1. In Alice's Adventures, Alice encounters creatures whose tolerance for what she says
varies considerably from what she would expect. Carefully identify, compare and contrast
the "hidden rules" of acceptable speech in six different spots Alice visits along her way.
One spot you may include is the waking world from which Alice comes. Do not answer
this question unless you can recall specific examples of acceptable or unacceptable speech in each of the six episodes.

 2. What prompts an adult writer to construct a work of fiction for children? Using Alice's
Adventures... as the basis for your answer, consider at least four factors that contribute
to the making of that book, including, of course, Carroll's relationship with Alice Liddell.
Support your answer with specific evidence of these factors in the text. Which factor do
you think weighs most heavily in Carroll's case? In that of two other children's book
writers with whom you are familiar? Do not answer this question unless you can
demonstrate a particularly solid knowledge of both the life and the writing of the two other children's book authors you will use as reference points in your answer.

3. Compare Alice's Adventures... to either Prisoners of the Sun or Haroun... in terms
of what their authors tell us about children (e.g., Alice, Tintin, or Haroun) as readers,
listeners-to-stories and storytellers. How does each main character reconcile the world of
fact with the world of fiction? What do reading, listening to stories or storytelling have to
do with the process of "figgering things out?," as this process plays itself out in each
story?

 4. Hergé's Prisoners of the Sun is full of references to ominous signs, from the pennant
on the Pachamacac to the eclipse of the sun. To the Quichua, the eclipse has sign value; to
Tintin, it is merely an item of exchange and use, exchangeable for freedom, useful as a
ploy. In Charlotte's Web, Charlotte's web possesses sign value to tourists, but to
Charlotte it is a matter of utility and exchange as well, a ploy for attracting flies (and
tourists) and an exchange for Wilbur's freedom. Other examples of such alternative
perceptions of objects (as signs or as useful or exchangeable items) abound in both folk
tales and children's literature. Discuss the meaning of such alternatives in Prisoners of
the Sun and in two folktales of your choice.

 5. Halmoni and the Picnic offers a contrast between a new generation in a "new country" and an old generation from an "old country." Such a contrast requires adaptation and accommodation between generations and "countries" or worlds. Compare the adaptations and accommodations proposed in Halmoni to those indicated in Hergé's Prisoners of the Sun, where an old world (Europe) and another old world (the land of the Incas) framed as the "New World" also require adaptations and accommodations for those who would reconcile their differences.