Critical Essays

"Critical" refers to judgment, and in the case of essays, we are talking about judging art. An art critic judges the quality of art. He answers the questions "Is it good?" and "What makes it good?" We will be more concerned with the latter question, because the works I've selected for us to analyze ARE UNQUESTIONABLY GOOD!

Critical essays in modern culture include movie and music reviews. Notice that these critics are experts in their field of art and they pay attention to specific artistic considerations: Music critics talk about instrumentation, rhythm, vocals, motifs, and dynamics. Movie critics talk about acting, camera work, special effects, themes, and scripting. Art critics talk about color, balance, detail, texture, rhythm, and symbolism. As literature critics, we will talk about theme, figurative language, tone, imagery, rhythm, etc. Art critics also talk about the artistic impact a piece has on its audience, which is a more subjective but equally valid type of commentary.

The best way to approach this task is to alternate between concrete details from the work and your own original, artistic commentary on those details. And, of course, you must package each paragraph with topical and concluding sentences. You will use a similar pattern in each body paragraph:

TS - CD/CM/CM - CD/CM/CM - (opt)CD/CM/CM - CS.

Also, each body paragraph will be devoted to a single artistic consideration, for instance one paragraph analyzing theme, one on imagery, and one on figurative language. Hopefully, this formula will help you write the best critique possible. As a novice critic, it is helpful to have a "recipe" like this on hand to help you organize your thoughts. I will not grade you on perfection of the formula, only on the resulting quality of writing. But trust me - the formula will be helpful.

TIPS FOR WRITING GOOD COMMENTARY:
1. Don't just re-state the CD
2. Use artistic terms like imagery, mood, theme, symbol, metaphor, simile...
3. Be artistic and interpretive. Go deep. Read some good critical pieces for inspiration, such as Sister Wendy's art critiques, other artistic analyses of Biblical texts, or just good literary essays.
4. Don't tell me the passage is good or marvelous or wonderful. Just tell me what makes it good.

Here are your topic options:
Matthew 5:1-16 (The Beatitudes)
Luke 1:39-56 (Mary's Song)
John 1:1-18 (In the beginning was the Word...)
I Corinthians 13:1-13 (Love is patient...)

Things I am allowing you to do on this essay:
1. Select your own paragraph topics. Any relevant literary concern.
2. Do one extra short "single-chunk" paragraph if necessary. Or, you can skip one paragraph for a total of 4 instead of 5. I am not as concerned with quantity of writing as I am with quality of writing. But there is a difference between concise writing and slack/skimpy writing!
3. Combine personal writing with critical writing. This means that you may refer to yourself in the first person and you may also use the commentary sentences to relate the verses to something personal.

EXTENDED DUE DATE: Wednesday 12/17