Purpose: The purpose of this assignment is to expand your
understanding of a text of British Literature and to build upon your
understanding of research methodologies.
Assignment: Write TWO (2) thesis-driven essays, one on Jane
Austen's Persuasion and one on James Joyce's Dubliners, in which you
use the critical essays included in the Norton Critical Editions of these
texts to construct a critical framework (background information to help
analyze the topic) to examine your topic.
Ways to
Proceed: You may examine the text from the author's point of view
(biography), from a historical standpoint, from a cultural standpoint, or
from any other critical standpoint that strikes your fancy.
The main point
is that you must have a critical framework (background information to help
analyze the topic) to support your thesis.
Other than that,
you are only limited in this assignment by the text you choose (you must
necessarily examine the text on which your paper centers—this is
a text-driven assignment), and by your own imagination.
Criteria
for Evaluation: Your research paper
should be typed, double-spaced, one inch margins (top, bottom, left, right),
twelve point font (Courier, Arial, Garamond, etc.).
Your research paper should
be between 8-12 pages, including all Annotated Works Cited entries. I expect you to
use the MLA writing guide
that is provided for you on this web cite to format your essay. At the minimum, I expect you
to to have the First Page formatted like an MLA Document, to have a header
containing your last name and page number, to
have proper one inch margins, and to have an Annotated Works Cited page that lists the
text/character/ theme that you used for this assignment.
An Annotated Works Cited is just like a Works Cited page
(i.e., it is a page that lists all of the works that you quoted, summarized, or
paraphrased in your essay; some people call this a Bibliography). However,
each
“Works
Cited” entry will have a brief annotation (note, summary, précis,
abstract) after each reference. This
annotation should be between 50 and 150 words in length.
It will describe in brief summary what you have read.
For example, if you were doing your essay on Hemingway’s “A Clean
Well-Lighted Place,” the last page of your essay should look something like
this:
(This
represents the top edge of the last page of your essay)
LastName
4
Annotated
Works Cited
Conrad,
Joseph. “Heart of Darkness.” Norton
Anthology of British Literature. 7th Edition.
Vol.
B. Ed. M. H. Abrams, et. al. New York: W. W. Norton, 2001. Conrad novella in which a
man named Marlow narrates a tale about his journey up the Congo river to meet a
man named Kurtz, a purportedly idealistic man. Marlow takes a job as a
riverboat captain with a Belgian Company that traded in the Congo. As he
travels to Africa and then up the Congo, Marlow encounters the widespread
inefficiency and brutality prevalent in the Company’s stations. The
native inhabitants of the region have been forced into the Company’s service,
and they suffer terribly from overwork and poor treatment at the hands of the
Company’s agents. The cruelty and squalor of imperial enterprise
contrasts sharply with the impassive and majestic jungle that surrounds the
white man’s settlements, making them appear to be tiny islands amidst a vast
darkness.
(This
represents the bottom edge of the last page of your essay)
The
preceding example of an
“Annotated Works Cited” page shows a Works Cited entry containing an
annotation with
128 words. It might be a little lengthy, but it is better to err on
the side of caution and be too wordy in such an instance than to be too brief
and risk not summarizing the story well enough. For this assignment, you
should plan on using as much outside research as you feel will be necessary to
develop your critical perspective adequately. Typically, I would expect
around four secondary sources (i.e., works other than the primary
sources written by the author that you are examining) for a project of this
length. I do not expect perfection
on this assignment. However, I DO expect that
“A” students will make a valiant effort at least TO STRIVE for
perfection. Your grade on this assignment depends as much on
your writing ability as it does on your effort. The better students in my
classes are, almost without exception, those students who seriously take to task
the prodigious effort of writing a quality essay. I am sure that those of
you who earnestly wish to succeed on this assignment
will do so. Good
luck on this assignment.
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