ENG 2D Formal Essay Assignment
Your task is to write a formal five paragraph essay in response to one of the topics found in your novel. You will be taught how to structure your essay and how to proceed through all of the steps necessary to create a good essay.
Each body paragraph must include TWO DIRECT QUOTATIONS FROM YOUR
NOVEL. (Your essay will have a total of six quotations).
Please review the potential topics below. Most are in the form of questions.
Your thesis will be a persuasive, debatable statement in response to the question. You may also come up with your own essay topic.
Important Due Dates:
1. Topic Selected _____________________________________
2. Thesis & Outline Approved by teacher____________________________
3. Rough Draft ready for editing________________________________
4. Final Copy of Essay due (along with entire writing process). Essays should be typed and double spaced.______________________________
PLEASE NOTE- The entire essay process includes MULTIPLE DRAFTS.
Essays that do not have more than one draft MAY not be accepted. Essays that are LATE without a legitimate reason will be penalized 5% PER day every day late.
Flowers for Algernon
1. Does the novel make a definitive statement about the role of intelligence in human life, or does it simply explore this idea as an open-ended question?
2. How has Charlie changed at the end of the novel? Is he different from the person he is at the beginning of the novel, and if so, how?
3. Choose one of the following themes and attach a persuasive/opinion statement about the novel to it:
The treatment of the mentally disabled.
The conflict between intellect and emotion or happiness.
The past can have a powerful influence on a person later in life.

Every person deserves human dignity.
Both harm and good can result from technology.
Love is a saving force.
People should not be judged until their reasons or circumstances are known.
Lord of the Flies
1. Perhaps to create a perfect society was beyond the boy’s capability in William
Golding’s Lord of the Flies, but could it have realistically gotten better? How did it fall apart, and could the society have been fixed?
Write an essay that discusses what crucial errors the boys made that they actually could have made different and, thus, made a better island society.
2. William Golding has said that his novel Lord of the Flies was symbolic from the beginning until the end when the boys are rescued. During the course of the novel these symbols are constantly changing, giving us a new interpretation of the island society.
Write an essay that discusses three different significant symbols from the book.
Explain the significance of the symbol, why it is symbolic and how over the course of the novel that symbol changes. Make sure to explain why the changes to the symbol are significant to the interpretation of the novel. (remember symbols can be both objects and characters)
3.
The boys initially chose Ralph for their chief/leader in William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, a position he still claimed even in the end when all the remaining boys nearly successfully hunted him down to put his head on a stick. Considering the state of affairs at the end of his term as chief, how did Ralph measure up to the job?
Write an essay that evaluates Ralph’s performance as chief of the boy’s island society. Be sure to include specific details relevant to Ralph’s performance.
4. In the novel the Lord of the Flies author William Golding constantly has the reader questioning the true nature of humans-whether it is good or bad.
Write an essay that discusses the idea that humans are essentially good or that humans are essentially bad. Choose one side and convince your audience (me) with two detailed examples from the text and two detailed examples from the last
50 years in history that humans are essentially good or that humans are essentially bad.
5
. Maybe true “world peace” is a simple -minded dream of beauty pageant bubble-heads, but does that mean that people should stop trying altogether? Dr.

Martin Luther King, Jr. had a dream; considering “human nature” should he have abandoned it? William Golding did not write Lord of the Flies to make us feel defeated but to empower us through a fuller understanding of “human nature.”
Write an essay that discusses what lessons/insights Lord of the Flies offers that people today could put to use and how they could put it to use.
All Good Children
1. Think about the behavior controls (the vaccine) that the government puts in place for the children in All Good Children . Why do the adults decide to do this? What is their aim? Compare this behavior control with some other form of control of young people by adults in our own modern society. What is
Catherine Austen trying to warn the reader about with respect to the limits and the potential consequences that should be imposed upon controlling the behavior of children?
2. All Good Children is a book that explores the theme of government abuse of power. Explore the different ways the characters in the book are limited by the rules of the government and explain what results the limits have on the lives’ of the characters.
3. Inside New Middletown's walls, creativity is a liability instead of a gift. Explain how the authorities of New Middleton limit and control the creativity of the citizens- what effect does this have? What message is Catherine Austen trying to send about the dangers of extinguishing peoples’ creativity?
The Fault In Our Stars
1. Every book teaches us some kind of lesson. Explore the life lessons in The
Fault In Our Stars. What does Hazel learn from her relationship with
Augustus? What do Hazel’s parents learn from Hazel’s illness and how she copes with it? Choose a third character in the book who learns an important lesson by the end of the story.
2. Part of a good story involves a major shift in the protagonist (s). How do
Hazel and Gus change, in spirit, over the course of the novel? What does that change mean to teach the reader about life, love or relationships?
3. Think about the major themes of The Fault In Our Stars. A couple are listed below:
- We all face adversity in our lives and how we face it determines our integrity and worth as people.

- Challenge and obstacles make many people better people and more capable of love.
Choose one and develop that theme into a thesis by addressing how that theme operates in the novel.
Ender’s Game
1. The I.F. has control over Ender because they were the ones who authorized his birth. Does Card seem to imply that governments or international alliances be allowed to have such control over individuals?
Explore what Orson Scott Card says about the dangers of this kind of control. What message is he trying to send to his readers?
2.
Are the characters in Ender's Game realistic? What features, if any, do they share with real people? What features, if any, do they have that are unique to the book? What does this say about the way people are? What does it say about the way they should be?
3. Mazer suggests that one's best teacher is one's enemy. Who are the most effective teachers in the novel, and why?
4. What do you think of Ender's observation that "Sometimes lies were more dependable than the truth"? What message does the novel send about truth and lies? Why is this important?
5. Is isolation important for creativity and/ or leadership? Could Ender have become as good as he was through different tactics? Explore this question and make sure your opinion is persuasive and debatable.
The Secret Life of Bees
1.
In what ways does Lily change throughout the course of the novel? In the end, in what ways has she grown up? In what ways might she still be a child? What lesson does Lily’s change as a person teach the reader ?
2.
Discuss the novel’s religious symbolism. Is The Secret Life of Bees a religious novel? Why or why not?
3. How does Lily's idea of a mother change throughout the novel? What message does the novel send about the nature of motherhood?
4. How does Lily's concept of race evolve throughout the novel? What message does the novel send about race?