Discussion Questions
Use our LitLovers Book Club Resources; they can help with discussions for any book:
• How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips)
• Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction
• Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart)
Also consider these LitLovers talking points to help get a discussion started for Until They Bring the Streetcars Back:
1. Talk about Calvin as a character. Do you find him a realistic portrayal of adolescent angst...or heroism?
2. Discuss Gretchen and her situation. Why, for instance, does her father make her wear ugly dresses? What else does he do to Gretchen? What does Gretchen tell Cal, and why does he decide to help her? How does he feel toward Gretchen at first, and in what way does his attitude change?
3. Talk about the Gant family—their interactions with one another, and the fact that none of them ever cries openly, only in secret. Are they typical, do you think, of the era...or not? How different are families today?... or not? What attitude, for instance, does Cal's father have toward parents who hit their children? Describe Calvin's relationship with his father, in particular? What does Cal learn about his father (Chapter 31)?
4. Pastor Ostrum defines love in this way: “Love wasn't having a warm feeling but it was a decision you make, and Love is not something we wait to have happen to us, but something we do." What does he mean and how does this concept play out in the course of the novel?
5. What do the two incidents—Gretchen and shoes and what Calvin attempts to do for the MCCluskey's dog—have in common; what do the two events reveal about Calvin?
6. How do the supposed protectors of the young—Cal's father, the counselor, pastor, police—respond to what Cal tries to tell them regarding Gretchen? Why doesn't Gretchen tell someone about her father? Does Mr. Luttermann ever get his just deserts?
7. Can breaking the law ever be justified, even if it's to help someone in trouble? In this case, did Calvin have an alternative? What else might he haven done?
8. Comment on the story about Uncle Emil that Cal remembers while he's in jail. And what about the line: "You climbed on, now you gotta ride it out." What does it mean to Calivn?
8. What is the role of public transportation in this novel? And what is the significance of the title?
8. How does Calvin change, what does he come to learn by the end of the book? Was what he gave up worth it? Who else changes by the end of the book?
9. If you're from St. Paul, what has changed from this book's depiction of the city in the 1950s? What has remained the same?
(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)
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