1. Describe the idea of innate depravity as it pertains to the central principle of Puritan ideology and how it is expressed in the Puritanical writers Bradstreet, Bradford and/or Taylor (use at least two.)

2. Compare and contrast the imagery of Bradstreet's "To My Dear and Loving Husband" with Taylor's "Huswifery" and how the respective imagery helps to characterize each poet's work and philosophy.

3. While Bradstreet has been criticized for her non-Puritan ideas, discuss, though, how much of her poetry does reflect Puritanical thinking.

4. Discuss the extent to which Taylor's poetry reflects specific concepts of Puritan theology.

5. Compare Rip Van Winkle with Franklin's Father Abraham in "The Way to Wealth," i.e., what do they have in common?

6. Cooper's Natty Bumppo, while a self-reliant frontier hero, has been deemed an early environmentalist and humanitarian. Discuss that idea.

7. Emerson, in "The Poet," called for the emergence of a new American poetics. Focusing especially on "The Prairies," discuss how Bryant meets those demands and also how he still merely imitates British poetry and familiar rules and does not meet those ideas as expressed through Emerson.

8. What are the problems with assigning any of the following classifications to Hawthorne's work: Puritan, non-Puritan, transcendentalist, antitranscendentalist, romantic, realist? Remember to cite specific works and/or characters to support your idea.

9. Explore the moral ambiguity (good vs. evil) in Hawthorne's works and, in particular, with one or more of his characters.

10. Discuss Hawthorne's view of women in the fiction we've covered.

11. Explain specific ways in which Thoreau's Walden may be considered "practice" of Emerson's theory.

12. Discuss the theme of self-reliance in Thoreau's works.

13. Look at the following two quotes: "I become a transparent eyeball. I am nothing. I see all" (Emerson, Nature) and "[the greatest poet] is seer . . . is individual . . . he is complete in himself . . . What the eyesight does to the rest he does to the rest" (Whitman, "Preface" to Leaves of Grass). Focus on Whitman's and Emerson's philosophical connections as well as where Whitman breaks from Emerson's practice.

14. Use the quote, "God bless Captain Vere!" in Melville's Billy Budd to "read" the entire work.

15. Explore the two kinds of justice Melville sets in opposition in Billy Budd and discuss the moral, political, and thematic implications in Billy's execution.

16. The literature of American Lit I has been criticized as a collection of works by "dead white males" mostly because of education and opportunities not afforded to others. Take a theme or topic by one of these "dead white males" and analyze it as to how it might have been altered or different if presented by someone other than a "white male."