Pet

Use these essay questions as writing and critical thinking exercises for all levels of writers, and to build their literary analysis skills by requiring textual references throughout the essay.

Differentiation Suggestion: For English learners or struggling writers, strategies that work well include graphic organizers, sentence frames or starters, group work, or oral responses.

Scaffolded Essay Questions

Student Prompt: Write a short (1-3 paragraph) response using one of the below bulleted outlines. Cite details from the text over the course of your response that serve as examples and support.

1. Pet includes both characters who fulfill traditional gender expectations and characters who do not.

• What message does this book convey about gender expectations? (topic sentence)
• Provide evidence from the lives of at least three characters that supports your interpretation.
• In your concluding sentence or sentences, show how the book’s message about gender expectations relates to the book’s thematic concern with Binaries as Fiction.

2. The book’s portrayal of the revolution contains allusions to our present society.

• What is the purpose of these allusions? (topic sentence)
• Offer evidence of at least three allusions to our present society.
• In your concluding sentence or sentences, connect these allusions to a larger message that Pet is trying to convey.

3. All of the human characters in Pet are Black people.

• What message about being a Black person in America is Pet trying to convey? (topic sentence)
• Provide evidence from at least three separate sections of the text that supports your interpretation.
• In your concluding sentence or sentences, show how this message is related to the book’s thematic concern with The Importance of Remembering and the Dangers of Forgetting.

Full Essay Assignments

Student Prompt: Write a structured and well-developed essay. Include a thesis statement, at least three main points supported by text details, and a conclusion.

1. On the night before they go to the library, Redemption tells Jam that “All knowledge is good knowledge” (86). Why does he say this? Does he feel the same way after he finds out about the monster in his house? How does he feel at the end of the novel? How does Jam feel about the idea that all knowledge is good? Why does she try to keep certain information from Redemption? Who else in this novel keeps secrets? In this novel, does keeping secrets harm or help?

Write an essay in which you take and defend a position about the novel’s stance on the value of providing honest information to others. Show how this motif supports the novel’s thematic concerns with Appearance Versus Reality and The Importance of Remembering and the Dangers of Forgetting. Support your assertions with evidence drawn from throughout the text, making sure to cite any quoted evidence.

2. In Chapter 1, Bitter says that “It is not easy to get rid of monsters…. The angels, they had to do things underhand, dark things” (18). What does this quote reveal about the novel’s ideas about good and evil? In such a morally complex world, what does it mean to be “innocent”? What does it mean to do the right thing? How would a person even know what the right thing to do is, if even the “good guys” are permitted to do “underhand, dark things”? Do people in the real world ever do terrible things for what they think are the right reasons?

Write an essay in which you evaluate the messages Pet sends about doing bad things in order to secure a good outcome. Explain these messages, offering textual evidence to support your interpretation. Show how these messages support the text’s thematic concern with Binaries as Fiction. Then, offer your own personal analysis of the morality of this vision of good and evil, focusing on the idea that it is morally permissible to do bad things in order to secure a good outcome.

3. What is the difference between “restorative justice” and “punitive justice”? Do different characters in Pet interpret justice in different ways? If so, how does the reader know which kind of justice the book is promoting, overall? Do some research into the ideas of restorative and punitive justice. Then, think about the things the characters in Pet say and do and decide which vision of justice each seems to have in mind.

Write an essay that defines both types of justice, demonstrates which type of justice appeals to each of the book’s main characters, and then uses evidence from the book to argue which version of justice the overall book is advocating for. Be sure to cite any quoted evidence and evidence from outside sources.