Events That Collide
IntroducedA significant event stages a value conflict
- Significant events often illustrate competing value systems that relate to a conflict present in the text.
- So an event is significant partly because it makes an abstract conflict concrete and visible.
- Ask which two value systems the event puts in the same room.
The dinner argument may be about who sits where; the real conflict is who gets to decide.
A significant event is significant partly because it...
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Ask which two value systems the event puts in the same room.
Events collide and accumulate
- Events in a plot collide and accumulate to create a sense of anticipation and suspense.
- Two verbs, and they are different: collide is two events meeting; accumulate is many adding up.
- So the analysis can be about a single meeting, or about a weight built over chapters.
Select all the ways the CED says events create anticipation and suspense.
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Two verbs, and they need different evidence.
A collision is where two lines meet
- In a long narrative, two separate developments often reach the same scene.
- The debt matures in the same week as the wedding; the letter arrives on the day of the funeral.
- That coincidence is a structure, and the scene where two lines meet is almost always worth the essay.
Collision, accumulation, or a value conflict staged?
Sort each observation by what it shows.
One quotation can demonstrate an accumulation.
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Accumulation is the point, so it needs three spaced instances.
Collision and accumulation need different evidence. A collision is two developments meeting in one scene, and one scene proves it. An accumulation is weight built over chapters, and a single quotation cannot show it — cite three spaced instances or the claim is unproved.
A collision is two separate developments reaching the same ____.
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That coincidence is a structure, and it is almost always worth the essay.
Accumulation needs several instances
- An accumulating pressure cannot be shown with one quotation, because accumulation is the point.
- Cite three instances spaced across the text and say what each adds to the weight.
- The reader should be able to feel the total from the spacing alone.
Match each claim to the evidence it needs.
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Matching the evidence to the claim is most of what makes an argument work.
An events pass
- For the event you chose, name the two competing value systems it stages.
- Decide whether your argument is about a collision or an accumulation.
- For a collision, name both lines; for an accumulation, cite three spaced instances.
Collision: the loan falls due in the same week as the wedding, so the scene must choose between two value systems — obligation to a creditor and obligation to a family. Accumulation: three refusals of help, in chapters four, eleven and twenty-two, each smaller than the last and each harder to take back.
Significant events illustrate competing value systems related to a conflict — name the two. Events collide and accumulate to create anticipation and suspense, and these need different evidence: a collision is two lines meeting in one scene; an accumulation needs three spaced instances.