Reading & Writing In This Class

Paper Topics

ESSAY ONE: pick one topic! No custom topics allowed. In your Bias Statement (see below) let me know which topic you plan to pick.

Option one,  Character Analysis: Using close-reading techniques,  pick a major character in McDonald's  New Moon that interests you. Note why in your introduction, and explore how the character's actions  change  the course of the novel's plot / story arc. Explore (to give an example) how the character's faults, failures, triumphs, and biases shape the action. Be sure you employ specific (and brief) examples of dialogue, properly cited, as well as brief examples from the plot. 

Option two, Thematic Analysis: Select two of the short stories assigned. Your job  here is to find two works that explore an idea differently (it could be, for instance, how a character changes as the result of another's actions, what it means to be human, or how  technology influences humans).  Your job is to  argue which  story does so  best, using techniques of close reading to defend your answer.

ESSAY TWO: Pick one of these two options. No custom topics allowed.  That got a few of you in trouble with Paper One. Pet Peeves will result in -10 for this one (and no more than that) but you will NOT be allowed to resubmit them for points. Whichever option you pick, you must employ close-reading techniques, as you did in Paper One.

Option One: The Fire Opal Mechanism argues that information is not enough. Knowledge matters more. Argue why knowledge matters more than information in the world of the novel. 

Option Two: In your opinion, which novel or short story makes the best case for how we creatively deal with the evil in ourselves or in others? Why does that matter? You may not pick the same work(s) you discussed in Paper One.

Option Three:  In Station Eleven "Survival is ins ufficient" gets painted on the Symphony's lead caravan. It's a theme in this book, certainly, but what does it mean in that world? Why is it an important idea for these survivors, or even those characters we meet who do not survive the Georgia Flu?

FORMAT AND IDEA: both essays

Essentially, for each paper, you will write an analysis paper of at least 1,500 words.  I will provide the topics. Both will focus on close-reading the texts.

• Your paper needs a governing claim (profs call them "thesis statements" but that is limiting). Think of a governing claim as a Constitution that governs all the other claims you make. It needs to come in your introduction, usually as the last few sentences. Please forget what Ms. Grundy told you in 10th grade about one-sentence thesis statements you write as a first part of your process (if you like Cs or Ds, go ahead).

• Instead of following that ridiculously doomed approach, do this: 

  • Ask yourself before you start, "What is the most important thing I want to say?"

  • Then "How can I say that AND answer Essid's question?"

  • Then write down a FOCUS. It might be "the women in Dune shape events as much as any of the men." Your paper MUST have a title that captures this focus (or I'll dock your grade). Why? A good title gives you a check against focus. If your paper drifts form the title you start with, change the title to capture the new focus OR consider changing the title.

  • BAD BORING TITLE: Women in Dune. THOUGHTFUL, FOCUSING TITLE: The Bene Gesserit and the Economics of Dune.

  • Then ask "so the heck what?" and begin to review the book not for quotations to meet word count but for depth: why do the women appear so important?

  • Start drafting, and be ready to refine that governing claim as you crawl (not rush) to a final version. I might find passages about Lady Jessica in Dune that reveal her power and role. Then I might see that Herbert uses certain metaphors to describe her power. From that, you can get a paper that is TIGHT. You cannot cover ALL the women in the book in 1500 words. Instead. DIG DEEPLY.

•  If you wish to share personal reaction, the use of "I" is strongly encouraged. A strong governing claim might look like this, for Dune and The Time Machine (a great read off the syllabus this semester):

"The Lady Jessica is one of the most complex and important characters in Dune. A close reading of several passages reveals that she sets in motion events that will change the history of the galaxy. To reinforce that central message, Frank Herbert employs several carefully chosen metaphors that reveal Jessica to be both an agent of human destiny and a slave to it."

"As I read Wells's novel, my mind kept returning to the White Sphinx, a symbol of riddles as old as Greek Myth. Of all the strange things the Time Traveler finds on his journey into the far future, it is the most enigmatic yet its whiteness reveals something deeper. A closer look at the color white in the novel shows that Wells associates it with death, the destiny of England, and the unknown."

The Bias Statement

This comes to me as a separate and preliminary step. Forget to submit it? -5 points on the paper grade.Your statement runs 100-200 words and should help you focus your paper in a way to both avoid to caving in to your biases about the book (or me, or the class).  In the end,  the statement helps you use bias as a source of power.  These are written with a lot of "I" point of view and they are reflective, not proving a point or positing a thesis. They can pose a question you need to address as you write.

Consider these statements:

From my childhood, I have been a fan of Neil Armstrong. I always thought he was the right man to be sent to the moon on behalf of our country. I never really had any opinion on Buzz but after reading the book and viewing the movie I have grown to dislike him. This may influence my tone during the paper.

Here the writer in my FYS class, The Space Race, tells me how studying the Moon landing of Apollo 11 (in both book and film First Man) changed his opinions and how it might influence his writing.

Another example:

I feel that Wu is clearly to the political left in his arguments regarding net neutrality and therefore I view some of his arguments as rather naïve. Many of his arguments rely heavily on the good of the U.S. Government, and while the government has great capacity for good, I believe it often fails in many regards. As a conservative person, with a negative view of the government, I feel that I view Wu’s words through a different lens, which makes it more difficult to accept his arguments on net neutrality. This lens also leads me to see an entirely different way to solve the problems put forward by Wu, which rely on an entire lack of governmental intrusion.

Here the writer understands how the political stance of a reading differs from his own. He knew that I found Wu's argument not only compelling but masterful (and apolitical, to me). He shows courage here, he knew how much I wanted Net Neutrality as a cornerstone to maintaining an open Internet. The writer and I talked a lot about how to present a free-market alternative to Wu, since both of us agreed on one thing: a diverse Internet would be a good thing and a monopolized one presents problems we both fear.

Finally, my bias statement about Lord of the Rings:

I adore these books. I read them every decade. But, to be honest, I see something new each time and they never bore me. One problem I have with Tolkien, however, is that his work tended to make other forms of fantasy difficult.  That fact makes it hard for me to read others' work, let alone write professionally about them. There exist outliers like Titus Groan by Mervyn Peake (a strange alternative Europe), or now China Mieville's Bas-Lag novels (that include both magic and tech in a world not at all connected with Earth). Yet these talented writers too must break with Tolkien's template. In the end, I am no longer a Middle Earth fanboy. I actually blame Tolkien for why most fantasy from the 1950s-80s bores me or seems derivative. How did one Oxford don manage to change fantasy that much? What was the genre like before him?

The Power of Close Reading

This may be the most important lesson of Eng. 215. You don't just read to capture the plot and retell it. That's boring as heck. Instead, you read methodically, noting how an author uses language, how themes recur, images and symbols keep coming back up again and again. You take notes. You spend a long time on passages that strike you as interesting. You re-read. You don't highlight too much but write it down somewhere with questions such as "Why does Tolkien bring in this ridiculous character?" or "I need to see why Herbert continues to kill off everyone close to Paul."

If you cannot or will not do that, you won't have a prayer of getting an A in my class. If a text confuses you, good. If you want the basic plot, of course you can read sources online, but they won't help you write for me. I read those sources too, and if you copy from them, off to Honor Council you go. Instead, use them to get a sense of a book's big picture. But to write for me you need to employ close-reading skills, to explore how an artist uses words to convey a bigger message.

Writing Consultant  

My eager and well trained Writing Consultants from English 383 will be reviewing your drafts. Cady Cummings, who took Eng. 215 with me and Eng. 383 last term, is their mentor and she too will help with your essays. Consider it a free chance at a rewrite. Drafts are mandatory, as is a personal meeting with the Consultant.  I will deduct 10 points if your draft is not at least a couple of pages (about 750 words) in paragraph form. You can outline the rest, but without an introduction as a paragraph and then more in draft form, you lose 10 points.

No guarantees about results, but I have found that students getting help from a mentor like Cady or the 383 class tend to get higher grades.

Late papers

-10 points if you do not submit a draft or are late with the revision. -10 points if you miss your required meeting with our Writing Consultant. After one week late, late work gets a zero. Those with accommodations for an extension provide your DAN and we'll work with you.

Avoiding Regrets

No Exceptions, From Your Editor-in-Chief

1. When you write for me, always review my Pet Peeves. Do not forget! I'll be kind for many of the commonly confused words, but not confusing its/it's here/hear their/there and similar. They make a writer look sloppy. You do not want to make those mistakes on the job market.

2. Your "voice" as a writer should be formal but not stilted. Do not employ big words you really do not understand or mile-long sentences. If you use a Thesaurus, find lots of sample sentences with your new word, to be sure you have it right. 

3. All work should read aloud nicely. A friend should be able to read it to you without your saying "stop! I can't follow that sentence." Of course you are free to employ terms from our list of terminology, but use them carefully.

4. Did you summarize rather than analyze? I will give you no credit for telling me what happens in a book I have read with you. Instead, focus on how specific events, dialogue, and details link.

5. When writing for me, a conclusion should include some sort of "extrapolation." What does your analysis tell us, broadly, about something such as speculative literature, humans and technology, the future? There is more on conclusions here at Writer's Web, the Writing Center's online handbook.

6. 5) Titles of books must be underlined or put in italics. Short stories go in "quotation marks." Thus: Dune  and "The Haunter of the Dark." I'll dock a paper 5 points if you fail to do that. It looks careless.

7. Citing properly: It is simple MLA. Period goes after the last parenthesis. There is no need for a works-cited or bibliography page, as both papers will focus on only one book.  Find more examples of MLA format, check here at Writer's Web, the Writing Center's online handbook. I'll dock a paper 5 points if you fail to do that.

• If you include the author's name in setting up a quotation, omit it after when you need only cite page:

• Bester makes Gully Foyle speak like a savage, especially when angry. We see this when Foyle first swears vengeance, saying "You leave me rot like a dog. You leave me die, Vorga" (24).

• If you do not including the author's name, you need it at the end:

• Gully Foyle speaks like a savage, especially when angry. We see this when Foyle first swears vengeance, saying "You leave me rot like a dog. You leave me die, Vorga" (Bester 24).

•  Your page citations MUST match those of the edition adopted for the class. If you use a different edition, fix that for the paper. If I cannot find the quotation, you will lose 5 points for the paper.