<p>
[QUOTE]
Wow. That is impressive.
[/QUOTE]
Thank you. </p>
<p>You are also mis-using the word diction. Diction is a little bit closer to tone than what I think you think it means. A good example of difference in diction is how you would speak with your friends vs. how you would speak with your grandmother. It's more like chosing words appropriate to your audience.</p>
<p>equine99,</p>
<p>That makes sence. I always thought it was the word choice. Thanks for informing me!</p>
<p>Again, NOT trying to be "mean" but in a college level intro english class, they will expect you to know what words like diction mean. Do you have a firm understanding of the words tone and voice? I HIGHLY reccomend that you take the slightly lower level class, because you need to have a strong foundation. Again, it isn't your fault if you weren't tought these things (or were tought them incorrectly), but you still need to learn them.</p>
<p>Actually, I just looked up the definition and it appears I am correct.
<a href="http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/diction%5B/url%5D">http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/diction</a>
[quote]
choice of words especially with regard to correctness, clearness, or effectiveness
[/quote]
I know about countless different english terms; e.g, antithesis, alliteration, epistrophe, parallelism, anaphora, allegory, irony, allusion, synecdoche, and this is just me starting to list them.</p>
<p>psst. apostrophe.</p>
<p>Ok. Since I spent the better part of an hour going through this thread (gosh why is this so freaking addictive?), I'd like my opinion to be known.</p>
<p>TheCaliforniaLife, I'd like to inform you that especially as a college student, specifically as a prospective english major, you will HAVE to be able to take criticism to be successful. More importantly, you will HAVE to be able to apply comments to your writing. Personally, I take criticism much better when I am given commentary on what I did correctly along with what I did poorly. Once you are given this sort of criticism, you will be able to more effectively edit your own works and gain strength as a young author.</p>
<p>I only read bits and pieces of your essays as I'm quite busy (I am in the process of writing my master's thesis), but below are my comments on your 'As I lay dying' essay (ironically, the only of the books I have read).</p>
<p>Though you make a good point regarding the motive of the book, your introductory paragraph is vague and needs more beef. For example, you mention fulfilling a loved one's final wish is interpreted as a final act of love. Give an example, either from your own life or a well-known proverb. Also, it is a very poor habit to place subjective modifiers in front of character or author names. He's William Faulkner, not the 'expetional literary artist, William Faulkner', not everyone believes he was exceptional and you lose that portion of your audience immediately. </p>
<p>You make decent arguements, but they are worded in such a fashion that it is much too complicated to read. You need to explain more (i.e. engage your reader). Explain the quotations rather than allowing them to over-run your essay. A good argumentative essay will convey to the reader the themes of the book without having to read the book beforehand. </p>
<p>Another missing point in this essay is a counterthesis. Is there any support for Anse completing this task selflessly? This can actually help an essay to convey to the reader that you have completed your homework and understand both sides of the arguement.</p>
<p>It's not uncommon to be at this place going into college, but be aware that unless you change your attitude, you will likely do poorly in either class if you aren't able to listen and apply criticism to your works.</p>
<p>Also, it doesn't speak highly of you to post essays you completed nearly a year ago in their incomplete format. It suggests you are lazy and overconfident about your skills, both of these character traits (if you indeed have them) lead to many students demise in college.</p>
<p>I just read this thread too, but I'm not as generous as Ophiolite and therefore, only have a few quick comments instead of an in-depth analysis of your essay. Personally, I feel the English Fundamentals class that you were placed in originally, is exactly what you need. Why are you so opposed to it? Go to that class the first week, get the syllabus and see if it feels worthwhile. Ask the professor if you can come to office hours to discuss and have their input on these example essays you included. Perhaps, you will respond better to criticism in-person, because you really are not responding very well to it in this thread.</p>
<p>lanie22,</p>
<p>I don't know if you are trying to say I spelt apostrophe. If you are, I meant epistrophe:
<a href="http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/epistrophe%5B/url%5D">http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/epistrophe</a></p>
<p>ophiolite,
Thank you for your time. I love criticism on my work. This is the main reason why I would come in during lunch to have my teacher review my work. I was a little fustrated with my mother earlier for not wanting to help me practicing driving so I can take my drivers test. I am sorry if I snapped at anyone. I didn't wholeheartedly mean to get angry. I just got a fustrated with the people who have never heard of my writing model.</p>
<p>Do you think my work deems going into a non-transferable-credit english course just so I can get into the regular english course or does it show enough ability?</p>
<p>Good luck on your master degree thesis!</p>
<p>"I love criticism on my work." </p>
<p>LMFAO</p>
<p>"I was a little fustrated with my mother earlier for not wanting to help me practicing driving so I can take my drivers test. I am sorry if I snapped at anyone. I didn't wholeheartedly mean to get angry. I just got a fustrated with the people who have never heard of my writing model."</p>
<p>Oh yeah, TheCaliforniaLife, it's perfectly ok to use your mom not taking you driving as an excuse to vent on us... no problems here. [/sarcasm]</p>
<p>by the way, you spelled "frustrated" wrong. (more than once). <-- thats reason enough to justify staying in the English Fund. course.</p>
<p>harsh .</p>
<p>TheCaliforniaLife,</p>
<p>Just choose one and submit it. See what happens. Learn from your mistakes; better yourself. You don't need to let others mock you.</p>
<p>Cliques will inevitably exist on forums. Much of what has been said is unwarranted. Indeed, many of your critics don't have impeccable grammar or style themselves.</p>
<p>"harsh ."</p>
<p>^^^ do you know how much of a waste of time my day has been checking on this thread again and again, spending my time crafting FULL PARAGRAPHS of advice for this guy, only to find out that he's mad because his mom won't take him DRIVING and THATS why he was giving us a hard time??? harsh? I think not.</p>
<p>do you feel better now?</p>
<p>I think a lot of what makes your essays sound pretty immature is that your writing is so simple (big awkward words aside). An excerpt from your "Siddartha" essay for reference:</p>
<p>Inadvertently, Siddhartha subsequently possessed The Four Noble Truths at the time of his enlightenment. The first noble truth is know suffering. His life with the aesthetics involved losing his desire for property, clothing, sexuality, and all sustenance except that required to live. One would learn to fast, to endure terrible weather conditions, such as the extreme cold, the extreme heat, etc. This is inadvertently how Siddhartha possesses Dukkha, The first Noble Truth. Siddhartha expresses this - Siddhartha learned a great deal from the Samanas; he learned many ways of losing the Self. He traveled along the path of self-denial through pain, through voluntary suffering and conquering of pain, through hunger, thirst and fatigue. He traveled the way of self-denial through meditation, through the emptying of the mind through all images. Along these and other paths did he learn to travel. He lost his Self a thousand times and for days on end he dwelt in non-being. But although the paths took him away from self, in the end they always led back to it. Siddhartha even understands but doesnt connect the fact that he is actually gradually attaining enlightenment by experiencing each of what he is learning and that what he learned while with the Samanas was several of The Noble Truths. The second Noble Truth is to abandon origins which are a cause for suffering. When Siddhartha left his father and his whole childhood behind to become a Samana, he, again inadvertently attained Samudaya by abandoning his origins. The third Noble Truth is Nirodha, which is knowing there is an end to suffering. And Siddhartha's soul returned, had died, had decayed, was scattered as dust, had tasted the gloomy intoxication of the cycle, awaited in new thirst like a hunter in the gap, where he could escape from the cycle, where the end of the causes, where an eternity without suffering began. Moreover, Siddhartha learned about the end of his own suffering when he was with the Ferryman and he learned to speak to the river. The forth Noble Truth is knowing The Eightfold Path. This is the part of The Noble Truths that Siddhartha wholly learned from his traveling.</p>
<p>Too many of your sentences start with "This..." or "The..." or "He...," and almost all of them are painfully simple subject-verb construction. They need variation; the way it is now, it reads choppy and simple. It also switches tense around a lot. When writing a literary essay, you always want to write it in the present tense.</p>
<p>Another thing--a huge pet peeve of mine--is that your quotes need to be worked into your own style of writing. If you say: The third Noble Truth, Nirodha, is the knowledge that "an eternity without suffering [begins]" after death, it communicates exactly the same sentiment in a fraction of the words. As it stands now, your essays are all far from concise. (Also, you should cite the page number where you found this quote in parentheses at the end of the sentence you use it in.) </p>
<p>When you learn to make your point as powerfully as you can in as few words as possible, then you give yourself room to expand into real analysis, which this essay in particular sorely lacks. My English teacher always said to write as if your audience already knows everything about the book. If you were to remove all the simple facts about the book from your paper, you'd be left with about half a sentence, if that. Had I read the book, your paper would tell me absolutely nothing. My teacher also has a "proof times 2" rule, which means for every assertion you make, you must support it with two specific examples from the text. Unfortunately, I'm not sure your essay makes any interpretive assertions at all.</p>
<p>Finally, I would break up this paragraph into two, at "Truths. The second...." And please change your concluding sentence; it says absolutely nothing to help your paper.</p>
<p>Please don't take any of this the wrong way--I'm trying to help you make your writing better. That being said, I would strongly recommend enrolling in the English class you tested into. If you take it seriously and with an open mind, I really believe such a class will improve your writing immensely.</p>
<p>(PS Out of curiosity, what was your AP English score?)</p>
<p>RBase07,</p>
<p>I never once pulled you out for your spelling mistakes. It is actually immature to put each one of my online comments under a magnifying glass. I could easily point out your mistakes as well.</p>
<p>"The ten-second-look-up-in-a-five-dollar-thesauraus "verbiage" you speak of isn't even all that great,..."</p>
<p>I'm did that only to prove a point. No one is perfect.</p>
<p>luckycharms,</p>
<p>Thank you for your advise and critique. After reading those essays again I have noticed some of those errors. I tried my best to provide 2 textual evidences for my essays. Sometimes in the alloted time this is extremely difficult.</p>
<p>I never took the AP English exam. A lot of personal reasons went into that choice. My father passed away 1 month before and I wasn't emotionally reading for it. I took my teachers version of the test a couple months later and received a B- to B+ (from what I recall).</p>
<p>
[QUOTE]
choice of words especially with regard to correctness, clearness, or effectiveness
[/QUOTE]
</p>
<p>It is exactly what I said it was, choosing appropriate words. From what you've shown (using overly complex language=not clear or effective) you do not have a solid grasp of it. Here's another example where your diction was incorrect:
[QUOTE]
he sure doesnt seem willing to give up money. With the money he basically stole
[/QUOTE]
Do you see how your diction is off here?</p>
<p>Here's another deffinition I found on the internet that is clearer than the one you presented:
n 1: the articulation of speech regarded from the point of view of its intelligibility to the audience</p>
<p>this thread frustrates me</p>