Outcasts Of Poker Flat Summary
= The resident of the Poker Flat want to improve the town by expelling the townspeople who were undesirable, so Oakhurst and the others forced to leave Poker Flat as a part townspeople who were. Conclusion The story “The Outcasts of Poker Flat” by Bret Harte depicts the journey of the four outcasts who are considered to be improper individuals by the people of the town. But their virtuous qualities are revealed when in course of their journey, they make every effort to save the lives of young lovers.
The Outcasts of Poker Flat
The Outcasts Of Poker Flat Character Analysis
Regionalism
Regionalismis a kind of literature that has focused on specific geographic areas includingpeople in the area. The writers capture on the speech, dress, common beliefs,and social interactions on the giving local (area). It gives the reader a clearexplanation on those specific areas. The regionalism has started during 1800sbecause of the changing that occur in the nation.Twoof the most powerful American regional writers are Mark Twain and Bret Harte.Both of them have capture of their reader local life, manner, and speech.
Respondand Think Critically
Readingfocus
QuickCheck
1.Why are Oakhurst and the others forced to leavePoker Flat?
=The resident of the Poker Flat want to improve the town by expelling thetownspeople who were undesirable, so Oakhurst and the others forced to leavePoker Flat as a part townspeople who were undesirable.
2.Why does Tom Simson act in the capacity of a “devotedslave” to Mr. Oakhurst?
=Eventhough he has beat Tom in a game but because Tom didn’t know how to gamble sohe decided to return him money.
3.What hashappened to the characters by the story’s end? Which two might still be alive?
= Everyonedied but Uncle Billy and Tom might still be alive.
Readwith a Purpose
4.How does each outcast react to the difficulties ofthe situation? Faced with hardship, do the characters act nobly ortreacherously? Explain.
=UncleBilly has got all the stuffs and left the cabin. He acted like treacherouslybecause he has escaped while others were still sleeping.
ReadingSkills: Predicting
5.Add a column to your chart, and for each prediction,indicate whether your prediction came true. Use your notes to answer thisquestion: What changes in the characters surprised you?
Character | Clue | Prediction | Yes/No |
All character | He even pointed out the fact that there was no provision, nor means of making camp. | Everyone might die. | Yes except Uncle Billy and Tom who might still be alive. |
Tom Simson | “Tommy, you’re a good little man, but you can’t gamble worth a cent. Don’t try it over again.” He then handed him his money back, pushed him gently from the room, and so made a devoted slave of Tom Simson. | He might follow Mr. Oakhurst when he has to live the town. | No,he caught up with Mr. Oakhurst later. |
VocabularyCheck
Matcheach Vocabulary word with its synonym.
Literaturefocus
LiteraryAnalysis
13.InterpretWhen Tom appears, Oakhurst has “a vague idea that the situationwas not fortunate” (page 628). Why might Oakhurst be uneasy?
= Because Tom and his wife have come to the cabin so Mr. Oakhurstthink that if there were more people then it will be hard for all of them tosurvive in the cabin. There was a limit of food. Oakhurst knew that TomSimson was too innocent so it is hard for him to deal with and undesirablepeople in the cabin.
14.Analyze How does each of theoutcasts—except Uncle Billy—change in the course of the story? What causes thechanges?
= Before Mother Shipton and Duchess of them always complained anddidn’t care about others at all. Both of them have changed because they canadjust to the surrounding and be good to others as well. They started to bekind to Piney. Fear of death has changed alln of the people so they need to dependon each other in order to survive in such a bad environment.
15.InterpretIn which ways is Oakhurst both the strongest and weakest of theoutcasts?
= Strongest part of Oakhurst was when he acted like a leader andnever gave up. His weakest was when he thought that everyone will die soon andhe felt a bit of discourages and hopeless .At the end, it seems that he haskilled himself.
LiterarySkills: Characterization
16.AnalyzeChoose one character from the story, and analyze how Harte bringshim or her to life. Which details reveal the most about the character? Cite atleast three details from the text.
= Uncle Billy, he liked to shout when he was disappointed and he wastreacherousand selfish.
LiterarySkills Review: Archetype
17.ExtendAn archetype is an imaginative pattern repeated through theages. Harte is credited with inventing the Western archetypal hero—self-reliant,solitary, and fearless. The original Westerners were only human, yet why domost people prefer legend over reality?
= Human has imagination and most of the writer like to writesomething that they have thought about to show their inner expression into the story which made it interested.
Your Turn
Outcast Of Poker Flat Characters
Identify nonessential elements,and set them off with commas
1.Harte born in New York moved to California.
=Harte, born in New York, moved to California.
2.Harte a newspaper editor began writing fiction.
=Harte, a newspaper editor, began writing fiction.
3.Harte’s stories which were popular in his time arenot well known today.
=Harte’s stories, which were popular in his time, are not well known today.
Summary
The story takes place in Poker Flat, a small California gold mining community. Certain inhabitants of Poker Flat feel that the community is going downhill. They have lost a lot of money, and worry that people's morals are sinking. Consequently a secret committee is elected. This committee decides who will be killed and who expatriated. One November morning, the stoic John Oakhurst, an avid poker player and the story's protagonist, notices a 'Sabbath lull' in the air on Poker Flat's main street and suspects the town is onto yet another round of exiling. On November 23, 1850 four people are exiled. The group consists of Duchess, a saloon girl, Mother Shipton, a madam, Uncle Billy, a local drunk and thief, and John Oakhurst, a poker player, who won a lot of money from the people sitting on the secret committee. They are instructed not to come back, on pain of death. The four characters get together and leave Poker Flat, heading to the nearby town of Sandy Bar, only a day's journey away but accessible only via a treacherous mountain pass in the Sierra Mountains range. After hours of traveling, Oakhurst’s companions get tired, and despite his remonstrances they decide to stop and rest. Despite Oakhurst's warnings that they do not have enough food to survive, the rest of his party decides it can survive on liquor. Meanwhile, Oakhurst encounters a young runaway couple, Piney Woods and Tom Simons, heading to Poker Flat to get married and seek their fortune. Tom Simons, also called “The Innocent,” has met Oakhurst before. They played Poker together, and Oakhurst won a great deal of money from him. Afterwards, he told Tom never to play poker again, and returned him his money. As a result of this Tom feels positively towards Oakhurst. He is thrilled to see him, and the young couple decides to spend some time with the group, obviously unaware of the fact that they were exiled for being immoral. Tom leads the group to an old cabin that he had found, and they spend the night. Upon waking, Oakhurst realizes that Uncle Billy has stolen off with the group's mules.
Analysis
In keeping with the story's roots in the Regionalism or 'local color' genre, Harte's story focuses on the particularities of one region, which in this case is a gold mining region around the Sierra Mountains in California. That said, Harte also departs significantly from the genre's focus on a region's everyday qualities, instead choosing to set the story in a time of crisis for the town of Poker Flat. Likewise, the story's protagonist, John Oakhurst, is at once a classically wise, stoic cowboy/gambler figure befitting his Wild West setting and a character in crisis himself; not only is he exiled, a disruption of his status quo, but he finds himself in a fatal situation where, unlike in the poker games to which he is accustomed, he cannot win. In these ways, Harte both adopts Regionalism and departs with its conventions, reworking the genre in order to highlight the hypocrisy that rules the otherwise classic Western town of Poker Flat.
The story also relies heavily on Biblical symbolism that positions John Oakhurst as a Christ figure. The narrative begin with the image of two men hanging from the boughs of sycamore trees in a gulch near the town, imagery that naturally calls to mind the two thieves that hung beside Christ during his crucifixion. In fact, the punishment that Oakhurst and his companions endure—exile into the wilderness—is loaded with Biblical allusions, particularly the story of Jesus’ temptation by the devil in the desert and the story of the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt. By referencing stories in which Christ (or Christians) suffer unjustly, this imagery implies that John Oakhurst is a martyr, persecuted for sins that he didn’t commit.
In a broad sense, the opening of the story actually functions much like an allegory, as it lends characters names like Tom “the Innocent,' whereas the exiles are earlier referred to as “improper” in the eyes of Poker Flat. Even the names that refer to trees implicitly editorialize the characters’ dramatic situation, as “Piney Woods” and “Oakhurst” refer to the idyllic yet tragic environment in which the characters find themselves. By referring to the pure environment in which the characters inadvertently serve a death sentence, these names automatically function as allegory, as they imply that John Oakhurst and Piney Woods are pure and innocent despite their dramatic situation.
This is heightened by the narrator’s frequent use of hyperbole, which again serves to emphasize the unjust nature of the characters’ situation. For example, the narrator says of Tom and Piney’s kiss that it was “so honest and sincere that it might have been heard above the swaying pines.” Against the backdrop of their unwitting encounter with sentenced criminals, this hyperbole functions to magnify the theme of innocence versus guilt.
The Outcasts Of Poker Flat Summary Sparknotes
The narrator makes heavy use of foreshadowing, as well. The ominous tone with which the story begins does not relax when the town's act of 'frontier justice' is achieved; instead it pervades the story, casting over all the event and actions a sense of the tragedy that will eventually befall the characters. The setting likewise serves to foreshadow the tragic ending of the story by functioning much like a character or divine being by interfering with the characters’ journey in the form of landscape and weather. For example, the red dust of Poker Flat has an eerie, assaulting effect on Oakhurst and can perhaps symbolize the haziness of the truth for the supposedly upright citizens of Poker Flat.