1a. What makes the doctor stop and get out of his car? Who approaches him when he stops? What do these people want the doctor to do?
2a. Where do the two men lead the doctor? What does the doctor do when he gets there?
3a. What does the doctor say to the gas station attendant about what has happened? Where does the gas station attendant say the doctor has been? What does he say about the two men?
1b. Why might the setting make the doctor nervous? Why do the two men make the doctor nervous?
2b. Explain how the doctor and the two men differ in opinion toward what should be done to the two men's friend.
3b. How do you think the doctor feels about what the gas station attendant says to him?
4a. What does the doctor think at first of the two men who stop him? What explanation does he provide for what he sees? Based on what the gas station attendant says, what is the story of the two men? What clues in the story help support the gas station attendant's words?
4b. Explain whose explanation you think is right—the doctor's or the gas station attendant's? Do you think the gas station attendant changed the doctor's mind? Why, or why not? If you were a police chief in the town, how would you explain the events that happened to the doctor?
5a. Explain whether you can understand the doctor's assumptions and attitudes toward Zeke and Eben at the beginning of the screenplay.
5b. Explain what Zeke and Eben try to tell the doctor about the killing they have done. Why might they have had to act as they did in their situation? How do they seem to feel about their behavior?
Dialogue. Through which character's dialogue do you learn the most about the two men the doctor meets? Explain.
Stage Directions. Explain how the stage directions help create the scary, mysterious mood or feeling of this screenplay.
1. Write a brief and spooky description of a scene at night or in the fog.
2. Imagine that you are a reporter writing about the strange experience that the doctor and others like him have experienced at Gettysburg. Write a news article about Zeke and Eben and the people who have encountered them.
3. Imagine you encounter a ghost from a historical time period. Write a dialogue between you and the ghost, in which you try to learn about that time period.
Writing Definitions. In your own words, write a brief definition for each of the following Words for Everyday Use.
1. arrogant =
2. dismissal =
3. enchantment =
4. grizzled =
5. grotesque =
6. indignant =
7. ironic =
8. scrutinize =
Dialect. A dialect is a version of a language spoken by people of a particular place, time, or group. Geiger uses dialect in In the Fog to emphasize that Zeke and Eben are from another time. Rewrite the examples of dialect below from In the Fog into the dialect of your own place, time, and group.
1. We don't aim to hurt you none.
2. Ye'll do proper, we're thinkin'.
3. It's for you to say if he's been hurt nigh to the finish.
4. Reckon it's bad in the chest like that, hey?
5. We never meant a mite o'harm, I can tell ye.
6. Reckon he'll pull through now.
7. Ain't stirred a mite since we left 'im.
8. Much obliged to you.
9. We ain't stopping ye.
10. Our thanks to ye.
