Main Essay Plans

[becca]

What are the main essay plans we should lay out for Catcher and Valentine? Like how we have done for R&J.

[thethoughtpolice]

Hi Rebecca,

Main plans you need to know for Catcher are to do with questions on:

1) Symbolism
2) A key scene where a character loses control or has a crisis point

These two essay plans can answer a whole range of questions on things like: setting, character not in harmony with society, a theme that is relevant to teenagers today etc

For Valentine

1) A poem with an unusual message/love poem
2) 2 poems on the same theme and which one you think is better
3) A poem that has striking closing lines
4) a poem that uses an extended metaphor (though this is basically the same as number 1)

You have written essays on these things using plans we've used in class. I'd take your previous essays and reduce them to bullet points.

If you do this, can you post the end result on the board or message it to me and I'll put it up if you're shy!!

Cheers

[becca]

Valentine Essay Plans:

Comparison.

Intro:
-2 poems, 2 different messages/views of love.
-Both introduce EM at beginning "I give you an onion.." and "Shall I compare thee to a summers day?"

Para 1: Both start of positive and romantically..
V: "it is a moon..."
-Hidden beauty of onion/relationship.
-Moon is traditionally a romantic symbol of mystery and passion.
-Onion and moon similar (white and round)

18: "Thou art more..."
-His lover is better than summer
-Summer traditional symbol of life and beauty.
- His love is more attractive and balanced than summer.

Para 3: Duffy creates a dark mood, while Shakespeare points out the downsides to summer.
V: "It will blind you.."
-Realistic view of love
-Love causes emotional pain
-Just as the onion essence can make you cry, so to can love cause emotional pain and tears.
"wobbling photo of grief"
-"Photo" suggests looking back, and this is painful.
-"wobbling" tears in vision, life around is breaking,
- Love blurs your view of your identity and what is important to you. It also influences the choices you make while in love.

18: "Sometime to hot.."
-Summer is amazing but nothing in comparison to his love.
" rough winds.." or "thy eternal summer shall not fade"
-Summer short and windy (bad), her beauty has no flaws and will last forever

Para 3: Last lines (Valentine only)
"It scent will cling to your fingers,
cling to your knife"
-Knife is the cutting of the onion which symbolizes the end of the relationship.
suggests suffering and pain.
Just as cutting onion the juices stay on the knife, so to the end of a relationship the feelings stay with you.

Conclusion: which is better? why?
Valentine better - more truthful interpretation of love and unique (which love is)
feel as if you connect will with poet.
Unlike Shakespeare’s.. which I feel is fake, cliché and as if he is pretending. He does not know his lover personality, he knows only of her outer beauty.

Valentine Essay Plans:

Comparison.

Intro:
-2 poems, 2 different messages/views of love.
-Both introduce EM at beginning "I give you an onion.." and "Shall I compare thee to a summers day?"

Para 1: Both start of positive and romantically..
V: "it is a moon..."
-Hidden beauty of onion/relationship.
-Moon is traditionally a romantic symbol of mystery and passion.
-Onion and moon similar (white and round)

18: "Thou art more..."
-His lover is better than summer
-Summer traditional symbol of life and beauty.
- His love is more attractive and balanced than summer.

Para 3: Duffy creates a dark mood, while Shakespeare points out the downsides to summer.
V: "It will blind you.."
-Realistic view of love
-Love causes emotional pain
-Just as the onion essence can make you cry, so to can love cause emotional pain and tears.
"wobbling photo of grief"
-"Photo" suggests looking back, and this is painful.
-"wobbling" tears in vision, life around is breaking,
- Love blurs your view of your identity and what is important to you. It also influences the choices you make while in love.

18: "Sometime to hot.."
-Summer is amazing but nothing in comparison to his love.
" rough winds.." or "thy eternal summer shall not fade"
-Summer short and windy (bad), her beauty has no flaws and will last forever

Para 3: Last lines (Valentine only)
"It scent will cling to your fingers,
cling to your knife"
-Knife is the cutting of the onion which symbolizes the end of the relationship.
suggests suffering and pain.
Just as cutting onion the juices stay on the knife, so to the end of a relationship the feelings stay with you.

Conclusion: which is better? why?
Valentine better - more truthful interpretation of love
Valentine Essay Plans:

Comparison.

Intro:
-2 poems, 2 different messages/views of love.
-Both introduce EM at beginning "I give you an onion.." and "Shall I compare thee to a summers day?"

Para 1: Both start of positive and romantically..
V: "it is a moon..."
-Hidden beauty of onion/relationship.
-Moon is traditionally a romantic symbol of mystery and passion.
-Onion and moon similar (white and round)

18: "Thou art more..."
-His lover is better than summer
-Summer traditional symbol of life and beauty.
- His love is more attractive and balanced than summer.

Para 3: Duffy creates a dark mood, while Shakespeare points out the downsides to summer.
V: "It will blind you.."
-Realistic view of love
-Love causes emotional pain
-Just as the onion essence can make you cry, so to can love cause emotional pain and tears.
"wobbling photo of grief"
-"Photo" suggests looking back, and this is painful.
-"wobbling" tears in vision, life around is breaking,
- Love blurs your view of your identity and what is important to you. It also influences the choices you make while in love.

18: "Sometime to hot.."
-Summer is amazing but nothing in comparison to his love.
" rough winds.." or "thy eternal summer shall not fade"
-Summer short and windy (bad), her beauty has no flaws and will last forever

Para 3: Last lines (Valentine only)
"It scent will cling to your fingers,
cling to your knife"
-Knife = is the cutting of the onion which symbolizes the end of the relationship.
suggests suffering and pain.
Just as cutting onion the juices stay on the knife, so to the end of a relationship the feelings stay with you.

Conclusion: which is better? why?
Valentine better - more truthful interpretation of love

Valentine - Extended Metaphor
[This essay was not written under timed conditions and may be to detailed for exam and was also written for the ambiguous message]

Intro:
- Portrays love in both negative and positive way using EM.
- Most effective enables her to convey truthful image of love.

Para 1: Introduction of EM "not..."
-This is not a bitter expression more a truthful statement about love. Duffy is saying love is too deep and heartfelt to be identified with just a red rose or a satin heart.
-"not" suggests negative look on love, and is also a rejection to so called romantic gifts.
-"moon" positive and promising language
- onion is like a present, wrapped up. which suggest something unknown and mysterious. This can be good or bad.
"It promises light"
-Hope & promise associated with a new relationship.
"undressing of love"
-suggests layers of personality, and through out the relationship these layers will be discovered.
- Also suggests sex and the undressing of partner & the trust involved in this, to be bear and nothing to hide behind.

Para 2: Drastic change of mood.
-Line 6 is the gift given to lover, she expects them to hold and peal onion.
-She talks of pain and grief which are parts of a working relationship
- the onion used to express rough side of love apposed to commercialized love, what love is truly made up of.
"will blind you with tears"
-can cause you to ignore others in your life as well as their problems, and can distract you from other apects to your life.
"wobbling"
- feeling of losing own personality reduces us to tears.
- love changes the way we look at ourselves and this can upset us.
She then reveals the purpose of the gift : honesty makes a relationship work and successful.
"I am trying..."
This is put in the middle to show importance, to be taken seriously and clearly shows her theme - the truth about love.

Para 3: commitment - good or bad?
" not a cute card.."
-similar repetition is used of first line
- used to remind reader of Duffy's rejection of traditional gifts and the uniqueness of her gift.
-"it's fierce..."
- Word choice is negative, which is not normally associated with love.
- onion is referred to buy its lingering taste which connects with how love is hard to recover from
- and how lovers can be controlling and obsessive yet loyal to each other.

-Word choice becomes more forceful "take it" as marriage is introduced
"Its platinum loops shrink to a wedding-ring"
-now we know more of the relationship;
at beginning (whole onion representing mystery and promise, new relationship)
At the start we have not scene the core, just like at the start of the new relationship we have not scene lovers true personality.
Now all the is left is white loops, suggesting no mystery, no new experiences, nothing new to find out.
This suggests relationship has reached a boring stage.
White loops = proposal of marriage, soon as you know somebody = marriage.
"Shrinks"
-can suggest closeness of couple
- loss of freedom, future is tamed.

Para 4: End of relationship.
- Dark Word Choice symbolizing ending of relationship
"lethal"
-relationship has killed future opportunities
"its scent..."
- onions essences remains, so do relationship feelings as relationship can be powerful and unforgettable.
"cling"
-not wanting to let go
- difficult to move on

Last stanza symbolizes the dangers of love
- love is not only re roses but tears and anger as well


Intro - Em of onion used to portray relistic view of love. made stricking in CL.

Para 1
- CL reprasent end of relation
- stricking through use of imagery
" Leathal... Knife"
-Onion chopped violently, end of relationship forceful and abrupt
"leathal" suggests death, lovers feel scared and bitter after break up.
Image reinforced by onions smell left on your fringers.. love feelings stay with you forever.

Para 2 - Build up to CL through out poem, talks of positive qualitis of love.
-compares love to onion in first lines
"moon.. love"
-romantic feelings felt at start of relationship
- moon symbol of love
- light imagery - postive and beauty
- hints at undressing of clothes

Para3 - builds darker presentation of love (more realistic0
"It will... grief"
-just as onion pealing = tears, so to realtionship = pain and emotion.
-truthful view of love not comersialized love shown through 'cute cars' on valentines day.
- suggests painfull memories (through photos') which stay with you forever

Para 4 - portrays dark and passionate love
"Its fierce..faitfull"
-eating onion = sharp experiance so toexperiance of love is powerful, even after relationship.
-"firce" word choice = power of relationship
while decribing positive also suggest that this is bad , jelous and cling together is unhealthy and self distructive
"take it"
- lover unwilling to exept gift
- suggests in love you have to exept good and bad not fairtale promise made on 14th feb.

Para 5 - ambiguity to show end of relationship builds to dark side of break up
"its platium..like"
-onion similar to ring - size, shape and colour
- ambigiouse image = ring silly and not needed
"shrink"
-loosing importance, only option

[becca]

The Catcher in the Rye

Symbolism

Para 1 - Ducks
-Ducks represents several main ideas
-Ducks represent H's mental state
- Holden Q’s where do they go? are they helped? really asking though, am I getting help?
"I found myself wondering where the ducks went"
-Ducks migratory pattern = H’s journey through life

-Taxi driver talks about fish. Unaware of change, meaning this is natural! "2it's their nature for Christ sake"
-tries to comfort H by telling him he will be helped; "listen, if you was a fish, mother nature would take care of you wouldn't she?" yes H you will be OK.
- H finds this hard to believe as he does not cope with unexplained change well due to Allies death.

-pond represents how Holden is in transition (childhood into adulthood)
"party frozen and party not."
-Holden wants to delay transition

Para 2 - Hat
- Represents H's uniqueness and individuality
"this is a people shooting hat"
-self isolation (appearance pushes people away)
- self consensus of hat " I knew I wouldn’t meet anybody that new me"
- hat represents main conflicts ( self isolation (as protection) vs. need for companionship)

- Hats colour = Allies and Phoebes hair = childhood innocence and purity
never explicitly connected! but could wear hat to connect to feelings

Para 3 - Title
- H's fantasy (to stop transition)
-not explained till convo with Phoebe (chp 22)
"I would just be the catcher in the rye and all"
-H on edge of cliff to stop kids falling off, stop change.
- H on edge of cliff to represent he is in middle of transition
- Rye = childhood boundaries and kids cant see over it

- song words muddled
- H thinks "catch" really "meet"
catch suggests presentation
meet suggest casual sex

Para 4 - Museum
-Nostalgic love = hopeless fantasy
- enjoys everything STAYING the same
"the only thing different would be YOU"
-"you" is to distance himself from situation, he is reluctant to believe that he will go through this transition
- H believes museum = purity ( untouched and glass cases)
- H believes this should be done to humans
"you ought tot be able to stick them in glass cases and just leave them alone"
- this would mean no change and no transition
- He is depressed that next visit to museum made by phoebe she will have changed.

- H enjoys exhibits as he can judge them but they cant judge them back. #

Conclusion -
use of symbolism very important.
-plays major part in illustrating main theme and ideas
- while chartering mental decline of protagonist Holden

Can't find any good key scene notes.

[thethoughtpolice]

Superb!

This is very good!

Rest of class USE it!