As you read the stories by Andrei Platonov in your coursepack, please consider the following questions:

What is your sense of the narrators of these stories? Who are they? What world do they come from? How does their tone - their "voice" - affect the stories? Find some examples that strike you.

Platonov's stories play with oppositions: between modern and old Russia; between city and village; between nature and technology. Find examples of these oppositions (perhaps you'll note others, as well). How do these oppositions function in the stories?

How does your understanding of the larger social and political context of Stalinist Russian affect your sense of these stories?

What questions are YOU left with, after you read "Fro" and "Among Plants and Animals"?