Notes on the Essay

Please print these notes and use them to guide your essay writing during this week. Come into class tomorrow with a functioning introduction and body paragraph. You will have the period to begin your next body paragraph.

Below this post, you will find the essay topic choices.

THE INTRODUCTION:

The Hook

We spoke about leads/hooks, but here, in layman's terms, is the purpose for them:

1. You have an audience for anything you write, and you need to appeal to the person/people to get them interested or to make them value what you've written. The hook can is just that: what you are saying to get the reader involved in your piece.
   
   1. Logic (Logos)
      
      1. Appeal to their reason/logic by referring to facts, inference, details, and other evidence
         
         1. Suggestion: Perhaps, you can begin with a statistic or an unfamiliar fact. You can also create a metaphor. This appeals to their logic because you connected two things and inferred a commonality between them.
            

            
            

   2. Emotion (Pathos)
      
      1. Appeal to their emotions by calling upon feelings of empathy, sympathy, anger, fear
         
         1. Suggestion: Perhaps, you can begin with a personal anecdote or a related news story to tap into your readers hearts.
            
   3. Ethics (Ethos)
      
      1. Appeal to the readers' ethics by establishing yourself as competent, fair, and trustworthy author
         
         1. Suggestion: Perhaps, you can begin by making a stanch statement about your topic
            
            1. e.g., Everybody who must be at the school and begin the day at the same time—staff, faculty, and students—needs and deserves space to park.
               
               1. This shows that the writer is dedicated to fairness and equality.
                  
      2. This is reserved mostly for speeches and letters, not literary analysis.
         

         
         

   4. Most literary essays are arguments that rely on both logical and emotional appeals.
      
2. You must make sure to flesh out the hook to avoid problems in logic (e.g., false analogy, circular reasoning, overgeneralization, false cause, single cause) because one wrong move and it can ruin your essay.
   
3. You will refer back to this hook to tie all your points together. So, please make sure that your anecdote or metaphor has enough substance to relate to your thesis in several ways.
   

Thesis—so frequently misunderstood:

1. You have a something to say when you write an essay, and you need to figure out what that is. Frequently, teachers will give you, as I often do, a list of proposed topics. I tend not to limit you to this list, especially if you come to a literary/scholarly conclusion yourself. The thesis is simply this: a statement about what you are trying to enlighten the reader about.
   
2. An effective thesis should be all of the following:
   
   1. Restricted
      
      1. A good essay deals with a bite-size issue, not with issues that would require a lifetime to discuss intelligently or thoroughly.
         
         1. e.g.,
            

Poor	Better
The world is a terrible mess.	The United Nations should be given more peace-keeping powers.
Abigail has many problems.	Abigail is a product of a lack of supervision.
Bob Ewell is an evil man.	Bob Ewell is repressed by a society that doesn't respect him.

1. Unified
   
   1. The tight structure of your paper depends on its working to support a concise idea.
      
      1. e.g.,
         

Poor	Better
Detective stories are not a high form of literature, but people have always been fascinated by them, and many fine writers have experimented with them.	Detective stories appeal to the basic human desire for thrills.

1. Specific
   
   1. A satisfactorily restricted and unified thesis may be useless if the idea it commits you to is vague.
      
      1. e.g.,
         

Poor	Better
James Joyce's Ulysses is very good.	James Joyce's Ulysses helped create a new way for writers to deal with the unconscious.

The Body Paragraphs:

The Proof

The substance of each of your body paragraphs will be the explanations, summaries, paraphrases, specific details, and direct quotations you need to support and develop the more general statement you have made in your topic sentence.

1. These paragraphs can vary in number. You may need three or four to prove your thesis true, perhaps even six.
   
2. Each of these paragraphs must include:
   
   1. Topic Sentence that Supports the Thesis Statement
      
      1. How will the details of this paragraph contribute to your overall thesis?
         
   2. Quote/Specific Details:
      
      1. Introduce the quote
         
         1. Provide context for the reader
            
            1. In one particular scene,…
               
         2. Use a "signal phrase" to introduce the quote
            
            1. He proclaims, "…"
               
            2. She asserts, "…"
               
      2. Direct Quote
         
         1. Use a direct quote when an author writes in particularly powerful language and when such textual evidence enhances your paper's argument.
            
         2. Be precise. Do not use a quote from an outside source (secondary source) if it is not well written or if you can state the point more clearly in your own words. In that case, you might summarize or paraphrase the author's ideas. If you summarize or paraphrase, you must still cite the source to credit the author.
            
         3. Prose quotations longer than four lines should be set off in block quotes, indented 10 spaces from the left margin and double spaced, without quotation marks.
            
      3. Your Analysis/Interpretation of the Quote
         
         1. Explain and discuss how the quote is significant. Relate the quote to your purpose in your paper.
            
         2. Demonstrate that this quote serves to make a particular point in your argument.
            
         3. Connect this to your HOOK.
            
      4. Be sure to transition/connect this paragraph with the following paragraph. You can make this the last sentence of the first paragraph or the first sentence of the next paragraph.
         

The Conclusion:

"Hello" is not "goodbye."

Your conclusion will clearly state what you've proven.

1. The purpose of a conclusion is to show how you've proven your thesis.
   
2. The conclusion should not introduce a new topic that has not been touched on in your essay.
   
3. Your conclusion should include the following:
   
   1. Connect all your points, relating them back to the thesis.
      
   2. Clincher: try to end your paper with a connection back to that hook, which will in turn reinforce your argument. These paragraphs can vary in number. You may need three or four to prove your thesis true, perhaps even six.
      

Homework for the Weekend

Name:______________________________                         Thompson—The Crucible

DIRECTIONS: Over the weekend, I would like you to craft your introduction. The two items I must see are a hook and a thesis. A thesis does not need to be the last sentence of an introduction, but it must be present. Here is a list of some possible essay topics for The Crucible:

1. Discuss the symbolic executions of Rebecca Nurse and John Proctor.
   
2. How do the narrative sections add to the play? In other words, what is their purpose? How would your judgment of what is happening on stage be different without these narrative sections?
   
3. One idea Arthur Miller tries to convey through The Crucible is how private conscience cannot be divorced from public action. Explain how one (1) character in the play tries to separate private conscience from public action and the consequences that ensue. Also, cite one (1) example from more modern times where this has occurred and discuss the result.
   
4. Discuss the role that grudges and personal rivalries play in the witch trial hysteria.
   
5. How is the caste system of Salem upended? In other words, how do the witch trials empower the powerless?
   
6. Discuss the role of Reverend Hale in the drama and the change he undergoes.
   
7. Discuss how the themes of The Crucible make it both universal and enduring. Is there any character in the play that, too, is universal (anyone that we can pick up and place in modern society)? Please note, this means that that he/she would have to have the personality to function in a modern society.
   
8. Several literary scholars see Mary Warren as a cipher. They claim that she is a nonentity because the reader only sees her as a pawn of Abigail, and then of Proctor, and then again of Abigail. Who is the "real" Mary Warren? What is her function in the play?
   
9. In Act IV, Reverend Hale states, "Life is God's most precious gift; no principle, however glorious, may justify the taking of it." Using specific references to the text (e.g., characters, events, or viewpoints), agree or disagree with Hale's perspective and defend your position.
   
10. The Crucible is famous as a political allegory for the Red Scare, but what exactly is Miller trying to say? Who do you think is being most criticized in the contemporary analogy?
    
11. Topic of Choice: MUST BE APPROVED BY ME
    

Here is a sample OUTLINE (If you don't like mine, create your own):

1. INTRODUCTION
   

   Hook (How will you get the reader interested in reading this essay? Story from your own life? Hypothetical situation? Intriguing question? Other interesting start? This should seem to you almost like a piece of creative writing)
   

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John's Dramatic Confession Analysis

I was wandering around youtube.com tonight and found this awesome analysis. Please comment about what this man is saying about John Proctor's confession.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Eel02K-WPo

Notes: Parris, Hale, and Rebecca Nurse

Notes about Thomas Putnam

Here are the notes we took in class today:





Please use the following format here:

II. John Proctor:

a. His Characteristics
i. points you want to make about each characteristic
1. quote to support


b. His Feelings
i. points you want to make about each emotion
1. quote to support


c. His Flaw(s)
i. points you want to make about each flaw
1. quote to support


d. Does he seek the purification and forgiveness he seeks?
i. points you want to make about his actions
1. quote to support

Beauty

Saw this and thought I'd share...

REVISED: Homework for the Week

We were supposed to build upon the eight sentence patterns, but after reading the rewritten paragraphs about Abigail's character, I felt it necessary to work on two more points: topic and structure. Thus, our grammar lessons had to be postponed until I could get you to write exactly how I expect you to. Also, tomorrow (Friday, October 16th), third period has an assembly. To keep both classes on the same page, you will have had to have read to page 138 (John Proctor's line: "God in Heaven, what is John Proctor?") by Monday. Your test on both the book and the vocabulary will be given on Tuesday of next week.

Sorry for any inconveniece/confusion this may have caused. Stay tuned and we will pick up on the eight sentence structures soon...