Get Talking: Ella Enchanted

How does the curse cause Ella to be "in danger at every moment"? What happens to her if she tries to disobey an order?

What does Mandy reveal about herself to Ella after Ella's mother dies? What does Mandy tell Ella about Ella's family line?

Why are the gnomes friendly to Ella? What does the gnome predict for her?

Ella's father doesn't know about her curse. Why not? Why does Mandy advise Ella not to let him find out? What kind of man is Sir Peter?

How does Hattie figure out that Ella will obey her commands? What does she do with her power? Why doesn't she tell anyone? What does Ella hope to learn from the bogweed?

Even though she is cursed with obedience, how does Ella disobey orders? Does Ella's curse ever help her? Find an example of a positive result of the curse.

Each time Ella's book of fairy tales is opened, a different tale appears. Do the tales reflect the person reading the book? Why else do you think the fairy book shows certain things at different times?

Can you find any patterns in the different languages spoken in the book? Can you find any spelling, punctuation, capitalization, or other characteristic that distinguishes each from the other? Make a chart or list of your findings.

How does Prince Charmont feel about Ella? Does Ella realize how he feels? Find passages from his letters and their conversations to support your answers.

After meeting Lucinda, Ella thinks, "I knew I was happy only because I'd been ordered to be, but the happiness was absolute." If you were cursed as Ella was, would you rather be free to hate being obedient or be forced to be happy about it? How much freedom do you have to disobey orders in your own life? What keeps you from disobeying? If you do disobey, how does that come about?

What would you do in Ella's situation if you were forbidden to continue a dear friendship? If your circumstances prevented you from marrying the person you loved? Can Ella behave differently? How? What would the consequences of her actions be?

What do you think is the worst "gift" Lucinda bestows on anyone during the novel? Compare your choice with other gifts and discuss the disadvantages of each. Try to think of unusual ways each gift would affect the person's life.

What is the difference between small magic and big magic? Discuss how Mandy's and Lucinda's ideas about big and small magic are different. How do Lucinda's opinions change? Can you think of real-life situations in which people have power equal to big magic?

Ella Enchanted is based on the story Cinderella. Discuss how Ella's character and story is similar and how it is different from the traditional tale. What do you think the three most important differences are? Explain.

As always, this is just to get you thinking.  I'll see you next week!

Gloria

These questions are taken from
              http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/collateral.jsp?id=10952_type=Book_typeId=4279

Book Blurb: Ella Enchanted

At birth, Ella is inadvertently cursed by an imprudent fairy named Lucinda, who bestows on her the "gift" of obedience. Anything anyone tells her to do, Ella must obey. Another girl might have been cowed by this affliction, but not feisty Ella: "Instead of making me docile, Lucinda's curse made a rebel of me. Or perhaps I was that way naturally." When her beloved mother dies, leaving her in the care of a mostly absent and avaricious father, and later, a loathsome stepmother and two treacherous stepsisters, Ella's life and well-being seem in grave peril. But her intelligence and saucy nature keep her in good stead as she sets out on a quest for freedom and self-discovery, trying to track down Lucinda to undo the curse, fending off ogres, befriending elves, and falling in love with a prince along the way. Yes, there is a pumpkin coach, a glass slipper, and a happily ever after, but this is the most remarkable, delightful, and profound version of Cinderella you've ever read.

Taken from http://www.amazon.com/

About the Author

Gail Carson Levine

I grew up in upper Manhattan, Washington Heights to be exact, a hilly, pretty neighborhood. My family lived across the street from P.S. 173, my elementary school, and from a park where I used to climb what my friends and I called the "danger" rocks, which were part of the palisades that overlook the Hudson River. Going up, clinging to cracks with my fingertips, terrified, I'd think, If I live, I will never do this again. When I reached the top I'd work my way down and start over just as frightened as before.

From third grade through high school I wrote stories and poems, and a few of my poems were published in an anthology of student writing, but I never thought of becoming a writer. The authors of most of my favorite childhood books were dead (Mark Twain, L.M. Montgomery, Louisa May Alcott, Anna Sewell). I knew a few artists because my dad owned a commercial art studio, and I saw actors in the movies and on stage, but I didn't think of writing as work that any modern person did.

In college——first Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio, then City College of New York (Phi Beta Kappa, not that I'm bragging)——I majored in Philosophy, a useless major for a future writer. Philosophers use winding, twisty, endless sentences and words like posit, predicate, epistemology, ontology. Don't get me wrong. Writers need to have enormous vocabularies, and I never met a word I didn't love, but we use our arsenal judiciously. We don't go all sesquipedelian at the drop of a hat.  And in college I met and married my husband David, who is a very witty man. He's been giving me humor lessons ever since!

After college, I worked for New York State government, mostly in jobs that had to do with welfare. My favorite time was the first part of my career when I helped people find work. How satisfying that was!
Meanwhile, I did my first bit of writing for children. In the 1970's I wrote the script for a musical called Spacenapped. David wrote the music and lyrics, and it was performed by The Heights Players, a community theater in Brooklyn. But I still didn't think of myself as a writer. I read novels constantly, as I always had, and one day while I was meditating I asked myself why, since I adored stories, I never made up any. That was the beginning of The King's Cure, an art appreciation book for kids. I wrote it and drew pencil illustrations of birds and used reproductions of famous art for the illustrations——and no one would publish it——but I became hooked on writing. I took writing classes and joined critique groups and The Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators (find it online at www.scbwi.org, a great organization). And I collected rejection letters for nine years until an editor wanted the manuscript for Ella Enchanted. You know the rest.

Taken from http://www.gailcarsonlevine.com/