The purpose of this assignment is to get you ready for the more expansive research you will need to complete for your formal written analysis of The Awakening. We’re getting close to being able to draw some final conclusions about Edna’s journey which means it is time to see what’s been said by scholars who’ve studied not only Chopin’s work, but other writing from the Victorian age (and turn of the century as well). So, treat the work you do for this assignment as an opportunity to practice your comprehension and analysis of literary criticism. Because before you can incorporate literary criticism within your own essay about the novel, you need to fully understand the what the "critic" is arguing, and how it may or may not fit in with what you have to say about the same piece of writing (The Awakening, in this case).

The process of reading the scholarly article I have provided you here, "Kate Chopin’s Narrative Techniques and Separate Space in The Awakening" should be similar to the active reading and annotation process you have already completed with our study of "The Story of an Hour" and "Desiree’s Baby." This means that when you are reading the article, you will want to annotate by asking questions, making observations (perhaps you agree or disagree with what the author is saying), and noting ideas or arguments that you find interesting. The primary difference, however, is that literary criticism reads quite differently that the stories that are often the subject of it. 

• In the case of an article like "Kate Chopin’s Narrative Techniques…" the author is providing a specific interpretation of the novel. Rather than give his reader a summary or opinion of the novel, the author is considering the novel through a specific lens and explains WHY and HOW that "lens" matters. To support their interpretation (which is ultimately their claim or thesis) in the essay, the author uses text from the novel itself to directly to SHOW the reader HOW they have arrived at the claims (argument) they make about the novel.
  • FUN FACT: The writing process I have described above is exactly what you will do in our class! 

The assignment:

Your job is to write a text-driven summary of the article. A well-written summary includes the following components:

• It includes the complete title of the text (article) and author
• It begins by offering a broad overview of the material (one or two sentences), which is then developed in more detail in the body of the summary.
• It gives credit to the author throughout. To make it clear that the ideas presented are the author’s and not your own; you should frequently use signals like “[The author] also states that…”
• It uses quotation marks and page references whenever a phrase, a part of a sentence, or a complete sentence is taken directly from the source text. But it also quotes selectively and sparingly.

The particulars:

• Your summary should be at least 300 words in length.
• You need to highlight the author’s main claim, i.e. what is their purpose in writing the article OR what is the argument they are making about the novel?
• Cite/Reference the article at least three different times in your summary; show your reader (me) how you know what you know about the article.
  • Each reference should be no longer than two sentences of directly quoted or paraphrased material – include page numbers from the article.
  • Example: Mou explains that "Through these subtle techniques, Chopin charts Edna’s remarkable journey of growth both as a woman and as a female artist" (104).

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