What are some introductory questions for student feedback of this text?

Introductory questions for student feedback: 

Marius calls his approach to Luther “essentially nonreligious.” What strengths and weaknesses do you find in this approach to a religious figure? In other words, what agendas might be shed and what agendas acquired?

Is Martin Luther, as Marius contends, a “catastrophe” for Western civilization? Why or why not? Another way of putting this: can one man be responsible for a civilization’s “catastrophe” or is this a result of trends larger than any one person can control?

Marius contends that what drove Luther was the question of whether God really can raise us from death. How does this relate to the apostle Paul? How does it relate to our own times? To you? 

Related to the question above, discuss how Luther’s fear of death drove his theology. It has been said the personal is the political: is the personal also the theological?

Do you agree with Marius that Luther’s sense of doubt was deeper than most have acknowledged? To what extent might Marius’s “nonreligious” viewpoint color his interpretation?

How does Marius characterize Luther’s relationship with Erasmus?

Do you blame Luther, as Marius does, for opposing Erasmus’s humanism?

Is Luther to blame for the religious wars of the sixteenth century, as Marius contends? Why or why not.

Marius says very little about Luther after 1527. What is your reaction to that?

In Tuck Everlasting, what is unusual about the Tuck family? What clues does the author give?

The Tuck family is different from every other family that Winnie Foster will ever meet, because the Tuck family is a family of immortals.  That's right, they will live forever.  Makes me wonder if Twilight took any inspiration from this book.  After all, that book was about a "regular," loving family of immortals too.  

Eventually the author explicitly tells readers that the Tuck family is a family of immortals, so I assume that your question is asking about early clues that the Tuck family is more than a family living in the woods.  

Chapter 2 introduces the reader to Mr. and Mrs. Tuck.  Mae wakes Tuck up from a peaceful sleep, and he says the following line:

"Why'd you have to wake me up?" he sighed. "I was having that dream again, the good one where we're all in heaven and never heard of Treegap."

That seems like a very odd thing to say.  Earlier Treegap was described as a peaceful little hamlet.  It hardly sounded like a place people would flee from.  The heaven comment is weird too.  Essentially, Tuck is wishing he were dead and in heaven.  

Mae Tuck tells Tuck that he should get over having that dream because nothing is going to change.  

"But, all the same, you should've got used to things by now."

Got used to what?  Why won't things change?  In fact, what things won't change?  It's a very odd conversation that they are having and more than hints to readers that there is something different about the Tucks.  

Chapter two's closing line drops the big hint that the Tuck family is not normal.  

For Mae Tuck, and her husband, and Miles and Jesse, too, had all looked exactly the same for eighty-seven years.

Wait, what?  87 years!  How does anybody look the same for that long of time?  I mean, some Hollywood stars definitely try, but Treegap doesn't seem like a place for high priced plastic surgeons.  From this point forward, the reader quickly learns about the spring water and its ability to give immortality, and Winnie must decide whether or not she would like to join the Tuck family in their uniqueness.  

Describe Brian's plan to land the plane when it ran out of fuel?

In Chapter 2 of Hatchet, Brian is faced with a critical decision as a result of the pilot's heart attack: he must find a way to land the plane. Remembering what he has learned about planes in the past and what the pilot taught him before his fatal heart attack, Brian tries to take control of the wheel and rudder of the plane, nosing the plane up so it can resume a steady path. He also attempts to use the radio to request help. In his search for the radio, Brian bumps the pilot, causing the plane to move suddenly. Knowing now that he truly is on his own, he finally finds the radio, but loses a signal before sending a coherent message. Brian decides that he must calm down and figure out a way to land the plane while sending distress calls on the radio every ten minutes. The distress calls goes unanswered, and he is uncertain if he should attempt to land the plane on his own or wait until it runs out of gas. Brian cannot bring himself to voluntarily land the plane until it finally runs out of gas and goes down. Aware that he must avoid trees, Brian tries to guide the plane toward a lake is it goes in for a crash landing.

Describe the two appearances of the ghost in "The Canterville Ghost."

In "The Canterville Ghost," the ghost makes his first appearance in Chapter Two. The family are in bed, having spent a full day driving, and the ghost plans to scare them by carrying his chains up and down the corridor. The noise wakes Mr Otis who gets out of bed and opens the door to find an "old man of terrible aspect" stood before him. His eyes were as "red as burning coals" and his clothes were "soiled" and "ragged." Instead of being terrified, however, Mr Otis offers the ghost a bottle of Tammany Sun Rising Lubricator to oil his chains and to prevent any further noise. This confuses the ghost and prompts him to flee down the corridor and return to his chamber.

The ghost makes his second appearance on a Sunday night in Chapter Three. Again, the family are in bed when they are awoken by a sudden crash in the downstairs hallway. When the family arrives downstairs, they find the ghost injured, "with an acute expression of agony on his face," because he has tried and failed to wear an antique suit of armor. Suddenly, the twins begin firing their pea-shooters at him while Mr Otis threatens him with a revolver. In response, the ghost lets out of a "wild shriek of rage" and then flees the room, extinguishing Washington's candle as he goes.

From the top of the stairs, the ghost laughs demonically, in an attempt to scare the family, but this fails. Instead, Mrs Otis opens her bedroom door and offers him some tincture for his "indigestion." Indignant and humiliated, the ghost turns "faintly phosphorescent" before vanishing into thin air.

What is the point of view of "Lamb to the Slaughter?"

The point of view is strictly that of Mary Maloney. Here is a typical example.

For her, this was always a wonderful time of day. She knew he didn't want to speak much until the first drink was finished, and she was satisfied to sit quietly, enjoying his company after the long hours alone in the house. She loved the warmth that came out of him when they were alone together. She loved the shape of his mouth, and she especially liked the way he didn't complain about being tired.

The narrator tells what Mary thinks, feels, and does. When Patrick is described, it is through Mary's point of view (POV). For example:

When he came back, she noticed that the new drink was a very strong one. She watched him as he began to drink.

The reader is not permitted to enter into Patrick's mind but can only guess what he is thinking and feeling from the way he acts, as observed by his doting wife. We know that Patrick has something important and painful on his mind because Mary sees he has made a very strong highball.

There is an excellent anthology of short stories arranged by points of view as classified by the editors, James Moffett and Kenneth R. McElheny. The full title of the book is Points of View: An Anthology of Short Stories (Rev. Ed. August 1995). "Lamb to the Slaughter" is not included in this anthology, but the editors would place it in the category they call ANONYMOUS NARRATION--SINGLE CHARACTER POINT OF VIEW. This is a very common story-telling technique. The story is told in the third person, e.g., "She watched him as he began to drink." The way Roald Dahl handles point of view in this story shows he is an accomplished fiction writer. 

Point of view is very important in story-telling because it is the chief way in which the author gets the reader emotionally involved with one of the characters. In "Lamb to the Slaughter" we sympathize and identify with Mary Maloney, even though she commits a murder, because we are held in her point of view from beginning to end. There is no one else with whom to identify without switching points of view, which can risk losing reader involvement. The other important way in which the author usually gets the reader to identify with one character is by giving that character a problem that must be solved. Mary's problem is that she has killed her husband and has to establish an alibi and dispose of the murder weapon. 

When the investigating police officers are devouring the thoroughly cooked and delicious murder weapon, they converse among themselves; but the author makes it clear that their dialogue is all being heard by Mary and that the reader is still in her point of view. Here is part of the dialogue and the very last line of the story which shows that Mary is listening to the whole conversation:

"Personally, I think the weapon is somewhere near the house."

"It's probably right under our noses. What do you think, Jack?"

And in the other room, Mary Maloney began to laugh.

In "The Road Not Taken," Robert Frost rhymes "sigh" with "I" and less traveled "by." What conclusions can you draw about the speaker’s attitude...

"The Road Not Taken" is a classic poem, regarded by many as the most famous English-language poem of all time, but it is deceptively tricky to interpret. 

In your question, you are looking at the final stanza of the poem. The first and the fourth lines of the stanza start with "I" and end with "sigh" and "by," respectively. To understand what this rhyming does, ask yourself, "How do these sounds make me feel?" The "I" sound is open, and it is almost a sigh if only understood as a sound. This sound, the sound of a sigh, goes with the tone of the final stanza. In this stanza, the narrator is reflective, almost sentimental, and is looking back on his/her life. The rhyming of these sounds adds to the sentimental reflection. 

Sentimentality is also known to be manipulative. Oftentimes, sentimentalism obscures the facts of an actual event. Indeed, in this stanza, the narrator changes what he said earlier in the poem (that the two paths "had worn... really about the same") and states "I took the one less traveled by, / And that has made all the difference." This is a sentimental trick. He views his actions as having made all the difference, but he actually chose the path almost at random. These sounds ("I") add to this wistful, sentimental shift.

Why did Great Britain and France decide not to get involved in the Civil War after Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation?

Lincoln's proclamation redefined the purpose of the war. It added a moral dimension to a war that had been officially about preserving the Union by destroying the rebellion. In short, it established that a result of the war would be the destruction of slavery. Given this fact, France and especially Great Britain would, by intervening in the war or recognizing the Confederacy, be supporting slavery in the eyes of many of their own people. Slavery was deeply unpopular among many influential English people (the nation having abolished slavery in its own right a few decades earlier) and the Emancipation Proclamation made the cause of the Confederacy morally repugnant. But in many ways, it reaffirmed what many British people were already thinking. Southerners had thought that the war, and the blockade that resulted, would bring about a "cotton famine" in Europe that would drive Britain and France, under the goading of wealthy and influential manufacturers, to intervene to stop the war or at least lift the blockade. This never really happened, though, partly because larger than normal cotton exports in the years before the war had led to surpluses. The mills in places like Manchester never stopped running. When shortages did occur, they were at least partly offset by cotton raised in India and other places in the British Empire. There were some in both nations who favored the Confederate cause, and a few incidents involving the blockade did lead to ill will between the Union and Great Britain, but forces advocating neutrality in the American conflict were always strong in Great Britain. So Lincoln's decision to issue the Emancipation Proclamation sealed the decision to stay out of the conflict for both Britain and France.