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Lesson 1 (from What The?)

Objective

Early in the novel, Foer establishes that the events of September 11, 2001, will be an integral part of his story. Along with Don Delillo's Falling Man, this was one of the first American novels to directly address this seminal national trauma. The objective of this lesson is to examine to use of September 11th in the novel.

Lesson

1. For class discussion: As a class, determine what reasons prolific authors had for avoiding the topic of September 11, 2001 as a topic in literature for five years. Was it merely a matter of taste or does the class think such traumas cannot be processed for a period of time? Why does the class think that Jonathan Safran Foer chose to filter the experience of 9/11 through the eyes of a child?

2. Divide the class into several groups and assign each one of the following traumatic historical events: Pearl Harbor, the Holocaust...

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