Choose two of these questions and write an insightful, cohesive essay in response to each. Be sure to have a clear thesis and support it with specific textual examples and careful analysis (28 points each).
- In an increasingly digital age, where we offload our memories to external devices, what role should memory play in our lives? As we’ve discussed, our identity is constructed via memory, and we’ve seen many characters who struggle because they fail to remember properly: Aeneas fails to remember his mission when he dawdles in Carthage, Dante doesn’t remember Beatrice’s beauty after she dies, Kaushik struggles to find proper ways of remembering his mother. Using three of our texts, make an argument for how we should train and use our memories.
- How should we make our home in an earth which was our home but which has been damaged by our fall? How do we make a home here in exile in such a way that cultivates us to dwell later in our restored home? Make an argument that answers these questions by drawing on three of the texts we’ve read this semester.
- How is the interpretation of a literary text similar to going on a long pilgrimage or journey? We’ve read about Aeneas journeying to found Rome, Dante’s arduous travels through the afterlife, Art traveling home after the war, Mark Twain gallivanting through Europe, and Hema and Kaushik traveling in search of knowledge and opportunity. Journeys cultivate certain virtues, they can be slow and difficult, they depend on the support of friends, and their effects linger long after they end. Using two of the texts we read, explain how interpreting a text is like going on a pilgrimage.