Writing Assignment 1

Goals

• To read and assess a professional scholar's published ideas about Aeschylus's Oresteia (a focus to start with, but you'll also see that elements in these arguments apply to other plays too)
• To test these ideas against your own reading of the Oresteia - either in a passage the scholar analyzes in the article you read, or in a different passage you feel raises related questions
• To demonstrate, in a concrete, specific, well-argued essay, where the scholar's ideas illuminate important aspects of the play you choose, and where those ideas can be improved on for an even better picture of what Aeschylus's trilogy is doing

Articles to consider - pick one

• Simon Goldhill, Reading Greek Tragedy, "The Drama of Logos," ch. 1, 1-32 (Cambridge UP 1986) - book on reserve.
• John Heath, "Disentangling the Beast: Humans and Other Animals in Aeschylus' Oresteia," Journal of Hellenic Studies 119 (1999) 17-47 - photocopy on reserve.
• Froma I. Zeitlin, "The Dynamics of Misogyny: Myth and Mythmaking in Aeschylus's Oresteia," Arethusa 11 (1978) 149-84; rpt. in Women in the Ancient World: The Arethusa Papers, ed. John Peradotto and J. P. Sullivan, 159-94 (SUNY Press 1984); rpt. in Zeitlin, Playing the Other: Gender and Society in Classical Greek Literature, ch. 3, 87-119 (UChicago Press 1996) - it's Zeitlin, Playing the Other that's on reserve.

To hand in at the start of class Wednesday, 6 February

• Identify the article you have chosen to focus on, and briefly summarize its central argument - do not spend more than one page total in your paper on mere summary! the important part of this essay is your analysis and well-supported critique
• Show how the scholar's views can be supported from the play and passages you have chosen to focus on - go beyond quotation or paraphrase to show what additional insights you can build on the scholar's work
• If the play you have chosen can be better understood by modifying the scholar's views, show why and how the argument can be modified to make it work even better
• Support your observations and suggestions by referring to specific, concrete passages of evidence in the play you're working on, and explaining how these passages help confirm your points
• For suggestions about pulling an essay together, see Dr. Long's Guide to Writing Papers

This file last updated 27 January 2002 by jlong1@orion.it.luc.edu.
http://www.luc.edu/depts/classics/