Unit #2: In-Class Assignment

Section 1: Quotation Analysis

Choose ONE of the following quotations to use for your assignment.

"His hands had been infected, and soon it would be his arms. He could feel the poison working up his
wrists and into his elbows and his shoulders, and then the jump-over from shoulder blade to shoulder
blade like a spark leaping a gap. His hands were ravenous. And his eyes were beginning to feel hunger,
as if they must look at something, anything, everything. (38)

"We need not be let alone. We need to be really bothered once in a while. How long is it since you
were really bothered? About something important, about something real?" (49).

"School is shortened, discipline relaxed, philosophies, histories, languages dropped, English and spelling
gradually gradually neglected, finally almost completely ignored. Life is immediate, the job counts,
pleasure lie all about after work. Why learn anything save pressing buttons, pulling switches, fitting nuts
and bolts?" (53).

“People want to be happy . . . Don’t we keep them moving, don’t we give them fun? That’s all we live
for, isn’t it? For pleasure, for titillation? And you must admit our culture provides plenty of these” (56).

“We’ve got to start somewhere here, figuring out why we’re in such a mess, you and the medicine
nights, and the car, and me and my work . . . We haven’t anything to go on, but maybe we can piece it
out and figure it and help each other” (63-64).