PREFACE LETTER TO STUDENTS PART 1 Jumping In 1-WRITING ABOUT LITERATURE: A CRASH COURSE The Pleasures of Reading-and of Writing about Literature The Open Secret of Good Writing The Writing Process A Checklist of the Basics 2-THE WRITER AS READER: READING AND RESPONDING Kate Chopin, "Ripe Figs" The Act of Reading Reading with a Pen in Hand Recording Your First Responses Audience and Purpose A Writing Assignment on "Ripe Figs" The Assignment A Sample Essay: "Images of Ripening in Kate Chopin's 'Ripe Figs' " The Student's Analysis Analyzed Critical Thinking and the Study of Literature 3-THE READER AS WRITER: DRAFTING AND WRITING Pre-writing: Getting Ideas Annotating a Text More about Getting Ideas: A Second Story by Kate Chopin, "The Story of an Hour" Kate Chopin: "The Story of an Hour" Brainstorming for Ideas for Writing Focused Free Writing Listing Asking Questions Keeping a Journal Critical Thinking: Arguing with Yourself Arriving at a Thesis and Arguing It Writing a Draft A Sample Draft: "Ironies in an Hour" Revising a Draft A Checklist for Revising for Clarity Two Ways of Outlining a Draft A Checklist for Reviewing a Revised Draft Peer Review The Final Version Sample Essay: "Ironies of Life in Kate Chopin's 'The Story of an Hour' " The Analysis Analyzed Quick Review: From First Response to Final Version: Writing an Essay about a Literary Work 4-TWO FORMS OF CRITICISM: EXPLICATION AND ANALYSIS Explication A Sample Explication: Langston Hughes's "Harlem" Working toward an Explication of "Harlem" Some Journal Entries The Final Draft: "Langston Hughes's 'Harlem' " The Analysis Analyzed A Checklist: Drafting an Explication Analysis: The Judgment of Solomon Thinking about Form Thinking about Character Thoughts about Other Possibilities For Further reading and Analysis: The Parable of the Prodigal Son NEW Comparison: An Analytic Tool A Checklist: Revising a Comparison For Further Reading and Comparison: Gwendolyn Brooks's "We Real Cool" NEW Finding a Topic Considering the Evidence Organizing the Material Communicating Judgments Review: How to Write an Effective Essay 1. Pre-writing 2. Drafting 3. Revising 4. Editing An Editing Checklist: Questions to Ask Yourself When Editing For Further Reading, Explication, and Comparison: William Blake's "The Tyger" NEW 5-OTHER KINDS OF WRITING ABOUT LITERATURE A Summary A Paraphrase A Review A Review of a Dramatic Production A Sample Review: "An Effective Macbeth" PART 2 Standing Back: Thinking Critically about Literature 6-LITERATURE, FORM, AND MEANING Literature and Form Literature and Meaning Arguing about Meaning Form and Meaning Robert Frost, "The Span of Life" Literature, Texts, Discourses, and Cultural Studies Suggestions for Further Reading 7-WHAT IS INTERPRETATION? Interpretation and Meaning Is the Author's Intention a Guide to Meaning? Features of a Good Interpretation An Example: Interpreting Pat Mora's "Immigrants" Thinking Critically about Literature A Student Interpretation of Robert Frost's "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" Sample Essay: "Stopping by Woods and Going On" For Further Interpretation, Comparison, and Writing: Robert Frost's "The Road Not Taken" NEW Suggestions for Further Reading A Checklist: Writing an Interpretation NEW 8-WHAT IS EVALUATION? Criticism and Evaluation Are There Critical Standards? Morality and Truth as Standards Other Ways to Think about Truth and Realism Suggestions for Further Reading 9-WRITING ABOUT LITERATURE: AN OVERVIEW The Nature of Critical Writing Some Critical Approaches Formalist Criticism (New Criticism) Deconstruction Reader-Response Criticism Archetypal (or Myth) Criticism Historical Criticism Marxist Criticism The New Historicism Biographical Criticism Psychological (or Psychoanalytic) Criticism Gender (Feminist, and Lesbian and Gay) Criticism Suggestions for Further Reading PART 3 Up Close: Thinking Critically about Literary Forms 10-WRITING ABOUT FICTION: THE WORLD OF THE STORY Plot and Character Writing about a Character A Sample Essay on a Character: "Holden's Kid Sister" The Analysis Analyzed Foreshadowing Organizing an Essay on Foreshadowing Setting and Atmosphere Symbolism A Sample Essay on Setting as Symbol: "Spring Comes to Mrs. Mallard" "Spring Comes to Mrs. Mallard" Point of View Third-Person Narrators First-Person Narrators Notes and a Sample Essay on Narrative Point of View in James Joyce's "Araby" "The Three First-Person Narrators of Joyce's 'Araby' " The Analysis Analyzed Theme: Vision or Argument? Determining and Discussing the Theme Preliminary Notes and a Sample Essay on the Theme of Eudora Welty's "A Worn Path" Preliminary Notes "Rising into Love" (essay on "A Worn Path") A Brief Overview of the Essay A Checklist: Writing about Theme NEW Basing the Paper on Your Own Responses A Note on Secondary Sources A Second Essay about Theme: Notes and the Final Version of an Essay on Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery" " We All Participate in 'The Lottery' " The Analysis Analyzed Suggestions for Further Reading A Checklist: Getting Ideas for Writing about Fiction A Checklist: Getting Ideas for Writing about a Film Based on a Work of Literature 11-GRAPHIC FICTION NEW Letters and Pictures Grant Wood's "Death on the Ridge Road" (painting) Topic for Writing Reading an Image: A Short Story Told in One Panel Tony Carillo's "F Minus" 12-WRITING ABOUT DRAMA A Sample Essay Preliminary Notes "The Solid Structure of The Glass Menagerie" Types of Plays Tragedy A Checklist: Writing about Tragedy Comedy Writing about Comedy A Checklist: Writing about Comedy Aspects of Drama Theme Plot A Checklist: Writing about Plot Characterization and Motivation Conventions Costumes, Gestures, and Settings A Sample Essay on Setting in Drama " What the Kitchen in Trifles Tells Us" The Analysis Analyzed Suggestions for Further Reading A Checklist: Getting Ideas for Writing about Drama A Checklist: Getting Ideas for Writing about a Film Based on a Play A Student's Essay on a Filmed Version of a Play "Branagh's Film of Hamlet" A Checklist: Topics for Critical Thinking and Writing 13-WRITING ABOUT POETRY The Speaker and the Poet Emily Dickinson, "Wild Nights-Wild Nights" The Language of Poetry: Diction and Tone Edna St. Vincent Millay, "I, being born a woman and distressed" Writing about the Speaker: Robert Frost's "The Telephone" Robert Frost, "The Telephone" Journal Entries Figurative Language John Keats, "On First Looking into Chapman's Homer" Preparing to Write about Figurative Language Imagery and Symbolism William Blake, "The Sick Rose" Structure Robert Herrick, "Upon Julia's Clothes" Annotating and Thinking about a Poem The Student's Finished Essay: "Herrick's Julia, Julia's Herrick" Some Kinds of Structure Repetitive Structure William Wordsworth, "A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal" Logical Structure John Donne, "The Flea" Verbal Irony Paradox Explication A Sample Explication of Yeats's "The Balloon of the Mind" William Butler Yeats, "The Balloon of the Mind" Rhythm and Versification: A Glossary for Reference Rhythm Meter Patterns of Sound Stanzaic Patterns Blank Verse and Free Verse Walt Whitman, "When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer" Preparing to Write about Prosody Sample Essay on Metrics: "Sound and Sense in A. E. Housman's 'Eight O'Clock'" "Sound and Sense in A. E. Housman's 'Eight O'Clock' " The Analysis Analyzed Suggestions for Further Reading A Checklist: Getting Ideas for Writing about Poetry 14-POEMS AND PICTURES NEW A Poem and a Sample Student Essay Vincent van Gogn, "The Starry Night" (painting) Anne Sexton, "The Starry Night" Sample Essay: "Two Ways of Looking at a Starry Night" The Language of Pictures Writing about Pictures Comparing and Contrasting William Notman, "Foes in '76, Friends in '85" (photograph) Analyzing and Evaluating Evidence Thinking Critically: Arguing with Oneself, Asking Questions, and Comparing-E.E. Cummings's "Buffalo Bill's" A Writing Assignment: Connecting a Picture with a Work of Literature Sample essay: "Two Views of Buffalo Bill" 15-WRITING ABOUT AN AUTHOR IN DEPTH A Case Study: Writing about Langston Hughes Langston Hughes, "The South" Langston Hughes, "Ruby Brown" Langston Hughes, "Ballad of the Landlord" Sample essay: "A National Problem: Race and Racism in the Poetry of Langston Hughes" A Brief Overview of the Essay PART 4 Inside: Style, Format, and Special Assignments 16-STYLE AND FORMAT Principles of Style Get the Right Word Write Effective Sentences A Checklist for Revising for Conciseness Write Unified and Coherent Paragraphs A Checklist: Revising Paragraphs Write Emphatically Notes on the Dash and the Hyphen Remarks about Manuscript Form Basic Manuscript Form Quotations and Quotation Marks 17-WRITING A RESEARCH PAPER What Research Is Not, and What Research Is Primary and Secondary Materials Locating Material: First Steps Other Bibliographic Aids The Basics Moving Ahead: Finding Sources for Research Work What Does Your Own Institution Offer? Taking Notes Incorporating Your Reading into Your Thinking: The Art and Science of Synthesis NEW Drafting Your Paper Focus on Primary Sources Documentation What to Document: Avoiding Plagiarism A Checklist for Avoiding Plagiarism How to Document: Footnotes, Internal Parenthetical Citations, and a List of Works Cited (MLA Format) Sample Essay with Documentation: "The Women in Death of a Salesman" A Checklist: Reading the Draft of a Research Paper Electronic Sources Encyclopedias: Print and Electronic Versions The Internet/World Wide Web Evaluating Sources on the World Wide Web A Checklist: A Review for Using the World Wide Web Documentation: Citing a Web Source A Checklist: Citing World Wide Web Sources APPENDIX A: TWO STORIES James Joyce, "Araby" Eudora Welty, "A Worn Path" APPENDIX B: GLOSSARY OF LITERARY TERMS APPENDIX C: HOW MUCH DO YOU KNOW ABOUT CITING SOURCES? A QUIZ WITH ANSWERS CREDITS INDEX OF AUTHORS, TITLES, AND FIRST LINES OF POEMS INDEX OF TERMS
