8^th Grade
Summer Reading 2008

The Light in the Forest
by Conrad Richter

The following questions should be answered on loose-leaf paper. These questions will be used as the basis of discussion the first few days of school. A test on the book will be given the first week of school.

In addition to The Light in the Forest, you will read Alan Williams’s Walk On. You will not be tested on Walk On.

My advice is to read Walk On first so that The Light in the Forest will be fresh in your mind when you return to school.

Study Questions for The Light in the Forest

Chapter 1

  1. Why does True Son object to being returned to his white family?

  2. What aspects of white society repulse True Son during the stop at the army camp?

Chapter 2

  3. Why does Richter shift the narration to Del’s point of view in Chapter 2?

  4. What arguments does True Son offer to show Del he is not white, but Indian?

Chapter 3

  5. Why does True Son contemplate suicide?

  6. What does the old sycamore at the forks of the Muskingum symbolize?

  7. Why does True Son give up the idea of eating the May apple root?

  8. How does Half Arrow characterize the white men?

Chapter 4

  9. Which of Little Crane’s comments about white men seem most revealing?

10. Why does Half Arrow watch quietly while the guard binds True Son’s arms?

11. What do the stories from Cuyloga teach True Son?

12. What does True Son’s crossing of the river symbolize?

Chapter 5

13. What signs tell True Son he has entered the white man’s territory?

14. In what ways does True Son find the wooden-framed lodges of the whites symbolic of their values?

15. Compare and contrast the appearance and behavior of Cuyloga to that of True Son’s white father.

16. Why does Del Hardy accompany Mr. Butler and his son to their home?

Chapter 6

17. Describe the significance of Richter’s shift in point of view at the start of Chapter 6.

18. Describe True Son’s reactions to the two names he isolates from Harry Butler’s speech - “Susquehanna” and “Paxton.”

19. Compare the reactions of Myra Butler, Aunt Kate, and Gordie to True Son on the first day of his return.

Chapter 7

20. Why does True Son have difficulty falling asleep his first night in the Butler home?

21.  What does True Son remember Cuyloga saying about the massacre?

22. What Indian ideas does Uncle Wilse Owens consider “heathen”?

23. How does True Son defend the Delaware language?

24. Compare the complaints against the Indians made by Uncle George to those made by Uncle Wilse.

25. Why does Uncle Wilse hit True Son?

Chapter 8

26. What reason does True Son give for Aunt Kate’s “theft” of his moccasins and Indian clothes?

27. How does True Son react to Del Hardy’s departure?

28. What white practices does True Son despise most?

29. How do Kringas’ remarks about the bounty of the Great Spirit help develop Richter’s theory of energy?

30. What analogies does Bejance draw between his life and True Son’s?

31. Why does the coming of February brighten True Son’s mood?

32. Why do Uncle Wilse and Harry Butler misinterpret True Son’s abortive adventure to Third Mountain?

33. Why is True Son unhappy to return home even though his father says Corn Blade is dead?

Chapter 9

34. Why is Myra Butler bedridden?

35. What do Aunt Kate’s remarks to Parson Elder indicate about her character?

36. What lessons does Parson Elder try to teach True Son?

Chapter 10

37. What do Dr. Childsley’s conjectures about True Son’s unexplainable fever reveal about his attitude toward Indians?

38. Why does Mr. Butler gain little comfort from his visit to True Son’s sickroom?

39. How does the scene of Harry Butler updating his account books let Richter criticize white civilization?

Chapter 11

40. How does True Son compare the value that whites and Indians place on messages they receive?

41. Why does the call of Memedhakemo, the turtle dove, make True Son so homesick?

42. How does Richter’s use of point of view increase the reader’s understanding of True Son’s illness?

43. How does Richter use imagistic language to explain the contrast between True Son’s Indian and white parents?

44. Why are Half Arrow’s remarks about True Son’s speech patterns significant?

45. Why does Half Arrow fail, but True Son succeed, in understanding Mr. Owens’ and his friends’ reaction to Little Crane’s stories?

46. During the attempted scalping of Uncle Wilse, what clues show the impact of “civilizing” forces on True Son’s character?

Chapter 12

47. What is True Son’s only regret about leaving the Butler home?

48. Why does Richter carefully point out which Indian tribes used the mountain path that True Son and Half Arrow are following?

49. Why does Half Arrow’s plan to steal the trader’s two dugouts disturb True Son, and how do the boys resolve their difference of opinion?

50. What does True Son think about as he and Half Arrow float by Fort Pitt?

Chapter 13

51. Why does Richter use most of Chapter 13 describing the idyllic days True Son and Half Arrow spend in the forest before returning to their village?

52. How does True Son’s and Half Arrow’s behavior toward their relatives change because of the experience in the forest?

Chapter 14

53. What interrupts the village’s celebration of True Son’s return?

54. As the war party advances, why do the scalps taken by Thitpan’s warriors upset True Son?

55. How does Thitpan angrily try to justify the scalping of the child?

56. How is True Son’s Indian mother similar to the white woman on the riverboat who accuses the men of being cowards?

57. How does True Son’s dream about the Butlers influence his decision to warn the riverboat passengers of the ambush?

Chapter 15

58. How do memories of Be-Smoke and Heavy Belt help True Son during his trial for treason?

59. Why does Cuyloga blacken his face with charcoal?

60. Compare the explanations for True Son’s “treason” made by True Son, Cuyloga, and the other warriors.

61. Why does Cuyloga refuse to say good-bye to True Son?

62. How does True Son’s second crossing of the river into white territory differ from his first crossing with Colonel Bouquet and Del Hardy?

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

An Examination of 18^th Century Life

1. What does Dr. Childsley’s treatment of True Son’s fever show about medical practices in the mid 1700s?

2. At Albany in 1754, John Penn and his associates, including Benjamin Franklin, purchased from the Iroquois rights to land west of the Susquehanna. The Delawares were outraged and claimed the sale void because neither the Iroquois nor any other of the Six Nations owned land in western Pennsylvania. The Delawares, nevertheless, were ousted from the region. How does Richter work this historical fact into his fiction?

3. Harry Emerson Wildes, author of The Delaware, describes Colonel Henry Bouquet as a merciless Indian hater who used bloodhounds to track down Indians. Compare Richter’s portrait of Bouquet with Wildes’.

4. In December, 1763, fifty Paxtang militiamen rode to Lancaster to massacre the Conestogo, a tiny tribe of basket makers, bowl carvers, farmers, and fishermen. How does Richter use this historical incident in the novel?

5. What does the excerpt from Harry Butler’s accounting ledger in Chapter 10 suggest about 18^th century farming?

6. Does Richter’s novel suggest that he agrees or disagrees with the following quote from St. Jean de Crevecoeur, an 18^th century French aristocrat who visited the American frontiers?

An Examination of Mysticism

1. Do you think The Light in the Forest concerns itself with spiritual as well as historical questions?

2. In what ways does Richter develop the theme of the mystery of the wilderness?

3. How does white civilization disrupt the organic unity of man and nature that the Indians experience?

4. Throughout the novel, Richter thematically examines the search for the Spiritual Father. Neither Cuyloga nor Harry Butler, symbols of the physical or earthly father, completely accepts True Son. But True Son often refers to a third “father.” Who is this father, and how may he eventually bring comfort to the alienated boy?

5. How does True Son represent the spiritual crisis of 20^th century man as well as of the displaced Indian?

An Examination of Richter’s Theory of “Psycho-Energics”

1. Do you believe that comfort and conveniences make man physically and mentally lazy?

2. How many appliances do you use during the course of a normal day and how do you view their use?

3. Richter believes that men hunger for energy, though they frequently experience energy deficiencies. Have you ever experienced such deficiencies, and what caused them to occur?

4. Richter thinks youth can be recaptured if one consciously tries to revitalize the supply of personal energy. Do you know older people who seem remarkably youthful? If so, what accounts for their youthfulness?

5. Richter writes that, in order to maintain the flow of energy, our desires and goals must never be fully realized. Is this, for you, a satisfying or frustrating philosophy?