I was first exposed to close reading in high school, and I’ve really enjoyed it ever since. I love the idea of looking for more within what I initially see, because I often find so much. The intricate analysis required for close reading is always a challenge, but one that I embrace because it pushes me to truly examine the writing in front of me. Breaking down and appreciating the little nuances of writing and the author’s choices is always so interesting, and it has made me a better writer in return.
The first two essays included in this section were written my freshman year, in English 124 (Academic Writing and Literature). For this course, I read four novels and wrote a rhetorical analysis essay for each. I had to choose a passage in the book, no more than two pages in length, and construct an argument about the novel based on what I found within that passage. My first essay, The Reality of Beliefs, focuses on a short story in The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien. This was the first college essay I wrote, and I was (and still am) very proud of it. My second essay, Escaping the Depths of Domesticity, analyzes a section of Alice Sebold’s The Lovely Bones. This essay is particularly special to me, because my professor gave me incredible praise upon returning it to me. He also read a section of it aloud to my class as an example of what close reading should look like, and this made me feel like I had really gotten a hold of the style.
My third essay was written at the beginning of my junior year for English 225 (Academic Argumentation). This class focused on songs and scholarly articles about hip-hop, which was an unconventional yet highly interesting topic. Mirror, Mirror is an analysis of the third verse of Eminem’s song “My Darling.” I struggled with this essay, as its three-page limit forced me to be very concise with my thoughts, but writing it was a really great experience.