张汉熙高级英语The_Loons.pptVIP

LESSON XII THE LOONS I. Background knowledge Author: Margaret Laurence, one of the major contemporary Canadian writers, was born in 1926 and died of lung cancer in 1987. She was educated in Manitoba, a province in south central Canada. After marrying an engineer, she moved with her husband to Africa and lived there for a number of years. I. Background knowledge About the Novel: THE LOONS is included in the 2nd section of her Norton Anthology (collection) of Short Fiction. Margaret Laurence wrote 5 separate short stories about this community. The Tonnerre family is one of the central families. I. Background knowledge The touching story tells of the plight of Piquette Tonnerre, a girl from a native Indian Family. Her people were marginalized by the white-dominating society. They were unable to exist independently in a respectable, decent and dignified way. They found it impossible to fit into the main currents of culture and difficult to be assimilated comfortably. I. Background knowledge At school, Piquette felt out of place and ill at ease with the white children. When she had grown up she didn't have any chance to improve her life. In fact her situation became more and more messed up. In the end she was killed in a fire. I. Background knowledge Her death is like the disappearance of the loons on Diamond Lake. Just as the narrator's father had predicted, the loons would go away when more cottages were built at the lake with more people moving in. The loons disappeared as nature was ruined by civilization. In a similar way, Piquette and her people failed to find their position in modern society. I. Background knowledge 2. The comprehension and perception of the title: loon: any of several large fish-eating diving birds of the northern part of the northern hemisphere that have the legs placed far back under the body and as a result have a clumsy floundering gait on land I. Background knowledge loon: distinctive Canadian bird, the bird of the lakes Several