Question

Directions: Identify a signpost from "Memories of a Dog". Write a short paragraph to explain how the signpost develops any of the following: character development, internal conflict, theme, relationship between setting and plot, setting, symbolism, conflict, or relationship between character and plot.

Include all four criteria:
1. Identify the title, author, paragraph, and the specific signpost you select.
2. Provide context for your signpost by briefly explaining what's happening in the story.
3. Provide one or more quotes from the text.
4. Explain how the signpost helps to develop any of the following in the story: character development, internal conflict, theme, relationship between setting and plot, setting, symbolism, conflict, or relationship between character and plot.

Excerpted from John Galsworthy’s 1912 essay.
Memories of a Dog

1 We set out to meet him at Waterloo Station on a dull day of February—I, who had owned his impetuous mother, knowing a little what to expect, while to my companion he would be all original. We stood there waiting (for the Salisbury train was late), and wondering with a warm, half- fearful eagerness what sort of new thread Life was going to twine into our skein. (Should he arrive with a label of caveat emptor?) I think our chief dread was that he might have light eyes—those yellow eyes of the common, parti-colored spaniel. And each new minute of the train's tardiness increased our anxious compassion: His first journey; his first separation from his mother; this black two-months' baby! Then the train ran in, and we hastened to look for him. "Have you a dog for us?"

2 "A dog! Not in this van. Ask the rearguard."

3 "Have you a dog for us?"

4 "That's right. From Salisbury. Here's your wild beast, Sir!"

5 From behind a wooden crate we saw a long black muzzled nose poking round at us, and heard a faint hoarse whimpering.

6 I remember my first thought: "Isn't his nose too long?"

7 But to my companion's heart it went at once, because it was swollen from crying and being pressed against things that he could not see through. We took him out—soft, wobbly, tearful; set him down on his four, as yet not quite simultaneous legs, and regarded him. Or, rather, my companion did, having her head on one side, and a quavering smile; and I regarded her, knowing that I should thereby get a truer impression of him.

8 He wandered a little round our legs, neither wagging his tail nor licking at our hands; then he looked up, and my companion said: "He's an angel!"

9 I was not so certain. He seemed hammer-headed, with no eyes at all, and little connection between his head, his body, and his legs. His ears were very long, as long as his poor nose; and gleaming down in the blackness of him I could see the same white star that disgraced his mother's chest.

10 Picking him up, we carried him to a four-wheeled cab, and took his muzzle off. His little dark brown eyes were resolutely fixed on distance, and by his refusal to even smell the biscuits we had brought to make him happy, we knew that the human being had not yet come into a life that had contained so far only a mother, a wood-shed, and four other soft, wobbly, black, hammer-headed angels, smelling of themselves, and warmth, and wood shavings. It was pleasant to feel that to us he would surrender an untouched love, that is, if he would surrender anything. Suppose he did not take to us!

11 lies. It is on our hearts that his life is engraved.

Answer 1

Title/author/paragraph/signpost: "Memories of a Dog" by John Galsworthy — paragraphs 8–9 — signpost: Contrasts and Contradictions.

Context: The narrator and his companion have just taken the new puppy from the train at Waterloo; they are seeing him up close for the first time and deciding what they think of him.

Quote(s): The companion exclaims, "He's an angel!" while the narrator immediately counters, "I was not so certain. He seemed hammer-headed, with no eyes at all..." (pars. 8–9).

Explanation: This contrast between the companion’s instant, sentimental reaction and the narrator’s skeptical, physical assessment is a clear Contrasts and Contradictions signpost. It develops character by showing the companion’s affectionate, idealizing nature versus the narrator’s more pragmatic, observant tone. It also sets up an internal conflict in the narrator — hope versus doubt — and hints at the story’s theme about differing perceptions and the slow building of attachment. Finally, the disagreement helps drive the plot: the companion’s immediate love propels their commitment to the dog, while the narrator’s reserve prepares readers for his gradual emotional change.