Literary Argument

The Literary Argument prompt always provides you with a list of potential works you may write about, but you are not required to stick to this list. Instead, you can write about any work that you have read before. It is suggested that you pick a work that:

1. You've read within the past couple of years and remember really well.

2. You've studied closely and analyzed as a whole.

3. You've had practice writing about.

Going into the exam, it is suggested you have a few works ready to go that you are able to write about (ones that you know the characters and plot well) so that you have something in mind no matter what prompt they provide to you. While some prompts can throw a curve ball, as long as you are creative, you can find one character in one of our books that you can write about. Often that out-of-the-box thinking benefits you in the end.

Common Questions:

1. Can I write about a movie? It is not recommended. This is especially true if you've seen a movie that is based on a book (such as the Frankenstein movies). As we know, movies take certain liberties with their source material, and the moment you mess up something that happened in the movie vs. the book, the AP© Reader is going to ding you on that. Obviously there are so many movies based on books it is hard to avoid writing about a work that only appears in print. That said, if you loved the movie-version, it probably isn't a good choice because it will be easy to confuse the two.

2. Can I write about a children's book, like Percy Jackson? Yes...but maybe don't. Technically you can write about any piece of literature, including something like Percy Jackson. These stories have great themes that certainly match up with the prompts, and the canon is ever-expanding to include things like this. That said, these essays usually don't work out well. Students usually read these when they are younger and more focused on the plot, so they turn into summaries more than arguments. Moreover, if it is a seires (like Percy Jackson), you have to write about one book and if you confuse the plot of two books that will count against you as evidence.

This prompt generally asks you to write about one character and how that character demonstrates a major theme, such as the impact of secrets from the prompt above.

Your thesis should:

1. Identify the work/character you are discussing.

2. Discuss how that character demonstrates the major theme from the prompt.

3. Give a sense of the complexity of that major idea through your selected character. You really want to emphasize causality in this response. How does the trait show up in a character and what does that cause to happen?

Sample Breakdown and Thesis for the prompt above:

• Idea: From the prompt.

  • • The Impact of Secret's on relationships

• Insight: What is the author trying to reveal in the work based on a character that reflects the Idea.

  • • Dorian Gray keeps his portrait a secret, which causes his further descent into moral decay.

• Aspects: Focus on 2–3 scenes in which we see how the character reflects this theme. Often they should be from the beginning, middle, and end.

  • • We could explore 1) Dorian's initial innocence, 2) seeing the change in the portrait and deciding to keep it a secret for aesthetics, 3) the ultimate death of Basil and himself because of that choice.

• Thesis: In The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde presents the innocent Dorian who holds a big secret about his supernatural portrait that displays the state of his soul. Through Dorian's transition from innocent youth, his attempt to hide his corrupted soul in a quest for beauty, and his ultimate death as he attempts to maintain his secret, Wilde reveals that maintaining a secret causes irreparable harm and yet the truth of a secret will always come out.

Unlike the Prose Analysis, which might be organized by Insight or Chronologically, it is suggested that you structure the Literary Arugment Chronologically to fully show the development of a character over the course of the text and how that reveals insight into the prompt. By following the text chronologically, you want to establish who the character was at first, when something changes, and the ultimate results of that change.

The key to this prompt is choosing scenes that most reflect the impact of the idea being presented in the prompt. Just because something is a key moment for the book doesn't mean it is essential for the prompt, so you have to think about what scenes most align with the idea you are responding to.

Example Layout from the Prompt Above:

• Thesis: In The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde presents the innocent Dorian who holds a big secret about his supernatural portrait that displays the state of his soul. Through Dorian's transition from innocent youth, his attempt to hide his corrupted soul in a quest for beauty, and his ultimate death as he attempts to maintain his secret, Wilde reveals that maintaining a secret causes irreparable harm and yet the truth of a secret will always come out.

• Body Paragraph 1 Topic Sentence: Dorian starts the story as an innocent soul, one who has known nothing of corruption, and it seems, nothing of secrets. His whole life is revealed in his eyes, and that may be what draws people to him.

• Body Paragraph 2 Topic Sentence: As he realizes that his prayer to stay forever young has come true, Dorian's attitude shifts as he suddenly has a big secret to keep, one that causes him to immediately become more protective of himself and that literally marks his innocent facade.

• Body Paragraph 3 Topic Sentence: In the end, Dorian's quest to hide his secret in order to maintain his aesthetic beauty cannot hold as it begins to drive him made and question the meaning of morality and whether any action is truly moral.

Note: To understand The Picture of Dorian Gray, the moment that Dorian makes a deal for his picture to take all of his sin and age is one of the defining moments that establishes the conflict of the work. Yet, that scene doesn't show up in my outline at all. Why? Because that isn't the key moment when something changes in relation to a secret. It is much later, when Dorian realizes that prayer has been granted that he starts to keep a secret. This is an example of how you need to consider what scenes most fit the prompt more than which scenes are most relevant for the work itself.

It is important to note that for the Literary Argument, you do not need to address any type of literary devices, nor are you expected to use quotations to support your ideas. You do not have the text in front of you, so incorporating quotations and literary devices would be difficult. Moreover, given the scope of what you need to achieve in the Literary Argument (reflecting on how an idea shows up across a full novel/play), incorporating direct quotations can actually be distracting in the little space you have to make your argument.

Instead for your evidence, focus on major moments in the story that cause transitions in your character and highlight the Insight presented in your thesis. Even though you are not using quotations, these should still be specific moments. It is not enough just to say that Dorian Gray harms his friends like Sybil and Basil. Be specific about how he harms them, why he does that, and what it reveals about him as a character. The more specific you can be the better because that gets into the depth of the character.

Due to this, you won't focus on Figurative Language or Tone so much in the Literary Argument. Instead focus on how Characters develop, how the Plot/Conflict shapes your characters, and any symbols/motifs that show up often throughout the work.