make sure to put purpose/most important part first
Furthermore, to ensure my exact thought process was as transparent as possible for the students, I deliberately kept my slides minimal, choosing instead to present every solution live on a whiteboard rather than using pre-written notes.
vs.
As such, I kept my slides as sparse as possible, and I presented all solutions live on a whiteboard rather than writing them beforehand, as this method best enabled me to share my exact thought process with students.
Many works of literature feature a character who acts as an antagonist or villain, yet whose motivations, background, or inner conflicts prevent them from being purely evil. In Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights, Heathcliff commits deeply destructive acts, yet his character resists simple moral categorization.
Prompt: Write a well-developed essay in which you analyze how Brontë portrays Heathcliff’s complex nature. Explain how his morally ambiguous actions and motivations contribute to an interpretation of the work as a whole. Do not merely summarize the plot.
Q1. what are the two sides of the ambiguity?
Heathcliff perpetrates abuse but is also a tragic victim of abuse himself, begging the question, “to what degree does the latter justify the former?”
Q2. What point does this ambiguity make?
Although we may expect Heathcliff, as a victim of abuse himself, to refrain from perpetrating the same violence upon others Although readers might expect Heathcliff’s history of subjugation to foster empathy, his turn toward tyranny rather than benevolence demonstrates how (unhealed) trauma more often breeds (a cycle of) vengeance than compassion.
rv: only retain key concepts like “subjugation” and “empathy”, reader can fill in the rest
Q3. How can we flesh this out into a two-sentence intro?
In Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights, the tension between Heathcliff’s tragic childhood and his destructive adulthood envelops him in moral ambiguity. While readers might expect his history of subjugation to foster empathy and refrain from further destruction, his turn toward tyranny rather than benevolence demonstrates how trauma breeds vengeance than compassion.
Q4. How should we split the two body paragraphs?
The oppression, abuse, and neglect Heathcliff suffers as a child desensitize him to violence and humiliation.
make more general…
Through Heathcliff’s childhood, Bronte demonstrates how abuse and social alienation can can strip individuals of their capacity for empathy.
- Hindley mistreats Heathcliff by constantly reprimanding him and forcing him to work as a servant.
- Heathcliff is denied the love/marriage he wants with Catherine due to his skin color and lack of social status.
Thus, once Heathcliff returns and assumes Hindley’s position as master of the house, he uses the same tactics of abuse and degradation to avenge himself upon Hindley’s innocent son, Hareton Earnshaw. (doesn’t explain why we should be surprised that Heathcliff employs the same tactics)
make more argumentative/show why it’s surprising…
When Heathcliff returns, he subverts the expectation of mercy and continues to perpetrate the cycle of vengeance upon Hindley’s son, Hareton Earnshaw, proving that unaddressed trauma breeds vengeance rather than empathy.
- He degrades Hareton by banning him from taking lessons, thereby forcing him to remain uneducated and illiterate.
- Just as Heathcliff’s poor social status separated him from Catherine, Hareton’s involuntary lack of refinement also creates tension between him and Cathy.