Georg Engel's Ernest J. Gaines: A Lesson Before Dying To understand or not to understand, that is the question...

A. Plot outline

external action

Part III

Chapter 9


  • Grant drives to Bayonne with Miss Emma
  • They have to undergo the prison bureaucracy until they are admitted to Jefferson's cell:
  • search of basket, emptying pockets, being patted down, list of forbidden things
  • walk to Jefferson’s cell past other prisoners
  • first confrontation with an unresponsive Jefferson