1. Read Stephen Crane's short story The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky." Compare Crane's theme or central idea in that story to the theme of the declining West in Schaefer's Shane. Although on the surface they are very different, what similarities are shared by Shane and Crane's Scratchy Wilson? How are Joe Starrett and Marshal Potter alike?

Marian and the marshal's wife?

2. When Shane struggles with the tree stump or fights with Morgan, Fletcher, and Wilson, it is clear who his antagonist is. But what, precisely, are the terms of his inner conflict? That is, what competing needs and desires make their various claims on the gunfighter? How are Marian and Joe involved in some of these conflicts?

3. Western. novels, mystery stories, Gothic romances, and much of science fiction are often dismissed by critics as examples of "escapist" literature, unconcerned with...