Sucker

1. Sucker By Carson McCullers

2. Topic and Theme • Topic: Relationships: • Brotherly love and hate; • Falling in and out of love. • Themes: • Searching for self-identity • Love and loneliness • Spiritual isolation • Understandingouremotions: guilt, conscience, confusion

3. Crisis and Climax • Initiating incident: Pete falls in love withMaybelle and, for the first time, begins to treat Sucker withfriendship and affection. • Complication/Crisis: Maybelle dumps Pete and, in hisown humiliation, heturns on Sucker and humiliateshim. • Twoclimatic points: • ‘You’re a swell kid, Sucker,’ I said. It seemed to me suddenlythat I didlikehim more thananybodyelse… • ‘You’retoodumb. Just likeyourname – a dumb Sucker.’

4. Conflict • External– Man vs. Man • Pete vs. Sucker • Pete vs. Maybelle • Internal – Man vs. Self • Pete vs. hisconscience

5. Role Reversal Irony: It isironicthat Pete nowfeelsuncomfortable in whatwashis ‘own room’ for so long. Sucker has succeeded in ‘putting Pete in his place’, a place that once belonged to Sucker. Moral: Treat as others as youwish to betreated (The Golden Rule) or ‘whatgoesaround, comesaround’.

6. Relevant passages • P. 182. ‘There is one thing I have learned, but itmakes me feelguilty and is hard to figure out. If a person admires you a lot youdespisehim and don’t care – and itis the personwhodoesn’t notice youthatyou are apt to admire.’

7. P. 184 ‘Anyway I guessyouunderstand people betterwhenyou are happy thanwhensomethingisworryingyou.’ p.185 ‘I feltso good…I wanted to befriendlywitheverybody.’

8. P. 184 ‘It seemed to me suddenlythat I didlikehim more thananybodyelse I knew – more thananyother boy, more thanmysisters, more in a certain wayeventhanMaybelle. I felt good all over and itwaslikewhentheyplaysad music in the movies. I wanted to show Sucker how much I reallythought of him and make up for the way I hadalwaystreatedhim.’

9. Group work: Plot line In groups of 2-3, draw a plot line for Sucker givingspecificdetails for each section to illustrate the causes and consequences of Pete’s abusive relationshipwith Sucker: • Exposition • Initiating incident • Rising action • Crisis – Conflict • Falling action • Dénouement

10. HCE 9: Relationships Think of situations whereyou have seen one personbeingtreatedwell or poorlybecause of the otherperson’sparticularmood. How canwemaintainhealthyrelationshipswithourfriends and family or datingpartners?

11. Abusive Relationships • What are the signs? • Whatkinds of behaviourconstitute abuse? • Whatkind of people becometargets of abuse? • Whywas Sucker a good target for Pete? • Whatcanyou do to help yourself or someoneelsewhois a victim of abuse? • Whatcanyou do if you are the abuser? • Whatcould Pete have done?

12. HCE Reflection In each of the three stories we have read, young people have facedconflict: • between men and women for equalrights; • betweenfamilymembers; and • withinthemselves -- strugglingwith the guilt for havingtreatedlovedonespoorly. Whatpersonalphilosophy guides you in maintaininghealthyrelationships?

13. A personalphilosophy How do youview/judgeothers? How doesthis impact the wayyoutreatothers? How do youview/judgeyourself? How doesthis impact the wayyou let otherstreatyou? Whatpersonalrule, motto or belief guides you in maintaining good relations withothers?