Version élève → LLCER anglais · Lycée général · 1re · Première

Séquence 5 · Walls and doors: the individual against the group (Frost, Dickinson, Chopin)

Does the group protect the individual or imprison them?

Bonjour !

Dans cette séquence de langues, littératures et cultures étrangères (anglais), tu vas chercher à répondre à la grande question écrite en haut de la page. Elle se fait en 2 séances. Pour chaque séance : lis la consigne, étudie les documents, réponds aux questions sur ta feuille ou sur l'ENT, puis recopie l'essentiel dans ton cahier. Tu peux imprimer cette page avec le bouton « Imprimer ».

À la fin, je serai capable de :

Les mots importants

dramatic monologue, blank verseproverb, tradition, conformitysituational irony, dramatic ironyshort story, ellipsis, twist endingfree indirect speech

Ressources de la séquence

Les notions, les repères et les pistes pour aller plus loin, utiles pour toutes les séances.

Les notions à maîtriser

Blank verse
Unrhymed iambic pentameter, close to speech: Frost's « Mending Wall ».
Dramatic monologue
A poem spoken by a character to a listener; the reader judges the speaker.
Proverb
Traditional saying: « Good fences make good neighbours » stands for inherited, unquestioned wisdom.
Situational irony
The opposite of what is expected happens: the husband is alive.
Dramatic irony
The reader knows what the characters ignore: why Louise really dies.
Free indirect speech
The narrator's voice adopts the character's thoughts: « What did it matter! »

Repères

DateÉvénement
1891Poems: Second Series by Emily Dickinson, published after her death (1886).
1894Kate Chopin, « The Story of an Hour » (first title: « The Dream of an Hour »).
1899Chopin, The Awakening: scandal and condemnation.
1914Frost, North of Boston, published in London.

Pour aller plus loin

Sources et bibliographie

Mon parcours : je choisis mon rythme

Séance 1 · Good fences make good neighbours? Frost and Dickinson

65 min

Séance approfondie : cours développé, documents sourcés, activités exigeantes avec coups de pouce.

La question du jour

Why do we keep walls we no longer need?

Mon plan de travail

Le cours à lire · Tradition and questioning

In « Mending Wall » (1914), two New England farmers meet each spring to repair the stone wall between their lands. The speaker notices that « Something there is that doesn't love a wall » (frost, hunters) and argues that the wall is useless: « He is all pine and I am apple orchard ». His neighbour only repeats his father's proverb: « Good fences make good neighbours ». The poem is in blank verse, close to conversation. The speaker sees the neighbour as « an old-stone savage armed » who « moves in darkness »: blind obedience to tradition. Yet the speaker himself starts the mending. Dickinson's short poem takes the opposite path: she chooses to be « nobody », against the dreary public life of « somebody ».

Document 1 · Robert Frost, « Mending Wall » (1914), lines 1 to 4, 12 to 15 and 23 to 27

Poem, North of Boston, 1914 (public domain).

Something there is that doesn't love a wall, That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it, And spills the upper boulders in the sun; And makes gaps even two can pass abreast. […] I let my neighbour know beyond the hill; And on a day we meet to walk the line And set the wall between us once again. We keep the wall between us as we go. […] There where it is we do not need the wall: He is all pine and I am apple orchard. My apple trees will never get across And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him. He only says, "Good fences make good neighbours."

Source : R. Frost, « Mending Wall », 1914 (full text on Wikisource).

Pour bien lire ce document :

frozen-ground-swell: gonflement du sol gelé ; boulders: gros blocs ; abreast: côte à côte ; cones: pommes de pin.

Document 2 · Robert Frost, « Mending Wall », end of the poem

Same poem.

Before I built a wall I'd ask to know What I was walling in or walling out, And to whom I was like to give offence. Something there is that doesn't love a wall, That wants it down." I could say "Elves" to him, But it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather He said it for himself. I see him there Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed. He moves in darkness as it seems to me, Not of woods only and the shade of trees. He will not go behind his father's saying, And he likes having thought of it so well He says again, "Good fences make good neighbours."

Source : R. Frost, « Mending Wall », 1914 (full text on Wikisource).

Pour bien lire ce document :

walling in / out: enfermer, exclure ; give offence: offenser ; savage: sauvage ; saying: dicton.

Document 3 · Emily Dickinson, « I'm nobody! Who are you? »

Poem, published in 1891 (public domain).

I'm nobody! Who are you? Are you nobody, too? Then there's a pair of us—don't tell! They'd banish us, you know. How dreary to be somebody! How public, like a frog To tell your name the livelong day To an admiring bog!

Source : E. Dickinson, Poems: Second Series, 1891 (full text on Wikisource).

Pour bien lire ce document :

banish: bannir ; dreary: morne ; livelong: toute la sainte (journée) ; bog: marécage.

Activité 1 · Understand

12 min
Essentiel

Supports : Documents 1 to 3

Consigne :

Read the documents and answer in English.

  1. What happens every spring in « Mending Wall »?
  2. Why does the speaker think the wall is useless?
  3. Why does Dickinson prefer to be « nobody »?

Ce qui est attendu (6 pts) : Comprehension

Activité 2 · Analyse

18 min
Essentiel

Supports : Documents 1 and 2

Consigne :

Analyse the two voices of the poem.

  1. What does the repetition of the proverb show about the neighbour?
  2. What image does the speaker use for him, and what does it suggest?
  3. Is the speaker entirely different from his neighbour?

Ce qui est attendu (7 pts) : Analysis

Activité 3 · Speak

15 min
Travail à rendre

Supports : Documents and lesson

Consigne :

Record 2 minutes: « Which walls (real or symbolic) do groups build today? Are they good neighbours? »

Ce qui est attendu (7 pts) : Oral production

Trace écrite · document à compléter (papier ou ENT)

Complète la trace écrite avec les mots de la banque, puis recopie-la dans ton cahier.

blank verseinnobodyproverb

In « Mending Wall », the neighbour repeats the _______ « Good fences make good neighbours »; the speaker asks what he is « walling ______ or walling out ». Frost writes in ___________. Dickinson prefers to be « ______ ».

Séance 2 · One hour of freedom: Kate Chopin's irony

65 min

Séance approfondie : cours développé, documents sourcés, activités exigeantes avec coups de pouce.

La question du jour

What does Louise Mallard discover in one hour?

Mon plan de travail

Le cours à lire · Irony in the short story

« The Story of an Hour » (1894) is a very short short story. Louise Mallard, who has « a heart trouble », learns that her husband died in a railway accident. Alone in her room, she slowly recognises a feeling: « free, free, free! ». Through free indirect speech, Chopin reveals that marriage meant a « powerful will bending hers ». Then comes the twist: Brently Mallard walks in, alive. Louise dies, and the doctors say it was « of the joy that kills ». This dramatic irony (the reader knows the truth) exposes society's blindness to women's desire for self-assertion.

Document 1 · Kate Chopin, « The Story of an Hour » (1894), beginning and middle

Short story, 1894 (public domain).

Knowing that Mrs. Mallard was afflicted with a heart trouble, great care was taken to break to her as gently as possible the news of her husband's death. […] She did not hear the story as many women have heard the same, with a paralyzed inability to accept its significance. She wept at once, with sudden, wild abandonment, in her sister's arms. […] There would be no one to live for her during those coming years; she would live for herself. There would be no powerful will bending hers in that blind persistence with which men and women believe they have a right to impose a private will upon a fellow-creature. A kind intention or a cruel intention made the act seem no less a crime as she looked upon it in that brief moment of illumination. And yet she had loved him—sometimes. Often she had not.

Source : K. Chopin, « The Story of an Hour », 1894 (full text on Wikisource).

Pour bien lire ce document :

afflicted with: atteinte de ; abandonment: abandon (au chagrin) ; persistence: obstination ; fellow-creature: semblable.

Document 2 · Kate Chopin, « The Story of an Hour », ending

Same story.

She breathed a quick prayer that life might be long. It was only yesterday she had thought with a shudder that life might be long. […] Someone was opening the front door with a latchkey. It was Brently Mallard who entered, a little travel-stained, composedly carrying his grip-sack and umbrella. He had been far from the scene of the accident, and did not even know there had been one. […] When the doctors came they said she had died of heart disease—of the joy that kills.

Source : K. Chopin, « The Story of an Hour », 1894 (full text on Wikisource).

Pour bien lire ce document :

shudder: frisson ; latchkey: clé de la porte d'entrée ; composedly: calmement ; grip-sack: sac de voyage.

Activité 1 · Understand

12 min
Essentiel

Supports : Documents 1 and 2

Consigne :

Read the documents and answer in English.

  1. Why is the news broken to Louise « as gently as possible »?
  2. What does she realise about the years to come?
  3. What happens at the end?

Ce qui est attendu (6 pts) : Comprehension

Activité 2 · Interpret

18 min
Approfondissement

Supports : Documents, lesson

Consigne :

Write a paragraph (about 150 words): « The real subject of the story is not death but freedom. »

Ce qui est attendu (8 pts) : Written production

Activité 3 · Translate

15 min
Travail à rendre

Supports : Document 2

Consigne :

Translate into French « She breathed a quick prayer that life might be long. It was only yesterday she had thought with a shudder that life might be long. »

Ce qui est attendu (6 pts) : Translation

Trace écrite · document à compléter (papier ou ENT)

Complète la trace écrite avec les mots de la banque, puis recopie-la dans ton cahier.

dramatic ironyfreedomjoytwist

« The Story of an Hour » ends with a ______: the husband is alive. The doctors say Louise died « of the ______ that kills », but the reader understands she lost her _______: this is ______________.

Fiche à trous · je complète

Complète le texte avec les mots de la banque (sur papier ou dans le document de l'ENT).

Freeinjoyneighbours

Frost's neighbour repeats: « Good fences make good __________ ».

The speaker would ask « What I was walling ______ or walling out ».

Louise Mallard whispers « ______! Body and soul free! »; the doctors say she died « of the ______ that kills ».

Ce que j'ai appris

Les 3 idées que je retiens :
Une phrase en anglais que je veux retenir :
Ce qui reste difficile pour moi / ma question pour le professeur :