Your independent assignment is to write the introductory paragraph for your first major paper. Your paragraph should have a clear opening that indicates what the topic of your paper will be, including the title of the novel you are considering (capitalized and in italics) and the name of the author. Your paragraph should articulate the question you will be asking or the topic you will be addressing. And your paragraph should end with a thesis statement, asserting exactly what your paper will argue. Your thesis should be a statement about either A Room with a View or Mrs. Dalloway. Please submit your introductory paragraph in the comment section under this post by 9:00 AM Tuesday morning.
22 thoughts on “Independent Assignment #7, 8/1/22”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
In A Room with a View by E.M. Forster, the stance regarding feminism is tittered back and forth throughout the novel. Lucy Honeychurch, the main character, faces a huge dilemma in regard to choosing what she desires rather than what others desire for her which touches upon the concept of feminism. Forster, for majority of the novel, has advocated strongly for feminism thorugh Lucy – making the character go against societal norms that were expected of women. Despite Forster’s ending the novel in a way that could be perceived as anti-feminist, Forster has held a strong feminist stance throughout the novel and has presented radical ideas in his novels despite the kind of society he lived in at that time. Forster’s novel espouses a feminist stance due to the notion that it promoted female individuality through Lucy Honeychurch’s interal dilemma of going after her personal desires rather than what society expects of her as a woman.
This is a strong opening paragraph. You offer a clear thesis and you do a good job of explaining the major questions you’ll be exploring. It’s a little bit repetitive, so you might consider cutting some of the sentences in it. And there are a couple clunky phrases. For instance: “the stance regarding feminism is tittered back and forth..” This is passive voice, meaning there’s no clear subject. Who titters back and forth? And I think you could streamline the thesis: “Foster’s novel espouses a feminist stance due to the notion that…” Is there a way you can say this without the phrase, “due to the notion that?” Otherwise this is a great opening paragraph
In Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf, the author illustrates that Clarissa Dalloway epitomizes feminist values. Woolf did not intend for Mrs. Dalloway to be a feminist novel, she wanted insight into the daily lives of women, matching that of men’s lives, her character Clarissa Dalloway embodies the feminist stance in the novel. The vital component of Clarissa Dalloway is that she finds empowerment in the task of formulating parties and gatherings for people because it provides her with a sense of purpose. Woolf gives Clarissa Dalloway the freedom, autonomy, and fulfillment through her daily imagination and interactions, giving her life that is worth going through, which makes this novel embody the feminist values.
Very clear thesis here. The main suggestion I would offer is that you could trim some of the wordiness and repetition. You say that someone or something epitomizes or embodies feminist values multiple times. You probably only need to make this statement once. And in the opening sentence, for instance, instead of writing “In Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf, the author illustrates that…” you could simply write: In Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway, the protagonist Clarissa Dalloway epitomizes feminist values.
Overall, though, this is a promising beginning.
Federico Jimenez
A Room with a View E. M. Forster
Literature writers of the 19th and 20th century gives the now day reader a vivid description of how it was to be living during those centuries. The architecture was different, the food, the clothing, decorum, and even the way we view society as a whole. Hence, during the late nineteenth hundred’s and the early twenty hundred’s social construct was completely different to what is currently. Women were expected to think, behave, and even act accordingly to the social norms. Women were view to a higher standard than men, and literature writers as E.M. Forster Fueled the antifeminism. A Room with a View written by Forster gives us a vivid glim of antifeminism. Instead of Forster pushing back on the social construct of his era and try to break the barrier of antifeminism through his literature. He joined society and pilled on women with his word by writing how feminism is inadequate and unladylike.
Very strong thesis here. A couple things: were women judged by a “higher standard” than men or just a different standard? And why might some people (in your view) mistakenly attribute a feminist stance to Forster? You might include a sentence or two explaining this and explaining why you disagree. Finally, be sure to check the grammar in your sentences carefully. In the first sentence, for instance, you say “Literature writers… gives…” It should be “give,” since writers is plural.
That said, you have a very smart thesis and I think it will make for an interesting paper.
In E.M Forster’s A Room with a View, Lucy Honeychurch is a woman of English society caught up in a love triangle of her own. Her potential suitors, George Emerson and Cecil Vyse represent the struggle Lucy faces between inner desires and external expectations. Throughout the novel, we get a glimpse of Lucy’s internal conflict as much as we do the of the external problems. There are other binaries that Forster is concerned with such as high society and commoners, men and women, and superiority and inferiority, all of which amount to corrupting an authentic pursuit of happiness, not just for Lucy, but for multiple characters. It is through Lucy’s journey from youthful and “inexperienced” to mature and “wise” that we come to understand how these various dichotomies intersect to hold back the advancement of feminism. Forster argues that dismantling these social binaries can aid the social acceptance of feminist ideologies.
We already discussed this introduction in depth. I would simply say you might focus, as I told you, on the intersection of class and gender hierarchies in the text rather than discussing how all variety of hierarchies impact the social acceptance of feminist ideologies. In any case, there are some very smart insights already in this introductory paragraph.
A Room with a View is a modern novel written by E.M Foster at the beginning of the 20Th century when the British colonial power had spread all over the world called “The Empire on which the sun never sets”. Therefore, the traditional social mechanism had gradually being changing and disintegrating with the rapid development of the economy. Between the feudal aristocracy and the working class in the new era they had the irreconcilable contradictions and conflicts, they were mutually exclusive and inevitably intersect with each other, it caused the young generation to fall into mental chaos, especially the part focusing on female. The author foster’s soul was implanted in this work with a painful self to express his complicated feelings of this controversial new world. In this book, a story of the main character Lucy, a trip to Italy, the first love, and off engagement, the readers were so easily affected by her psychological changing, confusing, struggling and rebelling a series of female consciousness to show her growth. Author E.M foster advocated feminism under the social progressive power and hoped that women will be treated fairly one day which as a good wish.
This is a very ambitious introduction, one that grapples with a lot of complicated ideas. I almost think you are trying to cover too much ground. For instance, you bring up the British Empire and its colonies, but you never quite indicate how this structure leads to social disintegration. You might simply focus on the breakdown of the old feudal order. And why does this create confusion for characters such as Lucy? And how does feminism challenge the old feudal values? One other thing: your sentences tend to be very long; some of them are run-ons. I would recommend that you try to use mostly simple sentences with one subject and one verb.
In 1908 when E.M. Forster published A Room with a View there were no beliefs of women having the freedom to do as they wish. Forster, nevertheless, applies feminist values into the story by allowing Lucy to be free spirited. Which is one thing I’ve realized while reading this novel. Lucy had flourished from a small seed to a beautiful flower which made her gradually attain a voice she never had. This novel begins by a curious Lucy wandering the city of Florence trying to find her way in the world. Despite her experiences and dictating family, she didn’t allow any of it depict her wants and needs. Forster imagining Lucy break through what is expected from a woman which was being forced into marriage to choosing the right man. Through her relationships with Cecil, Lucy began to realize what she wanted, and it was not Cecil or being a wife. It was simply being a person having the free will to choose her own destiny and so she did. While Forster does channel feminism, there’s many times where the novel comes out hypocritical where there was sexism involved that restrained Lucy doing from what she wanted.
Some good initial thoughts here, but you need a stronger thesis. Does Forster ultimately retreat from the feminism he advocates early in the novel by having Lucy marry George? If so, why?
Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway depicts the experiences of her characters over the course of one day in London in June of the 1920s. Its characters are emblematic of a nation that is fascinated with reflection and melancholy since it takes place shortly after the First World War. We all comprehend the idea of time. One hour is equal to a certain number of minutes, hours in a day, and days in a year. But we seldom consider the fundamental feature of time. Woolf has three distinct positions on memory and time. The characters in Mrs. Dalloway experience the past and present in varied ways, and they all deal with their memories in very different ways. Clarissa embraces, Septimius convulses, and Peter wallows in it, so really time lived and actual time.
This is a very suggestive opening. But as I indicated in my notes on your draft, you need to specify the three positions on memory and time that Woolf offers. Are these three positions connected to how Clarissa embraces, Septimus convulses, and Peter wallows in it? I love these characterizations, but you need to say a bit more about what you mean by them.
A Room with a View is a novel by E.M. Forster is about a young woman named Lucy Honeychurch who is on holiday in Italy with her chaperone, Miss Bartlett. Lucy meets a young man named George Emerson, who is also on holiday with his father, whom she falls in love with. From this union, issues of church doctrines, social conventions, and class hierarchies arise. Questions of the novel’s ability to offer a possible vision to replace the world it rejects and characterization of the book’s politics also fall in the picture. A Room with a View seeks to address social relations of the people by taking charge of the elaboration of the kind of society it imagines, how Forster thinks we should treat one another, how we should behave, and on what basis we should make our life judgments. Essentially, it analyzes how normative the society is structured and how characters like Lucy are asked to lead their lives together with an alternative to what Forster proposes as the request.
You establish the problems that Forster is addressing very well. You could say a little more in your introduction about what kind of alternative he is proposing.
In Mrs. dalloway by Virginia Woolf there is a stance concerning feminism. Clarissa Dalloway is one of the main characters who seems to struggle with what she wants and what society seems to want for her. Virginia Woolf, for most of the novel advocates strongly for feminisms through her character Clarissa. Woolf shows what is expected of Clarissa and her experience and how Clarissa feels. Despite some sayin this novel is anti feminist Woolf gives strong feminist ideas and views regarding the time period. Woolf novel illustrates a feminist stance due to Clarissa Dalloway internal and external struggles and selfhood that leads to a change in Clarissa in grasping her true self.
You seem to have a strong and persuasive reading of the novel. But you need to be more specific in your introduction. What exactly about Clarissa’s internal and external struggles makes this novel feminist? In what sense are you understanding the term feminist? What goals or ideals is the novel seeking to advance?
In her complex novel “Mrs. Dalloway”, Virginia Woolf explores, among many other things, how the war impacts people of different ages and social standing. This is done primarily by bringing the reader into the lives and thoughts of Mrs. Dalloway, a well to do woman in her fifties, and Septimus Smith, a man in his twenties who fought in World War I and came home with shell shock. While these characters do not seem connected, they are both living in an England which has been affected by war and are now trying to navigate a changed world. Mrs. Dalloway and Septimus serve as two contrasting examples of how to view World War I, with Mrs. Dalloway representing an older and more upper class section of the population who think of the war as a noble victory for the English Empire and her values and Septimus representing the actual human cost of war on the younger generation.
This is a very clear opening, but you could offer a more forceful thesis that connects Septimus to Clarissa and explains what you think Woolf is trying to say by juxtaposing these two characters.
Virginia Woolf’s modern novel “Mrs. Dalloway” espouses a feminist stance with the use of strong female characters and social issues that women have faced in the 20th century. Even though, Woolf did not intend for “Mrs. Dalloway” to be a feminist novel the main character Clarissa Dalloway had many empowering attributes that had led to the feminist stance which include her past relationships choices and experiences. Hence, the strong female character represented the feminist stance in Mrs. Dalloway.
* My introduction is still very weak but I will work on making it better.
This is a pretty good start. But you might ask just how independent Clarissa really is. Does she reject or challenge patriarchal norms? Isn’t she conventional in many ways? Then how does her independence or strength manifest itself? And does Woolf celebrate her for her strength? How exactly?