Click here for the introduction to the Round and Square series "Assignments"
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| [a] Distant View RF |
If you are not enrolled in an autumn semester 2012 course at Beloit College called The New Yorker and the World, you may wonder what this is all about. The post is an assignment, in "real time," for my students, but it is part of a larger "project" in which I intend to show readers who are interested what actually happens in my classes. Although I am just one example among many hundreds of thousands, I am doing this because I wish more teachers "showed their work," precisely the way those of us (of a certain age) had to do in math class back in the day (not to mention English class for the seventy-four living people who still remember diagramming sentences). For more on the Round and Square topic called "Assignments," please click on the introduction to the series.
Assignments, New Yorker, The New Yorker and the World,
This is a two-part post. Click below for the other "half" of the assignment.
This is a two-part post. Click below for the other "half" of the assignment.
The New Yorker and the World
Autumn 2012
Midterm Review Essay Assignment
Harold Ross's New Yorker
Overview
You have packed a great deal into the last nine weeks. Beyond the basics of arriving on campus, meeting new people, signing up for classes, and adjusting to food service dining hours, you have been doing a little bit of reading. Let's review. You have looked through whole months of The New Yorker from its storied past—February 1925, November 1929, August 1936, December 1941, August 1945, July 1947, and, finally, December 1947. In our little FYI enclave, we have just come to the end of Harold Ross's tenure (1925-1951) as the first editor of The New Yorker.You have learned a whole bunch (as we are said to say back home). Now you will write about it.
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| [b] Past RF |
Your midterm assignment for FYI asks you to write a review essay that analyzes the editorship of Harold Ross through the lenses of the magazine, the books you have read, our discussions in class, and your own "takes" (never forget that word) on his work. In addition to actual "primary source" material (The New Yorker itself), you have read a number of texts that historians usually call "secondary sources." These are the things—written or drawn later and with perspectives that often have the advantages and disadvantages of passing time—that contextualize the stuff of Harold Ross's lived experience. Among this latter group, you have read Ben Yagoda's The New Yorker and the World it Made, Brendan Gill's Here at the New Yorker, and James Thurber's The Years With Ross. You have also had the "opportunity" to look through Thomas Kunkel's biography of Harold Ross, Genius in Disguise (not required but useful).
That's a whole bunch of stuff.
In fact (the word-irony is intended), there is so much material there that you just might find yourself buried in detail. This is not optimal, since I am asking for an essay in the range of 2,000-3,000 words (words...not pages). That is, depending on the font you choose, somewhere in the range of 6-10 pages. We'll get to the details soon, but let me say here, at the outset, that 2,000 will barely get the job done. I have put that number in as a rock bottom minimum. This is not a minimum that will garner you a very high grade (even Ernest Hemingway would probably lack proper development in that range).
You should aim to end up with a word count somewhere in the 2,700-3,000 range—maybe a little bit less, and maybe even a little bit more. Hear me clearly, people: you need not write much more than that. For example, 5,000 words will probably get you a good grade, but almost exactly the same one that 3,000 properly developed words would have accomplished. There is a downside, too. Sheer verbiage often leads right back to the problem that too little has. Both share almost all of the same traits (except industriousness). If you write (much) more than 3,000 words, you are doing it for yourself. I will read it, but you probably should be spending your time on other things. It is unlikely to help, and it might hurt (sixteen sloppy pages are much worse than ten merely moderate ones).
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| [c] Expert RF |
So...you have a bunch of books and magazine issues. You have thought about the quizzes, which have asked about covers, cartoons, advertising, historical matters, and writing styles of different eras. You have also (let us not forget) written four Talk of the Town pieces, with accompanying illustrations. You know a lot. You know more about The New Yorker than all but a handful of subscribers. You are, in your own way, an expert on the early years of the magazine. I am not in fear that this word will lead you astray. It is unlikely that you will mistake your expertise for all-knowingness. I stress the word expert, though, because most students tend to notice how little they know, and many are incapacitated by it. In reminding you that you know a lot, I am telling you that you are ready. We'll worry about the larger, Socratic implications of it all later.
You are ready to write your first real review essay.
The rest of this assignment will be nuts-and-bolts, dealing with review-essay form, audience, and project details. The first paragraphs (above) matter more than you might think, so I hope that you did not just skip down to the details. Context matters in everything, but it is especially so in new assignments. A review essay is not a book report, a term paper, or even a "Talk of the Town" piece. It requires that you "channel" your readings while remaining ever in charge, ever the expert (or at least "learned guide"). Your readers will need you, and the paragraphs above are more important than they might seem. Reread them if need be.
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| [d] Genderpast RF |
Write a review essay of about 3,000 words (about ten pages) analyzing the world of Harold Ross's New Yorker (1925-1951). It will be a "formal" essay in the sense discussed under #2 on my style sheet, but remember: "formal" does not mean "stuffy." Don't lose the wonders of that "Talk of the Town" voice you have developed. Just channel it for a new assignment. You will weave what you have learned from many sources into an essay that reviews their messages and incorporates your own.
Review Essay
One of the best explanations of the "review essay" came in my first FYI (back in the early Neolithic). I was explaining the difference between a book review and a personal essay, when a particularly perspicacious student shouted:
Oh, I get it! In a book review, it is all about the book.
In a review essay, the book is a prop!
Think about that. For all the little quibbles we may have with the statement, it is about the best, brief explanation ever put forth. In a book review, our job is to give the reader the best possible sense of the book itself, without getting in the way. There will always be an author to be found, but it should be all (or mostly) about the book. In a review essay—what you are writing here—you need to take charge. In other words, it is a great deal more like a "Talk of the Town" piece than you might have thought. You need to "report" on the books (and magazine issues), but the message is yours.
Never forget this. In the context of our class discussions, you will be reporting on Harold Ross's New Yorker and the books that have been written about it. Indeed, it will be much more like a "Talk" piece than I hinted above. The reason I don't say that it is exactly like "Talk" is because you need to focus your energy on "reporting" (analyzing, interpreting) on the books with more discipline than is required in some "Talk" pieces.
As we discussed, there are many good examples of review essays in The New Yorker. If you have been reading movie reviews, you will have seen a range of "personal engagement" already. Reviewers are unafraid to give their opinions, but they (almost) always show a deep knowledge of the films being reviewed. This is much more complicated than "I laughed, I cried..." or "two thumbs up..."
In the next post, we'll wrap up the assignment with discussion of preparations and nitty-gritty details. Click below for the second half.
This is a two-part post. Click below for the other "half" of the assignment.
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| [e] Enclosed RF |
This is a two-part post. Click below for the other "half" of the assignment.
Harold Ross's New Yorker 1 Harold Ross's New Yorker 2 |
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