For Wednesday, December 11

Write a 50 minutes timed essay for homework.

Hints for essay writing.

1. Annotate the prompt carefully.  I will grade your annotations.  (Make sure you are actually answering the prompt.)
2. Start with your thesis; leave room for coming back to an introduction later.
3. Jot down a rough outline-thesis plus topic sentences
4. Remember:  It is your job to show how an author accomplishes his purposes.  This means your thesis must speak to the author's purpose.  You are writing about THE WRITING.
5. Stay organized with topic sentences that refer to your thesis
6. Do not forget the quotation sandwich format=use embedded quotations
7. Write in your own voice; do not use big words for the sake of using big words
8. If you find yourself running out of time, jump to your conclusion.

Your prompt:

 

1. (Suggested time—40 minutes)

 

In the following soliloquy from Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part II, King Henry laments

his inability to sleep. In a well-organized essay, briefly summarize the King’s thoughts

and analyze how the diction, imagery, and syntax help to convey his state of mind. (I THINK WRITING ABOUT HOW THE DICTION LEADS TO TONE IS A GOOD OPTION; PERSONIFICATION WOULD WORK; APOSTROPHE MEANS I AM ADDRESSING AN ABSTRACT CONCEPT=SLEEP; CONTRASTING IMAGERY)

How many thousand of my poorest subjects

Are at this hour asleep! O sleep! O gentle sleep!

Nature’s soft nurse, how have I frighted thee,

That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down,

And steep my senses in forgetfulness?

Why rather, sleep, liest thou in smoky cribs,1

Upon uneasy pallets stretching thee,

And hush’d with buzzing night-flies to thy slumber,

Than in the perfum’d chambers of the great,

Under the canopies of costly state,

And lull’d with sound of sweetest melody?

O thou dull god, why liest thou with the vile

In loathsome beds, and leav’st the kingly couch

A watch-case or a common ’larum-bell? (alarm bell)

Wilt thou upon the high and giddy mast

Seal up the ship-boy’s eyes, and rock his brains

In cradle of the rude imperious surge,

And in the visitation of the winds,

Who take the ruffian billows by the top,

Curling their monstrous heads and hanging them

With deaf’ning clamour in the slippery clouds,

That with the hurly death itself awakes?

Canst thou, O partial2 sleep, give thy repose

To the wet sea-boy in an hour so rude,

And in the calmest and most stillest night,

With all appliances and means to boot,

Deny it to a King? Then, happy low, lie down!

Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.

 

1 huts

2 not impartial

 

  



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