Question # 1


(1987 AP Essay)






With every new generation comes new customs, traditions, ways of living, fashion, and more enhanced tools that we use in our daily life. George Eliot claims about how "old Leisure" was a very different life style growing up too compared the new Leisure. Eliot uses personification and imagery has her stylistic devices to support her view.


Eliot uses the element of personification describing the "old" and the "new" style of leisure. An example, of the "old" is, "He was contemplative, rather stout gentlemen, of excellent digestion-of quiet perceptions,

undiseased by hypothesis: happy is his inability to know to causes of things, preferring themselves." With this she is claiming how back then in the "olden days" the people were much more less worry free about their day. "Happy is his inability to know to causes of things," is contradicting the idea of how the "old" days were. It is expressing that the people were happier even though they might have been the cause of something bad that had happened to themselves. As in the "new" or "modern" generation people are more laid back abut life and just let technology run things for them.


Imagery was a literary element that stood out a lot. Eliot expressed several examples in her writing. For instance in describing the "old" leisure she claimed,"He lives chiefly in the country: among pleasant seats and homesteads, ad was fond of sauntering be the fruit-tree wall, and scenting the apricots when they warmed by the morning sunshine of sheltering himself under the orchard boughs at noon, when the summer pears were falling." We are given painted picture of where he is living and the surroundings. The old was characterized with the beauty of nature, the calm living life style. As for the "new" more fast pace going life style; Eliot shows us how the "modern" life style is. "a vacuum for eager for amusement: prone to excursion-trains, art museums, periodical literature, and exciting novels, prone even to scientific theorising, and cursory peeps through microscopes.” Through technology we the people are learning new life styles to live by. We have been given the opportunity to enhance our lives with the power of technology to make things easier for us. This is was differentiates us from the two, "old" and "new" styles of leisure.


With this said, Eliot is proving that both generations have varied the life styles of living. Each generation that comes there will be new habits of ways of living life. "Old" leisure was described to be more connected with nature and the beauty of working hard. "New" leisure there is life of using technology to enhance our styles of living. To be able to simple things down for us. And Eliot expressed these both sides very well.

Question # 2

(1987 AP Essay)

The Crucible by Arthur Miller exemplifies social attitudes and political views that go on during the Salem trials. The social status that goes on in town are based off very religious views. The town is following the ideas of Puritans. During the Salem witch trials the towns people expressed a high factor of intolerance. This shows how the town follows the moral laws of conforming into the true religion and follow God with out sin.

The town is a very religion based, giving off the impression that they only live to follow God and must live without sin. Miller gives wonderful examples of how the town reacts too the word that "witch craft" is going on throughout the town. The social attitude about when the word has been spread, the town reacts hysterically about the sinning that is going on. Miller expresses how society is so captured through religion and how society has no real privacy. The social attitudes being expressed in this play are how the towns folks live with no privacy, follow the word of God, and they are so terrified having the thought that someone upon them has sinned. Constructing your life to follow God and have no private life is the society that have formed to become. Living with practically one eye open because the town is paranoid that witch craft is going on, is not the life style to live by.

The towns political views are expressed how they follow Gods word and believe if a person has sinned then the person should go to court and be humiliated in front of the town. The town "resolves" their problems through court and hold trials to see what the conclusion of their issue is. All the people focus how everyone is sinning by lying and should be hung for their actions. Rather then trying to forgive a person, they believe in getting rid of the "problem". 

In conclusion, The Crucible holds examples of it's social attitudes that the town holds. And it's political views of solving situations that go through out the town. Their social attitudes results in paranoia and believing that the whole town is bewitched. And their style of "resolving" issues is by just getting rid of the problem.