1.2 A Common Dilemma
Jeff is not happy. His clock shows 2 a.m., but his computer screen shows nothing. For the last four hours he has tried to get started on an essay on William Shakespeare’s The Tempest, but he just doesn’t know where to begin. “It’s Professor Johnson’s fault I’m in this mess,” he thinks to himself. “My other teachers always told me exactly what and how to write, but Professor Johnson asked us to focus on what each of us finds important about the play. She even told us that no one knows Shakespeare’s real intentions, and that a million ways to analyze the play are possible.” Jeff slams his hand down on the table. “If this is true, how do I know when I’ve found the right interpretation?” And Professor Johnson made it even more difficult for Jeff by instructing her students not to summarize the plot or give unsupported opinions, but to come up with their own interpretations, show why they are important, and justify them through close readings of particular scenes. “No one has ever shown me how to do this,” he grumbles to himself as he gulps down his third cup of coffee.
In actuality, Jeff already possesses the ability to write an analytical essay, and he would have realized this if he had considered a discussion he had with his father just a few hours earlier when he called to ask for more than his usual college allowance. In making his case, Jeff utilized all the elements of academic analysis in a deliberate and effective manner.
First, he has to consider how to state his request in a manner that will not sound ungrateful or overly demanding:
Jeff: Dad, I know you and Mom are helping me out as much as you can, but could you please float me a few more bucks this month?
Father: I’ve already sent you a check; why do you need more?
Jeff expected this question and has already chosen his answer by carefully selecting only those details that will help him to sway his father to give him what he wants:
Jeff: My books are really expensive this term; plus I have to pay lab fees. Oh, and I need to contribute to the fraternity charity drive.
Father: I don’t understand; I thought we gave you enough money for all of these expenses.
Jeff must now explain how the examples he just provided justify his original request because obviously his father does not see the need as clearly as he had hoped:
Jeff: Well you should know that textbooks are much more expensive now than they were when you were in college, and I’m afraid that my fraternity wasn’t able to raise enough money with our ice cream social to give the orphans tickets to the circus.
Father: Am I supposed to pay for the orphan’s enjoyment and your education? You need to be more responsible with the money we give you.
Jeff has only one more chance. He has to show his father that his decision to teach his son a lesson is less important than what will happen if the money is never sent:
Jeff: I guess you’re right. I don’t really need to buy all my textbooks; one professor said that only 25 percent of the midterm will be on it, which means if I study the other books really hard, I might still pass with a C, and Cs get degrees. And I am sure the orphans will get over not seeing the circus. They need to get used to disappointment; it is a hard world, full of mean people who don’t care about children.
Father: (Sigh) How much do you need?
The Functions of Analysis
To convince his father, Jeff had to carefully evaluate the situation to develop a point of view that he could support and justify. In doing so, he made plenty of assertionsStatements that present an interpretation of a particular piece, event or issue., statements that present points of view; used examplesSpecific passages, scenes, events, or items that inspire our assertions., specific passages/scenes/events/items that inspire these points of view; gave explanationsStatements that reveal how the examples support or complicate the assertions., statements that reveal how the examples support and/or complicate the assertions; and provided significanceStatements that reveal the importance of the analysis to personal and cultural concerns., statements that reveal the importance of the analysis to both personal and cultural concerns.
AnalysisA way of examining a subject by expressing, supporting, examining and showing the importance of our opinions on it. is a way of understanding a subject by using each of these elements, expressing an opinion (making assertions), supporting that opinion (including examples), justifying that opinion (explaining the examples), and showing why the opinion matters (extending the significance). The second letter in the second component (examples) helps create the acronym AXESAn acronym for analysis that reminds us to include each of the four components: assertions, examples, explanations, and significance., which is the plural form of both axe and axis. This acronym provides a way not only to remember the four components but also to visualize them working together. Like an axe, analysis allows us to “chop” our subjects into their essential components so that we can examine the pieces more thoroughly, and, like an axis, analysis inspires insights that become the new reference points around which we rearrange these pieces.
Though a complete analysis always needs to use these elements, the reasons for engaging in it may vary widely. For instance, sometimes the goal is to persuade the reader to accept an interpretation or to adapt a course of action, and other times the goal is to explore several possible interpretations or courses of action without settling on any one in particular. But whether the goal is to persuade, explore, or enlighten, analysis should always spring from a careful examination of a given subject. We always tell our students that they do not need to convince us that their points of view are correct but rather to reveal that they have thought about their subject thoroughly and arrived at reasonable and significant considerations.
The exact structure and form of an analysis will vary depending upon subject, purpose, and audience. Though an analysis should include attention to each of the four main components, it should not be written in a formulaic manner, like those tiresome five-paragraph essays that you might recall from high school: “I spent my summer vacation in three ways: working, partying, and relaxing. Each of these activities helped me in three aspects of my life: mentally, physically, and psychologically.” At best, formulaic essays serve as training wheels that need to come off when you are ready for more sophisticated kinds of writing. Rigorous analysis doesn’t rely on formulas or clichés, and its elements may occur in different orders and with various emphases depending on your purpose and audience. In fact, individual elements may sometimes blend together because a section may serve more than one function. With practice, you won’t even need to recall the acronym AXES when producing an analysis, because you will have mastered when and how to express each of its components.
A Question of Balance
Though it would be impossible to outline all the possible manifestations and combinations of these elements of analysis, this book will help you to create, balance, and express each of them with precision, clarity, and voice. The first task is to make certain that all these elements are present to some degree throughout your paper, because when any one is missing or dominates too much, the essay starts to drift from analysis to a different mode of writing. Consider, for instance, how Jeff could have gotten off track when trying to respond to the following speech from The Tempest, when the character Prospero becomes morose as the play he is putting on within the play becomes interrupted:
Our revels now are ended. These, our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits and
Are melted into air; into thin air.
And, like the baseless fabric of this vision
The cloud capped towers, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
And like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep (Act IV, Scene 1: 148-57).
Response 1: Review (Assertion emphasis)
This is a very famous speech about how our lives are like dreams. No wonder Shakespeare is such a great playwright. He continuously and brilliantly demonstrates that he knows what life is about; this is why this is such a great speech and I would recommend this play for everybody.
Assertions are necessary to communicate your points of view, but when you make only declarative statements of taste, your essays will seem less like analyses and more like reviews. A review can be useful, especially when considering whether a movie might be worth spending money on, but in an analysis you should not just state your opinions but also explain how you arrived at them and explore why they matter. For instance, Jeff could have looked more carefully at the text to specify how Shakespeare connects our lives to dreams, which, in turn, might lead to a more nuanced discussion of how this applies to his own life.
Response 2: Summary (Example emphasis)
First, Prospero gets angry because his play was interrupted, causing his magical actors to disappear. Next, he shows how everything will dissolve in time: the sets of his theater, the actors, and even “the great globe itself.” He concludes by comparing our lives to dreams, pointing out how both are surrounded by sleep.
Like a review, a summary can sometimes be useful, especially when we want the plot of a piece or basic arguments of a policy described to us in a hurry. However, a summary stops short of being an analysis because it simply covers the main aspects of the object for analysis and does not provide any new perspective as to why it is significant. Though you need to provide examples, you should select and discuss only those details that shed the most light on your points of view. Always remember that people want to read your essay to learn your perspective on what you are analyzing; otherwise, they could just examine the piece for themselves. Again, more attention and thought could make this far more compelling. If Jeff stopped to consider why this particular part of the play was worth summarizing, he’d be on track to offering an interpretation as to why the interruption of the play within the play causes Prospero to lament the brevity of life in general.
Response 3: Description (Explanation emphasis)
In Prospero’s speech, Shakespeare points out how life, plays, and dreams are always being interrupted. He makes a lot of comparisons between these different areas of existence, yet makes them all seem somewhat similar. I never really thought about how they are all so similar, but Shakespeare helps me consider ways that they all kind of fit together.
Though you should explain how you derived your assertions from your examples and not just let the piece speak for itself, you should not do so in too general a manner. You do not want to give the impression that you are trying to remember the details of a piece that you are too lazy to pull out and reconsider, but that you are engaging in a close reading or a careful consideration of all the aspects of an issue. Your analysis should seem like it was a challenge for you to write, and not something that you pieced together from vague recollections. Because Jeff’s reader may not share his views, he should have gone on to explain how and why he sees similarities “between these different areas of existence” both within and outside of the text.
Response 4: Tangent (Significance emphasis)
This speech reminds me that life is short. My father keeps telling me that life is over before you even realize it, and he should know because he’s getting pretty old (he’s in his late forties!). I think it also shows that it’s important to be careful about what you dream of because these dreams may affect the way you choose to live your life. I dream about being a famous surfer and that’s what makes me try hard to be one.
If an essay had no significance, the reader might constantly think, “So what?” You might provide a very close reading of the piece, but unless you have a reason for drawing our attention to it, your essay will not leave the reader with anything new or important to consider. Be careful, however, not to leave the piece completely behind when discussing why it matters, or your essay will seem less like an analysis and more like an excuse to deliver a soapbox speech or to write about something that is easier for you to discuss. Had Jeff gone on to discuss how the line “we are such stuff as dreams are made on” speaks to his desire to live his own dream of becoming a famous surfer, his readers might understand how his goal is relevant to an analysis of the play rather than seeing it as being off-topic.
Response 5: Analysis (attention to each aspect)
In The Tempest, William Shakespeare connects plays, lives, and dreams by showing that while each contains an illusion of permanence, they’re all only temporary. The “baseless fabric of this vision” of “cloud capped towers” may immediately refer to the painted sets contained within the “great globe itself,” the name of Shakespeare’s theater. Yet when we measure time in years rather than hours, we can see that most of the real “cloud capped towers” of the Seventeenth Century have already faded and at some point in the future even the globe we live on will disappear and “leave not a rack behind.” Likewise, it is not just the actors who are “such stuff as dreams are made on,” but all of us. We are unconscious of the world before we are born and after we die, so our waking lives mirror our sleeping lives. Thinking of it this way leaves me with mixed feelings. On the one hand, I find it a bit disturbing to be reminded that neither we nor our world are permanent and all that we do will dissipate in time. On the other hand, it inspires me to enjoy my life further and not to worry too much about my inability to accomplish every one of my goals because nothing I do will last forever anyway.
Had Jeff not waited until the last minute to write his essay, he might have come up with a paragraph like this last one that gives adequate attention to each of the elements of analysis. The main assertion that our dreams, our lives, and our creative works only provide an illusion of permanence sets the analytical stage in a compelling fashion. The examples are well chosen and intelligently explained. For instance, the analysis shows that whether we see the “cloud capped towers” as actually existing or as paintings on the sets of the stage, they both have succumbed to time. Finally, it reveals the significance of the author’s perspective without coming to a trite conclusion or skipping off on a tangent. In general, the analysis reflects the thoughts of a writer who is engaged enough with the text to take the time to carefully consider the quote and reflect on its implications. Though the paragraph could use a more thorough development (especially of the significance) and a more deliberate style, it certainly reveals a more compelling analysis than the previous four paragraphs.
So is it a waste of time to write paragraphs that mostly consist of summaries, opinions, descriptions, or tangents? Absolutely not. Thinking and writing are not separate processes but occur simultaneously, and we often need to produce responses that focus on one of these simpler rhetorical modes before we can understand the underlying complexity that allows us to develop a more thorough analysis. And Jeff will experience essentially the same thinking and writing process when he switches from his Shakespeare essay to the ones he’s composing for his courses in history, political science, and psychology. It may not be as easy to compose academic essays on these subjects as it was for him to convince his father to send more money, but with patience, dedication and the right attitude, he may even be more satisfied with the result.
Exercise
Write about a time you tried to persuade a friend of your point of view on an issue. What assertions did you make? What examples did you use to back them up? How did you explain how you saw the examples? How did you reveal the lasting significance of the decision that you wanted your friend to make? How did these components take a different form the next time you tried to persuade your friend to see a different subject in a new light?
A Productive Attitude
So much of writing comes down to the attitude we have when we begin it. First and foremost, we should resist the desire to simply get through the writing as fast as possible. Taking time can save time, especially when we make the effort to understand the surface meaning of a subject before pondering its deeper significance. For instance, to understand the previously discussed passage from The Tempest, you might need to look up some of the more obscure or archaic terms such as “revels” or do some general research to learn that The Globe was the name of Shakespeare’s theater and that a “baseless fabric” would refer to a painted set within it.
With this general understanding you can begin to formally write your essay, but be careful not to try to produce a formal draft too soon because sometimes you can get writer’s blockA psychological state in which one is unable to continue the process of writing, usually due to the desire to produce a final draft before considering the ideas more fully. when you haven’t taken the time to thoroughly explore your ideas. If you get stuck and do not know where to begin your analysis, go back and write out your thoughts less formally. This will help you to think (and get more excited) about what you want to write. At the same time, don’t wait too long to get started, because motivation usually comes after you’ve begun the process. Often when you force yourself to start writing you will discover new insights that will ignite your desire to find even more. Even we, as English Professors, seldom feel like sitting in front of the computer and wracking our brains for another writing session, but once we get started and become excited by what we produce, several hours may just zoom by without us even noticing.
Of course, this happens only when we get into the act of writing itself and shut off the voices of self-doubt. Most of us carry a committee of past teachers and critics in our heads, a committee that constantly questions every word we write: “Can’t you find a better way to put that? This piece of writing is terrible and it will prove to everyone that you were an imposter all of these years.” Thoughts like these do not, of course, motivate us, but instead make us want to leave our desks to see what’s on tv or in the fridge. To get anything accomplished, therefore, we first have to make a deal with these voices of self-doubt; if they will be silent long enough to let us get out a draft, then we will go back over the writing with a more critical eye later.
Once we start writing we have to remember that it is not a linear procedure, moving steadily from invention to writing to revising. Instead, writing is a recursive processA process, like writing, that moves back and forth between its various aspects without a set sequence or order. in which all of these functions may go on simultaneously. Writing emerges out of an increasingly complicated discussion between writers and their words. As we put the words down on paper or on the computer screen, we take a step back, consider their implications, and add, delete, rearrange, or modify them until they express our views in a clear, precise, and thorough manner. This often takes several drafts. Writing is not a skill (something you can master after a few lessons), but an art, and, like any art, you can never perfect it. In fact, the better you get at it, the more time and effort you need to devote to it. Any child can learn to play “Chopsticks” on the piano before even having a formal lesson; however, a concert pianist must spend hours practicing everyday before being satisfied with a performance. Likewise, when in high school, we might get by with only writing one draft of an essay before handing it in, but in college it takes substantial revision before a paper may be considered acceptable.
To help your writing go more smoothly, find a good place to work, relatively free of distraction, and set aside a certain amount of time that you plan to devote to the assignment. Ideally, try to spend between two to three hours a day writing; less than that does not give your ideas adequate time to develop, but more than that tends to make you feel like you’ve exerted your analytical muscles too hard (which is another reason not to wait to begin the essay until the day before the assignment is due). Also try to break the writing into smaller tasks, focusing on one section of analysis at a time, to avoid the feeling of being overwhelmed by the magnitude of the project. Remind yourself that the section you work on might appear anywhere in the finished draft and that you do not have to write the essay in the same sequence that it will later be read. You can always change the order after you have a chance to articulate your thoughts more fully.
By this we do not mean that you should write in the exact manner that we or anyone else do. Some writers like to outline their papers before they begin; others like to discover their ideas while composing. Some like to begin their assignments early, and others get added inspiration from the adrenaline of a looming deadline. Additionally, your composing process may vary, depending on your subject and the nature of the assignment. For instance, if you know a subject well, you may not need to do as much additional background reading as you would when tackling one that’s less familiar, and if the assignment does not allow you to hand in additional revisions, you might want to start it earlier to make certain that you have the time to fully develop your main ideas.
Having said all this, there is a common way that most of us go about forming an analysis, at least initially. As you will see in Chapter 2, once you’ve learned something about a subject and considered your general feelings toward it, you can carefully examine the key examples to establish your main perspective or working theses. Afterward, as you will see in Chapter 3, you can modify and justify these perspectives by explaining how you derived them and by considering their broader implications. After considering your essay, you may choose to present your perspective as an argument, discussed in Chapter 4, or as ambivalence, discussed in Chapter 5. However you go about it, to contribute something worthwhile to the ongoing discussion on your subject, you need to slow down the process of analysis to fully consider the relevance of each of its features. Doing so will not only help you to understand and appreciate the subjects you analyze for your classes, but also can make you more successful in your future endeavors.
Whether you go into business, medicine, law, or any other profession, you will be expected to develop, present, and defend your opinions. Simply having a wealth of factual knowledge will continue to have less and less importance in this information age, where people can get basic answers by picking up their cell phones or searching with Google. More significantly, when people cease to think critically and analyze established knowledge, both social and academic progress stagnates. Just imagine what the world would be like today if teachers had given up on analysis five hundred years ago and continued to allow students only to memorize what we knew then about all academic subjects. We’d still be living in a feudal society, riding around on horses, and facing a life expectancy of around thirty-five.
Furthermore, analysis can also help us to understand and change those parts of our lives that often matter more to us than our careers and contributions to academic knowledge. We don’t have to take Socrates’ phrase “the unexamined life is not worth living” as seriously as Thoreau did and escape to a cabin in the woods to look at ourselves without distraction. Yet we can all benefit from slowing down from time to time to think about our daily activities, key relationships, and future goals and consider how we might make each more fulfilling. If we learn to examine and avoid the mistakes we have made in the past, we are more likely to take control of the present and move toward a more promising future.
Exercise
List at least three goals you hope to achieve in your personal and/or professional life. For each of these, write a short paragraph about how your ability to achieve the goal will be much more likely if you are able to both develop and articulate your thoughts more effectively.