For this assignment, I decided to revise my literary analysis paper. I was truly proud of the work I had created. After a quick look-over, I noticed several features of it that made me come to this conclusion:
1) Before this piece, my writing had been characterized by a few elements which clearly distinguished my paper from others. It was concise and strongly-worded. However, when I was assigned the analysis, I took a different approach. I had planned to develop a longer paper, with good wording spread across it fairly. Personally, I think this idea was the proper approach to a paper -- it emphasizes the saying: "quantity is a quality in itself." My literary analysis introduced me to another style of writing which was met with good feedback, so I'll be striving to use it in the future.
2) The simplicity of all of my errors presented in the paper frustrates me and creates a goal to perfect this paper, ridding it of these silly flaws. These mistakes can be corrected with the stroke of a few keys, nothing major. Problems associated with my paper are nothing severe, such as ideas or organization, but elementary errors.
Despite the reasons I wanted to use this paper, it has numerous faults, as indicated above. These errors fall under the categories sentence fluency, conventions, and formatting.
1) Right off the bat, Dr. deGravelles pointed out flaws involving my formatting. Both my heading and my page number had the incorrect font, which hurt the quality of my paper.
2) I had two issues involving the introduction of quotations. Instead of using a colon, I used a semicolon in two different situations. Keep in mind, this was before we learned about methods in which a writer introduces quotations and examples of what to stay away from (Dating Spider man, etc.)
3) In my introduction paragraph, there were two problems, one about tense shifting and another was just repetition. My first error jumped from Thiong'o uses (present tense) to Thiong'o developed (past tense). This is very easily solved by replacing the "ed" of developed with an "s." My second fault was in the sentence: "With a few exceptions, development of Kamau's emotions follow Freytag's pyramid, with a few exceptions." After seeing this in my paper, I facepalmed.
3/18 - 30min., 3/19 - 30min., 3/20 - 30min., 3/22 - 30min., 3/23 - 45min.
Total - 165 min., Moribito (pp 145 - ~215)
No need to face palm :). It sounds like you've identified some specific issues to address. Try to think more generally about how you might improve the paper. Your discussion with a writing fellow may help you find other possibilities for growth.
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