New African by Andrea Lee and Autobiographical Notes by James Baldwin or outside work.

In this essay you'll write your own statement about the value of a work of literature and then provide reasons why your evaluation is correct and evidence to support those reasons.

On one level this essay is about your opinion -- you set the criteria by which the work is judged -- but it is also about thinking clearly and supporting your ideas with evidence. If you'd like to sneak a look at this exercise before you start the prewriting, it's on pages 1181-1184 in your textbook.

Before you begin the reading for this section, make a list of stories, books, poems, or plays that have moved you. Some of your entries may have moved you because they seemed so wonderful and some because they seemed so downright awful. Either kind is a good candidate for...
[ View Full Essay]