Question 2

(Suggested time—40 minutes. This question counts as one-third of the total essay section score.)

The following excerpt is from Nisi Shawl’s novel Everfair, published in 2016. In this passage, the narrator describes the experience of a young woman, Lisette, as she rides her bicycle through the French countryside in July 1889.

Read the passage carefully. Then, in a well-written essay, analyze how Shawl uses literary elements and techniques to portray Lisette’s complex response to her experience of riding her bicycle.

In your response you should do the following:
• Respond to the prompt with a thesis that presents a defensible interpretation.
• Select and use evidence to support your line of reasoning.
• Explain how the evidence supports your line of reasoning.
• Use appropriate grammar and punctuation in communicating your argument.

Lisette Toutournier sighed. She breathed in again,
out, in, the marvelous air smelling of crushed stems,
green blood bruised and roused by her progress along
Line this narrow forest path. Her progress, and that of her
new mechanical friend. Commencing to walk again,
she pushed it along through underbrush and creepers,
woodbine and fern giving way before its wheels. Oh,
how the insects buzzed about her exposed skin, her
face and hands and wrists and ankles, waiting to bite.
And the vexing heat bid fair to stifle her as she
climbed the hillside slowly—but the
scent—intoxicating! And soon, so soon, all this effort
would be repaid.

There! The crest came in sight, the washed-out
summer sky showing itself through the beech trees’
old silver trunks. Now her path connected with the
road, stony, rutted, but still better suited for riding.
She stood a moment admiring the view: the valley, the
blurred rows of cultivation curving away smaller and
smaller in the bluing distance, the sky pale overhead,
the perfect foil for the dark-leaved woods behind her
and by her sides. Not far off a redwing sang, cold
water trickling uphill.
She had the way of it now: gripping the rubber
molded around the machine’s metal handlebars, she
leaned it toward her and swung one skirted leg over
the drop frame. Upright again, she walked it a few
more steps forward, aiming straight along the lane, the
yellow-brown dust bright in the sun. The machine’s
glossy paint shone. Within the wheel’s front rim its
spokes were a revolving web of intricacy, shadows
and light chasing one another. Tiny puffs of dust
spurted from beneath the black rubber tires.
She raised her eyes. The vista opened wider, wider.
The road laid itself down before her.

Up on the creaking leather seat. Legs drawn high,
boots searching, scraping, finding their places . . . and
pedal! Push! Feet turning circles like her machine’s
wheels, with those wheels. It was, at first, work. She
pedaled and steered, wobbling just once and catching
herself. Then going faster, faster! Flying! Freedom!
Saplings, walls, and vines whipped by, flashes of
greenbrowngreengrey as Lisette on her machine sped
down the road, down the hill. Wind rushed into her
face, whistled in her ears, filled her nose, her lungs,
tore her hair loose of its pins to stream behind her.
She was a wild thing, laughing, jouncing over dry
watercourses, hanging on for dear, dear life. Lower,
now, and some few trees arched above, alternately
blocking the hot glare and exposing her to it
coolwarmcoolwarm, currents of sun and shade
splashing over her as she careened by. Coasting, at
last, spilling all velocity till she and the machine came
to rest beside the river.

The river. The comforting smell and sound of it
rushing away. Out on the Yonne’s broad darkness a
barge sailed, bound perhaps for Paris, the Seine, the
sea beyond,<sup>1</sup> carrying casks of wine and other
valuables. Flushed from her ride, Lisette blushed yet
more deeply, suddenly conscious of the curious stares
of those around her: Mademoiselle Carduner, the
schoolmistress; and Monsieur Lutterayne, the
chemist,<sup>2</sup> out for a promenade during his dinner hour
or on some errand, seizing a chance to vacate his
stuffy shop. Flustered, she attempted to restrain her
hair into a proper chignon,<sup>3</sup> but at only sixteen and
with many pins missing, this was beyond her skill.
She began furiously to plait<sup>4</sup> her thick blond curls,
and the others moved away.

At last she was alone on the riverbank with her mechanical friend. She tied her plaits together, though she knew that momentarily they would slither apart.
She stroked the machine’s still-gleaming handlebars, then leaned to fit her forehead at their center, so. “Dear one,” whispered Lisette. “How can you ever
know how much you mean to me? Who would not
give all they could, everything they had, in exchange
for such happiness as I have found with you?”

<sup>1</sup>The Yonne River in France is a tributary of the Seine
River, which passes through the city of Paris toward the
Atlantic Ocean.
<sup>2</sup>pharmacist
<sup>3</sup>a hairstyle in which the hair is pinned into a knot at the
nape of the neck or at the back of the head
<sup>4</sup>braid
