Essay Instructions: Previous writer?s Username: johnfitz44
Assignment:
Your Composition paper Assignment:
1) Write outline for this Composition paper too. This paper must be two (2) pages long (double spaced). The paper will be assessed based on content, organization and grammar.
2) Instructor?s instruction:
You will write your First Composition paper on Edgar Allan Poe.
EasyTown; I favor theme and setting of "The Tell-Tale Heart".
We may choose one of the following topics:
1. You could write about the Gothic setting in the story. Please, consult my lecture notes.
2. You could write about the Gothic theme in the story.
**** EasyTown; See Notes Gothic setting, Gothic Theme at end of document ****.
Write your paper on the Character of Poe's narrator. It could be insanity, it could be the issue of sanity versus insanity, and so the discrepancy in the character. Write on any major aspect of the character that intrigues you most. A few tips. I am positive all of you know what a thesis statement is. But let me refresh your memory about it.
The thesis statement occurs within the opening two paragraphs of your paper and it must state the main theme of your paper, or in other words the gist or essence of your paper.
You appeal to your audience first through your Thesis Statement. It is the most crucial part of your paper. For example, you are writing your paper about the discrepancy in the character of the narrator.
If that is your main topic you could start addressing it directly in the first two opening paragraphs of your paper. You could also start with your own view or perception about it.
You will see throughout the term, I will emphasize a great deal on developing your own original thought. You could also start disagreeing with any critic ( I would like to refer to Ken Friden's article "Poe's Narrative Monologue"--the major part of it in my lecture notes).
Body paragraphs:
I am positive you know about body paragraphs. But, let me refresh your memory about it. Body paragraphs are as essential parts of your paper as the Thesis statement is. In the body paragraphs you develop your central idea or theme which you have already introduced in your thesis. You could do it in a various ways. For example, if you have introduced to your audience that discrepancy of the narrator's character in the "Tell-Tale Heart" as the main topic of your paper, then the role of your body paragraphs will be to elaborate that by examples from the story. If you are using any critic, then you can use the opinion of the critic to substantiate your argument. You also have to make sure that all the body paragraphs are connected to your main argument in the thesis statement.
Conclusion:
Conclusion is the part of your paper in which you nicely and stylistically bring your paper to an end. Sometimes you repeat your thesis statement in a different way--the whole idea is to rehash the entire paper. You conclude about the discrepancy of the narrator's character--you could end with a comment of your own that supports your entire paper.
Other Topics:
Some of you expressed interest in the theme and setting of "The Tell-Tale Heart". You could choose one of the following topics:
1. You could write about the Gothic setting in the story. Please, consult my lecture notes.
2. You could write about the Gothic theme in the story.
Notes:
It is interesting and quite significant to notice what B. L. St. Armand has said in relation to the Gothic genre in his article, "The 'Mysteries' of Edgar Poe: The quest for a Monomyh in Gothic Literature",
In exploring the mysteries of Gothic taste, it is easy for the critic to forget that the whole genre was, first and foremost, a fashion, a style, and a mode of interior decoration. That the particular interior being redecorated was human consciousness itself is ancillary to the nature of Gothic as primarily an aesthetic revival which somehow managed to provide Romanticism with its first full set of swaddling clothes.
The Gothic movement in literature must be understood in conjunction with Romantic movement in literature. The early nineteenth century movement in Romantic literature which started as a reaction to the classical age of eighteenth century literature which is associated with reason and classical rigour gave birth to the Romantic movement in literature. The Gothic movement in literature could be considered as an off-shoot of the Romantic movement in literature, in Armand's words, "the extreme left wing or avant-garde of Romanticism, with a curious organic vitality seemingly built into it" (26). Thus, if Gothicism is considered as a left-wing or avant-garde of Romanticism, or as the quote above suggests as an aesthetic revival in order to put some kind of control on Romanticism, it is important to consider the traits of Romanticism.
Romanticism or Romantic movement is predominantly pre-occupied with Imagination,-- an escape from the world of reality/pain to a fantasy world with no pain and imperfection. Let us consider a stanza from the Romantic poet Keat's "Ode To a Nightingale":
Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget
What thou among the leaves hast never known,
The weariness, the fever, and the fret
Here, where men sit and hear each other groan;
Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gray hairs,
Where youth grows pale, and specter -thin, and dies,
Where but to think is to be full of sorrow
And leaden-eyed despairs,
Where Beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes,
Or new Love pine at them beyond tomorrow. (Literature 717)
The focus is here on the escape--notice the expressions in the first line, "fade far away", "dissolve" and "quite forget" --an invocation to escape the mundane world which is full of pain and suffering. The name of the poem is, "Ode to a Nightingale" and the song of the nightingale is the object of nature which helps the poet to transcend the world of pain. Thus, transcending pain through nature, via natural objects and thus escaping to the world of beauty is the major preoccupation of the Romantic movement and especially Romantic poets. As Gothic movement occurred in the literary world almost concurrently, Gothicism also puts a great deal of emphasis on escape but not via contemplation on positive aspect of nature like "nightingale's song", but rather contemplating on a broken castle, or an antiquarian element etc.. Let me quote a passage from the famous Gothic novelist Mrs. Radcliffe's novel, The Mysteries of Udalpho:
Emily gazed with melancholy awe upon the castle, which she understood to be Montoni's; for though it was now lighted up by the setting sun, the gothic greatness of its features, and its mouldering walls of dark grey stone, rendered it a gloomy and sublime object. As she gazed, the light died away on its walls, leaving a melancholy purple tint, which spread deeper and deeper, as the thin vapour crept up the mountain, while the battlements above were still tipped with splendour. From these, too the rays soon faded, and the whole edifice was invested with the solemn duskiness of evening. Silent, lonely and sublime, it seemed to stand the sovreign of the scene, and to frown defiance upon all, who dared to invade its solitary reign. As the twilight deepened, its features became more awful in obscurity, and Emily continued to gaze, till its clustering were alone seen, rising over the tops of the woods, beneath whose thick shade the carriages soon after began to ascend.
The Mysteries of Udalpho , although a Gothic novel, Mrs. Radcliffe here pursued some of the quest of the romantic poets. For example in the description of the Gothic castle you could see the use of the word "sublime" along with the words grey stone" "gloomy" etc.. Again, notice the expressions which describe the castle, "Silent, lonely and sublime"--there is a constant reference to the word "sublime." One of the critics mentions, "What Mrs. Radcliffe has done ...is to make the momentous connection between the life of nature and the life of the mind which made Romanticism itself into a true revolution of the human consciousness" ("The Mysteries of Edgar Poe" 28). But, it still falls under the category of the Gothic genre.
If one compares Poe's stories with The Mysteries of Udalpho, one could see the Gothic excess and the bizarre elements present in a greater scale in Poe's short stories. Robert l. Carringer comments:
Characteristically Poe's protagonists exhibit a morbid preoccupation with various forms of physical disintegration (especially decay and putrefaction), and Poe has an almost clinical regard for the representation of mental excitement, especially those forms of terror that are aroused by the prospect of death or derangement for his narrators. His disintegration processes of his own psyche." (18)
Previous writer?s Username: johnfitz44
