Analytical essay on short story (STX)

Her kan du se to eksempler på, hvordan et analytical essay til 12 om en short story kan se ud. Det første eksempel stammer fra STX A, mens det andet er fra STX B. 

Eksemplerne er dog også relevante for short story-opgaverne på HHX A og HTX A, da de har stort set samme instruktioner (dog er det kun STX A, som har et direkte krav om stilistisk analyse af en bestemt del af teksten).

STX A - Eksempelbesvarelse

Denne eksempelbesvarelse tager udgangspunkt i en opgaveformulering fra skriftlig eksamen i Engelsk A på STX fra den 20. maj 2019, som handler om novellen "Let's Go to the Videotape". Vi har også skrevet en study guide til novellen. 

Losing your partner can be devastating, and even more with a child involved. On top of handling your own grief, you need to manage your child’s. As a remaining parent, the responsibility of parenthood weighs heavily, and you may be struggling to face the painful emotions and move on. This struggle is portrayed in Fiona Maazel’s short story “Let’s Go to the Videotape” from 2016. Since losing his wife, Nick has been caring for their 5-year-old son Gus, but father and son find it hard to talk about their loss. When Nick wins a TV show, he believes it could be the start of a happier life.

The story is told by a limited third person narrator which follows Nick’s point of view. The action starts in medias res when Nick and Gus are in the studio waiting for the result of the video contest. Nick submitted a funny video he made of Gus crashing his bike. The story includes several flashbacks, and already in the first one we learn about the making of the video, the tragic loss of Gus’ mother in a car accident where the blame is still waiting to be assigned, and how Nick and Gus have been hit hard by it (ll. 1-25). The first sentence of the story foreshadows a problem in Nick and Gus’ relationship: “The finalists were him and some other people, but really there was just him. Him filming his boy.” (l. 1). Th...