ENGL 2580: Survey of American Literature II
Dr. S. Toland-Dix, Professor
CRITICAL ESSAY ASSIGNMENT
The critical essay should be an interpretation of literary text(s) that establishes the author’s intent by analyzing characters, imagery, and/or themes/main ideas. Each paper should contain a clear, analytical thesis statement. Develop your argument through close reading and textual analysis using the SIEL method – State, Illustrate, Explain, Link — that you have been practicing in journal entries.
IMPORTANT DATES:
1) Journal entry 5 requires you to answer specific questions about your essay topic. To write the entry effectively, you will need to define your topic specifically and decide exactly how you plan to support your thesis. I will give you feedback and suggestions about your topic. This journal entry will be due by 11:59 pm, Tuesday, April 12th. I will accept late entries until 11:59 pm, Wednesday, April 13th.
2) You are not required to submit a draft for review. If you choose to, you may submit a draft between Thurs. April 21st and 11:59 pm, Sat., April 23rd.
Final Drafts must be submitted by 11:59 pm Thurs. April 28th.
Length: 4 -5 pages in length. Points will be deducted from your grade if your paper does not meet length requirements.
Format: Typed, double-spaced, appropriately and METICULOUSLY documented. All papers must be typed in 12-point font with 1 inch margins on all sides.
Your analysis will be based on your own close reading of the texts. You are not allowed to use secondary or critical sources in developing your analysis. All essays should have a Works Cited page to cite the primary text you are analyzing. BE SURE that you understand the conventions of MLA parenthetical documentation. You will be penalized at least a letter grade for sloppy, inaccurate or incomplete documentation. Plagiarized papers will fail automatically.
Access the link below.
On the left sidebar: First click on Research and Citation. Next click on MLA Style. Now click on MLA Formatting and Style Guide.
Don’t get frustrated! It looks a lot more complicated than it is.
For your essays, you will want to know:
1) What information to include in a parenthetical citation.
2) What should the Works Cited page look like.
3) What information to include in a citation for The Round House, if you write on the novel. I will post citation information for “Sonny’s Blues.”
POSSIBLE TOPICS:
Consider and discuss the significance of the author’s intent in ALL of these essays. At the center of any literary analysis are the core questions: Why did the author write this story? What impact does the author want the story or novel to have on his or her readers? What do you consider an important purpose of the story?
Note that the questions within each possible topic are intended as prompts. Your development of the essay will be guided by your thesis statement. In other words, this is not an exam! You do not have to answer all parts of the question!
1) Write a thematic analysis of “Sonny’s Blues” in which you analyze Baldwin’s development of one of the following themes:
- the evolving relationship between Sonny and the narrator/ his brother.
- the impact of Sonny’s addiction on the brothers’ relationship and how they resolve that.
- Sonny’s path as a musician – what it costs him and how he is learning to manage the demands.
- How the narrator grows and changes
A good way to approach this analysis is by focusing on 2 or 3 specific scenes that best illustrate your thesis or prove.
Keep in mind that — 1) most of the story is told through the narrator’s perspective. We don’t get Sonny’s perspective until the letter he writes his brother from jail after the narrator writes to tell Sonny that his daughter, Sonny’s niece, has died from polio. 2) Baldwin uses flashbacks very skillfully to give us background information about Sonny and his brother. When you discuss a memory, clearly establish why it is significant. 3) Be sure to discuss the significance of the conclusion of “Sonny’s Blues.” What does the author want this story to depict? Reveal? Emphasize? Etc.
2.) The Round House is a bildungsroman, or coming-of-age story. Write a character analysis of the narrator and protagonist — Joe Coutts. How does he change over the course of the novel? This is a very large topic, so you must choose a focus. You may choose to focus on particular relationships – with his parents; with his friends, with Mooshum, etc. Note two or three specific events that you think were particularly important in Joe’s growth and development over the course of the novel. Whatever focus you choose, you must discuss why you think he decides to kill the man who attacked his mother.
3.) Characters, including Cappy, Mooshum, Linda Wishkob, Sonja, Father Travis, Whitey, etc. play indelible roles in the novel’s central story. Choose one or two of these characters. Discuss their relationship with Joe. In what way are they important to the development and/or resolution of the novel? What, if anything, do their stories reveal about life on the reservation? About historic and contemporary interactions between white people and Native Americans within the novel?
4.) Write a character analysis of one of Joe’s parents OR a comparative analysis of both of Joe’s’ parents – Geraldine Coutts or Judge Antone Coutts. What does the novel reveal about their marriage, how they feel about one another, how they relate to each other, etc. How does Geraldine/Antone deal with the crisis that ensues after Geraldine is raped? Also discuss her/his relationship with Joe and how that relationship changes over the course of the novel.
5.) The Round House is a mystery and a coming-of-age story that both reveals and protests against historic suppression and colonization of Native Americans by the United States government. Erdrich says that she wrote this novel to reveal the legacy of violence against Native women and the inability of tribes to prosecute non-natives on their own land. In your essay, discuss how she uses the fictional case of the sexual assault of Geraldine Coutts to dramatize the consequences for the woman, her family, her community, her assailant, of laws with so many loopholes that they provide women almost no protection from assault. See her “Afterword” in developing your essay. Discuss at least two of the court cases or actual laws that she includes in the novel.
6.) Write a character analysis of Linden Lark. Why does he have such deep hatred of Indians? How does he justify that hatred? How does he justify his actions? He and his family are described as having a deep sense of entitlement specifically as white people interacting with Native Americans. How does the court case his family lost influence his behavior? Consider also his relationship with his twin – Linda Wishkob, and one other character: Governor Yelton, Mayla Wolfskin, his mother, Judge Coutts, etc.. Ultimately do you believe that Linden is a wiindigoo?