Which details best support the central idea of the excerpt? Select three options.
Which questions best demonstrate how to objectively evaluate an essay for interesting and unique presentation? Select two options.
Read the excerpt from "How the Grimm Brothers Saved the Fairy Tale."Despite difficult personal problems and meager financial support from 1805 to 1812, the brothers proved themselves to be innovative scholars in the new field of German philology by publishing articles and books on medieval literature. In fact, they would be surprised to learn that they are more famous today for their tales than for their superb philological studies, which include pioneering work on German sound shifts, and the founding of the voluminous German Dictionary in 1854. But it was their training in philology and the demands that they placed on themselves as researchers that assisted their collecting and editing the tales.
Read the excerpt from an essay about fairy tales.The Grimms’ fairy tales address the experiences of people who are living in difficult situations. For example, there is the story of Rapunzel. There is also the story of Hansel and Gretel, who had to escape their house in order to find food and were locked out.Which revision would best help the author support the thesis more effectively?
Read the excerpt from an essay about folk tales.The majority of folk tales involve danger. Stories like "Little Red Riding Hood” are based on dangerous situations the characters have to get out of.Which revision would best help the author present the main point more effectively?
Read the excerpt from "How the Grimm Brothers Saved the Fairy Tale."What compelled the Grimms to concentrate on old German epics, tales, and literature was a belief that the most natural and pure forms of culture—those which held the community together—were linguistic and based in history. According to them, modern literature, even though it might be remarkably rich, was artificial and thus could not express the genuine essence of Volk culture that emanated naturally from experience and bound the people together. Therefore, all their efforts went toward uncovering stories from the past.
Read the excerpt from "How the Grimm Brothers Saved the Fairy Tale."All of the tales in the first edition bear the marks of their diverse storytellers who believed in the magic, superstitions, and miraculous transformations of the tales. It may be difficult for us to understand why this is the case, but for the storytellers and writers of these tales, the stories contained truths about the living conditions of their times. The tales in the first edition were collected not from peasants, as is commonly believed, but mainly from literate people whom the Grimms came to know quite well. Evidence shows that these people often obtained their tales from illiterate or anonymous informants. Even if they did not know their informants, the Grimms came to trust almost everyone who contributed to their collection. It is this mutual trust that marks the tales as something special and endows them with a certain humanity, what Germans call Menschlichkeit, and it is this mutual trust among folklorists in the nineteenth century that marks it as the golden age of folk and fairy tales. The tales in the first edition set a certain standard that collectors began to follow and still follow even today.
Read the excerpt from "How the Grimm Brothers Saved the Fairy Tale."Turning to the tales of the first edition, a reader might notice that many of the stories such as "The Hand with the Knife,” "How Some Children Played at Slaughtering,” and "The Children of Famine,” have nothing to do with fairies or happy endings. Instead, these are stark narratives about brutal living conditions in the nineteenth century. For instance, "The Children of Famine” begins this way:Once upon a time there was a woman with two daughters, and they had become so poor that they no longer had even a piece of bread to put in their mouths. Their hunger became so great that their mother became unhinged and desperate. Indeed, she said to her children, "I’ve got to kill you so that I can get something to eat.”
Read the excerpt from "How the Grimm Brothers Saved the Fairy Tale."Between 1812 and 1857, seven editions of their tales appeared, each one different from the last, until the final, best-known version barely resembled the first. Given that the first edition has recently been honored in bicentenary celebrations throughout the world, it is perhaps a good time to reexamine what we think we know about the original tales of the Brothers Grimm.
Ruth is writing an essay about the reasons for changing a folk tale from a dark, grotesque story to a story that is appropriate for children.How should Ruth organize her writing to provide the best structure for her essay? Select two options.
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