Sample Hum. 110 paper
Take a look at the commentary in red for recommendations on how the following writing selection has been successful and how it might be improved. Orange passages indicate some (though certainly not all) portions of the text that contain grammatical/spelling errors or that could simply be rephrased to clarify the passage's meaning. If you click on any of these passages you will be referred to resource guides, handouts, etc. that describe the rules and conventions related to the particular issue. Perhaps you can see some problems with the text that the editor did not
The Unity and Opposition of Eros and Strife
Without despair there can be no happiness; without strife there can be no love. It seems, therefore, that love is equated with happiness, and strife with the anguish of despair. In modern terms, this parallel holds true. Make love, not war: it is as simple as that. However, the fact that this is not an absolute is proven through the literary works of the Ancient Greeks. In the collective mind of such writers as Hesiod and the Greek Lyricists, love, as personified by the god Eros, is just as evil in nature as Eris, or strife, and markedly even worse. Strife seems to contain a stronger positive element and is subject to glorification while Eros is looked upon with a certain amount of dread. [Direct thesis statement. The writer could have been more forceful in his phrasing of the statement (e.g., "The Greek mindset holds that strife is a positive element subject to glorification . . . ."). The introduction is clear, but it is possible that the appeal to clichés risks not punctuating the thesis statement strongly enough. Nevertheless, it is already apparent in this essay that the writer has a clear and concise style, which is noteworthy in itself. Take ]
In describing the nature of Eros, one begins with the Theogeny of Hesiod in which the birth of the cosmos occurs through the emergence of the goddesses of Chaos and Gaia. Into this black void Eros is born, "the fairest of the deathless gods," whose existence, as a catalyst of procreation, is the means by which all gods thereafter are generated(Theog.120). Love is the force that continues the lineage of gods through Zeus down to the birth of the human race. In being the "fairest of the gods," Eros is a positive, generative force --or so it seems. The force that in one instant brings about life is also described as one that, "unstrings the limbs and subdues both mind/ and sensible thought in the breasts of all gods and all men"(Theog. 120-123). In subduing both heart and mind and through the "unstringing of limbs", love renders both gods and men helpless, weak, usurping them of all strength and potency. Here lies the evil of just such a force, for without domination and authority, both gods and men alike are viewed as lacking any worth. This is the duality of Eros, the god of Love whose power lies in both creation and destruction. [There are some really interesting ideas introduced in this paragraph, and for the most part those ideas come across rather clear. It might be a good idea to underline the duality of Eros by fully exploring each facet of that god and then comparing the two. For example, one might spend three or four sentences discussing the procreative power of Eros, punctuate the beginning of the next area of analysis-- the destructive power of Eros-- using a transitional tag such as "on the other hand," and then point out the duality in a few short concluding sentences. The ideas here are right on, but it could be much improved by playing around a bit with the organization. Still, notice the writer's transition into the next paragraph. It is direct and to the point. It might have worked to somehow link the following sentence to the previous one, but being plain and to-the-point works too!]
Love in Ancient Greece, as embodied in the deity of Eros, is an external force. [Here, the writer may want to key the reader into the fact that he is about to explain what he means by the term "external." For example, the writer might use a transitional tag like "in other words . . ." See Transitions handout.] Whereas modern culture, in focusing upon the internal, likes to speak fondly of "being in love," the Greeks seem more to have been victims of a fate wrought by the insidious god of Love:
Here I lie mournful with desire, feeble in bitterness of the pain gods inflicted upon me, stuck through the bones with love. (Archilochus, fragment 24)
Archilochus, as a writer of Greek Lyric poetry, presents in the above fragment the idea that Eros comes upon men as an overpowering force that serves only to weaken and destroy. The duality of Love in being a balance of both good and evil, is therefore tipped more towards a focus on the anguish and pain of desire--a desire for that which is beyond one's grasp.
Such yearning for the unattainable inherent in Love is also the subject of another example of Greek Lyric poetry written by Sappho. Her conception of desire forms the image of a triangle, like that of a love triangle, in which the characters are a man and a woman in intimate conversation, being observed by a distant, unknown figure. [The writer has a tendency to use sentence structures that rely heavily on the use of commas. Even though the writer tends to use commas appropriately, these sentences tend to be rather long or complicated. It would be a good idea to perform some exercises on simplifying sentence structure.] The figure addresses the woman with expressions of longing in proclaiming:
Like the very gods in my sight is he who sits where he can look into your eyes, who listens close to you, to hear the soft voice, its sweetness murmur in love and laughter, all for him . . . (Sappho, fragment 2)
[It is generally a good idea to avoid abstract nouns when you can use a specific, concrete ones. Why not "observer" or "individual" rather than "figure"?]
The feeling of longing and passion is not isolated from the destructiveness of Eros, however, because immediately following such statements of desire, the figure goes on to describe the physical sensation of jealousy as paralleled with a slow process of death. First cutting off the senses and the capacity to speak, soon the entire body is enveloped in fever; Love has become a disease in which the mind, the heart, and the body are gradually gripped with decay and eventual death. Archilochus also describes the pain and yearning of Love to a physical death, though in more symbolic terms:
Such is the passion for love that has twisted its way beneath my heartstrings and closed deep mist across my eyes stealing the soft heart from inside my body . . . (Archilochus, fragment 26)
The image of being immersed in a deep mist is a Homeric one used frequently in the Iliad when a soldier is mortally wounded as Amaryngkeus is in Book IV when Peiros plunges his spear into his enemy and "a mist of darkness closed over both eyes"(IV. 525-26).
Finally, the poetry of Anacreon plays into the concept of Love as an evil plight of mankind:
Like a blacksmith the Love God has hammered me and crushed me on his anvil, and has plunged me in a winter torrent. (Anacreon, fragment 3)
Not only does the excerpt illustrate the duality of Love in the contrast of the hot metal being plunged into ice, it is analogous with Sappho's piece in comparing the initial moments of desire in their intense heat and passion to the onset of death in which the victim is cold, unreactive, and unemotional. This excerpt also indicates that there is an inevitable change that comes about as a result of Love--a change that is much like hot metal being pounded into another shape only to be assaulted with ice, instantly frozen into a new form. Sappho illustrates this fact as well when the unknown figure uses the phrase, "I can feel that I have been changed"(Sappho, frag. 2). A transformation has occurred over which the victim has no control--a transformation instigated by an external, omnipotent force. This force, this disease, is Eros. [A powerful and appropriate conclusion to this area of analysis. At this point, the writer has introduced a score of ideas: some of them would benefit from further extrapolation, but this statement really brings things to a head for the reader.]
The nature of Eris, as the god of Strife, is introduced in the Theogeny of Hesiod as the offspring of Night. Strife is the product of darkness and the creator of war (Ponos), a "loathsome" and "capricious" being that serves as one of greater evils of this world (Theog. 226, 225). There seems to be no sense of duality, of good and bad, within this context until Hesiod eventually rejects this view for a more clearly defined interpretation in his Works and Days. In this latter version, Eris is comprised of two opposites, one destructive, another constructive. The first is the competition of battle, the rage of war in which warriors are locked in fury, contending for glory and riches. The desire for that which they have not is what leads men to this form of "oppressive" Strife. The second arises from this same desire, but instead compels men to work and struggle through manual toil to attain a greater status of increased money or land. This Strife is a positive force that "stirs even the shiftless onto work"(Works and Days,20) The view of Strife as being entirely evil has been rejected for the notion that even this "loathsome" being has the duality that lends to it a hopeful aspect: man can change for the better provided he utilizes his desire as a force that overcomes laziness, compelling him to work even harder. This change is a transformation in which the individual is not destroyed but instead lifted to a higher state. In fact, examination of what Hesiod calls the "oppressive Strife", leads to the conclusion that even within the context of war, there is hope for the better (Works and Days, 15). While war may transform a man through death, it does so by elevating him to the status of a great hero. This is revealed in the Greek Lyric poetry of Tyrtaeus:
And he who so falls among the champions and loses his sweet life, so blessing with honor his city, his father, and all his people . . .
why such a man is lamented alike by the young and the elders, and all his city goes into mourning and grieves for his loss.
His shining glory is never forgotten, his name is remembered, and he becomes an immortal, though he lies under the ground . . . (Tyrtaeus, fragment 1)
Though Eris may be defined by its destructive capabilities in this instance, for it brings about the death of many, it seems not to be an insidious, hateful force, or one that is to be avoided. Instead, it has the capacity to endow honor upon those who engage in battle, even those who are overcome with death; while "no one loves this oppressive Strife, but compulsion and divine will grant her a share of honor"(Works and Days,15-16). The death of a warrior is therefore a "beautiful death" in which the deceased is endowed with honor and immortal glory through the many stories that continue to be told for centuries following his demise. The transformation that overcomes the laborer is also a process in which Strife drives the individual towards harder work and increased honor through elevated status. Thus, while there is a duality of positive and negative, it appears that this revision in classifying Eris, has created a favoring of a more positive nature attributed to Strife. Strife is a transformation of elevation; through toil and even in death, there is honor. [The writer seemed to make a distinction between the portion of the paper dealing with Eros and the portion dealing with Eris. The latter is extremely well put and succinct, but is so much more concise than the first that the essay seems unbalanced. The writer might consider reorganizing the paper into two or three logical, distinct, but related tiers of interest. This should result in a more persuasive fulfillment of the objectives set forth in the thesis statement.]
In so many instances, Eros and Eris are one and the same and thus the writers of Ancient Greece do not exert any effort to distinguish one from the other. Their influence upon gods and men alike is such that the areas of the body which are affected by either Love or Strife are mutual to both. For example, Eros as defined by Hesiod in the Theogeny , has the same effect that Strife does upon the warrior in battle, as expressed in the Iliad when a warrior's "limbs are unstrung" and his "knees are broken"(V.176). Similarly, the heart is wrenched with pain in the Love that Archilochus claims "has twisted beneath my heartstrings . . . stealing the soft heart from inside my body"(Archilochus, frag. 26); this is the same despair that Hesiod describes in the rage of the Titans who "struggled for a long time against one another/ and did fierce battle, heartsore with strife"(Theog.,631). As a second point of similarity, these two forces are externalized as gods and therefore overcome an individual, without the victim having the capacity to exert control over their influence. Under their powers, a man yearns for and desires what he does not have, whether or not this takes the form of a particular lover, as in Sappho's poetry, or the wealth and status of another man as described by Hesiod. At this point, however, the two reveal important differences for while the yearning for Love acts as a destructive force or a disease, while Strife and the longing for something better serves to bring honor to an individual. In both, a man is transformed and it is this change that may bring about death; through Love a man decays psychologically to the point of almost a physical demise, while Strife in battle causes death physically while allowing the glory of the hero to live on forever. As a final distinction, Love is that which usurps a man's power and domination in the psychological sense so much to the extant that it drains a man physically as well, while Strife weakens through labor and battle but serves to increase what is defined as "male power" through honor and status: such is the reasoning why Eros was dreaded and Eris was glorified. [A provocative conclusion. The writer introduces several interesting arguments in this paragraph which would have been extremely effective if they had been confined to a third area of analysis of equal size to those addressing Eros and Eris. All in all, though, the paper winds down rather nicely: the last few sentences, some of the most important in any paper, are both eloquent and accurate. Take a look at the Conclusions handout]
Sources
___________. Greek Lyrics. Trans. Richmond Lattimore. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1960.
Hesiod. Theogeny/Works and Days/Shield. Trans. Apostolos N. Athanassakis. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1983.
Homer. Iliad. Trans. Richmond Lattimore. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1961.
[Accurate and well-formatted bibliographical references.]
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This paper addresses some very interesting distinctions between the Greek notions of Eros and Eris: it provides abundant and appropriate support for its subarguments and explains those subarguments in a relatively clear and direct manner. The writer might consider reorganizing the paper in such a way that the three areas of analysis implicit to the essay are more equal (in length and content) and apparent. A good strategy for this might be to write an outline of the paper's current structure to see that similar aspects of Eros and Eris are being addressed in each section. Transitions (especially "transitional tags" such as "nevertheless" or "however") between ideas would clarify the direction of the paper to a great extent. Some very important issues are being discussed in this essay: it would be a shame if readers lost interest due to structural imbalances!