This assignment asks you to combine close reading skills with your ability to draw broader conclusions and/or your ability to compare several texts and discuss how the same theme/concept is developed by different writers. You can use as many supplemental sources as you need, These sources must be listed in the bibliography.
The goal of your critical analysis paper is to produce a solid conceptual argument supported by textual and contextual evidence. Unlike the close reading assignment, you are encouraged to build your argument from any part of the text(s) and any number of passages may be cited and referenced. The total number of words is 1,300-1,500 in number, including name, essay title, citations, and bibliography. You must include the word count at the top, left-hand side of the page.
You can choose any theme and any literary text that you’ve read for this course: Sophocles, The Three Theban Plays, trans. by Robert Fagles.
Dante, Inferno, Portable Dante, trans. by Mark Musa.
Walt Whitman, Song of Myself
Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment, trans. by Constance Garnett.
Montesquieu, Persian Letters, a new translation by Margaret Mauldon, Oxford World’s Classics.
Jennine Capó Crucet, How to Leave Hialeah.. Your bibliography should list your source text(s), critical text(s), and online texts (web addresses). Any bibliographical style is acceptable, but it must be consistent. Alphabetize by author in the bibliography.
Within your essay, authors may be cited in two ways. For example “Smith (2015:34) argues that….” or at the end of the sentence “… (Smith 2015:34).”
The ideal essay will use an academic voice and style that provide a well-balanced portrait of the literary work. The essay can consider various points of view, but make one as the main argument or most coherent interpretation. Transitional sentences should be used to improve the flow of the discussion.
Make sure that you include a creative and focused title in order to help the reader gain a quick grasp of your argument and discussion.
In addition to the title, make sure that you create boldface section titles for each of your main sections/arguments.
