The+Harvest



The Harvest By: Tomas Rivera Page: 616-620  __**Exposition**__:  In the beginning of the story, it is taking place in the Midwest during September and October. The narrator is introduced as a farm worker, who thinks that this time of year is the best year because the season is almost over, and the farmers can soon return home to Texas. The main character of the story, Don Trine, is introduced to us. He always seen walking through the fields, and he likes to be alone. The other farmers try to go with him, but he always pushes them off and takes a different direction.   __**Rising Action**__:  Next in the story, the other farmers start talking, and begin to wonder what Don Trine does when he goes off on his walks alone. They see all the holes that are dug around where Don walks and cannot figure out what they are all for. Some of them believe that he is hiding money and that his fortune is hidden away where he always takes he walks to. So after discussing the ideas, some boys that work on the farm, decide they want to know what he does on the walks, and they follow him.  **__Climax__**:  After the boys begin to follow Don Trine, Don realizes they are following him, and decides to take a different path than the one he usually takes. The boys begin to get bored with following him, and decide to go back to the farm. Another day, one of the boys who was very interested in where Don goes, follows him again, and makes sure to stay back so he is not seen. The boy then realizes that when Don Trine takes his walks, he is digging holes, and going into them, because he likes to feel the earth moving around him.  = =
 * Plo ****t Su ****mm ****<span style="font-size: 13pt; color: rgb(153,51,0); font-family: Verdana;">ary ** <span style="font-size: 13pt; color: rgb(17,75,153); font-family: Verdana;">

<span style="color: rgb(203,29,247);">__**Tomás Rivera**__
==<span style="color: rgb(203,29,247);"> ==

<span style="color: rgb(203,29,247);">
====<span style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(203,29,247); font-family: Arial;"> Tomás Rivera was born in Crystal City, Texas on December 22nd, 1935. He was born into a group of migrant farmworkers that traveled through the farmlands of the US. A lot of what he saw helped give him ideas for his stories. Rivera was very persistent with his schoolwork, and eventually got a Ph.D. from Southwest Texas State University. His love for schooling, led to him becoming an educator to other people, but this limited the time he could spend writing. Even with all his schooling, he is still one of the most known Mexican authors in the US. Most of his works are all about farm workers, but he was most famous for his Spanish Literature. He ended up marrying <span style="color: rgb(0,0,128);">Concepción Rivera. Tomás <span style="color: rgb(0,0,128);"> Rivera died on May 16th, 1984 at the age of 48 due to a heart attack. Following his death, many plazas were named after this famous Spanish writer and many southern institutes named part of their campasus after Rivera. [|[19]]====

<span style="font-size: 110%; color: rgb(0,255,0); font-family: Times New Roman;">__**Poetry**__ __**Mood of the story:**__ The moods of the story, are that the story is very mysterious and suspenseful. Don Trine makes it a point that he does not want anyone to know what he is doing on his walks, and if someone does try to follow him, that he goes a differnt direction. No one can figure out what he is doing, and people begin to make assumptions as to what they believe is going on, and they are far from right.
 * <span style="font-size: 110%; color: rgb(0,255,0);">__Books__ **
 * **Rivera, Tomás (1971), Y no se lo tragó la tierra. " ... and the earth did not part.",**
 * <span style="color: rgb(0,0,0); font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">**(1973), Always and Other Poems, Sisterdale, TX: Sisterdale.**
 * <span style="color: rgb(0,0,0); font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">**(1990), Olivares, Julián, ed., The Searchers : Collected Poetry, Houston: Arte Público.**
 * <span style="color: rgb(0,0,0); font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;">**(1991), Olivares, Julián, ed., Tomás Rivera: The Complete Works, Houston: Arte Público.**
 * <span style="font-size: 110%; color: rgb(0,255,0); font-family: Times New Roman;">__Film__ **
 * **//...And the Earth Did Not Devour Him//.**

A symbol in this story is the earth and the ground. This is represent life and what is going on during the story. All the people in this story are farmers and since they are diging all day, the ground is representing their life as farmers. A more obvious example is how Don Trine is digging holes in the ground and laying in them. This is a big part of his life, and without the holes, he would not be able to feel the earth moving around him.
 * __Symbol:__**

<span style="display: block; font-size: 130%; color: rgb(0,0,255); text-align: center;">__**Vocab Words**__ __**Harrowed**__: To be broken up by a frame with spikes drawn by a horse or tractor. Part of Speech: Verb Sentance: The farmer adjusted his __**harrowed**__ before plowing the field. Synonym(s): shredded, cut, torn Antonym(s): together, balanced

Part of Speech: Adverb Sentence: The boy **__astutely__** walked about the class room as he knew he put a tac on the teachers chair. Synonym(s): intelligently, sensibly, wittily Antonym(s): foolishly, sily, untntelligently
 * __Astutely__**: cleverly or cunningly.

Part of Speech: Verb Sentence: The boy gently __**caressed**__ his cat. Synonym(s): canoodling, rubbing, fondling Antonym(s): rough, rigid, unyielding
 * __Caressing__**: To rub gently or rub against.

1. "Let's see, who he's got to take care of? He's an old bachelor. He ain't never married or had a family. So, with him working so many years...Don't you think he's bound to have money? And then, what's that man spend money on? The only thing he buy is his bit of food every Saturday. Once in a while, a beer, but that's all." ~This shows that Don Trine is all alone and that he really has no one to spend time with while he is sitting there.
 * __ Quotes: __**

2. "Why would he want to be all by hisself anyway?To heck with him:its his business." ~This shows that in the beginning of the story, the boys really dont care about what Don Trine is doing.

3. "Well its bound to be Don Trine. But wat's he hiding? Why's he making so many holes?" ~This shows the boys are becoming more curious as to what Don Trine is doing.

4. "Look here's a coffee can,. I bet you this is what he digs with. I think you're right." ~This is showing suspense building through the story. The boys are starting to realize what Don Trnie may be doing on his long walks.

5. "Who said he's burying anything? Look he always goes for his food on Saturday. Let's check close where he goes this week. And on Saturday when he's on his errand, we'll see where he's hiding. Whadda you say? Good'nuff. Let's hope he doesn't catch on to us." ~This shows that the boys and the other men on the farm, are becoming very interested in what Don Trine is doing. So much so that they are devising a plan to figure it out.

<span style="font-size: 130%; color: rgb(0,0,255); font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;"><span style="font-size: 130%; color: rgb(0,0,255);">THEME : <span style="color: rgb(0,128,0);"> A theme of this story is, “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” They thought Don Trine was a crazy and the boys could not figure out what he was doing when he would go off by himself and dig holes in the ground. During the story, the curious boys follow Don Trine to find out what he is doing. Then after the boys give him a chance to show them what he is doing, the boys realize that Don Trine is not weird, that he just wanted to feel the earth moving in his hands.

Many stories can also have a dual meaning, and I think that this is one of them. Another theme to this story could definitely be "Make a loving connection to the Earth and everything it provides. Don't just take advantage of it." Don Trine is a perfect example of this quote. Him being a farmer shows that he must already have a certain amount of respect for the land to halp his crops grow. But later on we see that Don Trine has been diggin holes into the earth and sleeping overnight to literally feel the earth moving. This shows Don Trine's connection to the earth, and shows how greatful he is for what it provides for him. SETTING: <span style="color: rgb(0,128,0);">This story takes place somewhere in the Midwest on the farm. Most of the time, the characters are out on the fields working and thinking about when they can finally go and move back to their homes in Texas. Time Period: This story seemed to take place during the early 1980's. During this time Mexican immigrants were one third of the total number of immigrants in the United States. 83% of all the mexican immigrants lived in three states: California, Texas, and Illinois. At this same time, many of those mexican immigrants began to migrate, the places they moved to were known as the new-settlement states. The reasons for the large migration were both economic and political. Point of View: This short story is told from the third person omnition point of view. This means that the story is told from a narrator, but the thoughts of more than one character are shown. <span style="display: block; color: rgb(0,0,255); font-family: Verdana; text-align: center;"> __**Characters**__ <span style="color: rgb(119,68,0); font-family: Verdana;">__Don__ __<span style="color: rgb(119,68,0); font-family: Verdana;">Trine __ Don Trine is one of the farm workers and the only character in the story who has a name in the book. He likes to keep to himself, and he never speaks to anyone about anything. He is an eligible bachelor and has never been married to a woman. Since he is so mysterious around everyone, no one knows what he is doing when he goes off by himself.<span style="font-size: 13pt; color: rgb(17,75,153); font-family: Verdana;"> Most of the town just speculates about what Don Trine does half the time. Throughout the story, it is revealed that Don Trine has a strong connection with the Earth, and everything it has to offer. <span style="color: rgb(119,68,0); font-family: Verdana;"> __ Group of Boys __ The boys in the group are young migrant farm who are always wondering what Don Trine is doing when he goes on his walks alone. They follow him to find out what he does but get bored with it, and lose interest. <span style="color: rgb(119,68,0); font-family: Verdana;">__ Curious Boy __ The curious boy is one of the boys that works on the farm that follows Don Trine to see where he goes and what he does on his walks. Even though the other boys don’t want to see what he is doing, the boys is interested in Don and realizes that the man is not crazy. The boy goes back later, and imitates what Don Trine did.

__**Characterization:(Round/Flat, Dynamic/Static)**

Don Trine__ ---Flat Character: He really does not change the way he feels about different things throughout the book. Since he keeps to himself, and does not open up to the people around him, we never really get to see what he is like. ---Static Character: He does not really change throughout the story. From the beginning to the end, he keeps to himself and just goes about his own business, not really payig attention to the other peope around him.

__Group of Boys__ --- Flat Character: The boys in the book are all very curious about what Don Trine does when he goes off on his walks. When they decide they are going to follow the man, they do that, but become bored with the fact tha he is just walking around and go bak to what they were all doing before on the farm. ---Static Characters: The group as a whole does not change the way that they feel throughout the story. All that the boys ever really did, was just wonder about what Don Trine was doing on his walks, and really nothing about the opinions they had changed.

__Curious Boy__ --- Round Character: This one boy in particualr, is different from the others, because he continues to wonder about what Don Trine does when he is out alone. After he sees what the man is doing in the ground, he also tries it out and seesthat he too enjoys being in the grond like Don does. --- Dynamic Character: The boy begins the story feeling the same way as the other boys on the farm do, and believed that Don was a crazy man. After the boys follows Don Trine on his walk and sees what he does with the soil and making the holes, the boy has respect for the man, and realizes that he is not crazy.

__ Characterization: Direct __
=<span style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(51,102,255); font-family: Arial;">Below are some quotes from the short story //The Harvest// which show how the author directly characterizes the character whether it is through orders or a flat out explanation of the character. = = “That’s why it wasn’t very surprising to see Don Trine take a walk __ by himself __ through the grove and to walk along the fields every afternoon. This was at the beginning, but when some youngsters asked him if they could tag along, he even got angry. __ He told them he didn’t want anybody sticking behind him __ .” = = = = This quote was primarily used for characterizing Don Trine. Notice, I underlined the words “by himself” and the sentence, “He told them he didn’t want anybody sticking behind him.” These two parts of that passage were used to describe how Don Trine is a man who usually keeps to him self. He doesn’t want anyone to be around him when he is talking his afternoon walks. It brings up a somewhat secretive aura if you will about him. It definitely shows that Don Trine is more of an introvert than a socialist, by saying how he doesn’t want anyone following him. = = = = “There he went through the same procedure that he had witnessed the day before. What he experienced and what he never forgot was __ feeling the earth move, feeling the earth grasp his fingers and even caressing them __. He also felt __ the warmth of the earth __. He sensed it was inside someone. Then he understood what Don Trine was doing. He was not crazy, he simply liked to __ feel the earth when it was sleeping __ .” = = = = In this quote, we see how Rivera is even characterizing the Planet Earth itself as being a living, breathing creature. By saying how the boy was “feeling the earth move, feeling the earth grasp his fingers and even caressing them.” Rivera is telling us that the earth was a moving and even embracing those around it. The boy also felt the “warmth of the earth”, which continues to show how the earth was a living creature. Telling us that Don Trine liked to “feel the earth when it was sleeping” can tell us that it was a truly organic creature to be able to sleep. = = = = __** Characterization: Indirect **__ = Here are examples of ways the story showed indiredt characterization. Authors show this by not coming right out and telling you how the characters are feeling, but using key words that you can infere yourself what the characters are like.

"That's why it wasn't very surprising to see Don Trine take a walk by himself trough the grove and to walk along the fields every afternoon." ~This quote shows us that Don Trine likes to be alone and have time to himself where no one else is around. By him being by himself on his walks, he is allowing himself to connect with nature, and do what he loves to do.

"That week the youngsters closely watched Don Trine's walks. They noticed that he would disappear into the grove, then come out on the north side........." ~This quote is telling us about how nosy the other people on the farm are. They are almost stalking Don Trine, trying to figure out what he is doing when he goes on his walks. This is also showing us how mysterious Don is to the rest of the people around him. The way that he disappears and comes and goes with out anyone knowing where he is, or what he is doing.

<span style="display: block; font-size: 150%; color: rgb(0,43,255); text-align: center;">__** Suspense **__ <span style="font-size: 130%; color: rgb(255,0,0);"><span style="color: rgb(255,0,0);">1. "Why would he want to be all by hisself, anyway?" This quote is an example of suspense because it shows that the kids are beginning to wonder where Don Trine is going and why he doesn't want to be followed.

<span style="font-size: 130%; color: rgb(255,0,0);">2. <span style="color: rgb(255,0,0);">"Yeah, he's gotta have a pile of money, for sure. But, you think he's going to bury it around here?" This quote is an example of suspense because it makes the reader wonder whether or not Don Trine has money buried and whether or not the kids will search for it.

__**Imagery**__ 1. "You can stick your arm in them up to your elbow." This quote allows the reader to draw a clear picture in their head of just how big the holes truely are.(pg.619)

2. "Naw, man. Why, look, you can't see them from the road." This quote helps the reader understand where the holes are in the field and how far away from the road they are.(pg.619) =[] =

=__ Critique: The Harvest __= =<span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(255,153,0); font-family: Arial;">Written By: Andrew T. Golden = =<span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(128,0,128);">// The Harvest //, a short story originally written by Tomās Rivera, was another one of his finer works. Although it is not his best, //The Harvest// was a story based on a farmer who found his own way to make a connection to the earth around him. Albeit unconventional, Don Trine (the main character) attempts to feel the earth move by sleeping in holes over night. The story was pretty interesting, in that it kept one’s interest for a short time as the curious boy attempted to figure out Don Trine’s methods. Most of the story was entertaining and a bit awkward. = =<span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(128,0,128);"> = =<span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(128,0,128);">One thing this story was lacking, was a bit more depth. The story contained basically 3 types of characters and was pretty straight forward. Now I am aware that this was indeed a short story, but much like a short film, the challenge of it is to create a story that’s entertaining and semi complex without being too long or confusing. This critic just doesn’t think that there was enough depth to the main plot, it just was there. = =<span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(128,0,128);"> = =<span style="font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(128,0,128);">I do understand, and like how Rivera chose to, as he has in many of his stories, relate his real life to his written work. Though this story he expressed some more of his Spanish culture through Don Trine’s methods. Most of the Spanish groups at the time this took place were farmers who were just finishing up their “harvest” for the year and getting ready for the winter. The author also explains how Trine makes a connection with the earth in a less than usual manner. But this showed how many farmers learn to value the earth and come to respect it. = = = = Overall Rating : <span style="color: rgb(255,153,0);">★★ = = [] =