Paper #1: Approaches to Analytical and Critical Writing

1. This paper must be turned in at the beginning of class on Friday, September 27; it is worth fifteen percent of your final grade. Your grade will be based on the thoughtfulness and attention to detail that you show in writing the paper as well as the strength and quality of your theses and supporting arguments. In addition to submitting a copy to your instructor, you should provide a copy to each of your classmates by posting a copy of your paper to the Canvas Discussion Board.

2. The paper should be no shorter than five pages in length, and the format should be precisely as follows: double-spaced, 12-point Times Roman font, 1-inch margins top and bottom, and 1.25-inch margins right and left.

3. The paper content should be divided into two parts. Each part of the paper should have a central argument or thesis. In the case of the first part, this is likely to be a simple observation of either a pattern or no pattern in the readings.

4. For the first part of the paper, extract the analytical observations made by each of the four authors about the first movement of Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony. Summarize the analytical points and underlying premise of each author, making comparisons where indicated, in about three pages of prose.

5. For the second part of the paper, evaluate carefully how ONE of the authors has used his or her analytical observations as the basis for interpretation. Again, be sure to organize your ideas about the author’s work around a central argument or thesis of your own. This part of the paper should be about two pages long.

6. Cite any direct quotations you include from any of the four authors using footnotes according to Chicago Manual of Style. Refer to Turabian, A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses and Dissertations as a guide for formatting of footnotes.

7. Review of papers will be conducted during Week 6. You will be assigned a paper to critique as well as criteria for the critique as part of the review. Further details concerning the review will be forthcoming.

List of Readings

Brown, David. Tchaikovsky: A Biographical and Critical Study. Vol. II: The Crisis Years (1873–1878). New York: Norton, 1982. 159-174.

Dahlhaus, Carl. Nineteenth-Century Music, trans. J. Bradford Robinson. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989. 266-268.

Kraus, Joseph C. “Tchaikovsky.” In The Nineteenth-Century Symphony, ed. D. Kern Holoman. New York: Schirmer, 1997. 311-315.

McClary, Susan. Feminine Endings: Music, Gender, and Sexuality. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1991. 68-79.

I don’t know how to write the topic for this paper, so please also write the topic for me, and for the sources, I don’t care how many sources you are going to use, so it’s up to you.