The Shining Houses

1) Explain what type of narration is used in this story.
There are three types of narration in this story there is retrospective narration and present progressive narration.

2) How is "The Shining Houses" structured? Why do you suppose Munro structured the narrative this way?
The shinning houses is structured in a way that you can get a little bit of the back story before you get right into the story. The story is set up like this for a reason. The author wants the reader to get to know Mrs. Fullerton. Also the author has to have Mary get to know Mrs.Fullerton's back story. Without this aspect of the story the reader would have had a totally different out look when it came to Mrs.Fullerton, they would nothave been able to empathize with her. Also Mary probably would not have had a character change when it came down to getting ride of Mrs.Fullertons house. This was set up by the author one to make it a better story and two, to make it the story that she imagined.

3) Discuss irony in the story with respect to the title.
The shinning houses is ironic because the houses are not shinny and the people living in them are not good people they do not have shinny personalities.

4) What distinction does the story highlight in terms of the difference between legal and moral?

The story shows that there is a large different between legal and moral. There are many things that are legal but they are not the morality right thing to do. In the story the "new people" all want to get rid of Mrs. Fullerton's house and yes they are legally going about getting rid of the house the right way but they are over looking the morals behind making someone move out of a house that they love. They simply look over her feelings and only care about what is best for them.
5) Sketch Mary's character. (note: this doesn't mean draw her, rather it means to describe her in terms of the definition above)

Mary's is a mother, she is caring, and seems to be content in the beginning of the story. She has moral values and knows that you have to respect people and what they want. See knew that you should respect your elders. She had the motivation to do what was best for Mrs. Fullerton based on the story that was told to. Mary was smart and knew what kind of a person she wanted to be. She did not let her feelings go hidden. although in the end to save herself greif it seemed, she over looked her own feelings to simply keep the peace.