Critical Response Papers: An Overview printable pdf download

Critical Response Papers: An Overview

Your critical reading and writing are vital components of your work for the program.

The critical response papers are at the core of this work. These papers are not meant to

be comprehensive or definitive. Instead, each one is intended to be an opportunity for

close inquiry, discovery, and imaginative thought. Each paper should be focused and

relatively brief, and should be guided by a thesis or argument of some kind.

A good way of arriving at fruitful topics of inquiry is to do a “self-diagnostic” in regards

to what your own writing might need. For example, if you are a fiction writer having

trouble with dialogue, you might write a series of papers that delves into the use of

dialogue in certain short stories or novels. The point is: make your critical work relevant

to your creative work. By looking deeply at the work of others, you should be refining

your idea of what you want to accomplish. And by thinking about issues of craft, you

should be approaching your own work with more rigor.

By the time you finish the program, the full body of your critical response papers—

culminating in the Critical Paper of the thesis year—will be a tangible manifestation of

your preoccupations and interests as a writer.

1st Year. You should read at least 24 books or articles during the year. With your

mentor’s guidance, this is the year in which you read widely in order to discover your

critical interests, to challenge your own craft and aesthetic, and to learn about writers

new to you. The papers should be short, usually 2-3 pages, although some topics might

warrant more space. The papers should be more about the “how” than the “what.” The

essays should not be book reports, book reviews, literary criticism, or summaries of

content. They should deal with issues of craft—that is, technical writerly issues.

2nd Year. You should read at least 15 books or articles during the year. An important

part of the dialogue between you and your mentor will be to determine the topic for

your thesis-year Critical Paper. At the least, there should be a well-defined topic at the

end of the year. In some cases, it’s advisable to have portions of the Critical Paper

already drafted by the end of the second year. The critical response papers written this

year can be freestanding essays, or they can be initial drafts towards the Critical Paper.

3rd Year. You should read at least 10-12 books or articles during the year. This may

include revisiting books from earlier years, expanded reading of a certain author or

topic, and work suggested by your mentor. The books selected should be instrumental

to your work on your Critical Paper and your Creative Thesis. There are no critical

response papers required in the thesis year. The Critical Paper is considered the

culmination of the participant’s critical reading and writing in the program.

Critical Response Papers: An Overview