Write a 2-page literary analysis of one of the short stories from the assigned readings for Module 02, explaining how the author used characteristics of modernist literature or dystopian elements to create the dominant theme of the short story. You should include two of the terms used in your Module 02 literary terms exercise, and highlight the unique elements utilized in either modernist or dystopian fiction from your reading this week. Consider the following:
What was the main theme of your chosen story? (This is the main idea or message of the story). Examples of theme might be man vs. technology, man vs. nature, love, death, coming of age, freedom, the hero or heroine’s quest, etc.
If you chose a dystopian story, what vision of the future did the reading reflect?
Which of the literary terms or characteristics of modernist fiction did you find in your chosen story? (See your lesson content and literary terms in Module 02 for more on these).
Focus as much as you can on how this short story exemplified the genre you have selected. You will also find it helpful to research the selected work online and in our library. You may use more than one article for your paper. Research includes at least one outside library article on the work selected.
Your paper must be written in APA format. Use the APA template from the Course Guide to complete this assignment. You should have an APA cover page; two full pages of essay text with in-text citations, quotes, and lines from the readings; and a reference page.
40 Short Stories: A Portable Anthology
“The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin
“Araby” by James Joyce
“A Hunger Artist” by Franz Kafka
“The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson
Yiu, A. (2003). Three-dimensional reading: Stories of time and space in Japanese modernist fiction, 1911-1932. University of Hawaii Press.
“Hell in a Bottle” by Yumeno Kyusaku
Haddon, M. (2003). The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time.
Continue reading this week; no assignments on this work until Module 3 (Next 50 pages recommended) (Cloud Library edition)
Literary Terms 2
Dadaism
A philosophy that rejected any s form of authority and created works which focused on mocking the establishment in art, music, and literature.
Anti-hero
A leading character, male or female, without positive attributes and status found in classic drama.
Nihilism
Total rejection of belief in anything; felt life was “meaningless”.
Surrealism
A 20th-century avant-garde movement in art and literature that sought to release the creative potential of the unconscious mind (e.g., irrational juxtaposition of images).
Stream of Consciousness
In fiction, the technique designed to represent a character’s inner thoughts, which flow in a stream without grammatical structure, punctuation or apparent coherence.
Utopian
A kind of fiction that imagines perfect social, moral, and physical worlds for the characters or citizens.
Didactic
A kind of fiction that is designed to present or demonstrate a moral, religious, political, or other belief or position.
Modernism
A movement that represented a radical break with conventions of the past, including religion, art, literature, and science.
Dystopian
A kind of fiction that illustrates the negative consequences of a so-called perfect society, usually created by technological advances leading to totalitarianism.
Primitivism
A recurrent theory or belief, as in philosophy or art, that the qualities of chronologically early cultures are superior to those of contemporary civilization.