Analyzing 'Middle Passage' Essay: Character & Themes in Olive Schreiner's Work - Prof. Suk, Papers of English Language

Download Analyzing 'Middle Passage' Essay: Character & Themes in Olive Schreiner's Work - Prof. Suk and more Papers English Language in PDF only on Docsity! Sp 2009/ Engl 1101: 2nd OFC – Analyzing Literature “Certainly the whole of the story is not written here, but it is suggested and the attribute of all true art, the highest and the lowest is this – that it says more than it say and takes you away from itself. It is a little door that opens into an infinite hall where you may find what you please.” Olive Schreiner in The Story of an African Farm Write an essay in which you discuss one or more elements of literature( no more than two elements) such as theme, character, motif, symbols, point of view, etc Figure conclusions and inferences you can make from observing, cataloguing and drawing inferences about the element of literature you have chosen to focus on in Middle Passage. These conclusions will form the content of your thesis that you will prove in your essay. Support your claim or thesis using primary text (the novel itself) and secondary sources (criticism and interpretation). The use of secondary source is optional. Look at the questions in the back of Middle Passage (if your book does not have it look at scanned pages on my website). These questions are meant to trigger ideas for your essay on literature. Don’t treat them as merely questions to be answered without thematic control, unity or order in your essay. Remember, you are writing an essay on literature and hence your essay should have all the features of an essay including a claim you make about the novel that will add to the meaning and understanding of the novel. Your audience is people who have already read the book so you are not merely summarizing the plot but saying something of importance about the novel. You are required to read the book twice to both collect ideas and generate new ideas. You may consult secondary sources if you wish but make sure you acknowledge all borrowings. The hardest task in writing an essay on literature is synthesizing, ordering and unifying the information and ideas you gather and generate. Be absolutely sure that you cite (through parenthetical citation) and document all borrowings in your essay using the MLA style of documentation and citation. Reminders: Avoid writing a paper that simply paraphrases the plot of the novel. Avoid writing a paper that merely praises its author for a job well done. Avoid extremely impressionistic judgments and statements that start with: “I fee that Mark Twain is a great comic writer.” Such statements are sheer opinion. Although you are interpreting the work you are not merely giving your opinions but drawing logical conclusions from the textual evidence provided in the novel and proving your conclusive ideas through support and proof from both primary (the novel itself) and secondary (interpretations/ criticisms of the text) Example of writing about one element (character analysis) of literature. Character in literature is the author’s creation, through the medium of words, of a person who thinks, expresses his/her thoughts and ideas, relates to and with people and has certain attitudes that are appropriate and consistent with his/her personality. You may write a character analysis of the protagonist or an important minor character by tracing his/her growth and development or decline as moral human agents. As you write your analyses focus on key events that test your character’s moral conscience. When you write a character analysis of a fictional person you pay attention to all the details about that character given by the narrator, the character himself /herself and other characters in the novel. You look at what the character says, what language s/he uses, 1 what others say about him/her, what s/he says about others, what s/he does, how s/he acts and the like. Basically you are describing the person and discussing his/ her strengths and weaknesses, including his/her propensity for growth or decline as a moral agent and explaining what causes the changes in his/her character and what steps s/he takes to bring about changes in his/her life and community You will gather all information about your character, draw inferences from this information and then prove your inferred claim in the essay. Prewriting - An important step novice writer ignore I Gathering & generating ideas: Collect all materials (descriptions, conversations, incidents, actions, - everything about your characters with page numbers you can refer to and reread) on paper. – This is your prewriting. From these material draw conclusions about your chosen characters – this will be your preliminary thesis. When you write (i) use the present tense which is required when you discuss or write about literature and the arts. Example: Jem tortures (not tortured) Boo Radley. (ii) Use the primary text which is the novel itself to illustrate your thesis and prove your points by using both direct and indirect quotes from the text and correctly acknowledging all borrowings using the MLA style of citation and documentation (iii) Mention the author of the novel at least one time in the introduction to indicate that you are discussing fictional characters. The first sentence of you essay could start as follows:Harper Lee in To Kill a Mocking Bird discusses race relations, rites of passage into adulthood, and the importance of developing a moral conscience that people can live by in their day to day lives. Drafting Introduction: You should have a clearly stated central statement that gives thematic control to the character you are analyzing. Your central idea will be whatever general statements you make about your character and how the character is a product of his/her environment or is unique in the way he she refuses to be shaped by his/her environment. Body paragraphs: You illustrate and prove your central idea in your body paragraphs by citing conversations, descriptions, incidents, etc from the novel. Some possible methods of organization are as follows: 1. Organizing around central characteristics (character traits) such as kindness, gentleness, generosity, firmness, melancholy, doubtfulness, degrees of goodness or evilness, etc. 2. Organizing around central incidents that reveal primary characteristics. Certain incidents will stand out in the story and you may use three or four of these incidents to illuminate the two characters. In this pattern of organization you regard the incidents only as they bring out hidden traits of the character. You will have to show how the incidents bring out the traits and also how they explain other things the character might do. Conclusion: Your conclusion should contain your statements about how the characteristics you have revealed about your chosen character are related to the novel as a whole. The question to consider and answer in your conclusions is: Does your character analysis help the reader have a better understanding of the character and human beings in general? 2