The essay instructions are provided in the attachment. The books that will be used are highlighted and the essay prompt is also highlighted.
english_102_essay__1_assignment.docx
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English 102 IK
Essay Assignment #1
Spring 2017 Semester
Prof. Wender
Length: 4-5 Pages
Format: Double-Spaced, 12” Times New Roman Font
Due: Monday March 20– In Class.
All late papers will be marked down one letter grade for every class meeting that passes after the deadline. Only hard
copies will be accepted in class (no emails or drop-offs in mailboxes.)
Paper Assignment #1: Romance and Its Discontents
For thousands of years, romantic love been considered the hallmark of civilization, and as such, an integral subject matter
of most cultures. When it comes to matters of the heart, just about every culture on earth has relied heavily upon the
collective wisdom of shorter forms of lyrical writing such as poetry or songs- forms that help us to make some sense out
of an experience that has been variously derided and celebrated as pathology, delusion, ecstasy, and salvation.
What songs and poems lack, though, is the special capacity of narrative fiction to render the passage of time through what
Russian literary scholar Mikhail Bakhtin calls a “chronotope”: “the intrinsic connectedness of temporal and spatial
relationships that are artistically expressed in literature.” One of the chief distinctions of 20th and 21st century fiction,
whether literature, film or television, is its ability to dwell both “in the moment” and, alternatively, to skip back and forth
across time by way of flashbacks and flash-forwards. It is this capacity to re-order events and selectively manipulate the
passage of time through ellipsis and ‘speeding up and slowing down’ time that prompts us to reflect more deeply on the
significance of falling in and out of love.
Please select two of the following short stories and write a comparison/contrast essay in which you examine the way that
each of the two narratives explores one particular theme of romantic love through its use of its plotting and narration.
(And here ‘plotting’ means the way the author chooses to order the events of the story, as well as the way the author
highlights, omits, or plays down certain events; ‘narration’ refers to the perspective and tone that is brought to the love
affair plot by way of the first or third person narrator.)
Eligible Stories to Choose from:
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Chopin, “Story of an Hour”
Chopin, “The Storm” (PLEASE NOTE: DO NOT use both Chopin stories for your essay)
Murakami, “On Seeing the 100% Perfect Girl One Beautiful April Morning”
Dagoberto Gilb, “Love in L.A.”
Elizabeth Tallent, “No One’s a Mystery”
lJhumpa Lahiri, “This Blessed House”
Some questions to consider in order to identify a common romantic love theme that is shared (to some degree) by both
stories:
What does ‘being in love’ mean for the major (and/or minor) characters of each story? Have the characters been in love
before? How old are they, and how does that affect their outlook? Where and when do the stories take place, and how
does that impact the characters’ perceptions of love? What about cultural orientation- what culture does each character
inhabit, and is that character exemplary of that particular culture, or somehow exceptional? Does our culture’s prevailing
notion of romantic love somehow conflict with your characters’ experiences and beliefs? How would you classify the type
of love affair the characters are involved with? Does your classification coincide with that of the characters, or do they
perceive the love affair differently? In what ways are the characters in your two stories similar, and in what ways
different?
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