1. Your essay should be 5-6 pages (at least mid-way onto the 5th page but no mo

1. Your essay should be 5-6 pages (at least mid-way onto the 5th page but no more than 6 full pages), in formal prose, typed, double-spaced, in 12-point font, with 1-inch margins. Cite page numbers and quotations.
2. Your essay should identify a thesis that takes a position on the question below, which you should support with analysis of evidence from the text. Each paragraph should develop one point in support of your thesis.
3. The essay should contain close readings that pay particular attention to word choice and form. However, you may also use New Historical Cultural interpretation and/or Historical Biographical interpretations or a bit of Interpretive Community Reader Response to support your thesis too. Avoid relying primarily on summarizing the action of the text.
4. I truly do encourage you to draw on what we have discussed in class, but you should also use at least one part of the novel that was not a focus of class discussion to demonstrate some of your own original thinking.
· Identify more than one possible theme or message about Dovey’s “I, the Elephant, Wrote This” and offer some literary proof for BOTH themes.
· Include at least 2 Formalist close-readings within the paper analyzing particular aspects of word-choice and imagery in the poem(s) you have chosen plus 2 analyses that use EITHER Historical biographical criticism, New Historical Cultural criticism, an Identity Criticism (Eco-feminist, Racial studies, etc.) Scientific study comparison, or Interpretive Community Reader Response Criticism (if you choose this one, be sure to identify what “community” you are using and why it is relevant).
· Make some specific connection between your 21st C text Heise’s book, Imagining Extinction.