Compare and contrast essay on Toni Morrison’s novel Beloved.

Learning Objectives:
 Engage in close, critical reading of literary texts and incorporate outside research
 Analyze and explore how the fundamental literary devices create meanings in text, creating intersections and overlapping interpretations and meanings
 Compare/Contrast the contribution of the genres of the poetic, prose, graphic/visual texts, and film; and how they work to create larger meaning in multiple texts
 Produce thesis-driven, coherently organized, evidence-based, academic analyses of multi-modal mediums of literature
Prompt:
For this paper, you will need to expand and go beyond the close-reading skills from your first paper and employ more complex analytic thinking and writing skills. You will compare and contrast the following items:

 Chose two different pieces from our class-assigned readings
 Ask yourself how the two pieces are tied together thematically, symbolically, metaphorically, etc.; tie in cultural, historical, social, and/or political similarities and/or differences you recognize when addressing the African American experience in America
 In your comparison between the two pieces you must consider how genre and medium grapple with at least two of the following issues: race, gender, sexuality, class, freedom/liberty, and ideas of “home.”
 Address how each piece impacts the messaging to the audience reception and interpretation (then and now)—and how when they are brought together they enhance the overall messaging and reader interpretation.
 Discuss how these differences/ similarities build up (or diminish) the importance of the overall meaning and application to socio-cultural ideologies of today.

Employing close reading as a building block for your comparative/ contrasting argument, you should focus your analysis on a small section (a few lines, couplet, or stanza of each poem or a couple of scenes from the film). Your analysis should include one or more of the particular poetic and literary elements that we have discussed (such as narrative structure, point of view/perspective, personification, imagery, symbolism, alliteration, metaphor, heteroglossia, form, etc.).
Process:
 Pick two pieces of work that interest you for this paper.
 Define each one’s genre; Be able to say: “This is a paper that brings together the genre of poetry and prose…and in doing so…” or “This is a paper that considers two novels…and as such…”
 To begin your analysis, isolate a specific shared theme developed in each poem/film (nature, slavery, color, poverty, labor and the workforce, motherhood, new ideas of self-identity, race, class, gender, etc.) Just pick one or two to maintain your focus and scope in this paper.
 Re-examine the pieces to find evidence (close reading) and make note of evidence as something that supports or contrasts the development of this theme.
o How is the treatment of your theme similar or different in the two pieces?
o How does each piece develop its treatment of the theme?
o What poetic/literary/visual elements contribute to your interpretation of the theme in each piece?
o What lines/stanzas/scenes seem especially significant to the development of the theme?
o What argument do you think the pieces makes through its development of the theme?
 Select the parts from each poem on which you plan to focus your analysis.
 Determine whether you wish to compare or contrast those lines.
o Are your answers to the above questions about meaning similar or different?
o What are the major points of comparison and/or contrast?
o How do the poetic elements work similarly/differently in each poem?
 Construct a short argumentative essay with a clear, arguable thesis statement that addresses:
1. What major subject do the two works address?
2. This is the theme (construct an argument to make about the subject)
3. How do poetic elements work to create similar/different statements about the subject/ theme?
o An example of this for two different poems might be:
 The speakers in Allen Ginsberg’s and Maya Angelou’s “America” poems both use personification to address issues of social justice in America. Both poems demonstrate the speaker’s disillusionment with the American Dream by suggesting that America has failed to live up to “her” promises.
 The body of your essay should include textual evidence to support each of your major points and a close, critical analysis of the lines you’ve selected that best illustrate your claim.
Requirements:
 MLA 8 formatting guidelines (1” Margins, 12 pt. Times New Roman font, heading/page number, double spaced, etc.), 4-6 pages in length
 At least 3 secondary sources; Works Cited page; use parenthetical (in-text) citations when quoting from the text
 Grammatically correct standard written English