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Essay #3 - Unit 3 (close reading)DeAnza College-EWRT1C
Instructor: Hearn
Fall 2002 - Essay #3 - close reading
Unit 3 - Defining the Other - Part 1
Assignment:
Select a 1-2 page passage from a poem or a short story from the course. (You may use two texts; however, do not use more than two). Write a 2-3 page essay that provides a close analysis of the passage/text. In your essay, you should show how the form of the text expresses the content of the text. Thus, your essay will address both the structure as well as the theme(s) of the text. Do not repeat a text you have addressed in a previous essay.
You should utilize the skills and terminology for literary devices we have reviewed when providing your analysis. Since this is a fairly short assignment, you should keep your introduction and conclusion brief. Instead, I am more interested in your reading of the text. Outside research is not necessary and should be used sparingly, if it all. Your objective in this essay is not to show how the author's life is intertwined with the text or what other scholars have said about the text; rather, it is to show what the text itself is saying about a topic. Thus, the evidence for your interpretation should come from the text itself (i.e. a formalist reading of the text).
Make sure that you use details in your close reading. You should not engage in a general discussion of a theme; instead, you need to point your reader to specifics in the text.
Example
Too general:
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The meter in "La Belle Dame sans Merci" contributes to the overall feeling of the poem. |
| Stronger: | The sudden change from iambic tetrameter to iambic dimeter (which is rarely used in poetry) suggests that something is missing from each stanza. Not only does this change in rhythm create a sense of eeriness in the poem, but it also reflects the knight's loss and his simultaneous desire to continue pursuing the lady. |
Possible texts
"How Beastly the Bourgeois Is"
"Vagabonds"
"The Hunchback in the Park"
"Daddy"
"Enter Dark Stranger"
"Power"
"Unholy Sonnet"
"Barbie Doll"
"A Good Man Is Hard to Find"
"Bitch"
"The Apparition"
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"Desire"
"La Belle Dame sans Merci"
"A Rose for Emily"
"Cassandra"
"Alzheimer's"
"Hard Rock Returns to Prison..."
"The Cask of Amontillado"
"The Yellow Wallpaper"
"Goblin Market"
"The Haunted Palace"
"Federico's Ghost"
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"Outcast"
"Discovery of the New World"
"What the Gypsy Said to Her Children"
"Désirée's Baby"
"Porphyria's Lover"
"Much Madness is divinest Sense"
"Schizophrenia"
"I Give You Back"
"Her Kind"
"The Man from Mars"
"Fleur"
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Logistics:
- All papers must be typed and double-spaced. Papers should have 1" margins on all sides and standard 12 pt. font should be used.
- Papers must be a minimum of two pages (not including the heading and title). Do not use an entire sheet of paper just for a title page.
- The paper is due by Tuesday, November 19, 2002 in my Administration Mailbox or in my office by 12:00 p.m. Do not submit papers in my English Department Mailbox.
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