Select one of the literary works on the reading list for this course.
Write a 1,400- to 1,750-word essay in which you analyze how it uses literary elements and figurative language to communicate its meaning.
To complete this final synthesizing essay, select one work from those assigned for the course and perform the following:
- Read it carefully, and reread it, paying particular attention to literary elements and figurative language.
- Analyze how your chosen work uses literary elements and figurative language. As you do so, pay attention to any patterns used to unite and/or organize these choices. (For example, are all the metaphors drawn from nature? Or is it more complicated, with one set of metaphors drawn from nature and one from a specific religion’s tradition?)
- Research your chosen author, to provide context for your analysis.
- Evaluate your chosen work for meaning or multiple meanings. These meanings might be biographical to the author, historical, philosophical, or fall into some other category. Meanings can be literal or symbolic, or both literal and symbolic at the same time. Some works have one fairly unified meaning; some have multiple meanings. You’ll want to identify all major meanings and how they relate to one another.
- Explain how the work uses literary elements and figurative language to shape and contribute to the meaning. If the literary elements and the figurative language clash at any points, you’ll want to identify those points, and explain the effect of the clash. If the literary elements and figurative language communicate one meaning, but the denotative content of the work communicate a different meaning, you’ll want to identify these points and explain their effect.
If the literary elements and figurative language used in your chosen work are part of a specific genre, tradition, or larger context, make sure you identify these elements and explain their effects. (For example, a sonnet follows a specific rhyme scheme. If you’re analyzing a sonnet, you’d show the effects of the specific rhymes in your chosen poem, but you’d also explain that this is a standard structure for the sonnet, following models established by Shakespeare. If your chosen poet wrote 17 poems using flower imagery, and this is the 17th of those poems, indicate how this affects the meaning, power, or impact of the poem.)
ENG270 Literary Interpretation and Analysis
- Films Media Group (1981). Givers of Truth (02:49) From Title: One Word of Truth, na.
- Films Media Group (2008). Literature’s Value (01:05) From Title: Alaa Al-Aswany, na.
- Films Media Group (2011). Stylistic Techniques (02:42) From Title: Elements of Narratives, na.
- Films Media Group (1981). Value of Art and Literature (03:09) From Title: One Word of Truth, na.
Support your analysis with at least three academic sources from the University Library. These are in addition to citing the textbooks as sources.