stories, novels, plays, or poems for your research paper

Assignment Description: Choose one of the following stories, novels, plays, or poems for your research paper. You may wish to read the introduction to the author and then to read the first few paragraphs of the story, novel, or play to help you make your choice. I suggest that you read your primary source (the story, novel, or play) before looking for commentaries (secondary sources), since you’ll want to experience it as literature with all its interesting details and surprises first. Once you have made your choice, read carefully and take notes, jotting down any questions that occur to you as you read. These questions will be part of your research paper.

From the Romanticism Era

1. William Blake, Songs of Innocence (If you choose Blake, you will have to read at least 5 poems in Songs of Innocence)
2. William Blake, Songs of Experience (If you choose Blake, you will have to read at least 5 poems in Songs of Experience)
3. Mary Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman
4. William Wordsworth, “Ode: Intimations of Immortality”
5. Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “Rime of the Ancient Mariner”
6. George Gordon Byron, “Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage”

From The Victorian Age

1. Robert Louis Stevenson, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
2. Bernard Shaw, Mrs. Warren’s Profession
3. Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest
4. Rudyard Kipling, The Man Who Would Be King

 From the Twentieth Century and After (Volume F)

1. Virginia Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway
2. James Joyce, The Dead
3. D. H. Lawrence, Odour of Chrysanthemums
4. Doris Lessing, To Room Nineteen

Preparing to Write the Essay

 Find at least four commentaries (articles, interviews, overviews, critical essays, etc.) about the story, novel, or play and take notes or highlight the parts that help in your understanding. You should use at least two substantial quotations from each commentary in your paper. I encourage you to use more than four commentaries (sources). Keep in mind that your research should focus on the literature itself, not on the author, The primary source (the story, novel, or play) does not count as one of the four commentaries (secondary sources). This means that you will have at least five sources (including the primary work itself) listed in your works cited.

Do NOT use:

• Internet (or print) sources that are “notes” or “summaries” of the primary source (CliffsNotes, Endnotes, Classicnotes, Booknotes, Sparknotes, Novelguide.com, etc) (Anything with lots of advertisements should be avoided.)
• Student papers or free essays from websites such as/like 1234helpme.com, freeessays.tv, gradesaver.com, sunflower.singnet.com, cbronte.com, bookrags, planetpapers.com, antiessays.com, directessays.com, academon.com, echeat.com—I’m truly amazed at how many websites like this exist! (These papers are often already plagiarized, or they are written by high school students with no real evidence for their views.)

Writing the Paper

 Begin your paper with a brief discussion of the primary source itself—who the author is, when it was published, and a very succinct (no more than a couple of sentences) precis or synopsis of the work. Then you need to provide your thesis: this would be a sentence or sentences which synthesize what you have found out about your source in the commentaries.

Then discuss each commentary (source) in a full paragraph for each source, letting the reader know what the critics have said about your story, novel, or play. You may summarize the main points of each commentary, but I would like at least one significant quote from each commentary. When you quote, you need to discuss the quote in your own words immediately after the quote. Be sure to cite all summaries and quotes in correct, current MLA format.

Use clear transition words/phrases to connect your commentaries and ideas. Do not break up your essay into sections with each commentary as a section title. Your essay should flow together as one clear document with proper transitions that connect your ideas and paragraphs logically and fluidly. The end of your essay should give an overall synthesis of what the commentaries say about your primary source.

NOTE: Please do NOT use the first person (I, me, my, mine, and personal opinions or experiences) in this essay. It should be written in third person, academic format. Include a Works Cited list at the end of the paper, listing all sources alphabetically, using MLA documentation format. Be sure to list your primary source (the story, play, or novel you are writing about).

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