Assignments for The Short Shorts
Day One
1. Read “Writing a Response Paper” on pp. 43-49 of the Kirszner text.
2. Read Eggers’ Accident. Choose one of the stories and write a 250-word response paper.
3. Read Holzer’s “Love and Other Catastrophes: A Mix Tape” and create a mock piece as to what
would be on your mix tape.
Day Two
1. Read “Writing a Comparison-Contrast Paper” on pp. 50-60 of the Kirszner text.
2. Read Bender’s Jinx and write a 200-word paper comparing/contrasting the two main characters.
Day Three
1. Read “Writing an Explication” on pp. 60-72 of the K text.
2. Read Wallace’s Incarnations of Burned Children and explicate the text in 200-words.
Day Four
1. Read “Writing a Character Analysis” on pp. 72-94.
2. Read Updike’s Oliver and create a 200-word character analysis.
3. Read Kincaid’s Girl and create a 200-word cultural analysis.
Day Five
1. Readpp. 95-151 about Writing in Literature.
2. Expand one of the above papers to adhere to the MLA format and in-depth analysis like the
examples given.