My favorite author is a guy named Terry Pratchett. He was the very reason why I began to warm up to the idea of reading back in high school. To me he was both funny and thought provoking. So I was ecstatic when I learned I would be doing an assignment in a Shakespeare class where I would be have to look at a Shakespeare play and an adaptation of it. One of his books Wyrd Sisters, is a parody of Macbeth. I told my professor the idea, and she was all for me doing it. She also saw how exited I was about doing it, and she ended up giving me some advice, "Be careful writing about things you love" and wow was she right.
Let me break this down for a minute. I am not saying here to only write about things you hate. If you only write about things you hate, that will lead to just a resentment of the field. I'm also not telling you to avoid books in class that you loved academically. If you love how Beowulf shows the influence of Christianity on Angola Saxon traditions, then you should do that. No, instead the danger is when you are so passionate about something beyond just it's academic marks.
Going back to my Terry Pratchett example. I have written three papers on Terry Pratchett's Discworld series and am currently writing my under-graduate thesis on Pratchett. But every time I write it I have to go back over it and ask the question, "Am I just summarizing?" It's important to not over summarize in any paper you do, but when you are working with something you love it can happen very easily. Just writing about what happens and letting that speak for itself. While that would be great if we were storytellers, we are not. We are interpreters.
The take away from this story is not that you need to avoid texts you love at all costs. As I said, I have looked at my favorite book series many times. I say they just as a word of caution. While you may love this book, your goal for any paper is not to get the author to read the book themselves. It is still to interpret and analysis a given text.
Let me break this down for a minute. I am not saying here to only write about things you hate. If you only write about things you hate, that will lead to just a resentment of the field. I'm also not telling you to avoid books in class that you loved academically. If you love how Beowulf shows the influence of Christianity on Angola Saxon traditions, then you should do that. No, instead the danger is when you are so passionate about something beyond just it's academic marks.
Going back to my Terry Pratchett example. I have written three papers on Terry Pratchett's Discworld series and am currently writing my under-graduate thesis on Pratchett. But every time I write it I have to go back over it and ask the question, "Am I just summarizing?" It's important to not over summarize in any paper you do, but when you are working with something you love it can happen very easily. Just writing about what happens and letting that speak for itself. While that would be great if we were storytellers, we are not. We are interpreters.
The take away from this story is not that you need to avoid texts you love at all costs. As I said, I have looked at my favorite book series many times. I say they just as a word of caution. While you may love this book, your goal for any paper is not to get the author to read the book themselves. It is still to interpret and analysis a given text.
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