in the text on page 8 R/ 10W
might explain why Blue Elk tells his people on Horse Mountain that they must
return to the reservation and then he will get them jobs at the sawmill in
Pagosa?
6. Even though George Black Bull is paid $2/day
to work at the sawmill, why can’t he quit his job and go back to the
reservation? [p.11R/14W]
7. Frank No Deer stole money from George Black
Bull three times. Why was this such a
serious offense to George, so serious that George killed him for it? [Make an
inference.]
8. On page 3 and page 13 Red [3 & 17 W],
what gesture is used by George towards his wife Bessie and by again by Bessie
with her son, Thomas? What does the
gesture mean?
9. Find an example of personification on page 14
R/ 19 W.
10. What does Bessie do after she uses the
grasshoppers to catch fish, and before she and her son go to sleep at night? [Page 15-16R, 20-21W ]
11. What literary element is this? “There at the foot of Bald Mountain…”
12. The father was unsuccessful at hunting deer
the first time he hunted? What made the
difference the second time he hunted, according to his wife? [p17R/ 23 W]
13. Bessie
wanted a round lodge rather than a square house made of lodge pine logs. What did the roundness symbolize? [p18 R/ 24 W].
14. What
literary element is this? “The wind sang
a song of wide skies and far mountaintops.”
[p18 R/ 25 W].
15. What
literary element is this? “First snow
came, six inches of it in the night, fluffy as cotton grass in bloom.” [p18 R/ 25 W].
16. What
literary element is this? “Winter is long
in the high country, and short white days can bring black
hunger.” [p19 R/ 26 W]
17. How much
time has passed now? “They lived as people
lived in the old days, and a third time the aspens turned to gold and showered
leaves on the lodge he had made as she wanted it, round like the year.” [p19 R/ 27 W].
18. What literary elements are in this
passage? “They sang the death songs for him, in the darkness with the stars
watching them. Then they went down the
mountain and back to the lodge. She said
to the boy, “Now you are the man.” [p 21 R/ 29 W].
