Some Mystic Element of Sympathy

“‘theirs was one of those strange, profound rare friendships between brown
and white, in which the very difference of race seems
to draw two human beings closer [. . .]" (157).
Joseph Conrad's Lord Jim (1900)

Flannery O'Connor's "Everything That Rises Must Converge" (1961), 485-500

1. what attitude does this story implicitly adopt towards Julian's attempts to--and here I use an intentional anachronism--"cancel" his mother?
2. Julian feels himself "sacrificed" to the "pleasure" of his mother (486). Is this an accurate assessment of his situation?
3. at what points does O'Connor allow her reader to side with Julian against his mother?
4. does the tale shed a uniformly flattering light on Julian himself?
5. is the paragraph at the top of page 492 that begins, The further irony . . ." an example of free indirect discourse?
6. following his decision to "openly [declare] war on" his mother (492), what aggressive actions does Julian take?
7. does the story provide, indirectly, an explanation for why Julian "had never been successful at making any Negro friends" (494)?
8. why might O'Connor have placed on the large black woman's head a hat which is the mirror image of his mother's hat (495, 485)?
9. what is the lesson Julian fears his mother will not have learned upon recognizing that she's wearing the same hat as a black woman (496)? Is he correct in his assumption that she has learned nothing? Is it possible for the reader to know, or does Julian's perspective shape our own too much?
10. does Julian's mother's racism impact her treatment of the little black boy, or does her racism remain quiescent during this particular interaction?
11. the following passage captures whose point of view--that of Julian, or that of the narrator? "[H]er eyes, sky-blue, were as innocent and untouched by experience as they must have been when she was ten" (485).
12. why does Julian keep thinking about the threadbare mansion lost to him and his family line (488, 494, 499)? What does it represent to him?
13. does the story's title telegraph a truth recognized by Julian?
14. at how many different points does O'Connor foreshadow the tale's surprising conclusion?
15. can the differing moral sensibilities contained within this story--sensibilities which roughly line up with the two main character's different world views--cohere into a single ethical vision, or are they incompatible?

Joseph Conrad's Lord Jim (1900), chps. 25-35

1. is the racism exhibited in this novel by such characters as the Patna’s skipper shared by its narrator?  Its author?
2. upon what foundation has the friendship between Jim and Dain Waris been laid?
3. why does Sherif Ali compel his followers to kill all “strangers in their midst” (176)?
4. does Jim find what he's looking for in Patusan?
5. what has Jim accomplished that encourages the Bugis to look at him as superhuman?
6. has Marlow’s tendency to see Jim as “symbolic” of something about the human condition (159) prevented Marlow from fully understanding his friend as an individual?
7. why does Marlow consider Jim as simultaneously free and imprisoned, adored and isolated?
8. does Marlow’s repeated, silent likening of Jim to a child affect Marlow’s actual treatment of and interactions with Jim? Do these comparisons reflect a troublingly paternalistic posture towards his friend/
9. Marlow at first cannot determine why Jewel would love Jim so “jealously,” her pretty smiles regularly succeeded by “a look of silent, repressed anxiety” (169).  What is the source of Jewel’s concern? 
10. does Marlow fail to quell Jewel's fears (188) because of their differing genders, or does his unsuccessful attempt suggest something more profound about the limits of human relationships across the board?
11. why does Jim feel helpless, instead of heroic, when Jewel claims she cannot be constantly watching over him ever night (178)?  
12. does Marlow appreciate women more than he fears them (165-66)? Do his opinions about the opposite sex constitute misogyny?
13. what is it that Jewel wished to be saved from when she begged Jim to leave Patusan after helping to save his life (185)?
14. does Jim’s imaginative capacity serve him well in Patusan?
15. does Marlow’s visit to Jim in Patusan assist the young man in his journey towards peace? Towards self-knowledge?
16. why does Jim aver that the Bugis can never know the shameful event from which he flees (181)?
17. what might happen to Jim if he were quite, quite alone for an extended period of time, now that he has found refuge in Patusan?
18. what does Marlow mean by his declaration that “‘“[Jim] is not good enough [. . .] nobody is good enough”’” (189)?
19. what is the “‘strange and melancholy illusion’” Marlow has which he believes to be, “‘like all our illusions,’” a “‘remote unattainable truth, seen dimly’” (192)?
20. do you believe Marlow’s comment on his story to be generalizable to other narratives—that they, too, are “‘truth disclosed in a moment of illusion’” (192)?
21. why is Jim so intent on staying in Patusan, amidst the Bugis?

Composition X (1939)
Wassily Kandinsky

Dr. Paul Marchbanks
pmarchba@calpoly.edu