eng 1102 xtig english composition and modern english ii 2
English 1102
Essay 4
Requirements: Minimum 1000 words
Draft Due via Canvas: 2.23
Final Copy Due: 3.8
Assignment: Write an essay that defends a thesis you developed through a close critical reading/analysis of a poem listed on the syllabus/weekly activities and supported by at least three secondary sources. This essay still relies on textual support from the primary text, but includes at least three secondary sources that support/sustain the student’s argument. Do not confuse “critical analysis†with “summary†nor should you speak of “relating†to the poem; the goal is to develop, sustain, and advance a thesis based on a critique of the primary text but also supported by at least three secondary sources. Use the MLA International Bibliography, JSTOR, and/or Project MUSE as in Essay 3 to support your ideas and thesis.
Choose one of the poems in chapters 9-16 in Backpack Literature (excluding William Blake’s “London†and the extremely short poems or the doggerel like the satire of Shakespeare’s ‘Thou art as lovely as a summer’s day’as that will be coveredby a sample essay) and write a three to four page essay analyzing it through a close reading that takes the poem completely apart. As we did in discussing Shakespeare’s soliloquies and other speeches (and as some of you did in Essay 3) each lineof the poem should be discussed in depth to support your thesis. Examine the words and the word origins, the images, the diction and tone that build up in the poem, the structure of the poem through its rhythm, rhyme, and meter. This is a difficult assignment, though it may appear simple. Don’t wait until the last minute to begin.
