Perspectives

In this part, we will help you put the short story “Mule Killers” by Lydia Peelle into perspective. We will look at the literary period and analyze the story by comparing it to two literary works suggested by your task.

Literary period

The short story “Mule Killers” was published in 2004, which makes it a Modernist literary work. The story is framed – which means that a secondary story is introduced in the main story...

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Other works

Here, we will focus on two poems suggested by your task: “To His Lost Lover” by Simon Armitage and “The Ecchoing Green” by William Blake (Wider Contexts, p. 202). Also, we will offer you some ideas to help you compare the story with the two paintings suggested by your task: “Cart Drawn by Oxen on the Heath at Sunset. The train Passes by” by Hans Smidth and “Stone City, Iowa” by Grant Wood.

“To His Lost Lover”

Simon Armitage’s poem deals with the themes of unfulfilled love and lost. The anonymous speaker presents two lost lovers who are separated.

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“The Ecchoing Green”

William Blake’s poem describes a spring day, from sunrise to sunset, and it focuses on a group of children playing in a natural environment. The old man who is watching them remembers that his older friends also used to play like that in the past. Finally, at sunset, the children return home to their mothers.

Although the main theme of Blake’s poem is human...

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“Cart Drawn by Oxen on the Heath at Sunset. The train Passes by”

Smidth’s painting suggests a simpler world, where animals are used on farms and where people connect with them and work in harmony with nature. Also, note that technology’s early presence...

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“Stone City, Iowa”

Wood’s painting, on the other hand, shows a different society, one where industrialization and modernization have already happened. As you can see, Grant’s...

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