Instructions 
Read T. S. Eliot's "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock," Herman Melville's "Bartleby, The Scrivener," and John Cheever's "The Swimmer."

Write a short 3-5 page essay interpreting one of the three characters--Prufrock, Bartleby, or Neddy Merrill--as an "anti" or "ironic" hero.

Structure of the Essay
The paper should be organized as a traditional thesis-support essay. The thesis should make a claim about the element you select from the list above. Here's an example:  Bartleby rejects the conventional attributes of the hero in his embrace of annihilation.

This thesis anticipates a definition and characterization of the hero concept (identifying the type of hero he most clearly seems to reject). Then, citing specific passages reflecting his nihilism, build your description of Bartleby as an "anti-hero." 

Content of the Essay 
Assuming the familiarity of the reader with the story, the essay should avoid a summary of the narrative line and focus on supporting the thesis. Use short quotations worked into the text of your own analytical sentences to provide support for the paragraphs. This is not a research paper and should reflect only your reflections supported by references to specific passages in the play. Each topic sentence should be a claim that adds support to your thesis. 

Format of the Essay 
Key-in the essay into the computer and save it to your floppy disks. Each line should be double- spaced with only a single double space between each paragraph. Block only those quotations longer than four lines of your text. 

Criteria for Grading
Your paper will be graded according to the following standards: 

1) Development - Does the essay satisfactorily develop the thesis and meet the minimum page requirement? 
2) Organization - Does the essay reflect the thesis-support format? 
3) Use of Source - Does the essay make use of important supporting passages in the short story? Are all references to the store correctly documented? 
4) Style - Does the essay reflect diction and syntax appropriate to a literary analysis? 
5) Correctness - Does the essay reflect mastery of basic writing conventions (spelling, punctuation, grammar, usage)? 

For further information, see "Standards for Writing and Evaluating Literary Essays."

Format of the Essay 
The essay should be three to four pages long, making use of short quotations from the literature in support of your observations.  Key-in the essay into the computer and save it to your floppy disks. Each line should be double- spaced with only a single double space between each paragraph. Block only those quotations longer than four lines of your text.

Criteria for Grading
Your paper will be graded according to the following standards:

1) Development - Does the essay satisfactorily develop the thesis and meet the minimum page requirement? 
2) Organization - Does the essay reflect the thesis-support format? 
3) Use of Source - Does the essay make use of important supporting passages in the short story? Are all references to the store correctly documented?
4) Style - Does the essay reflect diction and syntax appropriate to a literary analysis? 
5) Correctness - Does the essay reflect mastery of basic writing conventions (spelling, punctuation, grammar, usage)?

Sample Essay
You will find in this site a sample essay to give you a better idea about how to organize and develop your paper. Click here to go to the sample essay.

Submission Assignments
In addition to regular mail delivery, distance-learning students may e-mail papers as Word or WordPerfect attached files to Dr. Grimes at ggrimes@dcccd.edu.

Submission Assignments through Regular Mail
Mail papers to:

Submitting Essays as E-Mail Attachments
It is absolutely essential to the security of your work that you follow exactly these guidelines:

1) Heading on Assignments
Place a heading on the first page of your essay in the upper left-hand corner.  The heading must include the following information:

First Name-Middle Initial-Last Name
DCCCD Student ID Number
Course-Course Number-Section Number
Month-Date-Year
Name of Assignment

Example:

John R. Pointer
ID 5555555
English 2326: 9543
February 20, 2001
Exercise 3

2) File Name
Save your file exactly according to this model:

JPointer-Ex3

3) Sending Me E-mail Messages
You must include your name and identify your message type in the subject line of each e-mail you send me.  For security reasons, if you fail to do so, I will delete your message without responding.

In the subject line, include your name and exercise number just as you saved your file above.
Example:

JPointer-Ex3

If you are sending me a message that needs immediate attention, then include one of the following formats in the subject line:

JPointer-Question
JPointer-Comment
JPointer-Urgent

Responding to Your E-mails
I always respond to your messages.  However, I always open "Question," "Comment," and "Urgent"  messages first and respond to them usually on the day I receive them. 

I will respond to your assignment messages within a day or two to let you know that I have received your work and files and whether or not I can open them.  To grade them, I open assignment messages in the order in which I received them.

Length of Time Required to Grade Your Work
It usually takes me from one to two weeks to grade essay-length papers and to return them.  Shorter papers I can grade much quicker.  I will return them as e-mail attachments to my response messages.

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This page was last modified on September 5, 2003,
and is maintained by Dr. Geoffrey Grimes.
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