Introduction
Jane Loudon was a pioneering science fiction writer, whose novel “The Mummy!” of 1827 was a landmark in the genre. She also wrote an engaging account of her family pets that included several anecdotes about cats.
IT is generally said that male cats do not like kittens. We had, however, an instance to the contrary. A strange cat had two kittens in the stable belonging to our house; and one day, pitying the wretched condition of the cat, when I saw her in the garden, I ordered her some milk.
A large Tom-cat we had, watched our proceedings very attentively, and while the cat was lapping the milk, he went to the stable, and brought one of the kittens in his mouth, and placed it beside the saucer, and then fetched the other, looking up in my face and mewing when he had done so, as much as to say, “You have fed the mother, so you may as well feed the children,” which we did; and I must add, for the credit of Tom’s character, that he never attempted to touch the milk himself.
Abridged
Questions for Critics
1. What is the author aiming to achieve in writing this?
2. Note any words, devices or turns of phrase that strike you. How do they help the author communicate her ideas more effectively?
3. What impression does this passage make on you? How might you put that impression into words?
Based on The English Critic (1939) by NL Clay, drawing on The New Criticism: A Lecture Delivered at Columbia University, March 9, 1910, by J. E. Spingarn, Professor of Comparative Literature in Columbia University, USA.
Archive
Word Games
Sevens Based on this passage
Suggest answers to this question. See if you can limit one answer to exactly seven words.
Variations: 1.expand your answer to exactly fourteen words. 2.expand your answer further, to exactly twenty-one words. 3.include one of the following words in your answer: if, but, despite, because, (al)though, unless.
Spinners Find in Think and Speak
For each group of words, compose a sentence that uses all three. You can use any form of the word: for example, cat → cats, go → went, or quick → quickly, though neigh → neighbour is stretching it a bit.
This exercise uses words found in the accompanying passage.
1 Much. Two. Very.
2 Himself. Place. Wretched.
3 Do. Touch. We.
Variations: 1. include direct and indirect speech 2. include one or more of these words: although, because, despite, either/or, if, unless, until, when, whether, which, who 3. use negatives (not, isn’t, neither/nor, never, nobody etc.)
Homonyms Find in Think and Speak
Each of the words below has more than one possible meaning. Compose your own sentences to show what those different meanings are.
This exercise uses words found in the accompanying passage.
1. Like. 2. May. 3. See. 4. Order. 5. General. 6. Lap. 7. Mine. 8. Saw. 9. Stable.
Add Vowels Find in Think and Speak
Make words by adding vowels to each group of consonants below. You may add as many vowels as you like before, between or after the consonants, but you may not add any consonants or change the order of those you have been given. See if you can beat our target of common words.
bgs (7)
bags. begs. bogies. bogs. bogus. boogies. bugs.
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