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Copywork
About This Passage
White reports the death of his heroine in a subordinate clause, almost in passing, while the foreground fills with the mundane machinery of a fair being dismantled, the Ferris wheel taken apart, the race horses loaded, the trailers driving away. The world's indifferent bustle continues; only afterward does the prose fall still into 'deserted' and 'forlorn.' Copy the passage and study how White's understatement and counterpoint, the great loss buried inside the small busyness, produce an emotional force that open mourning could not.
Next day, as the Ferris wheel was being taken apart and the race horses were being loaded into vans and the entertainers were packing up their belongings and driving away in their trailers, Charlotte ...
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Discussion Questions
Narration Prompt
Retell the chapter's events in sequence, from the two friends alone after the ceremony to Wilbur's winked good-bye and Charlotte's solitary death. When you reach Charlotte's disclosure that she is dying and Wilbur's rescue of the egg sac, slow down and explain the significance of each.
Discussion Questions
- Charlotte meets her own death with composure, telling Wilbur she feels 'peaceful,' while Wilbur, hearing the same news, collapses 'in an agony of pain and sorrow.' Construct an argument about why White gives calm to the one who is dying and despair to the one who will live on, and what that choice helps the chapter say. Use the details of how each one responds to defend your thinking.
- Charlotte reduces her own existence to 'we're born, we live a little while, we die' and a 'mess' of 'trapping and eating flies,' yet insists that helping Wilbur let her 'lift up my life a trifle.' What account of a meaningful life is Charlotte advancing in this answer? Use her own words to explain what you think.
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Vocabulary
Item 1
Heartfelt feelings or expressed convictions; what Charlotte thanks Wilbur for when he offers his life for hers.
Item 2
A trivial amount or slight degree; how modestly Charlotte claims helping Wilbur improved her own life.
Item 3
A state of urgent hopelessness driving rash action; what grips Wilbur as he pleads with the stalling rat.
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Critical Thinking
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