“Great literature is simply language charged with meaning to the utmost possible degree.”
Ezra Pound
If I did not find value in studying English literature, I probably would not be an English major (or maybe not a very good one). To me, the value of studying literature resides in interpretation, in the idea that a text can be understood in an infinite number of ways. For example, the Gender Studies essay I wrote talks about the homoerotic undertones of the relationship between Edna Pontellier and Mademoiselle Reisz in The Awakening. Someone else could read The Awakening and completely disagree with my point of view and have enough evidence to make an argument against my own. That is the beauty of studying literature; the possibilities are endless, as long as one can provide evidence to support their claim.
One of the main reasons why I enjoyed working with The Awakening so much this semester is because of the ending of the story. Is Edna’s decision to kill herself selfish or freeing? Can it be both? I found it fascinating that even my own interpretation of the ending could change depending on which literary theory I was focusing on. The same goes for “The Story of an Hour.” What exactly causes Louise to die? Is it because of the loss of freedom she feels only for a brief moment? The endings of both of these stories have been incredibly fun to grapple with because of their ambiguity. As the quote at the top of the page explains, there is meaning in every word of literature if you look close enough for it.
Even more so, literature’s value has to do with human connection. As a woman living in the 21st century, I am able to read The Awakening, published in 1899, and relate my experiences to Edna Pontellier’s experiences. Furthermore, literature is a channel through which marginalized writers shed light on the issues of society, and therefore is a means of connecting marginalized groups of the past and the present. Groups who have been oppressed can read and study literature and feel that they have a voice. Literature tells the stories that history textbooks do not.
My writing process for this class was ever-changing, as it should be. I would not expect my process of writing a New Critical essay to be the same as my process for writing a New Historical essay. I have never taken a class that stressed the importance of the writing process as much as English 305 has, and therefore, my own personal process became much more refined. I was more organized in my writing than ever before, completing an outline for my essays and making a list of source quotes before even beginning a draft. Who have I become?
My normal writing process before taking this class was to sit down and crank out a draft the night before the essay was due, not even bothering to revise. But no more! In only fifteen short weeks, I have revised more than I have drafted, and I am a changed woman because of it. Okay, maybe not a changed woman, but definitely a changed writer, and I am grateful for that. I feel that I made such a drastic change this semester because of how daunting this class seemed at first. English 305 is often spoken about like a ghost story, something that is meant to induce nightmares. Before the semester even started, I promised myself I would work as hard as I could in order to keep the nightmares at bay. Now, I cannot envision myself going back to my old ways.
Anyway, my average writing process looked a little something like this:
- Freak out over the daunting task of writing an essay
- Give myself a pep talk
- Dive headfirst into research/reading
- Realize that I over-researched
- Sift through six pages of source quotes to find the best ones
- Put together an outline
- Write a first draft that I have zero confidence in
- Receive positive comments that restore my confidence
- Revise, repeat
To see a more in-depth depiction of my writing process for each essay, head on over to my Process Portfolio.
When this course started, my thoughts on my writing were riddled with insecurity and self-doubt, somewhere along the lines of “I am going to get my writing ripped apart and criticized, and I cannot do this.” My thoughts now, after successfully completing Literary Theory and Writing, are simply, “Maybe I am not such a bad writer after all.”
To be very honest, I do not think it should have taken me this long to come to that realization, but confidence has never really been my strong suit. This course, however, has helped me gain confidence in my writing, even though I had virtually no confidence in the drafts I turned in (see above). Of course, I am not trying to say that my writing is perfect, no piece of writing is, but after receiving fairly positive comments on my work this semester, I feel that maybe I should start viewing my own writing in a positive light.
Another area I tried to improve on this semester was revising, specifically my willingness to press the backspace key. For any writer, it can be difficult to delete an entire paragraph of writing that just is not working out. To spend so much time researching and constructing only to have to delete entire chunks of writing is gut-wrenching. Because I am not used to even having the opportunity to revise my essays, revision became one of the hardest parts of this class. My stubbornness needed to take a back seat to allow my rational mind to tell me, “Anna, this is not working. Just get rid of it already.” Comparing my first drafts to my final drafts, I can easily see the value of revision. Thank you, rational mind, for keeping me open-minded.
For the time being, I am going to bite my tongue and explain what some of my writing strengths are without bringing up any weaknesses. Let’s see if I can do it.
I feel that I have a very detail-oriented mind that always wants to push deeper. This was especially helpful for the Close Reading essay because I was able to dissect specific quotes and pull out multiple different meanings without much hardship. Being detail-oriented in this course allowed me to have the patience to do research for hours on end, only feeling satisfied when I found the “perfect” source. Additionally, I feel that my ability to construct strong thesis statements not only made my arguments stronger, but it also made my essays well-organized. I have a very formulaic way of splitting up my paragraphs to ensure good organization and flow of topics.
As I look back on where I started in this class just fifteen weeks ago, I am a little shocked at how much I have actually grown in my writing. Even though I will not miss how much work went into it, I will forever be grateful to English 305 for teaching me so much. Since this website is an homage to Kate Chopin, I feel it is only fitting to end this section with a quote from her that sums up the ending of this course: “So the storm passed and every one was happy.”
