Mariah Critique

113 Essay Critique Critiqued by: 106 AP LIT, A4 3/26/09 This essay struggled with addressing the prompt fully, and I think that because the author was unsure about their stance on the prompt, they were only able to make generalized insights about the novel. The introduction of the essay contains a ton of passive sentences that do not exactly push the essay towards one idea. Their thesis does address one of the topics in Death of a Salesmen, but it does not depict how Willy Loman’s attachment to the past effects his actions, attitudes or values. The following body paragraphs contain mostly plot summary that are controlled by topic sentences that are too vague and just reiterate the thesis. I think this essay could be greatly strengthened if the author makes the thesis more specific, narrows her topic sentences down to a singular thought, and then adds commentary after every piece of evidence or “pot summary.” The essay is always falling back on the phrase “living/returning to the past” and while that is something that must be explained in the essay to address how Willy is connected to the past, it is non-productive for the author to use it as a crutch phrase to base all other analysis on. The idea that Willy is separated from reality is a statement. To become an interesting piece of analysis the author needs to make an abstract idea from that fact. The author should ask questions like what is significant about Willy’s separation from reality? What does this say about Willy’s character? Addressing a more abstract concept rather than an obvious fact from the book will make the essay stronger and probably allow the author to come up with better evidence and add some pertinent

commentary. I would give this essay a high four simply because it is not completely off topic, but it only vaguely addresses the prompt and makes clear the meaning of the work. The analysis is superficial and too general.