3 part section

Draft 1–Proposal–The proposal should consist of a paragraph or more discussing which story you plan to write about and why. Which element will you discussion and use to argue the main point in your essay? Due by Sept 29^th

Draft 2–Outline–submit your analytical outline for the essay. Due by Sept 30th

Draft 3–Rough Draft–This is a copy of the nearly complete draft of your paper. You will receive feed back on this essay before you turn in the final copy of your essay for grading. Due October 4^th

 

RUBRIC

Topic: Analyze any of the pieces of fiction listed below by using one or more of the following: Setting, Style, Tone, Symbolism and Allegory, Idea or Theme. Also the elements studied previously can be employed in combination with the above listed elements.

Outline: An Analytical Sentence Outline is required. An example can be found on p. 38 of Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing.

Length: 600 words

Grade: 100 points

Stories assigned:

“Blue Winds Dancing” [320]

“The Story of an Hour” [337]

“A & P” [370]

“The Fall of the House of Usher” [505]

“The Masque of the Red Death” [516]

“The Cask of Amontillado” [525]        

NOTES

Paper 3 Lecture Notes

Setting

Like all humans, literary characters do not exist in isolation. They are usually involved deeply with their environment and their surrounds.

Setting is the natural, manufactured, political, cultural, and temporal environment, including everything that characters know, own and otherwise experience.

Three Basic Types of Setting

1. Public and private places, together with various possessions, are important in fiction, as in life.

One possible thesis to illustrate this is: “In Maupassant’s   ‘The Necklace’, the loss of a comfortable home brings out the best in the major character by causing her to adjust to her economic reversal.”

1. Outdoor places are scenes of many fictional actions.

The natural world is an obvious location for the action of many narratives. And these locations may influence and interact with character, motivation, and conduct.

1. Cultural and historical circumstances are often important in fiction.

Just as physical setting influences characters, so do historical and cultural conditions and assumptions. The broad cultural setting of Jackson’s “The Lottery” is built on the persistence of a primitive belief despite the sophistication of our modern and scientific age.

Authors use setting to create meaning, just as painters include backgrounds and objects to render ideas.

Some Literary Uses of Setting

1. The setting is usually essential and vital in the story
2. Setting augments a work’s realism and credibility
3. Setting may accentuate qualities of character
4. Setting is a means by which authors structure and shape their works
5. Various settings may be symbolic
6. Setting is used in the creation of atmosphere and mood
7. Setting may underscore a work’s irony

Tone and Style

Tone refers to the methods by which writers and speaker reveal attitudes or feelings—toward the material, toward their readers, and toward the general situation they are describing or analyzing.

Style refers to the way in which writers assemble words to tell the story, to develop the argument, to dramatize the play or to compose the poem. It is best considered as the choice of words to convey the content.

As a guide to the types of words authors use to control tone, a major classification of diction can be made according to three degrees of formality or informality:

1. Formal (or high)
2. Neutral (or middle)
3. Informal (or low)

Formal or high diction bestows major importance to the characters and actions being described. It consists of standard and also “elegant” words, correct word order, and the absence of contractions.

Neutral or middle diction is ordinary, everyday standard vocabulary, shunning longer words and using contractions when necessary. Neutral words may be thought of as clear window glass, while words in the formal or high style are more decorative, like stained glass. Neutral diction is appropriate for stories about every day, ordinary people going through situations they encounter or can imagine encountering in their lives. Generally, writers today favor neutral diction as a means of putting their characters in a light that is normal and appropriate but also respectful.

Informal or low diction may range from colloquial—the language of relaxed, common activities—to the level of substandard or slang expressions. A person speaking to a close friend uses diction that would not be appropriate in public and formal situations and even in some social situations. It is a natural choice for stories told in the first-person point of view as though the speaker is talking directly to sympathetic and relaxed close friends.

Additional terms:

Concrete words describe qualities of immediate perceptions. If you say, “Ice cream is cold,” the word cold is concrete because it describes a condition that you can feel.

Abstract words refer to broader and less palpable qualities; they may therefore apply to many separate things. If we describe ice cream as good, our word is abstract because good is far removed from ice cream itself and conveys no descriptive information about it.

Denotation is a limiting term, referring to what a word means.

Connotation is a broader word, referring to what the word suggests.

Through the careful choice of words, not only for denotation but also for connotation, writers control tone even though they might be describing similar or even identical situations.

Verbal irony describes such contradictory statements, in which one thing is said and the opposite is meant. There are important types of verbal irony.

In understatement the expression does not fully describe the importance of a situation, and therefore makes its point by implication

In hyperbole or overstatement, the words are far in excess of the situation, and readers or listeners therefore understand that the true meaning is considerably less than what is said.

Often verbal irony is ambiguous, having double meaning or double entendre. Ambiguity of course may be used in relation to any topic.

Symbolism and Allegory

A symbol creates a direct meaningful equation between a specific object, scene, character, or action and ideas, values, persons, or ways of life. In effect, a symbol is a substitute for elements being signified, much as the flag stands for the ideas of the nation.

Many symbols are generally or universally recognized and are therefore cultural (universal). They embody ideas and emotions that writers and readers share as heirs of the same historical and cultural traditions.

An allegory is like a symbol because it transfers and broadens meaning. Allegory is more sustained that symbolism. An allegory is to a symbol as a motion picture is to a still picture. Allegories are often concerned with morality and especially with religion, but we may also find political and social allegories.

A fable is an old, brief, and popular form. Often but not always, fables are about animals that possess human traits and contain morals.

A parable is a short, simple story with a moral or religious message.

A myth is a traditional story that embodies and codifies the religious, philosophical, and cultural values of the civilization in which it is composed.

What is a “dropped quote”?

This is a quote that is placed into a student essay without introduction or is inserted without thought of how it flows into the content or development of the essay. So in a sense the quote is just “dropped” into the essay without much thought or planning and therefore lends little to your argument.

The quoted material should be placed carefully and with great thought into the paper so that it supports what you are trying to say.

Make sure to follow the quoted material with a comment about what it means or how it is used to support your argument.

Please read W-11 “Literary Analysis” in The Little Seagull. And read R-3 pages 95-108 for “Synthesizing Ideas”.

Third Person Point of View

All formal papers should be written in third person point of view. Third person makes reference to people and subjects outside of you as the writer. So the paper should not contain “I” or “you”.

First person—refers to I, me, mine, our, us, we, … (Used in the writing of journals or diaries)

Second person—uses you and your (Often used in self-help books or instruction books on how to do something)

Therefore, first and second person point of view are too informal to use in college papers.

Third person—refers to the person by name or as, for example: the student, Mr. Jones,

Example of third person point of view:

If the student is to receive his paper back in a timely manner, he must submit it by the due date.

You will see that the highlighted words are singular pronouns and subject written in third person point of view. Please see The Little Seagull S-6 page 277 (Pronoun Reference), S-9 page 287 (Shifts and Point of View).

Writing a Thesis Statement

The thesis is a very prominent part of any essay. The professor is looking to see if:

• the thesis is clear, argumentative, and focused.
• the thesis comes at the end of the first paragraph
• the thesis is paraphrased or reflected in some way in the first sentence of the last paragraph
• the entire essay supports and proves the thesis sentence

Composing a Title

As you think about revising and proofreading your paper, focus for a while on giving your paper a title.  Think about using the thesis of your paper as a starting point for your title. Additionally,

DO NOT

• use a complete sentence for your title
• go beyond 5 or 8 words for your title
• use the title of the story you are writing about as the title of your essay
• put quotation marks around the title of your paper.

DO

• let your reader know EXACTLY the point of your paper (not just the topic)
• let your reader know your position on the argument (your thesis)
• grab your reader’s attention.

How to Create a Hanging Indent

An easy way to indent your work cited entries is as follows:

In Word highlight your citation

Go to Paragraph in the toolbar above

Pull down the menu

Select “Special” (it is right above where you change your spacing from single to double)

Under Special you will see the word “Hanging” at the bottom of the list

Select Hanging and press OK

This will automatically indent your citation according to MLA requirements

Lawrence, D.H. “The Horse Dealer’s Daughter. “ Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing. Ed. Edgar V. Roberts and Robert Zweig. 10^thed. New York: Pearson Longman, 2012. 477-86. Print.

Illustrative Student Essay

Excellent sample essays can be found at the end of each chapter in your textbook—Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing.

One such example is on page 219.

The student has titled his essay The Character of Minnie Wright in Glaspell’s “A Jury of Her Peers.” This example shows you the student’s thesis, the topic sentences of each body paragraph and the topic sentence of the conclusion—all of which are needed for the analytical outline.

Also great information is given at the beginning of each chapter in which the stories assigned to you are found.

Paper 3 Checklist

Make sure:

1. The paper does not retell the story
2. The paper is written in present tense
3. It is written in third person—no “I” or “you”
4. The paper is double spaced
5. The paper is typed in 12 or 14 font
6. The paper contains a title

Ask yourself the following questions:

1. Is my essay an analysis?
2. Have I mentioned the author and the title of the story in the first line of my introductory paragraph?
3. Does the thesis statement contain one of the elements of fiction assigned for this paper—setting, style, tone, symbolism and allegory, idea or theme?
4. Does my Paper 2 file contain an outline, the essay and a work cited page?
5. Did I proofread carefully for grammar and organization?

Again, make sure the paper does not retell the story!!!

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