Writing About Literature, Brief Edition, 11th edition
Published by Pearson (August 11, 2005) © 2006
- Edgar V. Roberts Lehman College, The City University of New York
- Hardcover, paperback or looseleaf edition
- Affordable rental option for select titles
- Free shipping on looseleafs and traditional textbooks
Appropriate for any college course or advanced placement course that emphasizes writing about literature.
Message: Writing about Literature serves as a hands-on guide for writing about literature, thus justifying the integration of literature and composition. The reading of literature encourages students to think, and the use of literary topics gives instructors a viable way to combine writing and literary study.
Story: When Ed Roberts first wrote Writing about Literature many years ago, he was responding to a direct need in his classroom. He realized that there was a direct connection between the way he made his assignments and the quality of student work he received. The more he described to his students what he wanted, and the longer he explained things, the better the final essays turned out to be. That’s when he started to write and hand out directions, thus saving him valuable classroom time. He tried and tested each assignment in a number of separate classes, and he has made innumerable changes and improvements based on both student questions and student writing. To this day, each new edition is revised and tweaked based on professors’ needs.
Is writing the primary objective in this course?
- Chapters are set up as essay assignments that are relevant to all genres. Each chapter contains discussion of a literary approach, suggestions for writing, together with an illustrative essay or essays showing how students might deal with the approach.
- Detailed writing instruction produces better student papers.
-
- Fulfills the requirement for composition.
- Meets the need of students to develop writing skills based on written texts and enables English faculty to teach literature while meeting their responsibility to teach writing skills.
-
- Illustrative essays represent a full treatment of each of the various topics and are kept within the approximate lengths of most assignments in undergraduate courses.
- Provide students with suggestions and guidance for thematic development.
-
Is flexibility in teaching your course important to you?
- Chapters are designed to be flexible and can be assigned according to your objectives and needs. The chapters are arranged in order of increasing difficulty, but no matter how the chapters are used, the two parts-discussion and illustration-enable students to improve their skills as readers and writers.
- Allows faculty to teach their course however they’d like.
-
- Appendix C is an anthology. Selections new to the 11th edition are Coleman's "Unfinished Masterpieces," Twain's "Luck," Brooks's "We Real Cool," Browning's "My Last Duchess," Browning's "Porphyria's Lover," Frost's "The Road Not Taken," Hughes's "Theme for English B," and Salinas's "In a Farmhouse."
- The works in the anthology can be mixed and matched to accompany the writing assignments.
-
Are your students new to the study of literature? What other tools does this book have to acquaint these students with literature?
- NEW Chapter on close reading- A preliminary technique for all students just beginning the actual study of literature.
- Appendix A contains brief descriptions of important critical approaches such as New Criticism, structuralism, feminism, deconstructionism, and reader-response criticism.
- A glossary helps students acquaint themselves with important literary terms and concepts.
- Invaluable in preparing for students preparing for entrance exams and the GRE.
-
- Chapter 1, “Preliminary: The Process of Reading, Responding to, and Writing about Literature,” has been revised.
- Addition of drawings will prove helpful to students beginning to write about literature on a serious level.
- Chapter 9, “Writing about a Work in its Historical, Intellectual and Cultural Context” restored and rewritten.
- Fully reflects the increasing pluralization of our society
- New chapter on close reading (Chapter 2)
- A preliminary technique for all students just beginning the actual study of literature.
- Chapters 2 through 7 reorganized.
- These six chapters, all of which are suitable for fiction and three of which are suitable for drama, are now arranged in the order of close reading, character, point of view, plot and structure, setting and idea or theme.
To the Instructor
Chapter 1 Preliminary: The Process of Reading, Responding to, and Writing About Literature
What Is Literature, and Why Do We Study It?
Types of Literature: The Genres
Reading Literature and Responding to It Actively
GUY DE MAUPASSANT, The Necklace
Reading and Responding in a Notebook or Computer File
Writing Essays on Literary Topics
The Goal of Writing: To Show a Process of Thought
Three Major Stages in Thinking and Writing: Discovering Ideas, Making Initial Drafts, and Completing the Essay
Discovering Ideas (“Brainstorming”)
Assembling Materials and Beginning to Write
Drafting Your Essay
Writing a First Draft
Developing an Outline
The Use of References and Quotations in Writing About Literature
Illustrative Essay (First Draft): How Setting in “The Necklace” Is Related to the Character of Mathilde
Developing and Strengthening Your Essay Through Revision
Checking Development and Organization
Using Exact, Comprehensive, and Forceful Language
Illustrative Essay (Revised Draft): How Maupassant Uses Setting in “The Necklace” to Show the Character of Mathilde
Commentary on the Essay
Essay Commentaries
Special Topics for Studying and Discussing the Writing Process
Chapter 2 Writing About a Close Reading: Analyzing Entire Short Poems or Selected Short Passages from Fiction, Longer Poems, and Plays
The Purpose and Requirements of a Close-Reading Essay
The Location of the Passage in a Longer Work
Writing About the Close Reading of a Passage in a Prose Work, Drama, or Longer Poem
Illustrative Essay: Reading a Passage in Mark Twain’s“Luck”
Commentary on the Essay
Writing an Essay on the Close Reading of a Poem
Illustrative Essay: A Close Reading of Thomas Hardy’s “The Man He Killed”
Commentary on the Essay
Special Topics for Studying and Discussing the Close Reading of Literary Works
Chapter 3 Writing About Character: The People inLiterature
Character Traits
How Authors Disclose Character in Literature
Types of Characters: Round and Flat
Reality and Probability: Verisimilitude
Writing About Character
Illustrative Essay: The Character of Minnie Wright in Susan Glaspell’s Trifles
Commentary on the Essay
Special Topics for Studying and Discussing Character
Chapter 4 Writing About Point of View: The Position or Stance of the Work’s Narrator or Speaker
An Exercise in Point of View: Reporting an Accident
Conditions That Affect Point of View
Determining a Work’s Point of View
Mingling Points of View
Summary: Guidelines for Point of View
Writing About Point of View
Illustrative Essay: Bierce’s Control of Point of View in “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge”
Commentary on the Essay
Special Topics for Studying and Discussing Point of View
Chapter 5 Writing About Plot and Structure: The Development and Organization of Narrativesand Drama
Plot: The Motivation and Causation of Narratives and Plays
Writing About the Plot of a Story or Play
Illustrative Essay (on Plot): Conflicting Values in Thomas Hardy’s “The Three Strangers”
Commentary on the Essay
Structure: The Organization of Fiction, Poetry, and Drama
Formal Categories of Structure
Formal and Actual Structure
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, Sonnet 73: That Time of Year Thou Mayst in Me Behold
Writing About Structure in Fiction, Poetry, and Drama
Illustrative Essay (on Structure): Conflict and Suspense in Thomas Hardy’s“The Three Strangers”
Commentary on the Essay
Special Topics for Studying and Discussing Plot and Structure
Chapter 6 Writing About Setting: The Background of Place, Objects, and Culture in Literature
What Is Setting?
The Importance of Setting in Literature
Writing About Setting
Illustrative Essay: Poe’s Use of Interior Setting to Augment the Eeriness of“The Masque of the Red Death”
Commentary on the Essay
Special Topics for Studying and Discussing Setting
Chapter 7 Writing About an Idea or a Theme: The Meanings and the Messages in Literature
Ideas and Assertions
Ideas and Values
The Place of Ideas in Literature
How to Find Ideas
Writing About a Major Idea in Literature
Illustrative Essay: The Idea of Love’s Power in Chekhov’s The Bear
Commentary on the Essay
Special Topics for Studying and Discussing Ideas
Chapter 8 Writing About Symbolism and Allegory: Keys to Extended Meaning
Symbolism
Allegory
Fable, Parable, and Myth
Allusion in Symbolism and Allegory
Writing About Symbolism and Allegory
Illustrative Essay: Symbolism in William Butler Yeats’s “The Second Coming”
Commentary on the Essay
Illustrative Essay: The Allegory of Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown”
Commentary on the Essay
Special Topics for Studying and Discussing Symbolism and Allegory
Chapter 9 Writing About a Work in Its Historical, Intellectual, and Cultural Context
History, Culture, and Multiculturalism
Literature in Its Time and Place
Writing About a Work in Its Historical and Cultural Context
Illustrative Essay: Hughes’s References to Black Servitude and Black Pride in “Negro”
Commentary on the Essay
Special Topics for Studying and Discussing Works in Their Historical, Intellectual, and Cultural Context
Chapter 10 Writing Essays of Comparison-Contrast and Extended Comparison-Contrast: Learning by Seeing Literary Works Together
Guidelines for the Comparison-Contrast Method
The Extended Comparison-Contrast Essay
Writing a Comparison-Contrast Essay
Illustrative Essay (Comparing and Contrasting Two Works): The Implication of “Westward” in Wordsworth’s “Stepping Westward” and Donne’s“Good Friday, 1613, Riding Westward”
Commentary on the Essay
Illustrative Essay (Extended Comparison-Contrast): Literary Treatments of Conflicts Between Private and Public Life
Commentary on the Essay
Special Topics for Studying and Discussing Comparison and Contrast
Appendix A Writing Examinations on Literature
Appendix B Critical Approaches Important in the Study of Literature
Appendix C MLA Recommendations for Documenting Electronic Sources
Appendix D Works Used for References and Illustrative Essays
Stories
AMBROSE BIERCE, An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge
KATE CHOPIN, The Story of an Hour
ANITA SCOTT COLEMAN, Unfinished Masterpieces
THOMAS HARDY, The Three Strangers
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE, Young Goodman Brown
KATHERINE MANSFIELD, Miss Brill
GUY DE MAUPASSANT, The Necklace [in Chapter 1]
FRANK O’CONNOR, First Confession
EDGAR ALLAN POE, The Masque of the Red Death
MARK TWAIN, Luck
Poems
MATTHEW ARNOLD, Dover Beach
WILLIAM BLAKE, The Tyger
ROBERT BROWNING, My Last Duchess
JOHN DONNE, Good Friday, Riding Westward
ROBERT FROST, Desert Places
ROBERT FROST, The Road Not Taken
THOMAS HARDY, Channel Firing
THOMAS HARDY, The Man He Killed
LANGSTON HUGHES, Negro
JOHN KEATS, Bright Star
IRVING LAYTON, Rhine Boat Trip
AMY LOWELL, Patterns
WILFRED OWEN, Anthem for Doomed Youth
DUDLEY RANDALL, Ballad of Birmingham
CHRISTINA ROSSETTI, Echo
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, Sonnet 30: When to the Sessions of Sweet Silent Thought
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, Sonnet 73: That Time of Year Thou Mayst in Me Behold [in Chapter 5]
SHELLYWAGNER, The Boxes
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH, Stepping Westward
WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS, The Second Coming
Plays
ANTON CHEKHOV, The Bear
SUSAN GLASPELL, Trifles
A Glossary of Important Literary Terms
Acknowledgments
Index of Authors and Titles, Topics, Directors, Producers, and Chapter Titles
Need help? Get in touch
Play
Pearson eTextbook: What’s on the inside just might surprise you
They say you can’t judge a book by its cover. It’s the same with your students. Meet each one right where they are with an engaging, interactive, personalized learning experience that goes beyond the textbook to fit any schedule, any budget, and any lifestyle.
Digital Learning NOW
Extend your professional development and meet your students where they are with free weekly Digital Learning NOW webinars. Attend live, watch on-demand, or listen at your leisure to expand your teaching strategies. Earn digital professional development badges for attending a live session.