ELIT 10 Intro to Fiction
Long Analysis Paper
Background: Your first analytical paper for this class was narrowly focused on a single element of fiction. You used that element to "unpack" the theme of your chosen story in only a few pages. This new paper assignment builds upon the competency in reading fiction that we cultivated together in the first half of our course by expanding our view of fiction to include things like the writer's biography, his or her aesthetic theory, and the insight of professional literary critics. In our mini-unit on the southern writer, Flannery O'Connor, we saw how expanding our vision this way enlarges our comprehension of the personal, artistic, and cultural context in which fiction is created. Hopefully, this showed us how the art of fiction opens a dialogue with its readership, inviting a variety of interpretive strategies and cultural engagements.
Assignment: Choose one of the three stories in Chapter 11 of our Kennedy/Gioia textbook: Hawthorne's "Young Goodman Brown," or Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper," or Walker's "Everyday Use." Examine the story in light of the author's biography, aesthetic theory, and critical reception. Use the sources in our textbook; no outside research is required for this assignment. Explain how the author's life, his or her ideas about how the stories work, and what leading critics have to say about the story inform our understanding and appreciation of the author's art.
Specifics: Your typed paper will fall between 4 to 6 complete pages, with the finished product coming in around 1,300 words. Write your paper for someone who is already familiar with the story. (Thus, there is no need to summarize it for them.) But don't assume that they have studied it in the same detailed way that you have, nor do they have access to the biographical, aesthetic, and critical information in our textbook. Your task is to show your reader how awareness of these issues impacts the function of the narrative, and thus their response to it. Delicately use the skills of paraphrasing, quoting, or summary as needed to substantiate your most important claims.
Submission: Upload your paper to our Turnitin.com account by 11:59pm Wednesday, November 29. This gives you two full weeks to plan, write, and edit your paper. Don't procrastinate: get started soon and check in with your professor or a tutor during your composition process. This paper is twice as long as the first, and it is worth twice the point value.
Paper Format: Use the Modern Language Association's (MLA) paper format and citations method. For details, see OWL's excellent web site w/examples: MLA Format. You might also find these short MLA format videos helpful.
Class ID:16151376
Password: paper4denny
200 points possible. A five-point per day late penalty will be imposed upon papers received after the deadline.