CRITICAL ESSAY PLANNING first part of question

1. CRITICAL ESSAY PLANNINGfirst part of question Choose a novel or short story in which a character seeks to escape from the constraints of his or her environment or situation. We are choosing “An Encounter” – NOTE CAPITALS AND INVERTED COMMAS

2. Second part of question • Explain why the character feels the need to escape and show how his or her response to the situation illuminates a central concern of the text. Explain why the character feels the need to escape • List 5 reasons why he might feel the need to escape:

3. Reasons to escape: • School is narrow-minded and boring • He longs for adventures like the ones he reads about • He has no outlet for his imagination at school • Teachers don’t allow him to stretch himself • He is too timid for the rough games and feels left out • Can only find release in his reading • All his games end the same way – in defeat

4. TOPIC SENTENCEStake one of your reasons and make it into a topic sentence • School is narrow-minded and boring The narrator needs to escape because his school is very narrow minded. THAT IS THE P OF PEE! NOW YOU HAVE TO SUPPORT THE POINT WITH EVIDENCE

5. The narrator needs to escape because his school is very narrow minded. Harmless children’s adventure stories had to be “circulated secretly” because Father Butler considered them “rubbish” although they were “sometimes literary” indicating that they might have some worth. They study Roman History which gives them a blinkered unrealistic view of the world. The boy looks for the sailor’s green eyes when he gets to the docks because of “some confused notion” derived from his school reading. The teacher states that the stories the boy likes are written by “some wretched fellow who writes these things for a drink” and that they are only fit for “National School Boy” – those at the poor state schools.

6. IS THIS ENOUGH?Look again at the question Explain why the character feels the need to escape and show how his or her response to the situation illuminates a central concern of the text. A reason for the boy’s need to escape has been given and some supporting evidence provided. BUT We have not yet addressed the second part of the question: show how his or her response to the situation illuminates a central concern of the text.

7. ….that they are only fit for “National School Boy” – those at the poor state schools… This needs to lead into the second part of the question - how his or her response to the situation illuminates a central concern of the text. ….There is a bigoted, stifling atmosphere at school conveyed in Butler’s outburst to the boy caught reading. A similar school regime is referred to in Araby – in which the narrator also feels trapped – and it is a central concern both of “An Encounter” and of the whole Dubliners collection.

8. The narrator needs to escape because his school is very narrow minded. Harmless children’s adventure stories had to be “circulated secretly” because Father Butler considered them “rubbish” although they were “sometimes literary” indicating that they might have some worth. They study Roman History which gives them a blinkered unrealistic view of the world. The boy looks for the sailor’s green eyes when he gets to the docks because of “some confused notion” derived from his school reading. The teacher states that the stories the boy likes are written by “some wretched fellow who writes these things for a drink” and that they are only fit for “National School Boy” – those at the poor state schools. There is a bigoted, stifling atmosphere at school conveyed in Butler’s outburst to the boy caught reading. A similar school regime if referred to in Araby – in which the narrator also feels trapped – and it is a central concern both of “An Encounter” and of the whole Dubliners collection.