Final Paper
CompLit 210
NATION AND NARRATION
W. Nericcio | Cynthia Luna

You have an essay due--it is to be delivered to my hand (or to Cynthia Luna's hand) in class, the last day we meet, May 6, 2008 at 3:30pm in Hepner Hall 210. No LATE PAPERS WILL BE ACCEPTED so make sure you come to class. While early papers will be accepted (you can, for instance, bring your paper with you and turn it in to me in class on April 29, 2008), late papers will not.  

Here are the logistical details:

1. Write well. Proofread your work, prepare a rough draft, and have someone with a brain that you know pre-read it for you before handing it to Cynthia and myself. 

2. Have a title that truly represents what you are going to argue! "Psychology in DEATH IN VENICE" just does not move a reader that same way this title does: "Child-Loving Sex Maniac Writer or Existential Hero: The Sordid Mysteries of DEATH IN VENICE."

3. Write unto others as you would have them write unto you; have a friend read one of your paragraphs back to you--if it sounds dull, it probably is dull.

4. Your paper should be anywhere from four (4) to seven (7) pages long; those of you taking this class for upper-division credit should author an eight (12) to twelve (15) page critical opus. 

5. Your essay MUST incorporate materials from TWO scholarly essays that directly relate to your chosen objects/topics of focus.  Please note the term scholarly! If it is not from an essay off of JSTOR, PROJECT MUSE, or from a book on the shelves in Love Library, it probably has not come from a scholarly journal; some noted journals full of useful stuff: PMLA, Critical Inquiry, American Literature, Comparative Literature, Diacritics, The South Atlantic Quarterly, Modern Language Notes, and World Literature Today. Newspapers, Time Magazine, and Newsweek are NOT scholarly sources, nor are high school essays posted on the internet.
5. CITE ALL SOURCES using the MLA stylesheet!

6. DON'T PLAGIARIZE. 

7. NOT CITING SOURCES = PLAGIARISM

8. Write as if you care about your ideas.  This is not an "essay" assignment, per se; it is an ANALYTICAL IMAGINATION CHALLENGE.

Here are your choices:

1. DEVISE YOUR OWN THESIS

Take two works we have read this semester and devise a unique independent study that combines them in an intellectually provocative fashion--you MUST BRING a two-paragraph proposal for this cool piece of independent scholarship to me in class TUESDAY April 22, 2008 so that I can go over it and greenlight it quickly.

2. DUELING POETS

Contrast the approach to poetry evident in the examples and the performances of Professor Ilya Kaminsky and Professor Josesph Thomas earlier in the semester.

3. GENIUS IN CONTRAST

How do Thomas Mann and James Joyce compare as writers? Do they share obsessions? Aesthetic tendencies? etc. Use four to seven pages to walk your reader through a comparative analysis of Mann and Joyce's art of fiction.

4. ETHNIC STUDIES

How do the peculiarities of race in America found in the pages of Twain's PUDD'NHEAD WILSON relate to those to be found in the memoir of Olaudah Equiano. Does a comparative literary approach to these texts reveal more than say a historical or political science approach might?

5. SUDDEN FICTION AND POETRY

Is there a way of creating common ground between Tino Villanueva's poetry (SCENE FROM THE MOVIE GIANT) and the sudden fiction examples assembled for our class by Dr. Stephen-Paul Martin.

6. DU BOIS, SHERMAN ALEXIE AND THE PSYCHE

Contrast the psychology of WEB Du Bois and Sherman Alexie as they are revealed in their various writing projects.

7 BIOGRAPHY AND LITERATURE

Do careful biographical research on Fyodor Dostoyevsky and Erna Brodber as you tie the life of the author to their works in the case of NOTES FROM UNDERGROUND and MYAL.

8.LITERATURE AND THE SISTER ARTS

Research and locate a version of the Faustus myth in literature, film, or theater. Contrast this work/version with the writing to be found in Christopher Marlowe's play.