Some Helpful Suggestions for Essay #2

1. Choose Your Own Adventure:

Plot you Chosen: Jeanette’s relationship to her mother

 

2. stages of the Hero’s Journey (for more detail about these 12 stages, see another file I uploaded )

 

Upon deciding which plot line you want to focus on, there is now the work of actually applying the various stages of the Hero’s Journey to the book. Ultimately, your goal is to show how the main character does meet the mythic criteria of a hero.

Focus on a select number of stages in your analysis of the novel and not every single one. Remember that the cycle is divided into 4 sections, where each section is made up of roughly 3-4 stages. The ones I think are extremely important to have in your essay, are the stages that cross thresholds. For instance, stage 5, stage 8, and stage 10 are all points where the hero crosses into a new threshold and these are 3 you should definitely have.

Lastly, you must focus on at least 8 of the 12 stages. You can focus on more if you feel it is necessary, but no less than 8.

 

3. Don’t Forget Your Elements (see another file I uploaded for elements detail)

Of course, the literary elements remain our key tools by which we analyze a scene in any story, whether a short story or a novel. So I ask once again, what are you focusing on in this scene, is it Character, Imagery, Setting, Point of View? The difference now regarding these elements is that you’re using them as analytical tools that, in turn, correlate to a stage in the Hero’s Journey.

It’s likely you will focus a lot on Character, since Winterson’s novel is, among many other things, about relationships. Yet, other elements, such as Setting, Imagery, and Point of View are equally important to the novel and should also be closely considered.