English Literature and Composition FRQ 3 Guide

English Literature and Composition FRQ 3 Guide J. Scott Perry ● Avoid mere plot summary, or in other words, plot summary is death. ● For FRQ 3 you can use novels, plays, and epic poems. ● Do not use short stories or literature that lacks sophistication. When in doubt, a Classic is always good (or Classic). ● Make sure you establish the “meaning of the work as a whole”, also known as the argument of the text. It can be the “call to action”. ● Your paper, handwritten should be about two and a half pages or more. But realize a ten-page plot summary is still just summary. Introduction: Capture attention by starting broad. If you are taking my Romeo and Juliet thesis from the “Welcome to AP” video, I could start it like this. People often have the best of intentions, but that does not mean that what they do is good. There are many things that can make a good person end up doing evil, all while thinking they are playing the role of Superman. For Friar Laurence, it is his own hubris that makes him blind to the fact that his good intentions are really leading everyone to tragedy. Then put in the thesis here. Your first instinct is to start telling me about the novel, which is summary, or in other words AP death. Pick a scene that really shows what you are trying to prove. But wait, what about context? In this part, the first body paragraph, briefly tell me what happened before the scene that will prove your point. Paraphrase, but don’t make this part the main part of your essay. Now this will be the biggest part of the essay. This is where you will take the scene from the play, book, or epic poem (such as the Odyssey) and blow it up. Have “apt textual support”, which means important quotations from the text for support, and explain your reasoning. No really, a lot of apt textual support, and really explain your reasoning. Explain it to me like I am a stupid four-year-old. The AP Readers scoring this know the text, but this is like math, they want to see your work. Connect the dots for them. Explain why it matters. In the AP Rubric, this is called “support and commentary”. Keep going. This is the biggest part of the essay. Nope. Keep going. This part can be many paragraphs. Now, briefly, paraphrase how the novel ends. Logically tell me, but tell me briefly, how we get to the end. The AP Rubric has a sophistication point that is about “sophistication of argument” if you have a relevant analogy to the real world, this will help you get that point. You need the point. But make sure there is a clear transition between the part about the book, then the real world, and then back to the book. You could use phrases such as: “This is like _________ which really helps to explain the argument in the text. In ______ this is what is going on . . . And at the end, “That is why understanding _________ gives us insight into (Book title) because (Reasoning explained), and that is why (thing in the book is still relevant today.” Impacts. Explain why this matters and gives us insight. If your text has a “call to action” as the argument, then you can see why you would want to explain this. This is also a way to make the text and the text’s argument relevant. This is where you have the essay’s conclusion. It is a reversal of the introduction. Where the introduction started off general and ended in a specific thesis, this will be a rehash of the argument made in the thesis and then go broad again, showing the context to the real world. You are probably noticing how this essay is all about showing how the argument in the text is relevant to the real world and life today. If not, now you know.