Promotional text that accompanied Francine Prose’s 2007 book Reading Like a Writer: A Guide for People Who Love Books and for Those Who Want to Write Them, the primary text for this course, summarized Prose’s aim in writing the book:

Long before there were creative-writing workshops and degrees, how did aspiring writers learn to write? By reading the work of their predecessors and contemporaries, says Francine Prose. In Reading Like a Writer, Prose invites you to sit by her side and take a guided tour of the tools and the tricks of the masters. She reads the work of the very best writers—Dostoyevsky, Flaubert, Kafka, Austen, Dickens, Woolf, Chekhov—and discovers why their work has endured. She takes pleasure in the long and magnificent sentences of Philip Roth and the breathtaking paragraphs of Isaac Babel; she is deeply moved by the brilliant characterization in George Eliot's Middlemarch. She looks to John Le Carré for a lesson in how to advance plot through dialogue, to Flannery O'Connor for the cunning use of the telling detail, and to James Joyce and Katherine Mansfield for clever examples of how to employ gesture to create character. She cautions readers to slow down and pay attention to words, the raw material out of which literature is crafted.

Grading Standards

The grade the instructor gives is a professional judgment of the quality of the student's submitted work and grades are based on shared assumptions and expectations. At the most basic level, the instructor expects that assignments will be submitted on time. Late submissions will not be graded and will receive a grade of F or 0. Submitted assignments are to be clearly focused and organized, with a discernible thesis statement. Generalizations and conclusions are to be adequately supported and, when appropriate, research documentation is to be well integrated and effectively presented. A formal writing style is required, along with proper grammar, punctuation, and spelling.  It is also important that students and faculty have shared expectations regarding the grading of assignments.

The grade of A reflects excellence. The A paper offers a well-focused and organized discussion appropriate to the instructor's assignment, reflects critical use of relevant materials, and demonstrates effective and formal writing requirements. Papers involving research and outside sources must demonstrate outstanding efforts to identify varied pertinent sources, to employ those materials critically in the text of the papers, and to provide error-free citations of those resources. 

The grade of B represents an effort beyond satisfactory and indicates the paper was completed in an appropriate and competent manner and, in general, demonstrates a strong attempt at original and critical analysis, writing, and research. The B paper may contain a number of minor errors of grammar or citation, and its thesis or its conclusions may be undeveloped or too weakly supported.

The grade of C indicates that the paper was done in a satisfactory or appropriate fashion and represents the average work expected for university courses. The presentation is organized around a central idea with arguments supported by relevant examples. The paper is structured into correctly written paragraphs and sentences. Although fulfilling the assignment, the C paper may exhibit one or more weaknesses including, but not limited to, errors of punctuation and grammar, imprecise or incorrect word use, inaccurate or uncritical use of materials, occasional inconsistency of organization or development, and lack of direct relevance of the selected research materials to the topic. 

The grade of D indicates that the paper may have a poorly defined topic or thesis, lack clear focus or organization, and contain unsupported generalizations or conclusions. Research support is inadequate, not clearly relevant, or improperly documented. A less-than-minimal research effort is evident. The paper may also suffer from numerous or major formal writing errors.

The grade of F indicates that the paper is not clearly relevant to the assignment and that its topic and thesis are poorly focused or defined. The paper may display inadequate organization or development, unsupported generalizations, and nonstandard formal features (including language usage, sentence structure, paragraphing, and so on). Research support is absent, inadequate, or irrelevant to the assignment.

SCHEDULE

Schedule

(Sample Only: A detailed schedule for the term will be provided in class).

Week One: Introduction, Close Reading, and Words

Course introduction, syllabus distribution.

Reading:  Francine Prose, chapter one, “Close Reading,” and chapter two, “Words.”

Week Two: Sentences and Paragraphs

Reading:  Francine Prose, chapter three, “Sentences,” chapter four, “Paragraphs.”

Week Three: Narration and Character

Reading: Francine Prose, chapter five, “Narration,” and chapter six, “Character.”

Assignment 1 due.

Week Four: Dialogue and Details

Reading: Francine Prose, chapter seven, “Dialogue,” and chapter eight, “Details.”

Week Five: Close Reading in Practice

Assignment 2 due.