Brooke Peterman

Mrs. Ault
AP English Literature
August 15, 2019

AP English Summer Assignment

A. Select a quotation that is particularly indicative of setting. Discuss the significance of time &
place and how the sensory details of the physical and/or social environment are important to the
events that happen in that place.

Pg. 166
“In Saint-Malo, people are fined for locking their doors, for keeping doves, for hoarding meat.
Truffles disappear. Sparkling wine disappears. No eye contact. No chatter in doorways. No
sunbathing, no singing, no lovers strolling the ramparts in the evenings--such rules are not
written down, but they may as well be. Icy winds whirl in from the Atlantic and Etienne
barricades himself inside his brother’s old room and Marie-Laure endures the slow rain of hours
by running her fingers over his seashells down in his study, ordering them by size, by species,
by morphology, checking and rechecking their order, trying to make sure she has not missorted
a single one.”

Setting:
This quote highlights one of the most vital aspects of the setting in Saint-Malo during this time
period. Before official German occupation of the city, there are clear signs of fear and distress
that are restricting civilians from doing basic things like eating desirable foods or strolling the
streets at night, which they would be doing otherwise. This is key to identifying the tone of this
quotation to be worrisome or cautious, exaggerated by the repetition of the word “no”. The tense
and fearful mood in Saint-Malo that is being built up contributes greatly to events that occur later
in the story. If there weren’t this echo of unease and disturbance in the streets, Madame Manec
would never have felt the need to rebel and Marie-Laure’s father would never have been
arrested due to a suspicious neighbor. This setting is also crucial to understanding
Marie-Laure’s character because by being sealed within the house, only accompanied by an
eccentric man and a busy maid, she feels trapped. She feels trapped in the house, the city, and
also the life that her father made her move to. She continues to organize shells because it
reminds her of her past life in Paris and the mollusks and shells she felt every day at the
museum. Marie-Laure’s boredom is eventually put to a halt when Madame Manec begins taking
her out on her morning errands with her.

B. Select a quotation that highlights a secondary character. Discuss the significance of how
and/or why this character is important to Marie-Laure OR Werner’s journey.

Pg. 253
“The women clap. Madame Blanchard squeezes Madame Manec’s hand and wheezes and
blinks her glossy eyes in pleasure.
… Then the women start up again, scheming, gabbling. Madame Manec brushes Marie-Laure’s
hair in long absentminded strokes. ‘Seventy-Six years old,’ she whispers, ‘and I can still feel like
this? Like a little girl with stars in my eyes’”

Secondary Character:
This quote is highlighting the maid Marie Laure lives with during her time in Saint-Malo,
Madame Manec. Serving as a maternal figure in Marie Laure’s life during this period, Madame
Manec represents resilience, strength, and confidence. Her strong will is what inspires this
group of 6 old women to come together and plot against the german forces occupying their city.
Without her powerful leadership, this group would not have formed and no efforts would be
made to restrain the germans’ power. Madame Manec’s role as a caretaker and a role model
are both vital to how Marie-Laure lives her days in Saint-Malo. By taking Marie-Laure on her
morning errand runs around town, Madame Manec teaches her about the city, even letting her
explore the beach, something Marie-Laure enjoys more than anything. Madame Manec also
inspires Marie-Laure to take part in the rebellion herself, however that is only after Madame
Manec’s death when Etienne finally has the courage to continue her work and let Marie-Laure
help. The secret messages read into Etienne’s microphone late at night, after being pulled
delicately out of bread rolls, are pivotal to Marie-Laure’s experience in Saint-Malo. This rebellion
not only empowers her to be more independent and intelligent, but also allows her to explore
the city more on her own, something very impressive for a young blind girl in Nazi France.

C. Select a quotation that highlights an external conflict between Werner OR Marie-Laure and
another character. Discuss the significance of this conflict and how it is important to that
protagonist’s journey.

Pg. 41
“Right. Then straight. They walk up their street now, she is sure of it. One step behind her, her
father tilts his head up and gives the sky a huge smile. Marie-Laure knows this even though her
back is to him, even though he says nothing, even though she is blind--Papa’s thick hair is wet
from the snow and standing in a dozen angles off his head, and his scarf is draped
asymmetrically over his shoulders, and he’s beaming up at the falling snow.
They are halfway up the rue des patriarches. They are outside their building. Marie-Laure finds
the trunk of the chestnut tree that grows past her fourth-floor window, its bark beneath her
fingers.
Old friend.
In another half second her father’s hands are in her armpits, swinging her up, and
Mari-Lauresimles, and he laughs a pure, contagious laugh, one she will try to remember all her
life, father and daughter, turning in circles on the sidewalk in front of their apartment house,
laughing together while snow sifts through the branches above.”

External conflict:
Marie-Laure faces a life altering external conflict throughout the novel. This is her blindness, due
to cataracts when she was 6. Throughout her life she struggles with obvious challenges related
to her blindness, but in the ever changing setting of France during the war, every challenge is
heightened. This is why her father, Daniel LeBlanc, a locksmith at the museum nearby, makes it
his life’s work to build her a scale model of Paris, and later on Saint-Malo, so that she can learn
the city streets by touch. This way Marie-Laure can be independent even with her disability. In
this quote, it highlights the first time Marie-Laure was able to find her way home by herself, after
her father took her to an undisclosed location somewhere in Paris. This activity happened every
tuesday, but on the tuesday in the quote, she finally achieved her goal. The pure joy,
satisfaction, and love described by the author proves that although Marie-Laure’s blindness was
tragic, it did mean that her and her father formed a firm and unbreakable bond. This bond was
everything to Marie-Laure but was tested later in the book, and even severed by the harsh blade
of death. However, the models Daniel LeBlanc built, the braille books he got her, and the many
times he let her run around the museum, feeling as many mollusks and shells as she pleased,
are all testaments to how strong their relationship was.

D. Select a quotation that highlights an internal conflict experienced by Werner OR Marie-Laure.

Discuss the significance of the conflict & how it helps us understand the protagonist or how it is
important to his/her journey.

Pg. 264
“Did they hear? Can they hear his heart hammering right now against his ribs? There’s the rain,
falling slightly past the high houses. There’s Volkheimer, his chin resting on the acreage of his
chest. Fredrick said we don't have choices, don’t own our lives, but in the end it was Werner
who pretend there were no choices, Werner who watched Fredrick dump the pail of water at his
feet--I will not-- Werner who stood by as the consequences came raining down. Werner who
watched Volkheimer wade into house after house, the same ravening nightmare recurring over
and over and over.
He removes the headset and eases past Volkheimer to open the back door. Volkheimer opens
one eye, huge golden, lionlike. He says, ‘Nichts’
… He turns. ‘Nichts,’ he says. Nothing.”

Internal conflict:

Throughout the book Werner faces a huge internal conflict, between whether to choose to tell
the truth, or do what is expected of him as a german pupil. This choice comes out in many
ways, between leaving his hometown to go to school, not defending Fredrick because he might
be punished as well, and helping kill hundreds of people but saying nothing to prevent it. In this
quote from the book, Werner is describing how he heard an illegal transmission, the one he and
his team had been searching for in Saint-Malo. However, this is the same transmission he heard
as a child with his sister, a french man speaking and a piano playing fluently in the background.
Instead of reporting it to Volkhiemer and the rest of his team like all the other transmissions he
found, Werner decides to keep this a secret. This is extremely important to Werner’s journey as
one of the main protagonists because it shows a definite shift in his mentality. Never before has
he tangibly stood up for something he believes in, or gone against official instructions. This time
he does both by then going out to find the house that transmitted the message and disobeying
his general by not reporting its location and inhabitants. Although Werner had never acted on it
before, he has always known that what the Germans were doing was wrong. By hearing the
sounds that had been a source of inspiration and solace in his youth, Werner was able to
muster up the courage to act on these preexisting feelings, fight back against the injustices he
had witnessed. This decision ultimately makes Werner more individualized and confirms his
faith. Because of this decision he goes looking for Marie-Laure during the battle, inevitably to
get captured by the Americans, and die weeks later.

E. Select a quotation that highlights a symbol found in the text. Discuss the significance of the
symbol and how it helps us understand character, plot or setting in the novel. (Symbols can be
people, places, or things in a narrative that suggest meanings beyond the literal. In Lord of the
Flies, for example, the conch can represent order or attempts to establish civilization and order
on the island. The destruction of the conch symbolizes the final end to civilization and the further
descent of the boys into savagery.)

Etienne even compares her to a snail “like a snail...curled up so tight in there.” after father
leaves
Pg. 403
“The beaches have been closed for several months, studded with mines and walled off with
razor wire, but here in the old kennel, out of sight of everyone, Marie-Laure can sit among her
snails and dream herself into the mind of the great marine biologist Aronnax, both guest of
honor and prisoner on Captain Nemo’s great machine of curiosity, free of nations and politics,
cruising through the kaleidoscope wonders of the sea. Of, to be free! To like once more in the
Jardin des Plantes with Papa. To feel his hands on hers, to hear the petals of the tulips tremble
in the wind. He made her the glowing hot center of his life; he made her feel as if every step she
took was important.”

Symbol:
A symbol that can be found in the novel is the ocean. Marie-Laure loved the sea growing up, not
because she lived by it, seeing as she grew up in Paris, but because of her curiosity for it. In her
youth she would explore the seashell collection of the scientists at the museum her father
worked at and read stories of great ocean exploration adventures. More than just being a
desirable fantasy in her adolescence, once she started to get older the sea represented
Marie-Laure’s childhood to her. In the ocean she could remember figments of her time in Paris,
as represented by this quote. In this section of the book, she is longing for her father and the
innocence of her childhood, a time when war seemed so impossible. The swift transition from
discussing the sea to desiring her father's touch shows how interconnected images of the shells
and barnacles are with her father and his nimble hands. In the increasingly hostile world of
Saint-Malo, Marie-Laure is able to go to her small hideout on the side of the street and feel the
ocean, have an escape from reality and return to her more carefree past. The ocean as a
symbol of Marie-Laure’s life back in Paris continues throughout the book, even at the end when
she is an old woman and still collects shells. This shows not only the impact her father’s role in
her childhood made on her life, but also how no one ever truly recovers from something as
traumatic as living through a war. They will always long for the time before the war, when they at
least had some semblance of peace.