ENGL 102.022/.025
Spring 2006
-- Essay # 3 (Poetry) Assignment --

Dr. Nick Melczarek | anmelczarek@salisbury.edu | 410-546-6203 (66203)
Pick a topic from the list below and write a 1,500-word essay on that topic. Follow MLA-style formatting as you learned in ENGL 101 and as shown in the Writer's Resource, pp.230-42. Keep margins at 1" all around, use 12-point font (either Palatino or Times), and double-space. Type on only one side of each sheet. You do not need a cover sheet; at the top right of the first page use a single-spaced header including
Your Name
ENGL 102, Section#
Essay 3 Poetry (which draft)
Submission date

Example:
Nick Melczarek
ENGL 102.022
Essay 3 Poetry (first draft)
February 17, 2005

Number all pages except page 1, in the top right-hand corner. You do not need a works cited page. Also give your paper a title that gives readers a clue of what your paper is about -- do not simply use "Theme for English B" or "The Ache of Marriage" as your title, because those are already the titles of the poems. Centre your title on the first page on the line after your header, and begin your essay on the next line -- no big extra spaces. Staple your paper before you turn it in; papers not stapled will not be read.
TURN IN YOUR ESSAY ON TIME TO MY OFFICE (Holloway 344). PAPERS THAT DO NOT ADHERE TO THESE GUIDELINES WILL BE RETURNED UNREAD AND COUNTED LATE. PROOFREAD YOUR PAPER FOR BASIC ERRORS BEFORE YOU TURN IT IN. EXCESSIVE UNNECESSARY WRITING ERRORS WILL CAUSE A PAPER TO BE RETURNED TO YOU UNREAD.

Be sure to use literary terms that apply to your discussion (e.g. protagonist instead of main character, etc.) and use them in such a way that shows you understand the term. Be sure to quote and cite the poems to illustrate and support your argument, in MLA parenthetical format. No bloc quotations, though. Avoid plot summary as well; papers that contain mostly plot summary will be returned unread.

TOPICS:

Topic 1: How does any one of the poems use any one of the following dramatic elements?

  • motif
  • ambivalence or ambiguity
  • allusion
  • connotation (See Bedford Glossary and the anthology for help with these terms.)

    Topic 2: How does any one or two of the poems force our reading from the literal to the figurative whether we want to or not?
    -- variation - How does any one or two of the poems guide us toward an abstract concept through depicting a physical event or phenomenon?

    Topic 3: How does any one or two poems use spatial-temporal impossibility in their work, and to what effect? (In other words, what use does any one or two poems make of violating the laws of space and time, and to what effect?)

    Topic 4: Explore how any one or two poems create an argument (how the poem(s) offers two or more sides to an argument about a concept).

    Topic 5: Explore the theme of different or parallel versions in any one or two poets. (Where the poem relies on two different senses of the same idea - not exactly double entendre, but where we get two different attitudes or senses of the same concept.)

    Topic 6: Pick a theme from either of the in-class note sheets, and show how any one poem presents that theme.

    • FIRST DRAFT DUE FRIDAY MAY 5, TO MY OFFICE BY 4 P.M.

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