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Copywork
About This Passage
Montgomery renders Anne's terror through accumulating physical details: muteness, clasped hands, the stare of fascination, the lump, the smarting eyes. The passage models how to build emotional intensity through somatic description rather than naming the emotion. The repeated 'sharp' (sharp-faced, sharp-eyed) mirrors the gimlet image Anne will use later. Each sentence tightens the emotional compression until the tears nearly break through.
Anne, sitting mutely on the ottoman, with her hands clasped tightly in her lap, stared at Mrs. Blewett as one fascinated. Was she to be given into the keeping of this sharp-faced, sharp-eyed woman? Sh...
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Discussion Questions
Narration Prompt
Summarize this chapter, then explain what you think the author most wanted the reader to notice or feel. What techniques did the author use?
Discussion Questions
- Marilla's decision to keep Anne is triggered not by argument but by seeing Anne's face — 'the misery of a helpless little creature who finds itself once more caught in the trap.' Is Montgomery arguing that moral decisions are ultimately visual — that we must SEE suffering to respond to it — and what would someone who disagreed with you argue?
- Mrs. Blewett evaluates Anne as labor ('you'll have to earn your keep'). Mrs. Spencer evaluates the situation as logistics ('I call it positively providential'). Marilla evaluates it as a moral crisis ('it would haunt her to her dying day'). How does Montgomery use these three women to present three different ways of seeing a child — and which way does the novel endorse?
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Vocabulary Builder
Item 1
Characterized by genuine goodwill — Mrs. Spencer's benevolence is well-meaning but shallow, unable to perceive the implications of her matchmaking
Item 2
Confirmed the truth of someone else's claim — Flora Jane's verification creates a chain of testimony that distributes responsibility for the mistake
Item 3
Occurring through fortunate timing, as if arranged by divine providence — Mrs. Spencer uses this word without irony for an arrangement that would destroy Anne
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Critical Thinking
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