Capstone: Running the Procedure Cold

This is Unit Twenty-One of Analyzing and Interpreting Literature, part two of two, and the last lecture of the course. Part one worked six of the board's ten questions. This part works the last four and gives the tally. Part one's governing idea was that the only honest test of twenty units of method is the board's own questions, worked in order, with failures reported as failures. This part pays it off in the tally: all ten answered by procedure rather than by recall, checked and not asserted, with the tightest margin named and the sample's limits stated. First the tone shift is finished by placing playful and humorous in unit four's lexicon, and passage two's lesson is drawn: three question types from one prose extract with no author, title or date. Then Sonnet forty-four, forty percent of the sample on fourteen lines: an inference that goes no further than the word injurious, a restatement that is a grammar question in literary clothing, a further inference one small step from the lines, and a paired option tested by its weaker half. Last, the honest tally, what ten questions cannot settle, what the course recorded against itself, and the procedure the student now has. By the end you will be able to place a tone term by its exclusions. To work the sonnet's four questions. And to state what the method proved, where it was tightest, and what it cannot claim.

Two entries to start: playful and humorous placed in the lexicon against somber and admonitory, and passage two's lesson, that three question types came from one prose extract without any author, title or date.

Know what each term excludes.

AIL 2022 Playful and Humorous in the Lexicon

Unit four built a lexicon because the board's options are specific. Playful and humorous sits at the light end, against somber and admonitory at the other. Knowing what a term excludes is what lets a candidate eliminate, which was that unit's method; elimination needs exclusions.

Three types, no author needed.

AIL 2023 A Prose Passage, Three Question Types

Paraphrase, referent tracking and tone shift, from one eighteenth-century prose extract. Units nine, seven and four supplied them. Nothing about this passage required knowing the author, the title, or the date, which the board states the exam does not need, and the board states this explicitly.

Twelve entries on Sonnet forty-four: what it says, then question seven and the inference rule, question eight as a grammar question with the conditional and subjunctive kept, question nine and how far an inference may travel, question ten and the paired option, and four questions from four units.

One sonnet, four questions.

AIL 2024 Passage Three: Sonnet Forty-Four

Shakespeare's sonnet beginning if the dull substance of my flesh were thought, injurious distance should not stop my way. Fourteen lines, and the board asks four questions on it, which is forty percent of the sample set on one poem, forty percent of the sample.

If thought, then here; but he is not.

AIL 2025 What the Sonnet Says

If his flesh were thought, distance could not stop him. Thought can jump sea and land as soon as it thinks the place. But he is not thought, being made of earth and water, so he must wait and weep: a conditional, then its refusal.

Injurious means it harms him.

AIL 2026 Question Seven: Inference

The board asks why the speaker complains of injurious distance. The published answer is that it frustrates his desire to be with his beloved. The word injurious does the work: distance is described as doing him harm, and the board's answer is reported as the board's.

Supported, and no further.

AIL 2027 Supported, and No Further

Unit nine's rule for inference questions: the answer must be supported by the text and must not exceed it. The option that infers most is rarely the one the lines support, and unit one called that the overstated-option trap; the boldest inference is usually wrong.

Every option is grammatical.

AIL 2028 Question Eight: Restatement

The board gives line five, no matter then although my foot did stand, and asks which option restates it. The published answer is that in that case it would not matter even if his foot stood. Every option is grammatical English, and the board's answer is reported.

Three grammatical facts, one answer.

AIL 2029 A Grammar Question in Literary Clothing

The intake called this item decisive evidence, and unit two was built for it. No matter then means it would not matter in that case; although means even if; did stand is a past subjunctive meaning stood. Three grammatical facts settle it; unit two was built for this item.

The conditional and the mood, both kept.

AIL 2030 The Conditional and the Subjunctive

The published answer keeps both: in that case preserves the conditional from line one, and even if his foot stood preserves the subjunctive. An option dropping either has changed what the line claims, and literary judgment cannot recover it; dropping either changes the claim.

To think the place is to be there.

AIL 2031 Question Nine: Further Inference

The board asks what can be inferred from two lines about nimble thought. The published answer is that thought has only to determine where it wants to be and it is there. The lines say thought can jump sea and land as soon as it thinks the place; the board's answer, reported.

One small step from the lines.

AIL 2032 How Far an Inference May Travel

The answer restates the lines with one small step: as soon as think becomes has only to determine. That is the size of step an inference question wants. An option adding a consequence the poem does not draw would be the overstatement unit one warned of, and that is the size of step wanted.

Frustrated and yearning.

AIL 2033 Question Ten: Speaker's State

The board asks what the speaker is throughout the poem. The published answer is frustrated and yearning. Unit five established that this question type is the tone question narrowed to a single person, and that unit four's lexicon applies to it unchanged; the board's answer, reported.

Test the weaker half first.

AIL 2034 Testing a Paired Option

Unit four's rule: either half can kill a compound option, so test the weaker half first. Yearning is plain from the wish to be with the beloved. Frustrated is carried by injurious, by must attend, and by the closing tears, so both halves are supported here.

One sonnet, four units.

AIL 2035 Four Questions, Four Units

Question seven needed unit nine's inference rule, eight needed unit two's parse, nine needed unit nine again, and ten needed units four and five. One sonnet drew on four separate units, which is why unit fifteen treated Shakespeare as an exam problem in his own right; unit fifteen anticipated this.

Five entries to close the course: whether the method answered all ten, where it was tightest, what ten questions cannot settle, what the course recorded against itself, and what the student now has.

Ten of ten, by procedure.

AIL 2036 Did the Method Answer Them

All ten, by procedure rather than by recall. Not one required knowing an author, a date, a title or a plot. That is the claim the unit map made at intake, and the sample set is the only place it can be checked; here the governing idea pays off, checked and not asserted.

Question one was the tightest.

AIL 2037 Where the Method Was Tightest

Question one, because four of its five option words are absent from the anchor and had to be supplied by this course. A student working from the anchor alone would have been unable to read the options, and that is the narrowest margin in the set; four of five terms came from elsewhere.

No fiction, no modern passage.

AIL 2038 What Ten Questions Cannot Settle

A sample of ten across three passages cannot show the paper's full range. No poetry other than a sonnet appears, no fiction appears at all, and no passage later than the eighteenth century. The method held here and that is evidence, not proof; evidence, and not proof.

Five defects, seventy gaps, two corrections.

AIL 2039 What This Course Recorded Against Itself

Five defects in the anchor, seventy terms it omits, two false claims corrected after checking, and one gate that cannot see a quotation. All are written into the units that found them, because a course that hides its corrections teaches the wrong habit; all recorded where they were found.

The exam supplies the passage.

AIL 2040 What You Have

A procedure for an unseen passage: read it whole, place the voice, parse what resists, settle the words, name the device, and test by elimination against what is pointable on the page. The exam supplies the passage. This is what to do with it, and this is what you have.

That is the tone shift finished, Sonnet forty-four's four questions, and the honest tally, with the governing idea paid off in ten of ten by procedure, and the course complete. You can place playful and humorous at the light end of the lexicon by what it excludes, and say that one prose extract carried paraphrase, referent and tone shift with no author, title or date. You can work Sonnet forty-four: read its conditional and its refusal, infer no further than injurious, restate line five by keeping the conditional and the subjunctive that three grammatical facts settle, take one small step from as soon as think to has only to determine, and test frustrated and yearning by the weaker half first, seeing four questions draw on four units. And you can give the tally: ten of ten by procedure, checked against the only evidence there is; question one the tightest because four of its terms came from this course and not the anchor; no fiction and no modern passage in the sample, so evidence and not proof; five defects, seventy gaps and two corrections recorded where they were found. The exam supplies the passage. Read it whole, place the voice, parse, settle, name, test. That is what you have.