Compare-contrast essay of Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice on one topic chosen from the list below.
Topics:
First impressions and later understandings
Marrying a person/marrying a family
Parents and children
Reading and its consequences
Self-expression and self-command
Communication modes
Within your selected theme or issue, develop a compare and contrast thesis about the two novels in a short essay of around 750 words, using evidence (details and quotes) from the two novels to develop your thesis. You need to shape an original and specific interpretive thesis. Examples of meeting and not meeting that standard are below.
Some of the topic areas are very general to give you a lot of opportunity to shape your idea.
Others are more specific and may be a better choice if you need to save your energy for writing the essay. All invite consideration of gender, sexuality, age, class, and other social identifiers, so dont feel you have to avoid these while you focus on the issue.
Regardless of your choice, the essay must be your own work: please do NOT use sources beyond the novel. Because you dont have time to research any historical contexts, do not make historical generalizations (i.e. men and women all married for money in Austens time).
Here are examples of meeting, and not meeting, this standard in your thesis:
Meets standard: While reading plays an important role in both Novel A and Novel B, the specific works mentioned provide another layer of meaning that extends what Austen says in the main parts of the plot.
(NOTE: this would be way too demanding to anatomize in a short essay, but it would be a fun longer paper.)
Meets standard: Surrogate parents are less effective than the actual parents in (novel title) and more effective than them in (second novel title) because of their understanding of the social dangers for young women would work.
Does not meet standard: Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility are alike and different regarding the issue of the influence of literature.
(this thesis introduces the topic but doesnt make any specific points about the similarities and differences.)
Does not meet standard: While the Dashwood sisters, the Bennet sisters, and Edward Ferrars have at least one parent in the novel, Willoughby, Wickham, Mr. Darcy, and Mr. Bingley do not.
(these are facts, not interpretation; you may develop an interpretation about the facts, though.)