What is the McCourt's bathroom like in Angela's Ashes?

The squalor and filth in which the McCourt children have to live is unbelievable. I suppose you are referring to the incident in the book where the bottom floor gets flooded out, so the family retreats upstairs. When an inspector comes he confesses to his colleague, "......(It's) Calcutta up there."

There is indeed cold running water, however, and Angela has salvaged empty jam jars to use as drinking glasses. That's it. There is no 'sanitary system' - only unsanitary conditions:

'It's December and it's freezing and we can see our breath. We pee into the bucket by the bedroom door and run down stairs for the warmth of the fire Dad has already started. We wash our face and hands in a basin that sits under the water tap by the door. The pipe that leads to the tap has to be held to the wall by a piece of twine looped around a nail. Every- thing around the tap is damp, the floor the wall, the chair the basin sits on. The water from the tap is icy and our fingers turn numb.'

- from Angela's Ashes, Chapter 3

In The Iliad, who is responsible for the death of Achilles and who helps him?

Achilles death is not described in the text of The Iliad.  The story of his death is part of later Greek myths.  However the death of Achilles is predicted by Hector in Book 22, as he is dying by Achilles' hand.  Hector, the prince of Troy, says that Achilles will be killed by Hector's brother Paris (who had stolen or lured Helen away from King Menelaus of Sparta and thus caused the Trojan War).  Hector said:

"I know you and what you are, and was sure that I should not move you, for your heart is hard as iron; look to it that I bring not heaven's anger upon you on the day when Paris and Phoebus Apollo, valiant though you be, shall slay you at the Scaen gates." (345)

The later myths tell how Paris shot Achilles, wounding him fatally in the only vulnerable place on his body -- his heel. 

There is also a story that Achilles had fallen in love with Polyxena, a princess of Troy, and had gone to the Temple of Apollo to negotiate peace with the Trojans so he could marry her.  At this meeting the Trojans betrayed him, and Paris killed him (helped by Apollo.) 

None of these stories appear in either of Homer's poems, but in The Odyssey Book 11 Odysseus meets and talks with the ghost of Achilles, so by the time of Odysseus' journey the hero is dead. 

Source: Homer, The Iliad. Samuel Butler, trans. Roslyn, New York: Walter J. Black, Inc., 1942.

What is a summary of the Wife of Bath's Tale?

In Arthur's court, a young knight comes across a beautiful young maiden and overcome by lust rapes her. The knight is ordered to be put to death. However, Arthur's queen and other ladies of the court intercede on his behalf and ask the king to give him one chance to save his own life:if, within one year, he can discover what women want most in the world and report his findings back to the court, he will keep his life. If he cannot find the answer to the queen's question, or if his answer is wrong, he will lose his head.

The Knight after wandering all over the place is not able find a satisfactory answer. Finally, an old and ugly woman promises to help him on condition that he marry her. The knight agrees reluctantly and they return to King Arthur's court where she tells the right answer: what women most desire is to be in charge of their husbands and lovers. The knight's life is spared but he is forced to marry her. Needless to say the knight is unhappy, so his old and ugly wife offers the knight a choice: either he can have her to be ugly but loyal and good, or he can have her young and fair but also coquettish and unfaithful, he replies that he would rather trust her judgment, and he asks her to choose whatever she thinks best. Because the knight's answer gave the woman what she most desired, the authority to choose for herself, she becomes both beautiful and good. The two have a long, happy marriage, and the woman becomes completely obedient to her husband.

In The Great Gatsby, why does Gatsby conduct parties in his house, but doesn’t participate in the parties?

Gatsby knows that Daisy lives directly across the bay from his own mansion. He can stand on his lawn at night and see the green light on the dock at Daisy's home. He throws wild and lavish parties, hoping that Daisy will wander in one evening and he can see her again. Gatsby doesn't invite people to his parties; they just come. Hundreds of people from East Egg, West Egg, and New York all come to Gatsby's parties to drink his liquor, eat his food, and dance to his music. After Gatsby does see Daisy again when Nick arranges a meeting, Gatsby stops giving parties altogether. He has no further need of them.

In "The Adventures of Huck Finn", what is Huck's motivation for traveling down the Mississippi?

 Huck believes that he needs to get away from his Pap so that Pap won't kill him. Just before Huck decides to leave, his Pap get so drunk that he chases Huck around their cabin with a knife calling Huck "The angel of death". Huck grabs his Pap's gun to protect himself but his Pap passes out in a drunken stupor before Huck has to shoot. The next day, he makes plans to leave. He fakes his own death and goes to hide on Jackson Island. There he accidently finds Jim who has run away from Miss Watson who was about to sell him away from his wife and family. The two outcasts join together to try to get Jim to a free state where Jim will be free to earn money to buy his wife and children back. The irony is that Pap is killed a few days after Huck escapes. His body floats by in a house that has been abandoned in a storm. Jim sees the body of Pap but doesn't tell Huck until the end of the novel. Jim doesn't want Huck leaving him alone. Of course, there is also irony in Jim's position because Miss Watson soon becomes ill and sets Jim free in her will just before she dies. So, both Huck and Jim have been running for reasons that no longer exist.

In "Mending Wall," which metaphorical walls could the reader infer as sometimes impeding communication between people?

The wall in the poem can certainly be seen as a metaphor for barriers that exist between people, preventing communication and understanding. One "wall" suggested in the poem is generational. The speaker in the poem seems younger than his neighbor, perhaps because he is more open-minded and less bound by tradition. His neighbor does not understand why doing away with the wall would be a good idea, and the speaker does not understand why his neighbor continues to live by his father's old philosophy. They view the stone wall from different generational perspectives.

Another kind of wall suggested by the poem is that of personality. The speaker possesses a humorous nature. He does not take this yearly ritual very seriously; he sees it as "just another kind of outdoor game." Placing the stones back into the wall is a balancing act, requiring a magic spell, of sorts. The speaker whimsically says to the pesky stones, "Stay where you are until our backs are turned!" He thinks of suggesting to his neighbor that "elves" are responsible for the damage each spring, but he doesn't. He would rather his neighbor thought of it himself, which he never will. His neighbor, in contrast, shows no sense of humor. He goes about his work grimly and methodically, moving like "an old-stone savage."

Many other kinds of walls serve to separate people: for instance, prejudice, poverty, fear, anger, pride, and cultural differences.

According to Krishna, what constitutes sin and what is evil?

I believe your question relates to the dialogue between Lord Krishna and Arjuna on the Kurukshetra battlefield just before the start of the great war between Kauravas and Pandavas.

Whether or not these events actually took place has not been established authoritatively. However, the advice and teachings of Lord Krishna to Arjuna, as recorded in the ancient Sanskrit text Bhagwad Gita, is still very relevant and useful today to help people lead a happy life.

Before understanding concept of sin and evil, we need to clarify some other concepts. Lord Krishna considers that the intention and feelings that motivate behaviour of individuals is more important for their long term happiness. The appropriate motivations aim at good of the total society, rather than personal benefits and comforts of the individual. Also, Lord Krishna says that decisions on actions to be taken must be based on codes of conducts, called dharma, designed to promote the welfare of total society in the long run. This has a very significant implication - all action must conform to dharma, irrespective of possibility of failure. This advice is supported by modern concepts of decision making process, wherein decisions are taken on the basis of expected benefits over a long term rather than immediate prospects of loss or gain. John Argenti, a reputed corporate planning expert puts the same idea in these words:

"A best decision does not always give best result, and a poor decision may some ties give very good result."

Once this basic concept of dharma is clear, we can describe sin - called papa in Sanskrit- as all actions not in line with dharma. Evil covers all actions intended to cause harm to others and society.

At times, society may be harmed by some action sanctioned by dharma because of the uncertainty of result. Such action is not sin. But if the intention is to deliberately cause harm to others, rather than total good of the society, then such action is evil. All evil actions are also sins, because they violate the basic requirement of dharma that our action must be guided by good of the total society rather than by considerations of personal benefits.