English - reading and writing assignment - Essay Example

Reading it helps us grow intellectually and emotionally. If we are learning a language, reading helps us learn new words and discover different ways of using them. Reading literature also expands our horizons, as it brings us to different places, cultures, and time, and introduces us to diverse characters that we would have not known within our own lifetime. Literature enables us to respond to human struggles and dreams. At the same time, reading literature also helps us learn more about ourselves, our culture, and the society we live in.

Roberts underscores that our interpretations of literature reveal our innermost desires, values, and goals too. It also makes us more aware of our society and the ills and good in it. Indeed, literature “makes us human” (2). Writing about literature entails an active engagement with the text. It requires following the work and identifying meaningful details and implications. We use our own knowledge and experience to check the authenticity and meaning of the plot and dialogues. Writing down notes is one way of responding to the text while reading it.

These notes can be the spring of our thesis and supporting arguments. Writing about literature basically means explaining what the text means through a focused argument. The analysis shows the reader’s thought process, as well as how he/she plans to describe and defend his/her ideas and arguments. Writing requires having an argumentative position and supporting details from the text and sometimes, even other sources, to effectively show that all our points lead to our thesis. In a sample essay about “The Necklace,” Roberts explains how de Maupassant uses setting to describe and explain Mathilde’s character.

The thesis stresses that Mathilde grows as a person and this growth can be seen through descriptions of her apartment, dreams about elegant rooms in a mansion, and her attic flat. Three topic sentences are presented, which support the