Literary Analysis Essay Assignment
English 2030
LENGTH: Between 1100 words and 1500 words, not including the Works Cited page.
SOURCES:
1-2 primary sources (the literary works that you are analyzing)
2-3 secondary sources (literary criticism or other informational sources that provide context for the literature about which you are writing). All secondary sources must be available online.
In the text of your essay, use direct quotes, paraphrases, and summaries from your sources to support your analysis and evaluation, and document each of these sources appropriately both in the text and on the Works Cited page. Follow MLA guidelines from 2016 for citing sources. Plagiarism of any kind will result in a zero for the assignment, so use the Turnitin tool in the Rough draft Dropbox as a way to check your essay for plagiarism. Use NoodleBib (available on the VSCC Library website under “Resources”) to help you create your Works Cited page.
Plagiarism detection: Plagiarism is a serious offense and will not be tolerated. It is the student’s responsibility to understand MLA documentation rules and to follow them when documenting sources in the literary analysis essay. If you need help, contact your teacher, the Language Center and/or Tutor.com tutoring services. Your instructor will use Turnitin.com for plagiarism detection for the final essay assignment. When you submit a copy of your final essay to the Dropbox in eLearn, it will automatically be checked for plagiarism. For that reason, you must save your file in a .doc, .docx, or .rtf format before uploading it to the Dropbox. No other file formats will be accepted, and failure to do so will result in a zero for the assignment.
FORMAT: The essay should be typed in a 12-point Times New Roman, Verdana, Maiandra GD, or Georgia font, double-spaced throughout, with 1” margins on all sides. There should be an appropriate header (your name, my name, class name, and date) and title on the first page of your essay, but you should not have a title page. Format page numbers according to MLA guidelines. Please follow the most current and standard MLA guidelines for in-text citations and Works Cited page.
ESSAY SUBMISSION: Check your course calendar for the due date, and submit your literary analysis essay to the final draft dropbox by that time. Your instructor will use the following criteria to calculate your grade on these essays. The essay should:
1) have a focused thesis, which appears in the introduction paragraph or shortly thereafter;
2) indicate that you have critically and accurately interpreted the texts based on the assignment topic which you have chosen;
3) thoroughly discuss the topic and give an indication of your knowledge of the texts;
4) be logically organized and offer smooth transitions between each idea;
5) correctly incorporate and cite primary and secondary sources in the text of the essay and on the Works Cited page;
6) be virtually free of errors in language and grammar; and
7) be formatted correctly according to appropriate academic manuscript guidelines (MLA).
As you work on this essay, consider the course discussions we have had in relation to the reading assignments, but students should also demonstrate the use of your own critical thinking skills in applying the concepts you have studied related to these writing topics. Try for a new and original approach to the assignment—even if it means you simply attempt a new way of looking at the literature than you did in the discussion forums.
Finally, and importantly, do not rely too heavily on plot summary or direct quotes in your essay. Many, many times students re-tell the story or summarize the author’s ideas rather than examining and analyzing a particular aspect of the literary texts. Since this essay is a literary analysis, your goal is to analyze and interpret the text to find greater meaning, examining the work to determine its relevance to social and cultural issues of the time period in which it was written and/or to our current society and culture. (Consult your Bedford Handbook for information on writing about literature.)
TOPICS: Choose one of the following topics for your analysis, and narrow the focus appropriately. Your essay may or may not answer all of the questions provided in each prompt, but you will typically need to examine theme as one element of your analysis since it’s a unifying force in this course.
1. Choose two short stories that deal with a similar theme (topic/subject), and compare/contrast the conflicts that the main characters in these two stories experience. Explain what types of internal/external conflicts they experience, what causes this conflict, and how they deal with it. What do these characters learn, if anything, from their experiences? What effect does that learning experience have on the characters? How do they come out of these experiences less innocent and more aware of the reality of the world around them? How do the conflicts these characters face in their experiences become a method for self-examination, if at all? Possible focal points: rites of passage, issues of morality, family influences, social or class issues, gender issues. Optional: Use Joseph Campbell’s theory about the hero’s journey as a basis for your examination of these characters’ experiences.
2. Compare/contrast the way that two poets show how parents can offer inspiration or guidance to a young individual. Examine the authors’ use of tone, diction, and at least one type of figurative language (simile, metaphor, symbolism, etc.) to analyze what these writers show us about the role a parent’s advice or guidance can play in inspiring his or her child. What is the message on which the poem focuses (the theme)? How clearly does that message come through? What types of experiences do these writers use as examples of what may be in store for their children in the future? How do they use those examples from their own lives to guide their children through life’s difficulties or joys? How important to the message is the parents’ adherence to social conventions (such as higher education, solid work experience, or religious affiliation)—in other words, how capable is each parent to guide his/her child? How likely is it that the child will willingly accept the advice being offered by his/her parent in each work? Evaluate each poem and explain what would make the advice contained therein successful or useful to the child/audience.
3. Compare and/or contrast the theme of individualism in two (2) works from the same genre (i.e. two poems, two stories, etc). What are the qualities that make a person an individual? How do these two writers/speakers/characters exhibit those qualities in each piece of writing? How does each writer’s choice of symbols, imagery, metaphors/similes, or any other type of figurative language influence the reader’s interpretation of the work as a whole? Consider the type of associations the figurative language will create in the mind of the reader, how that language expresses the writers’ attitude towards a subject (like youth, maturity, parents, heroes, etc.), and/or how the work might illustrate some type of conflict that people in a similar situation might experience (internal or external). Possible focus: the individual and how the language illustrates positive impressions of the individual (self-confidence, self-awareness, self-motivation) or negative impressions of the individual (self-consciousness, self-interest). [Optional: write an analysis ONLY on the excerpt from Walt Whitman’s Song of Myself.]
4. Several of the literary works we have read this semester demonstrate some form of rebellion where a person stands up for him/herself, usually against some type of social convention or societal expectation. Examine and analyze the theme of “standing up for ourselves” or “rebellion” in 1-2 of the stories or in the drama we have read this semester. What forces seem to be oppressive to the character(s) in the stories? Against what do they rebel? What form of rebellion do the characters in the story take, and why? Analyze the internal and/or external conflicts that the characters experience, as well as the way they work through and resolve the conflict(s). If you are comparing characters, then who achieves total rebellion, or whose is more successful, and why? Examine the ways this rebellion represents a societal or systemic need for change. In addition to analyzing elements of plot and character, you may also want to analyze the writer’s or writers’ use of at least one other literary element and connect it to his/her method of communicating the theme in order to evaluate the effectiveness of the message. Optional: Analyze the works as feminist or Marxist critiques of gender expectations or class structures.
5. Shirley Jackson and Ursula K. LeGuin each have written a fictional story that examines the dangers of conforming to the status quo. In these two stories, we can see the effects of conformity both on individuals and on the communities to which they belong. Examine and analyze the theme of “conformity” in 1-2 of the works we have read this semester; this may involve your covering the two works listed here, or you may want to analyze an entirely different work that we have read this semester. What comment do these writers make about following tradition or following the status quo (theme)? What do these writers reveal as causes for their characters’ conformity (conflicts)? What are the effects on the characters/people in these works, on their behavior, and on the quality of their lives (conflicts)? You may want to examine the writer’s or writers’ use of at least one form of figurative language (symbolism, irony, metaphor, etc.) in order to analyze his/her method of communicating the theme and to evaluate the effectiveness of the message. If you are comparing, then which work is a more effective commentary on our tendency to conform to societal expectations, to tradition, or to the status quo, and why? Optional: Analyze the works as feminist or Marxist critiques of gender expectations or class structures.
6. In our unit on “Defining Heroism,” we became familiar with Joseph Campbell’s philosophies about our cultural concept of heroism. Analyze and evaluate one short story in the context of the quests or “hero’s journey” the protagonist goes on. Use Campbell’s 12-step process of the hero’s journey to show how the protagonist falls in line with his concept of the hero’s adventure. Review the Lesson Notes for this unit, which outline the Hero’s Journey in depth, and consult your MLA guidelines regarding how to cite that source.
7. Analyze and compare two works to show how writers demonstrate the transition from innocence to experience, from youth to maturity. You may choose two poems or two stories, but do not mix genres unless you receive prior approval from your instructor. Think about the use of figurative language or elements of fiction: How does the writer create a sense of innocence? What experience(s) from youth do(es) the writer(s) focus on? What are the common experiences in the two works? What does the writer show us about the experience of growing up, and what should we learn from it? Is conflict/challenge/ disillusionment/change a positive or negative element of the human experience in the works you are analyzing? In what stage—innocence or experience—does the character/speaker seem happier? Why? If pain is addressed in the two works you are analyzing, what role does it play? How might these writers demonstrate that pain can be good for us? How does the growth from innocence to experience affect one’s sexual, social, or political behavior? What can these literary works show us/remind us/reveal to us about growing up?
8. Analyze Leo Tolstoy’s novella, The Death of Ivan Ilyich, through the context of Elisabeth Kubler-Ross’s five stages of dying. What part does ego play in the way that Ilyich copes with his illness and his impending death? How does Ivan work through the stages of dealing with his own death? How might he answer the question, “Have I lived a good life?” What is the resolution to his story: does he find peace in the end? Why or why not? Is the end of his life a lesson to those around him, or must each individual face death on his/her own in his/her time? Finally, explain what this story shows readers about coping with adversity and mortality. Additional option: Analyze character in the story by comparing the roles that other characters in the story play in helping (or not) Ivan. Or analyze Gerasim as a foil to Ivan by comparing/contrasting the two characters.
9. Compare/contrast two works which both use a first-person narrator. Is each narrator reliable or unreliable? Why? What traits of each character are revealed by their telling of the story? Does seeing the narrator/protagonist through his/her own eyes and from his/her own account give us a clear picture of that character and the events that he/she is recounting for us? What characteristics lay just below the surface in each narrator/character—characteristics that the narrator may not even realize about him/herself?
10. Look at two stories that end in a questionable way, and argue for why the ending is optimistic. Examine the tone, plot, narrator, and protagonist in each work. Is the protagonist an antihero? Why or why not? How does the writer make a positive message out of a story that may otherwise seem so negative? How much of the optimism depends on the reader’s own attitude towards the character, conflicts, and story in general?
11. In “Commencement Speech, Kenyon College,” David Foster Wallace implies that an individual’s moral sense can come not as much from his/her religion or his/her upbringing but from a conscious effort to step outside of oneself and empathize, to think about how it feels to be other kinds of people. In “The Lesson,” Sylvia’s moral sense is likewise awakened. Though Wallace’s speech is about something else entirely, can we use it to help us think about Sylvia’s sense of right and wrong? Where does hers come from? How is it awakened? Do you have any sense if this awakening is temporary or longer-lasting? What does Bambara’s story show us about this essential element of growing up?
12. An important line in Bambara’s “The Lesson” comes near the end: “Anybody else learn anything today?” “The Lesson” is more obviously a story of education, but in what way is one other story also about education? Choose one other story that we have read this semester and compare it to the lesson of Bambara’s story. What character learns a lesson in each story? What is the lesson? Compare the way that each character/narrator reflects on the impact of her lesson: what is the impact of the lesson in each story? What can readers learn from reading the story?
13. In the unit on heroes, we read some additional interpretations of Flannery O’Connor’s “Good Man Is Hard to Find.” How do you understand O’Connor’s description of the grandmother’s “gesture” as being about grace? Does your interpretation of the story change if you read it as being about a literal moment of salvation? Compare your own interpretation of the story to O’Connor’s, explaining your reasons for agreeing or disagreeing with her interpretation. Is her interpretation helpful to your own understanding of the story, or does it detract from what you originally interpreted the story to mean? Why? What does it mean about how literature works that a reader can disagree with a writer about her own work?
14. Analyze two stories as allegories by examining the different allegorical and symbolic elements in each story. Is an allegory the appropriate form for the message that the writer is trying to communicate? Why or why not? What role does symbolism play in each story, and how does it contribute to the central theme? How effective is the symbolism in each story, and why? What is the central message that the author is trying to communicate, and can/does the writer avoid being overly didactic when using this form?
15. Analyze the way that 1-2 authors write about the African-American experience. What does it mean to be “colored,” and is it a positive or negative experience? Why? Does the experience change depending on the social or historical context in which the author is writing? Describe the “voice” that is being established in each work. Give specific examples, and explain the main point (theme) that each writer is trying to communicate with his/her piece. Optional: Connect each work to the Harlem Renaissance movement and analyze the relevance of each work to that movement.
16. Compare/contrast the use of temperature—cold and/or warmth—as a symbol in two works from the same genre. What are the multiple layers of meaning for that temperature? What emotional associations do we typically make with the cold, with the warmth? How do these writers emphasize or contradict those associations? How does the symbol work to communicate the writer’s central theme?
