What’s wrong with your paper that begins, “In this paper I will say three things” is this: it asks your reader to care about the selfie-word “I” without showing her what “I” really is – that is, who you really are. To make your word-selfie work, you’ll have to make its word outfit start looking good.
The two most efficient grooming aids for that job happen to be poetry and drama — poetry because in addition to saying, “Look how pretty my words are!” it says, “As long as you’re looking at me, listen to me too”; and drama because it adds, “And while you’re at it, let’s bring in the whole body and get physical.” To make our own language worth looking at, listening to, and moving along with, we’ll spend time this semester with some poems and plays about men and women. And you’ll see: F. Scott Fitzgerald, writer of good prose, was right when he said, “To write good prose, read good poetry.”
Texts: The Norton Anthology of Poetry, shorter edition
Homer, The Odyssey, translated by Robert Fitzgerald
Mary Zimmerman, The Odyssey: A Play
Anton Chekhov, Three Sisters, adapted by David Mamet
Shakespeare, As You Like It
Assignments for the grade: Four five-page papers, midterm and final.