paper - Course Paper Prompt and Writing/Submission...

Course Paper Prompt and Writing/Submission Guidelines
Prompt
Course Papers Must Take the Following Form:
Construct a dialogue in which two playwrights we have read this semester are
discussing one another’s dramaturgy, or in which both are addressing the work of a
third. This dialogue is an exchange of ideas, including both analysis and debate.
Incorporate through what is said and how it is said the tone and concerns of the authors
(meaning, Euripides doesn’t speak in classical verse, but neither should he sound like
Kid Rock). Your choices can cross both time and space (so Shakespeare may encounter
Ibsen, for example), and the playwrights must refer to their own writing when arguing a
point. Stay only with the play read in class by each dramatist as the example of their
work. Give the conversation significance: take care not to derail into free association, a
dismissive insult match, or exchanges of trivia.
Paper goals are evidence of fluency with the material through an organized and
systematic submission, employing analytic thought, course points of focus, class
concepts and vocabulary, and some degree of original ideas.
Common Issues
Avoid the trap of spending too much time establishing the setting and providing ‘local
color’ or comic relief through incidental, expository chit-chat. Get to a point of focus in
discussing drama and theatre as quickly as possible and stick to meaningful topics.
Do not include personal biography of the playwrights in the conversation. Stating
empty historical facts and statistics serves no active purpose and wastes valuable space.
Assume your debaters know one another’s life stories already.
Do not include plot summaries of plays. Employ the convention that each has read and/
or seen the other’s play in question so that your use of that drama through supporting
examples is specific to the points under debate.
Do not allow speakers to simply exchange their points of view without engaged debate.
Consider the face off a championship match, not routine practice. There is a huge
investment in each side proving their philosophies, dramaturgy and practice are
superior.
Do not allow speakers to filibuster. An exchange of monologues is not a dialogue. Keep
the conversation active. Use the image of a tennis game—the ball must be kept in play.