English Essay Assignment
Details
Page requirement: 5 pages-- 12 point font, Times New Roman -- double spaced. Essays that are not a full five pages (not including the Works Cited page) may not be eligible for grading).
Audience:
Imagine you are writing to other college students or professors. Do not assume your readers know the texts you are discussing.
Thinking:
E. B White and Eudora Welty both write about the transformative nature of place in their essays titled "Once More to the Lake" and "The Little Store." They examine how a place can change us even though at first that place may just seem as though it is simply a backdrop to our life. In other words, while we may think a place pays a minor role in our lives, when we look back, that place may in fact play a major role in shaping who we are. For example, White writes, " this was the background, and the life along the shore." Later in the story, White realizes that, in part, the lake was life. As a child,Welty sees the little store as a destination, a place, but later realizes that the store taught her the "facts of life, or death" (159). In fact, both writers come to an epiphany (realization) about the place they describe by the end of their story. Think about other ways these stories are both similar and different.
Notice that I use the present tense when writing about the stories; you should use the present tense in your essay. Since White's text is in a Word file, you do not need to include page numbers when you cite his text, but you should follow all the other rules according to MLA guidelines. I include the citation information for your Works Cited page on the top of White's handout.
Writing:
Write a 5 page essay that analyzes the similarities and differences in " Once More to the Lake" and "The Little Store." The word analysis is extremely important here. Do not retell the stories or simply summarize them. Analyze the similarities and the differences. You might consider the following questions to help generate some thinking about the similarities and differences. You do not need to answer all of these questions; they are designed to help initiate your analysis and can be used as a jumping off point.
• Does traveling or rooting ourselves in place lead White and/or Welty to a better understanding of place?
• How do White and Welty's perspectives of place change throughout their lives?
• In what ways are these authors defined by place? How do the authors' writing styles differ? How are they similar?
• How does each write create a sense of place?
• How do the authors blend the old and the new? The past and the present? The child and adult view?
• How do the epiphanies or realizations at the end of the texts compare?
• What effect does revisiting this place have on each writer?
• What stands out about what each author remembers?
Note:
You should quote from the texts to prove your thesis. See your writing manual for citing instructions. When you use quotes, be sure to analyze them fully. Do not use the first person or "I" voice in this essay. Please include a Works Cited page.