ENG 559: Topics for Second Essay

Due the last day of class (Thursday, March 11), your second essay should be from 1,500 - 2,000 words and adhere to the formatting guidelines that can be linked to here:

http://people.cohums.ohio-state.edu/herman145/papertemplate.html

Please submit a hard copy of your essay at the beginning of class on 3/11, rather than sending it to me via e-mail. Again, list the number of words at the end of your essay, making sure that your paper falls within the target length.

As you read through the framing comments that follow, review the prompts, and choose your topic, note that I have decided to provide an extra-credit option for anyone who wants to pursue it. To be eligible for extra credit, you would need to incorporate into your discussion 5-6 outside secondary sources--i.e., sources not included on our syllabus. Be sure to provide complete bibliographic references for these sources, and to use MLA formatting when you cite or quote them in your essay. (The above link provides pointers to information about MLA formatting guidelines.) In determining how much extra credit to give to people who choose this option, I'll consider how thoughtfully the outside sources have been selected and how carefully they've been integrated into the argument you develop in your essay.

As with your first essay, this assignment is designed to give you practice using the analytical tools that we're focusing on in the course. More specifically, your second essay will again afford you a chance to explore how tools from narrative theory can be used to develop interpretations of specific narratives. So this paper too is a more elaborate version of what you've been doing while composing entries for your reading journals. You should think about ways in which the tools you focus on can be used to generate productive interpretations of (or questions about) your narrative case studies. At the same time, you should also think about how the narratives you discuss can throw light on both the possibilities and the limitations of the tools. What aspects of the narratives do the tools allow you to explore? Are there any aspects of the narratives that present a challenge to those tools?  

Here are the options for your second essay. As with the first essay assignment, the questions listed under each prompt are intended as "brainstorming questions," so you don't have to try to address all of these questions in your essay. Remember: don't hesitate to contact me if you have any questions about any aspect of this assignment.

Option 1: Compare and contrast the nature and functions of gaps by comparing (A) either Plath or Bechdel with (B) either McEwan or Ishiguro. In other words, this prompt asks you to compare one of the narratives that we're reading in unit 3 with one of the narratives we're reading in unit 4.
    For this option, first use the Glossary in Abbott's book (pages 228 and following) to pinpoint places where he discusses the role of gaps in narrative. Also read Prince's entry for "ellipsis" (and the entries for other terms mentioned there), and reexamine Doležel's discussion of gaps in fictional versus historical narratives. After reviewing this work on gaps, use these theorists' ideas to explore the gaps in the two texts you've chosen. What kinds of information is "gapped out" in each text, when, and with what effects? Can you detect patterns in what is being omitted and in the way such omissions are placed or distributed in each text? What does the nature and method of gapping say about the narrator, in each case? Furthermore, in each narrative how does the omission of information--the occurrence of these specific gaps in these specific places in the narrative--affect your interpetation of the events being narrated? Can you connect the authors' use of gaps to broader goals they may have had in presenting their respective storyworlds?

Option 2: Compare and contrast how narrative is interconnected with issues of ideology in either (A) Plath's The Bell Jar or Bechdel's Fun Home and (B) McEwan's Atonement. In other words, this prompt asks you to compare McEwan with one of the narratives we're reading in unit 3.
    For this option, read Luc Herman's and Bart Vervaeck's discussion of ideology in their chapter on this topic. You might also want to refresh your memory of Abbott's related concept of "masterplot" by looking up that term in his Glossary, checking out the pages where he discusses the idea in his book, and considering how masterplots relate to the more general concept of ideology. Next, extrapolating from Herman and Vervaeck's discussion of how issues of ideology can be examined at the levels of story, narrative (= discourse), and narration, use this general model to compare and contrast the two narratives you've chosen. Thus, whereas Herman/Vervaeck focus on The Great Gatsby as their example narrative, you'll be uncoupling their general approach from that specific text and using it to compare and contrast the two narratives that you are examining.
    When you look at the story level of the two texts you've chosen, in what ways are issues of ideology pertinent in these two narratives? And what about at the levels of discourse and narration? Is Herman's and Vervaeck's model more illuminating in connection with one of the texts than the other, and if so, why and how? Conversely, do the narratives you discuss suggest complexities in the way ideology operates that might require adjustments to Herman's and Vervaeck's approach?   

Option 3: Compare and contrast how narrative is interconnected with issues of identity in (A) Plath's The Bell Jar and (B) either McEwan's Atonement or Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go. In other words, this prompt asks you to compare Plath with one of the narratives we're reading in unit 4.
    For this option, read the articles by Gutenberg and Ritivoi, as well as the excerpts of the book chapters by Taylor and MacIntyre. I would also recommend that you reread the last three sections of chapter 10 of Abbott's book (pages 136-44), in which the chapter broadens out from a focus on literary characters in particular to a discussion of the more general issue of representing selves in stories. Next, draw on these sources to outline a set of questions that are in your view central for any investigation of narrative and identity. Then use these questions to compare and contrast the two texts you've chosen.
    In outlining your key questions about narrative and identity, you might want to follow the general approach used by Herman and Vervaeck in their chapter on "Ideology" (see Option 2 above). If you take that route, you would draw from Gutenberg's, Ritivoi's, Taylor's, and MacIntyre's ideas to develop questions that can be asked about issues of identity at the story, discourse, and narration levels of your two focal texts. But you need not follow this general approach if you wish to frame another way of exploring questions of identity and narrative in your two texts. 
    In any case, issues that you might want to consider include: In what ways (through narration, characterization, emplotment, etc.) do the two narratives present models of what a self is and how it evolves over time? What factors shape (limit but also enable) the development or formation of the self in each narrative? What other questions about identity and narrative can you draw from the sources mentioned above, and how might those questions serve as a basis for comparing and contrasting the two narratives you've selected?

Final thought: Exploring the kinds of questions encompased by Options 1-3 is the basic form of activity undertaken by scholars in the field of narrative studies. Hence, in working on this assignment you will really be engaged in primary research. In other words, as you work on this assignment--and also on your final research projects, for that matter--you're not just writing a paper; beyond this, you're joining a larger community of scholars in the effort to develop ways of understanding what stories are and how they work!