Literary argument
Torn between obligation and desire
- Units 3 and 9
- 6 points
- About 40 minutes
You get a literary idea, such as a conflict between old and new, and pick a novel, story or play you know well, from your own reading or a list of about 40 works. Then you write an essay arguing how that idea contributes to an interpretation of the work as a whole, without just summarizing the plot. On the exam: Free-response question 3 of 3 in Section II (3 essays in 2 hours, 55% of the exam score); about 40 minutes suggested; 6 points: thesis 1, evidence and commentary 4, sophistication 1.
The question
Suggested time: 40 minutes, including planning. There is no passage: you choose the work and write about it from memory. Pick a novel or play you know well enough to discuss specific scenes, choices and details.
Suggested time: 40 minutes
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The essay
6 pointsIn many works of literature, a character is pulled between an obligation (to a family, a community, a faith or a promise) and a personal desire that the obligation forbids or makes difficult. How the character responds can expose the cost of each choice. Choose a novel or play in which a character faces such competing claims. You may use a work from your own reading or one from the list below. Write an essay that analyzes how the character's response to these competing claims contributes to an interpretation of the work as a whole. Analyze rather than retell the plot. In your essay: • State a thesis that answers the prompt with a defensible interpretation. • Give specific evidence from the work that supports your line of reasoning. • Explain how that evidence supports your line of reasoning. • Use grammar and punctuation that make your argument clear. Suggested works: The Age of Innocence Anna Karenina Antigone The Awakening Bread Givers Brooklyn Death of a Salesman A Doll's House Ethan Frome Everything I Never Told You Fences Hamlet The House of Mirth Jane Eyre Madame Bovary Middlemarch The Mill on the Floss The Namesake Persuasion A Raisin in the Sun The Remains of the Day Romeo and Juliet Their Eyes Were Watching God Things Fall Apart
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