Choose two works by two different writers and write 1200-1500-word a comparative essay.

Topic: Edgar Allan Poe, “The Fall of the House of Usher” and Nathaniel Hawthorne, “Young Goodman Brown”

Paper details:

Paper #3: Comparative Analysis

Choose two works by two different writers and write 1200-1500-word a comparative essay. In your essay, you might choose one particular element that connects the two works, for example, a theme, type of character, image, stylistic device, or other idea. Explore how the two texts connect, keeping in mind that you should go beyond merely describing similarities and differences.

Try to show how reading the two works alongside one another helps to illuminate both works and create a deeper understanding. This essay will depend on your choosing an interesting approach.

Your essay must engage with at least one work from after the due date of Paper #2. The other work may be from earlier in the semester, if you choose.

Different Genres. Choose works from two different genres that seem to engage in conversation about similar or overlapping ideas, issues, problems, or concerns.How does the genre affect your reading of the work?

Do the particular features or conventions of that genre contribute to the ways in which the writer engages that issue or idea? Make sure to draw a broad conclusion about the significance of the claims you are making.

Different Perspectives.

Choose any two works that, side by side, present different perspectives on a similar issue or theme. Attempt to discover how reading one text may illuminate, complicate, challenge, or enrich your reading of the other.

How do the two texts work together to lead to a deeper understanding of that idea? Make sure to draw a broad conclusion about the significance of the claims you are making.

Stylistic or Formal Connections. Choose any two works that you feel represent interesting stylistic or formal choices on the part of their authors. For example, you might look at the use of metaphor in Wheatley and Dickinson, plot structure in Rowlandson and Jacobs, or syntax in Douglass and Winthrop.

How do the writers’ choices shape the stories they tell? How does style/form/technique affect your reading and interpretation of the texts?

Make sure to draw a broad conclusion about the significance of the claims you are making.

Specific Requirements:
1. This must be an argumentative essay with a controversial thesis: a reasonable reader should be
able to disagree with your interpretation of the texts.

Your essay’s thesis must go beyond observation; it must go beyond a listing of similarities and

An observational or descriptive (not argumentative) thesis will not be able to earn full credit. In creating an argumentative essay with a controversial thesis, it is important to know the difference between observation and argument.

Move beyond observations and toward a unique, interesting assertion.

Make your keen observations, then tell readers why those observations are meaningful.

Your essay must be based on close reading. Try to practice the close reading techniques you honed in the previous papers. Your role here is not to summarize the texts but to analyze and interpret them; thus, you must work closely with the texts themselves, including properly citedtextual evidence in the MLA documentation format.

Outside sources will not usually be necessary. Dictionaries and background information from the anthology are always acceptable to use.

Any ideas from outside sources, whether quoted, summarized, or paraphrased, must be cited appropriately. If you are bringing in outside sources discuss it with me beforehand.

Format: Your essay should follow MLA format: 12-point Times New Roman; one-inch margins on all sides; double-spaced.

Name, date and section number in the upper left of the first page. Remember to title your essay and number the pages. You must include a Works Cited page

You should turn in your paper electronically through Canvas by 11:59 PM on the due date. The Works Cited page does not count toward the final word count.

Each assignment that you turn in must be an analysis of a work we have read in the weeks since the last assignment you turned in. You cannot wricgote on the same work more than once for credit.

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