How did Betsy's brother prove to be quite selfish?

Betsy, Lyddie's roommate, uses most of her money to put her brother through college. Betsy's parents are dead, but she has an uncle in Maine who allows her to visit. When Betsy has time off work to go to her uncle's for a holiday, she doubts her brother will have time to see her. She fears he may be "too pressed with invitations from his university mates" to spend time with his sister, even though she is the reason he is able to attend the university. Later, when Betsy becomes seriously ill, Lyddie writes to her brother. Although he is less than a day away from Concord Corporation, he writes that he is too busy studying for final examinations but that he may be able to come at the end of the term to visit. Betsy laughs, but Millie is appalled at the brother's selfishness. Betsy asks if Lyddie wouldn't do the same to help her little brother, and Lyddie almost replies that Charlie is nice. She obviously means that Betsy's brother is not.

What are some quotes from Romeo and Juliet showing their dependence on one another?

Romeo and Juliet become codependent almost immediately in Romeo and Juliet, and this is one of the reasons their relationship becomes so hurried and ultimately deadly. (Although I do not think Shakespeare intended Romeo and Juliet to be read as a play warning of the dangers of codependency, it can certainly be read with that framework in mind.) Here are two quotes that point to the dependency Romeo and Juliet share:

ROMEO: Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon, / Who is already sick and pale with grief / That thou her maid art far more fair than she. Be not her maid, since she is envious; / Her vestal livery is but sick and green, / And none but fools do wear it; cast it off. (II.ii.3-9)

Immediately, Romeo compares Juliet to being more beautiful than celestial bodies like the moon. This is a big claim and indicative of his uncontrollable feelings for Juliet.

JULIET: Come, gentle night; come, loving, black-browed night; / Give me my Romeo; and, when he shall die, / Take him and cut him out in little stars, / And he will make the face of heaven so fine / That all the world will be in love with night / And pay no worship to the garish sun. (III.ii.20-25)

Whether Juliet's feelings can be classified as lust, love, or a crush, it is clear that she is consumed by her thoughts of Romeo. In her public moments she figures out how to be with him, and in her private moments she can only think of him. This is similar to many young, dependent relationships.

Interestingly, it's important to note that the dependency between Romeo and Juliet is often expressed through celestial imagery. Shakespeare is stating that Romeo and Juliet circle each other in the same way that planets and moons orbit each other, tied by gravity.

Does Tom really change when he becomes religious in "The Devil and Tom Walker"?

Tom Walker does not change as he ages; he merely grows fearful of the hereafter because he has sold his soul to the Devil.

Washington Irving writes that as Tom grows older he begins to feel anxious about the next world:

He thought with regret on the bargain he had made with his black friend, and set his wits to work to cheat him out of the conditions.

So, Walker becomes "a violent churchgoer," praying vociferously so that heaven can hear him. He becomes sanctimonious in his practice of religion and attendance at church and his acting as a "stern supervisor" and "censurer" of his fellow-churchgoers: 

...he seemed to think every sin entered up to their account became a credit on his side.

Nevertheless, Tom still worries that the Devil will collect his due. So, he tries to not be taken unaware and carries a small Bible in the pocket of his coat. At his desk, he keeps a larger Bible and makes the pretense of reading it whenever someone comes into his office.

It is clear that Tom Walker dreads the day of reckoning with Old Scratch. As a young man he was greedy and eager to be wealthy, not worrying about the conditions of his pact with the Black Man. However, as he ages, Tom begins to worry about the hereafter, so he becomes superstitious, thinking that if he prays and attends church and keeps a Bible out, he can thwart the Devil.

Certainly, the satire of Irving is apparent in the denouement of his story in which all of Tom's religious efforts fail. For, one day Tom leaves his little Bible at the bottom of his coat pocket and the large Bible is buried beneath a pile of mortgage papers to be foreclosed, so the "black man whisked him like a child...and away he galloped." 

What is the metaphor in "A Poison Tree" describing the speaker's wrath?

This poem is an extended metaphor, meaning that the metaphor is maintained at length, in this case, through the entire poem.  The metaphor is that the narrator's wrath is a seed that grows into a tree. The narrator is saying that he has chosen to keep his wrath towards a foe to himself, and in doing so, nurtures it until it grows into a tree that bears a poisonous apple, which kills the friend he is angry with.

In the first verse, he hints at the metaphor, saying "My wrath did grow" (line 4). In the second verse, the metaphor is extended further. The narrator "waterd it in fears" (line 5) and with his tears.  He provided it with sunshine in his false smiles, and finally the tree bears fruit in the third verse, "an apple bright" (line 10). His foe sees the shining apple, consumes it, and dies.  It is the poison of the narrator's wrath that has caused the foe to die. 

This metaphor is a particularly good one, since our anger, held inside, does bear poisonous fruit, although I find that the poisonous fruit often tends to harm the one bearing the anger, rather than the one against whom the anger is directed. Be that as it may, wrath held and nurtured is toxic, and the poem is telling us to beware of this in the form of a powerful metaphor.

How can the relationship between Charlie and Miss Kinnian be described?

In Daniel Keyes' story "Flowers for Algernon," Charlie and Miss Kinnian start out as student and teacher. Charlie looks at Miss Kinnian as an older woman who is smart and who can teach him how to read and write and help him with other academic pursuits.

As Charlie becomes more intelligent, however, he begins to see Miss Kinnian differently. He realizes she is not very old at all and that they are close in age. He sees that she is attractive and wants more of a personal relationship with her. They begin to date, and he soon finds himself in love with her.

"I knew that this was only the beginning. I knew what she meant about levels because I'd seen some of them already. The thought of leaving her behind made me sad. I'm in love with Miss Kinnian" (Keyes 23).

Charlie's IQ continues to improve to the point that he leaves Miss Kinnian behind intellectually. The teacher becomes the pupil in a way. Charlie begins to see that, not only is he a whole lot smarter than Miss Kinnian, he is even smarter than the doctors who performed the experimental surgery on him. His increased intelligence changes his relationships with everyone.

What meanings are associated with the names Desiree, La Blanche, and L'Abri, and how do they relate to the story?

The names in the story "Desiree's Baby" have interesting meanings in the story, especially the names Desiree, La Blanch, and L'Abri. All three are French names, relating to the French ancestry of Armand. France is a place where the racial discrimination that existed in Louisiana was not as severe. This accounts for the fact that Armand's mother, who was of mixed race, remained in France rather than coming to live in Louisiana on the plantation. 

Desiree means "desire." When Armand fell in love with Desiree, he was infatuated to the extent that her unknown family heritage was not a concern. However, in an alternate interpretation of the story, one where Armand has already read his mother's letter long before the bonfire scene, we could imagine that Desiree represents Armand's "desire" to keep his own African heritage hidden. By marrying a woman whose parentage was a mystery, if their offspring showed signs of Armand's African heritage coming through, he would have an excuse for the baby's looks and would not have to reveal his own mixed blood. (To support this interpretation, note that the story never says that when Armand finds his mother's letter among Desiree's letters that he has never read it before.)

"La Blanche" means "the white one." The name is somewhat ironic in that La Blanche is called "yellow" in the story, meaning she was of mixed African and Caucasian blood. She was possibly a quadroon (1/4 black) or an octaroon (1/8 black). The name stands for the argument within the story about who is white, Desiree or Armand. When their baby begins showing features consistent with African heritage, Armand insists that those qualities have been passed on to the child through Desiree, but at the end of the story we learn that Armand's mother was partially black. We have no way of knowing whether Desiree had any African heritage because she was a foundling, but she is definitely lighter complected than is Armand.

"L'Abri" means "shelter." It is the name of Armand's plantation. It, too, is ironic in that Armand should have been the one to provide shelter and security for Desiree and their son. However, when he has reason to believe Desiree is part black, he sends her away from his "shelter." 

Ambrose Bierce uses more than one point of view in "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge." What are the two main points of view that he uses?

The only point of view employed by this story is third-person limited omniscient. 

We can tell that Part I uses this kind of narrator because he knows only the thoughts and feelings of Peyton Farquhar.   In the last few paragraphs of the section, readers learn of his thoughts just before he is hanged. "He closed his eyes in order to fix his last thoughts upon his wife and children." He hears the strange, loud ticking of his own watch, and the ticks seems to get further and further apart in his mind, causing him to feel a great deal of "apprehension." We can only know this because the narrator knows his feelings.

In Part II, the narrator knows that "No service was too humble for [Farquhar] to perform in the aid of the South" and that he believes that "all is fair in [...] war." Thus, it is also in third-person limited omniscient.

In Part III, almost the entire section takes place in Farquhar's head, from the time he begins to fall through the bridge until the moment the noose snaps his neck. If the point of view could not provide us with his thoughts, readers would have no access to this section at all.