ENG 106 UM The Fish By Lydia Davis Close Reading Essay
Description
Write an essay in which you make a claim, based on a close reading, about one (or possibly two) of the (mostly literary) texts we have read so far this semester. (The texts are: poems by Philip Larkin and W. H. Auden; a short story by Lydia Davis; and the Guardian article nglish Flirting.|/p>
Tuesday February 7: bring draft to class for peer review
Thursday February 16: final version due by email or through Blackboard
What is a close reading?
An analysis of specific, detailed elements of the language, tone, and/or structure of a text.
How do you carry out a close reading?
Read. Closely. Then do it again. Look for individual words, phrases, narrative perspectives, etc. that strike you as unexpected, interesting, puzzling. Then try to work out why they stand out. For example, when the narrator of (e Caterpillarcarries the creature rather than brings it downstairs, what is evoked in that word choice? Why is it important for the poet to note that the ship in Breughelàpainting in Yeatsàpoem is xpensive!nd %licateü/p>
Then look for patterns across the story/poem/text: are words or phrases repeated and/or subtly changed? (For example: % is too small to have any smell e is simply too small, really, for me to go on thinking about him.`Is there a continuous `then B then C and finally D.arrative, or is there a different organization? What is the result of these patterns in the text?
Ask (yourself) a lot of questions. For example, who is the poem/story/essay addressed to? Is there something significant thatàmissing/avoided in the text? Why does the author use this particular word/phrase (and not another one that might have been more expected)? Is this text in a genre/form that I recognize from other texts/stories?
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