ENG 3630
Paper 2 Topics
Write on one of the four topics given below, or propose your own. Be sure to articulate a clear claim as a , suggest what is at stake in your thesis, offer supporting claims in each supporting paragraph and support those claims with specific evidence from the text that you discuss in detail, showing how the evidence bears out your claim and, ultimately, your thesis. Your paper should be 2-3 pages in length and use MLA formatting.
1. In Fitt IV of Sir Gawain, the Gawain poet gives the Green Knight some distinctive and characteristic gestures. The Green Knight, for example, vaults over a small stream (ln. 2231 ff.) at one point, and rests jauntily on his axe to observe Gawain at another (ln. 2331 ff). These gestures, as much as what the Green Knight says, help to characterize him for the reader. For this topic, discuss the use of gesture by the Gawain Poet. How does the Gawain Poet use gesture in the service of characterization? That is, what do gestures tell us about a character and his or her state of mind? How do gestures help to set a particular character apart as a distinctive individual? You can discuss any character in the poem, including the Green Knight; Gawain, Arthur, or Lady Bertilak might also be good candidates.
2. Doctor Faustus portrays the extended internal struggle of Faustus, where he repeatedly flirts with the idea of repenting of his deal with Mephistopheles. For this topic, trace Faustus’s internal struggle. In which scenes does he seem most to be struggling to make a decision about whether to embrace or renounce his bargain with Mephistopheles? What kinds of things or arguments seem to tempt him in either direction? What seems to be his final decision, and why does he come to that decision? Or, does he come to a final decision at all? Finally, based on what you’ve discussed, you might consider how psychology and morality are related in this play.
3. Consider the changes that Wyatt made in “Whoso List to Hunt” to Petrarch’s Rima 190 (see pages 121-122). What seems to motivate those changes? That is, what kinds of changes does Wyatt make? What are the effects of those changes? How, for example, is the speaker of Wyatt’s poem different than the one in Petrarch’s?
Or,
How is the beloved portrayed differently? What are the similarities? What do we learn about Wyatt’s poem through the comparison? One important change Wyatt makes is in language: from Italian to English. So, additionally, you might want to consider how Wyatt uses the resources of English in his version: what does he do with English’s rich resources of meter and rhyme? How do the metrical or rhyme schemes of the poem help to shape the changes he makes from Petrarch’s original?
4. Sonnet cycles typically have a loose plot-line to them. Events are suggested, usually after the fact, by details and hints dropped in individual sonnets. Taking Sidney’s, Shakespeare’s, or Wroth’s cycle as your material, discuss how the poet creates the sense of developing events. What hints or cues does the poet introduce in one or more sonnets that indicate something has happened between the speaker and his beloved (or beloveds, in Shakespeare’s case)? How does the poet use the conventions of a sonnet to create a sense of the characters involved, their changing perceptions, and/or evolving events?
5. Write on a topic of your own choosing. Please present the topic to me by Nov. 5
