The Inquisitor’s Tale

Use these essay questions as writing and critical thinking exercises for all levels of writers, and to build their literary analysis skills by requiring textual references throughout the essay.

Differentiation Suggestion: For English learners or struggling writers, strategies that work well include graphic organizers, sentence frames or starters, group work, or oral responses.

Scaffolded Essay Questions

Student Prompt: Write a short (1-3 paragraph) response using one of the below bulleted outlines. Cite details from the text over the course of your response that serve as examples and support.

1. Although the story has many different narrators, the three children do not tell their own stories.

• How does mainly using third-person narration throughout the text impact how the reader feels about or understands the story? (topic sentence)
• Give three examples from the story that support your idea about how the third-person narration affects the reader.
• In your concluding sentence or sentences, show how the impact you described supports the novel’s thematic concern with The Power of Difference, Storytelling as Unity, or Reckoning with Complexity.

2. Each of the children has special abilities or characteristics. Ironically, the circumstances in which they live mean that their greatest strengths are sometimes what cause them to be rejected and persecuted.

• What is ironic about how people around the children react to their special abilities and characteristics? (topic sentence)
• Give an example from each of the children’s lives that shows how they are rejected or persecuted for the very thing that makes them special.
• In your concluding sentences, show how this irony relates to the text’s thematic concerns with The Power of Difference and Reckoning with Complexity.

3. In many ways, Michelangelo and Hubert are opposite kinds of characters—one is thought to be good but is really evil, and the other is thought to be evil but is really good.

• What message about appearances is conveyed through the characters of Michelangelo and Hubert? (topic sentence)
• Give an example of the children’s initial beliefs about Michelangelo and an example that shows his real character.
• Give an example of the children’s initial beliefs about Hubert and an example that shows his real character.
• In your concluding sentence or sentences, show how the message about appearances supports the text’s thematic concern with Reckoning with Complexity.

Full Essay Assignments

Student Prompt: Write a structured and well-developed essay. Include a thesis statement, at least three main points supported by textual details, and a conclusion.

1. Do some more research into The Canterbury Tales. What is this book mostly about? How are its narrative strategies similar to and different from The Inquisitor’s Tale? How is its narrative structure similar to and different from The Inquisitor’s Tale? Does The Canterbury Tales share the themes of The Power of Difference, Storytelling as Unity, or Reckoning with Complexity? Once you understand more about this book, write an essay that compares and contrasts the two stories, taking a clear position about the extent to which The Canterbury Tales influences The Inquisitor’s Tale. Be sure to cite any quoted evidence or evidence from outside sources.

2. What is ironic about the nature of the Inquisitor’s job? Whom does the Inquisitor work for? What is he expected to do? What does “inquisitor” mean? How does the process of doing his job change him and his ideas? Can a person who is genuinely curious and open to the world—an “inquisitive” person—carry out the orders of the Church without thinking deeply about the complexity of the world? Write an essay in which you analyze what is ironic about the Inquisitor’s task. Connect this irony to the text’s thematic concern with Reckoning with Complexity. Be sure to cite any quoted evidence.

3. Hatem Aly’s illustrations in The Inquisitor’s Tale mimic those found in illuminated manuscripts. But unlike traditional illuminated manuscripts, Aly’s illustrations are sometimes meant to be funny and comment on the story from a different perspective than those offered by the narrators. Write an essay in which you explore how these illustrations are similar to and different from those in the traditional illuminated manuscripts of the Middle Ages. Connect your discussion with the story’s use of multiple narrators and its thematic concern with The Power of Difference, Storytelling as Unity, or Reckoning with Complexity. Be sure to cite any quoted evidence or evidence from outside sources.