“The Lady with the Pet Dog” By: Joyce Carol Oates
Questions:
1) At the end of paragraoh 19, Oates has Anna ask herself the question “what did it mean to enter into a bond with another person ” ? Write an essay explaining how the story answers the question.
To enter a bond with someone means to feel complete with someone and to be happy with someone. When you enter a bond with someone you confide in them and you feel whole. Entering a bond doesn’t necessarily mean to start a relationship , it simply means they feel comfortable with someone.
2) What story did you like better – Chekov’s story or Oates’s ? What’s the point of retelling the story ?
I think Chekov’s story was better because Oates’s story had to many details. I like the fact that she rewrote the story from a different point of view, because it gives us a different feel of the characters. I would choose to read Chekov’s story rather than Oates.
3) Why are Anna and her lover drawn to each other ? What do we learn about their spouses that helps explain the attraction ? Are there any other explanations ?
Anna and her lover are drawn to eachother because they feel like they complete one another and when they are with eachother they are happy. They have a dull attraction to their spouses and aren’t very happy.
4) Why is Anna so unhappy after the affair in Nantucket begins ? Why does she think of suicide ?
The reason Anna is so unhappy after the affair in Nantucket is because she has a lot of guilt bottling up inside of her and she says that she needs to drain is her lovers poision out of her. She looks at her husband and sees shame, not in him but within herself. She regrets everything she did with her lover and she wishes she could take it back but at the same time she still wants to be with him.
5) How does Oates’s arrangement of incidents validate Anna’s feelings that “everything is repeating itself ?
Anna feels that everything is repeating itself because it’s like she experienced being in the same room with her loves and she seems as if she is repeating everything but I think she is just coming to realize that what she’s doing is wrong. Oates makes Anna sound like she is going crazy or she has a bad case of bipolar.
