For the Midterm Essay you will read and complete a historical analysis of excerpts from three plague diaries of eyewitnesses to the Plague of Athens (Thucydides), Black Death in 17th century England (Samuel Pepys) and Covid-19 in 21st century Wuhan, China (Fang Fang). These diaries will be made available to you.
[Tip: In order to do well on this assignment, you do not need to read every single word, especially of the Pepys diary. Rather, I would suggest skimming to get a sense of scope and then diving deeply into certain sections for a close reading.]
The paper must address the following questions:
Which elements – in terms of narrative story-telling devices and themes – do they have in common? What does each diary contribute to our historical understanding of their respective plague event? What do plague diaries allow us to see that other kinds of historical sources do not?
You should draw on your notes from lectures and readings to provide some context and background for each of these plague events. For citations, please simply list the author’s last name followed by the page number in parentheses (Slack, 102), or if you are quoting a lecture write (Doe, Lecture 9/24/21). No outside sources are required for this paper. If you do elect to use outside sources, please provide a bibliography at the end of your paper. This will not be counted towards your word limit.
Hint on structure: One option would be to divide the paper into three sections, with each section devoted to one diary. Consider ordering your paper chronologically. For each diary, be sure to address the three questions above. Be sure to include both an introductory paragraph (with a thesis statement!) as well as a concluding paragraph that sums up what we have learned.
The paper must be 3-4 double spaced pages, approximately 900-1200 words. It should be submitted to Turn It In on our Canvas course site.
Pepy’s Diary:
https://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/
Fang Fang:
https://glose.com/read/wuhan-diary/contents
Thucydides is attached as a p
