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Length: 3-4 pages

Choose any one short story from the anthology and perform an interpretation. An interpretation builds on an explication to present a more developed argument. Begin your paper with an introduction that presents the story’s conflict and primary strategies/effects and ends with a thesis that argues for what the story does, how it does it, and why it’s important. A successful thesis demonstrates the connection between form and content and presents an argument about that connection. Use your close reading skills to provide evidence in support of your argument.  

Step by step guide to Close Reading:

1. Who’s telling the story and what’s their role in it? What’s the POV and its impact on your understanding of the story?

2. Plot: What happens? Why?

3. Who are the major characters and what are their relationships?

4. Figurations?  Are there any major symbols? What about similes and metaphors?

5. Identify the tone and theme. What’s the author/narrator’s attitude? Toward whom is it directed? How does it influence your reading?

When you describe how the different formal elements relate to the content, you have a close reading.