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ENGL 1200:0016 Essay 1 Assignment Sheet
As stated in our syllabus, this essay will be a 3-4 page detailed close reading of 2-3 passages from a text. For this first essay, you can write on one of the texts we are working on/have already encountered, (meaning: 2-3 passages from the readings in The Odyssey that we have done already, or 2-3 lines from the Vuong poem or the Rumi poem), or a text from outside the course that you are interested in working on (for this, you will need to get me to approve it ahead of time).
What the first essay is:
For this close reading analysis, you will use the close reading skills that we have been working to develop in class and in your journals to perform a literary analysis of one of the texts we have read. Leave yourself time to revise at every stage.
This essay should be a close-reading, text-centered analysis that focuses on how elements of the text (its form, narration, style, literary devices, and construction, etc.) are contributing to the execution of the work’s larger themes.
Besides providing a thorough analysis of specific passages in the text (like you have been working on developing in your journal entries), the paper must also have an argumentative and interpretative thesis that brings these smaller observations together into one cohesive narrative. You are welcome to start by choosing any facet of the text or moment that interests you, or you can work from one of the prompts listed on the last page of this assignment sheet.
Formal Requirements
· 3-4 full pages double-spaced NOT including your Works Cited page, 12 pt. Times New Roman font (or comparable), with 1-inch margins on all sides. You do not need a title...
7.) OUTLINE:
I: Introduction: set up prompt and passages with argument
A. Hook
B. Set up
C. Passages chosen (briefly summarize scene)
D. Argument you will make based on close reading with your prompt
II: Close reading Helen and the drugs
A. Self-medicating to stall memories
B. “pain and rage” and “every evil” taken away, but really it’s memory
C. Not a permanent forgetfulness
D. Why did they start this practice?
III: Close reading Menelaus on the beach
A. Menelaus is a warrior, very action oriented—he responds well to the suggestion to get up and do something about his pain
B. Compare to Odysseus and Telemachus, the other criers we’ve gotten to know so far?
IV: Synthesis
Although there are many scenes of weeping in The Odyssey, these two passages reveal an unease about grief’s effects on people. The passages and their larger scenes (taken together) suggest that although it is normal to grieve over memories of loss, and although they recount the memories in storytelling form to each other, these characters take steps to actively avoid dwelling on their memories.
V: Conclusion
Odyssey: The Blinding of Polyphemus
In the incident that Odysseus succeeds in luring Polyphemus to be drunk and blinded him by inserting a burning stake into his eyes as he was asleep. After they manage to the blind, Odysseus manages to escape by clinging to a belly of a grazing sheep. Polyphemus killed the other six in the company of Odysseus. The blinding of Polyphemus in book 9 presents the themes of the Gods, fate, disguise, cunning and self-restraint, and grief; the passage has used symbolism and uses a tone and mood of seriousness.
Odysseus is presented as cunning. Odysseus knew that fighting Polyphemus would be very challenging while in a normal situation. It was until he made Polyphemus drugs that he could blind him. The only way to win against Polyphemus was to make him weak through trickery. When Odysseus meets Polyphemus in his cave, he disguises his identity...
