I Am An Efficient Editor

Kim Brooks, we know has been “teaching composition at state universities and liberal art colleges and community colleges as well,” (Brooks 2) however what makes her truly passionate about the situation is her love for literature since she was a teenager. “Like so many, depressive, creative, extremely lazy high-school students, I was saved by english class” (1). Brooks demonstrates through these quotes her credibility, not only because she’s a teacher but because she truly loves writing and believes others should receive the education which she was fortunate enough to get. She was not apart of any clubs or extracurriculars, she wasn’t interested in other academic classes, so she knows how beneficial having the skills to converse, to write and to properly articulate one's self are. Brooks shares this personal anecdote, otherwise known as pathos, to relate to those reading, most specifically high school students like she once was. While focusing this piece mainly on English it can also be associated with other classes in high school as well. She is trying to illustrate how one can use what is learned in high school in their life if given the proper tools and taught skills which can be applied

Our teacher, Mrs. Hetrick, provided the answer to our question: “These essays could have easily been generated by a computer program. They tell me nothing about yourselves; why in the world you are telling me all of this? You need to make me care about the message you are conveying, otherwise, your writing is useless.” She then told us that while we were all communicating in the proper format, we had failed to take into consideration whom our audience was. In order to truly persuade and influence our audience, we had to do more than place complicated ideas into a grammatically immaculate sentences; we need to show the audience why they should care about our writing; otherwise, they will just lose interest. I realize now that this experience provided a stable foundation for what I consider to be an example of passionate rhetorical ability, which helps me reflect on what authors Wallace deems as “good” through their rhetorical strategies.

My English Literature major has helped me to achieve an outstanding level of appreciation, enjoyment, and knowledge of both American and British Literature. As a high school AP English student, I struggled through great works like Hamlet and To the Lighthouse. My teacher’s daily lectures (there was no such thing as class discussion) taught me merely to interpret the works as critics had in the past. I did not enjoy the reading or writing process. As a freshman at Loras, I was enrolled in the Critical Writing: Poetry class. For the first time since grade school, my writing ability was praised and the sharing of my ideas was encouraged by an enthusiastic and nurturing professor. Despite the difficulty of poetry, I enjoyed reading it.

Before going into the details of what I’ve learnt from this assignment, I would like to give a

In literary education, from childhood to maturity, individuals are taught how to write not to improve themselves as critical thinkers, but to fulfill the requirements given to them in a prompt. Whether to analyze or argue, this form of writing has led to a cease of literary improvement in students today, making many question the effectiveness of writing classes. Mike Bunns, in his article “To Read like a Writer”, explores this topic and stresses the necessity for young readers to critically examine the author’s choices in order to improve their own pieces of work. Bunns effectively argues to his audience of college students that improved comprehension comes from focusing on the rhetorical choices authors decide to make in their compositions by tying personal narratives with repetitive questioning throughout his article.

Coming into AP Lang, I felt as if I was a relatively strong writer. However this year, I have progressed immensely both as a writer, reader and thinker. Immediately confronted with intricate pieces of writing from some of the worlds greatest authors, I was thrusted into a position where I really had to challenge myself. Not only have I felt that I grew at my ability to recognize the implicit argument any piece by “fondling the details”, but I also learned how to use my own personal beliefs to shape the way in which a text impacts me. From my interpretation of “In History” as a indirect bridge towards white academia or the ways in which Walton uses primary sources to personify the oftentimes hidden structures of racism in the South, I feel like

Critically evaluating an author’s work opens opportunities for discussion. This is advantageous in any class setting but especially so in an online setting where interaction is limited. Like an accident where five witnesses give different versions of what happened, an evaluation helps students take a new look at a work. For example, I found my first reading of “A Modest Proposal” sarcasm at its best; a somewhat amusing look at the attitude of upper members of society and what might be done to solve their “problem.”

I thought to myself, “Isn’t that the point of a rhetorical essay?” Soon after, I came to the realization that a rhetorical analysis requires the writer to assess both the good and the bad aspects of an

To break it down, I had trouble writing Rhetorical Analysis in the beginning because I did not have any experience with connecting literature to a big idea that the author wants readers to understand. In high school, I was only taught to analyze the works of literature without connecting to the real

On order to effectively analyze “The Writer,” one might look to the Advanced Placement format, for instance, to best understand the meaning of Wilbur’s poem.

In the poems “Marginalia” and “Introduction to Poetry”, Billy Collins uses metaphor, personal anecdote, and violent imagery to convey the danger the author is in when they allow people who do not care enough to make educated remarks to freely comment on their work. Collins has dedicated his life to literature and teaching, and he has a large amount of experience in this subject. The main subject of “Marginalia” is the ignorant comments that people often make about literature. “Introduction to Poetry” has a similar message said in a different way: the students that Collins teaches often do not want to fully immerse themselves in the poem. Rather, they try to take shortcuts to find the supposed “true meaning” of the poem.

My analysis is on introduction to poetry by Billy Collins. Collins relays the message that readers should be patient and open-minded when reading poems in order to see the meaning. Poetry is something to experience by going inside of it. There is a heavy use of metaphors in this poem.

A common misconception found among students is buried within the idea of poetry. There's always a looming idea of what makes a poem “good,” or what type of mold a poem should fit. All that they learn in school supports this idea. Edgar Allan Poe's works are pristine examples of syllable stressing, whereas Robert Frost's generally follow a predictable rhyme scheme. While it's important, and some would argue a necessity, it can also have the unintended side effect of discouraging students from writing on their own.

Writing has always been a stressful experience my whole lifetime. Throughout high school, I had painfully struggled to put my thoughts on paper for English assignments. Writing has never been one of my strengths. I remember being told from the instructor of the class “remember put in your own words”. I had a very difficult time completing this task. The annotations Is what I struggled with the most of every assignment. The poems were the most difficult to interpret. I still struggle with the annotations, but they are not as difficult to annotate as they were when I started the class.

In my preparation for this essay I thought that there was going to be very little that I would learn about the elements of poetry. This is not because I am an expert and have nothing new to learn, but rather the opposite. I have never really spent the time to break down and appreciate poetry. One of the reasons I think that I haven’t spent the time on poetry is due to my reading habits. I usually read to gather information and poetry is on the other end of the spectrum. Fredrick Gruber sums this up, “Poetry tends to give general truths while history gives particular facts.” (Gruber) Having said all of this though, I did see a couple of things that I could apply to my own writing. I will first start off with some elements of poetry that I