poem by Li Bai

Week 3 Essay/Essay 1

• This should be a close reading essay, and should use as evidence primarily passages from the story or stories that you discuss. You may not use ANY outside sources without the instructor’s approval.
• The essay should be in MLA essay format (see the sample essay attached below) and use MLA citations. A works cited entry and in-text citations for each text discussed are required.
• It should have a self-assessment (which should answer these questions) as the first page.
• The essay should be focused on making a debatable claim about the work(s) in question; informational essays or essays consisting of summary are not appropriate. The claim should be supported with discussion of specific passages from the text(s) on which the essay is focused. The essay grading rubric is attached below.

1. 1. The Tragic Hero: In Oedipus Tyrannus, should we view Oedipus as tragic only, or can we find something heroic in his actions and end? Support your argument by discussing only events and lines from the play. Make sure to explain your definition of “hero” so that your readers are working from the same set of criteria that you are.

1. 1. Assessing Right Action: In Week 3, we read two sacred works that talk about righteous and morally good behavior–both the Gita and the Qur’an can be seen as providing models for how to act well as part of a human community. For this topic, use the moral advice given by 1 of those two works to evaluate the choices and/or actions of a character from 1 work we read in Week 2; you could, for instance, evaluate the choices/actions of the narrator of one of Li Bai’s poems using the models given by Krishna in the Gita, or evaluate Oedipus himself using the models in the Qur’an. For your thesis, make a claim about whether that character would be considered a morally good person under the models of the sacred text in question. Use only passages from your chosen two works as support for your claim.

1. 1. Shared Themes: Choose one (1) poem by Li Bai, and identify in it a theme that you also can find in Oedipus Tyrannus. Compare and contrast the two works’ treatment of the theme. Do they deal with that theme in a way that is more alike or different? Focus your thesis on arguing how the treatments are more similar/different, and support your argument by discussing only passages from the two works.

1. Make your own topic: create your own critical question to answer in your essay. If you choose this topic you must contact the instructor for approval by Thursday of Week 3. Essay submissions with unapproved topics will be returned.