English 1B Essay Topics
You should choose ONE of the following FOUR options to write on.
Your essay should be 2000 words long, including references but not the bibliography.
Please ensure you follow the submission guidelines on Myplace.
Please ensure your essay is formatted according to the guidance in the English Studies handbook.
We have prepared a short list of suggested secondary reading which you may wish to consult, though you should use the library’s resources to find other reading. The list is available on the class Myplace page.
Essay topics:
1. In what ways does Black Watch explore ideas of community AND/OR national identity?
You should make use of close textual analysis in your answer, and in addition you should engage with AT LEAST TWO of the following dramatic features:
Use of costume
Use of movement/dance
Use of dialect
Stage directions
2. Choose one object, site or character from Robert Louis Stevenson’s Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (eg. Jekyll’s laboratory; Hyde’s rooms in SoHo; Utterson; the silver-headed cane; the back door to the laboratory). Give an in-depth analysis of the representation of that object/site/character in the text. How can it be read in different ways?
You should engage very closely with textual examples in your response, but you can also refer to critical theories we have looked at to back up your reading of those textual examples.
Your essay should include the following:
At least one paragraph on how your object/site/character is described in the text.
At least two paragraphs analysing those descriptions – eg. the connotations of particular words used – offering alternative readings of the same descriptions. What does s/he/it represent, and how?
At least oneparagraph explaining the ways in which these different readings might work to
add meaning to the text.
3. Write an essay on EITHER Beachy Head by Charlotte Smith (p. 279), OR ‘In Hilly Wood’ by John Clare (p. 269), OR ‘Lines Written in Early Spring’ by William Wordsworth (p. 252, allin the Sheers anthology). In all cases your essay should include discussion and analysis of the following poetic features:
Metre
Rhyme scheme (if applicable)
Images (including metaphors and similes)
Interesting linguistic features, such as alliteration, assonance, syntax (word order)
The speaker of the poem and the imagined audience; narrative voice
You should include at least two paragraphs in which you tell your reader how these elements connect, and what your analysis of them reveals about the potential meaning(s) of your chosen poem.
4. “That’s my twin brother,” said Miranda…
“And who is she?” Miranda sighed.
“Very funny,” she said… “That’s me…”
I stared at her, and when she didn’t smile to show she was joking, I looked at the picture again… the girl in the picture was not the girl who stood in the room with me; I can unequivocally say that it wasn’t her. (White is for Witching, p.162)
Discuss the depiction of personal identity in White is for Witching, with particular reference to two of the following:
race
gender
sexuality
nationality
Your essay should take the form of a close textual analysis, using appropriate secondary reading or literary theory to support your discussion.
We expect you to use the following basic convention for referring to a text:
• name of author of book + date of publication + page numbers
e.g.
(Sharpe 1987, p.32)
(Hirsch 1984, p.51)
(Furniss and Bath 1996, p.56)
