Choose one of the following topics for your essay. As before, you will have to f

Choose one of the following topics for your essay. As before, you will have to focus on one of the general topics listed below into your own, precise thesis. Please, remember to support your main points with references to and examples from the novel only. No secondary sources are needed. Your essay should be 4 FULL pages long and in the same MLA format as your previous essays. Please note that we do have a plagiarism checker, which also includes any AI, that runs through the system once you turn in your essay.
After you introduce the novel and the author in your introductory paragraph, please remember that for any direct quotes or paraphrased evidence, you only need the page number in parenthesis at the end of a sentence. When you use one primary source only in an essay, there is no need to keep repeating either the title or the author’s name in the rest of your essay. In your analysis, please avoid using direct, uninterrupted quotes longer than four successive lines in a paragraph. They take too much space away from your own analysis. The longer your direct quote is, the more you need to analyze it. Direct quotes are not decorative elements, used instead of your analysis, but rather evidential support to your main points and interpretation.
Try to “unpack” as much of the symbolic structure and meaning in the novel. Examine the imagery used and patterns of imagery, irony, and different points of view. All the important terms for literary analysis are included in the document, titled “Fiction Terms and Definitions.” Please review these terms and use them as they apply to your specific analysis. Finally, as I explained in class, remember that mirroring is a narrative strategy that contrasts different characters in similar life situations but with entirely opposite outcomes. (For example, America is raped by Jose Navidad and his friend, but when these same two men discover Kyra, also alone in the canyon, they do not attack her. America is vulnerable and an immigrant; Kyra is clearly a professional woman and powerful. The criminals know that the consequences of each attack would be vastly different.)
The pdf of the book is attached and other sources to help.
1. The symbol of the coyote appears throughout the novel and offers multiple interpretations. What is the most significant meaning of this symbolic representation in your opinion? Support your view with appropriate evidence from the text. Please, focus on at least one major character and examine her/his relationship to coyotes or the gradual transformation into a predator, as is the case with Delaney. You can also create a thesis that establishes the symbolic meaning of coyotes to all four, major characters and support that thesis with adequate evidence for each character.
2. Boundaries/Borders/Walls/Barriers – both physical and imagined – play a large role in the novel, especially the front gate at Arroyo Blanco Estates. In what other instances do boundaries appear and what do they represent? What roles do the different characters play in constructing these boundaries?
3. How does mirroring, as a narrative strategy, function in Tortilla Curtain? Include examples of mirroring characters, events, images, etc…
4. In your opinion, who is or who are the most alienated and isolated character(s) in Tortilla Curtain? Explain your position using relevant evidence from the text.
5. Is Tortilla Curtain a predominantly political or environmental novel, or both? Does the novel offer any solutions to these issues?