09 Feb 2009 [ Prev | Next ]

Ex 1: Close Reading Group Exercise

(Originally listed as due on Feb 6, but I've changed it to the 9th.)

Groups of four
Choose a text (1-2 pages of prose from the 2nd half of The Great Gatsby)
Read (and re-read, paying close attention to the actual words)
Identify a theme (gender, nature, race, power, love, forgiveness, time, etc.)
Search your chosen passage for additional or closely related references to that them
Take a stand

Non-obvious
Debatable
About the Work Itself
(not about life in general, human nature in general, your personal opinions about the subject, real people or events that relate loosely to the literary work, or or events that took place during the time the work was written; not about any subject that you could have written about without ever having read the work)

Defend your position. (In class on Feb 2, we will workshop how to do this.)

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