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March 29, 2024, 04:05:44 am

Author Topic: Am I summarising too much? (Text response)  (Read 1305 times)  Share 

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tsukasho

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Am I summarising too much? (Text response)
« on: June 01, 2022, 07:17:50 pm »
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Our school is currently doing the Great Gatsby and after looking at the high scoring responses from vce examination reports, I realize that they don't really follow the TEEL structure and kind of integrate everything together.

I tried to replicate this, but I fear that I may be summarizing too much, however I'm not sure. Can someone please read over my body paragraph and see if this is true?

Question - "The Great Gatsby shows that living the American Dream can end in tragedy. Discuss".

Gatsby’s trait of manifesting the American Dream is initially his strong suit. Gatsby was born into a “poor family”, however his ambition led him “restless” and not contempt with his current situation. Gatsby is presented to have pursued the idea of the American Dream from a young age, as he “left his home at age 17” to seek prosperity. Fitzgerald exemplifies the hard-working nature of Gatsby through his ability to please and become a “right hand man” of Dan Cody, a rather influential man at the time. It is through this relationship that Gatsby attains the knowledge and elegance of the higher class of society, and despite not receiving his “20k inheritance” from Cody’s death, his perseverance still enables him to enter the upper class of society. In all, his manifestation of The American Dream at this point, serves as nothing else but an advantage.

TSEtuition

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Re: Am I summarising too much? (Text response)
« Reply #1 on: June 04, 2022, 10:52:55 am »
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Hi tsukasho!

I would agree with your criticism that there is definitely a lot of summary going on in your BP, but I would also add that your topic sentence (or first sentence - whatever you prefer to call it) is not helping you set clear parameters for discussion throughout the paragraph. It's difficult to discern what you're trying to argue in this BP - is it that he embodies the failure of the American Dream? that he succeeds in achieving the American Dream to some extent? Is this a criticism of the American Dream or a criticism of Gatsby's role in embodying it? Or are you examining how he achieved (to some extent) the American Dream?

I would encourage you to go back to your plan and make sure your have 3 main ideas/argument for each BP, then work on it to break it down into smaller ideas. Eg, if your main idea for this BP is 'Gatsby's can only superficially achieve the American Dream', ask yourself questions like what do I mean by superficially? how does he achieve it? what aspects does he achieve? how can I tell? what in the novel tells me this? Once you've broken it down this way, it should be easier to go back and edit your BP to reflect your ideas.

Hope that helps! :)
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