\

Present a commentary/critique on a chosen

creative nonfictional text representing a particular Creative Nonfiction

type or form (Biography/Autobiography,

Literary Journalism/Reportage, Personal
Narratives, Travelogue, Reflection Essay, True
Narratives, Blogs, Testimonies, Other Forms)
HUMSS_CNF11/12-IIb-c-17
Self-Learning Module (SLM)
Quarter 2 - Module 8: Critique Types and Forms of Creative Nonfiction:
Memoir First Edition, 2020

Republic Act 8293, section 176 states that: “No copyright shall subsist in
any work of the Government of the Philippines. However, prior approval of the
government agency or office wherein the work is created shall be necessary for the
exploitation of such work for a profit. Such agency or office may, among other things,
impose as a condition the payment of royalties.”
Borrowed materials (i.e., songs, stories, poems, pictures, photos, brand
names, trademarks, etc.) included in this module are owned by their respective
copyright holders. Every effort has been exerted to locate and seek permission to
use these materials from their respective copyright owners. The publisher and
authors do not represent nor claim ownership over them.

Development Team of the Module

Writer: Cynthia I. Lontoc

Editor: Mary Rose D. Dilay
Reviewer: Joseph F. Jambalos
Illustrator & Layout Artist: Geriza R. Rico

Printed in the Philippines by Department of Education – Division of Oriental

Mindoro

Office Address: Sta. Isabel, Calapan City, Oriental Mindoro, 5200

Telefax: (043) 288-7810

E-mail Address: oriental.mindoro@deped.gov.ph

 MODULE 9:
Critique types and forms of Creative Nonfiction:
MEMOIR

IN A NUTSHELL
Good writing is essential and should be the desire of every ” student specifically the students taking Creative Nonfiction. Creative

writing may include your journey to meeting many writers from

different backgrounds. You will understand the complexities of their
works and the power of their minds. You can also share your creativity
in appreciating the diversity of people. You complement the products
of different writers and the choices they made in crafting their
nonfictional texts. Further, as students of this class, you can trace the
history that influences nonfictional texts written by various writers.
Since you will find ways to search about the story behind the text or it
may be stated in the text.
In this module, you may also get familiar with the literary
techniques and criticisms that can be considered in understanding and
analysing different types and forms of nonfictional texts such as
biography (story of people’s life that are written by other people),
autobiography (someone’s personal account of his/her own life),
memoir or personal narratives, critiques or reviews, reflective essays,
and other nonfictional texts. You had to explore also others’ stories or
experience alongside the writers.

TARGETS UNLOCKED
At the end of this module, you should be able
to
1. Present a commentary/critique on a chosen creative nonfictional text
representing a particular type or form (Biography/Autobiography, Literary
Journalism/Reportage, Personal Narratives, Travelogue, Reflection Essay,
True Narratives, Blogs, Testimonies, Other Forms)

CHECK YOUR SCHEMA

In the previous lessons, you get familiar with some literary terms.
Check your understanding with some of them in this activity.

Task 1: Try To Remember

Directions: Analyze the statement and put a check ( ̸) to all correct statements.
Put a sad face ( ) to those incorrect statements.
Example: ̸Theme is unseen and usually unstated yet it is vital.
 1. All the elements of the stories must add up to a theme.
2. Theme cannot reveal the writer’s whole world of life, of how the world works---
or fails to work.
3. A theme is the same as moral, which is a rule of conduct.
4. A theme is usually a much more complex and original revelation about life.
5. The central message communicated by a literary work is theme.
6. External conflict takes place when the character struggles mentally to
resolve opposing needs, desires, or emotions.
7. Internal conflict is when the character struggles against an outside force---
nature, another person, a machine, or even a whole society.
8. Figurative language or figure of speech is meant to be taken literally.
9. Symbol is often an ordinary object, event, person, or animal to which we
have attached extraordinary meaning and significance.
10. Parallelism as literary technique in writing is made of similar construction
of ideas in words, phrases, clauses, or sentences.
11. Style is the particular way a piece of literature is written---not what is said but
how it is said.
12. Choice of words or diction, imagery, dialogue, length of sentences,
structure, and tone do not contribute to the style of a writer’s work.
13. Memoir is a form of nonfiction in which the writer recalls significant events
and people in his or her life.
14. Critiquing is a systematic way of objectively reviewing a masterpiece to
highlight both its strengths and weaknesses and its applicability to practice.
15. Formalistic critics spend much time analyzing irony, paradox, imagery,
metaphor, setting, characters, symbols, and point of view.

MAKE CONNECTIONS
Congratulations for answering Task 1. You will encounter some of
them in Task 2. Try how well you can recognize them as you read the given
text.

Task 2: Search Me
Directions: Read the given text carefully and try to answer questions 1-3.

After that fourth night, that proud night, that triumphant night, I was the only
subject. Simmons invited no more candidates to the platform. I performed alone every
night the rest of the fortnight. Up to that time a dozen wise old heads, the intellectual
aristocracy of the town had held out as implacable unbelievers. I was hurt by this as if I
were engaged in some honest occupation. There is nothing surprising about this.
Human beings feel dishonour the most, sometimes, when they most deserve it.
(From The Autobiography of Mark Twain).
 1. In this text, find out which of the following is considered by Mark Twain.
Get the literary devices used from the list below.
second person point of view
first person point of view
personification
parallelism
characters
imagery
symbols
setting
theme

2. What does the underlined word mean?

PROBE & EXPLORE

Congratulations for doing task 2. This time you may know Frank
McCourt as Barbara Sande Dimmitt recounted his experience in school.

Task 3: Moving On
Directions: Read the recounted experience carefully and answer questions 1-3.

1 A born storyteller, McCourt drew from a repertoire of accounts about his

youth. His students would listen, spellbound by the gritty details, drawn by something
more powerful than curiosity. He’d look from face to face, recognizing a bit of himself
in each sober gaze.
2 Since humor had been the McCourt’s weapon against life’s miseries in
Limerick, he used it to describe those days. “Dinner usually was bread and tea,” he
told the students. “Mam used to say, ‘We’ve got our balanced diet: a solid and a
liquid. What more could we want?”
3 The students roared with laughter....
4 One day McCourt lugged a tape recorder to class. “We’re going to work on
writing. Each of you will tell a story into this,” he announced. McCourt then
transcribed the stories. One boy described the time he was climbing down a fire
escape past an open window when an awful smell hit him. “There was a body in the
bed,” McCourt typed. “The corpse was all juicy and swollen.”
5 McCourt handed back the essay the next day. “See? You’re a writer!”
6 “I was just talking,” the boy protested. “ I didn’t write this.”
7 “Yes, you did. These words came out of your head. They helped me
understand something that was important to you. That’s what writing’s about. Now,
learn to do it on paper.” The boy’s shoulders squared with pride.
8 The incident reminded McCourt of something that had happened at college.
A creative- writing professor had asked him to describe an object from his childhood.
McCourt chose the decrepit bed he and his brothers had shared. He wrote of their
being scratched by the stiff stuffing protruding from the mattress and of ending up
jumbled together in the sagging center with fleas leaping all over their bodies. The
professor gave McCourt an A, and asked him to read an essay to the class.
9 “No!” McCourt said, recoiling at the thought. But for the first time, he had
begun to see his sordid childhood, with all the miseries, betrayals, and longings that
tormented him still, as a worthy topic. Maybe that’s what I was born to put on the page,
he thought. (From The Education of Frank McCourt by Barbara Sande Dimmitt)
1. From what type of literary piece is the given text?
a. autobiography
b. biographical article
c. critique/review
d. personal narrative
e. reflective essay
2. Which shows the simplicity of life of the main character?
a. paragraphs1 and 2
b. paragraphs 3 and 4
c. paragraphs6 and 7
d. paragraphs 7 and 8
e. paragraphs 2 and 8
3. How do you feel about the use of comedy in such a sad story in life as
what the main character did in dealing with his life’s miseries? Have you
known persons having the same way of dealing with life’s miseries?

DEEPEN YOUR
UNDERSTANDING
Congratulations for doing task 3. Try to read and understand the
lecture below. You may also search the given literary techniques/devices and
literary criticism online.

In the previous discussion, you have learned different literary techniques or

devices. Literary techniques or literary devices include the rules, conventions,
and structures of different literary pieces.
How do writers considered these techniques in crafting their literary piece? As
they write, they consider symbol or symbolism, figurative language or figure of
speech, motif, theme, tone, setting, characters, structure, and other literary
techniques to creatively present their ideas and communicate well to their readers.
Nonfiction consists of these elements which are also found in fiction narratives.
For instance, in memoirs, you see how usually the writer uses first person and
creates an atmosphere of closeness to the readers. Memoirs focus on an individual’s
subjective reflection about events that he/she experienced. These are filled with vivid
descriptions and the writer’s own interpretations of the experience. Unlike an
autobiography, memoirs are shorter because the writer includes only specific events
and need not be written chronologically. Most memoirs share the following
characteristics:
• They usually structured as first- person narratives in the writer’s own
voice.
• Though some names may be changed to protect privacy, memoirs are
generally true accounts of actual events.
• Despite their personal nature, memoirs may deal with newsworthy
events with significance beyond the writers’ own lives.
• Unlike strictly historical accounts, memoirs often include the writers’
feelings and opinions about historical events, giving insight into the
impact of history on people’s lives.
What helps the readers see how ideas are related in literary nonfiction? For
instance, in writing a memoir, writers cite geographical details, historical details, and
personal details. It is the structure that the writer prefers to present ideas. In
analyzing the structure of a literary work such as memoir, examine the relationship
between its parts and its content.
Moreover, the writer’s easiest way to reveal the characters is to use direct
characterization---to describe directly the person’s traits, or special qualities. Other
writers reveal their characters indirectly like telling appearance, actions, speech,
private thoughts, and how other characters respond.
In a written expression, reflection, or interpretation of recollected experiences,
you analyze what part is true. As stated by Donovan, Melissa (2015), creative
nonfiction is factual so there is no room for fabrication or manipulation of the facts.
Donovan added that other nonfictional texts include memoir, biography.
autobiography, personal essays, literary journalism, speeches, or any topical
material such as food or travel writing, self- development, art, or history that can be
creatively written with a literary angle. Angle involves the scope and focus in writing
about real events.
Obviously, creative nonfiction also called literary nonfiction or narrative
nonfiction uses literary styles and techniques to create factually accurate narratives.
Creative nonfiction contrasts with other nonfiction, such as technical writing,
journalism, or informative nonfiction, which are also noted in accurate fact but not
primarily written in service to its craft. As a genre, creative nonfiction is still relatively
young, and is only beginning to be scrutinized with the same critical analysis given to
fiction and poetry.

In understanding and analysing creative nonfiction, readers may consider the

appropriate approaches in literary criticism. These enable the readers to craft
interpretative, yet scholarly judgments about the specific literary nonfiction. Readers
may answer the questions from the chosen approach to fully understand the craft of
the writer. The following are suggested helpful approaches in critiquing (systematic
way of objectively reviewing a masterpiece to highlight both its strengths and
weaknesses and its applicability to practice).

1. Historical / Biographical Approach: Historical / Biographical critics see

works as the reflection of an author’s life and times (or of the characters’ life and times).
This approach deems it necessary to know about the author and the political,
economical, and sociological context of his times in order to truly understand the
work(s).
A Checklist of Historical Critical Questions:

• When was the work written? When was it published? How was it received by
the critics and public and why?
• What does the work’s reception reveal about the standards of taste and value
during the time it was published and reviewed?
• What social attitudes and cultural practices related to the action of the work
were prevalent during the time the work was written and published?
• What kind of power relationships does the word describe, reflect, or embody?
• How do the power relationships reflected in the literary work manifest
themselves in the cultural practices and social institutions prevalent during the
time the work was written and published?
• To what extent can we understand the past as it is reflected in the literary
work? To what extent does the work reflect differences from the ideas and
values of its time?

Checklist of Biographical Critical Questions:

• What influences—people, ideas, movements, events—evident in the writer’s

life does the work reflect?
• To what extent are the events described in the word a direct transfer of what
happened in the writer’s actual life?
• What modifications of the actual events has the writer made in the literary
work? For what possible purposes?
• What are the effects of the differences between actual events and their literary
transformation in the poem, story, play, or essay?
• What has the author revealed in the work about his/her characteristic modes
of thought, perception, or emotion? What place does this work have in the
artist’s literary development and career?

2. Moral / Philosophical Approach: Moral / philosophical critics believe that the

larger purpose of literature is to teach morality and to probe philosophical issues.
Practitioners include Matthew Arnold (works must have “high seriousness”), Plato
(literature must exhibit moralism and utilitarianism), and Horace (literature should be
“delightful and instructive”).

Checklist of Moral/Didactic Critical Questions:

• What enduring truth is revealed in the theme of this work?

• How are the actions of the protagonist rewarded and the actions of the
antagonist punished?

3. Formalism / New Criticism: Formalism

A formalistic approach to literature, once called New Criticism, involves a close
reading of the text. Formalistic critics believe that all information essential to the
interpretation of a work must be found within the work itself; there is no need to bring
in outside information about the history, politics, or society of the time, or about the
author's life. Formalistic critics spend much time analyzing irony, paradox, imagery,
and metaphor. They are also interested in the work's setting, characters, symbols,
and point of view.

A Checklist of Formalistic Critical Questions:

• How is the work structured or organized? How does it begin? Where does it
go next? How does it end?
• What is the work’s plot? How is its plot related to its structure? What is the
relationship of each part of the work to the work as a whole? How are the
parts related to one another?
• Who is narrating or telling what happens in the work? How is the narrator,
speaker, or character revealed to readers? How do we come to know and
understand this figure?
• Who are the major and minor characters, what do they represent, and how do
they relate to one another?
• What are the time and place of the work—it’s setting? How is the setting
related to what we know of the characters and their actions? To what extent is
the setting symbolic?
• What kind of language does the author use to describe, narrate, explain, or
otherwise create the world of the literary work? More specifically, what
images, similes, metaphors, symbols appear in the work? What is their
function? What meanings do they convey?

4. Marxist Criticism:
Marxist criticism is a type of criticism in which literary works are viewed as the
product of work and whose practitioners emphasize the role of class and ideology as
they reflect, propagate, and even challenge the prevailing social order. Rather than
viewing texts as repositories for hidden meanings, Marxist critics view texts as
material products to be understood in broadly historical terms. In short, literary works
are viewed as a product of work (and hence of the realm of production and
consumption we call economics).

Checklist of Marxist/Cultural Criticism:

• What is the economic status of the characters?
• What happens to them as a result of this status?
• How do they fare against economic and political odds?
• What other conditions stemming from their class does the writer emphasize?
(e.g., poor education, poor nutrition, poor health care, inadequate opportunity)
• To what extent does the work fail by overlooking the economic, social and
political implications of its material?
• In what other ways does economic determinism affect the work? How should
readers consider the story in today’s modern economic setting (nationally,
globally, etc.)?

The suggested questions in the given literary criticisms or approaches will guide
you to conceptualize your analysis/critique accordingly. You will analyze which questions
are you going to answer for the introduction, which questions will be considered for the
body, and which of the questions will be reflected in your conclusion.
As critic, your decision on what to critique in the writer’s work is still crucial.
Therefore, not all suggested questions in the given approaches will be answered
when writing your critique. Anyway, there are still other critical approaches available
online and in literary criticism books. You may also consider those approaches.

PUT IT INTO PRACTICE

Congratulations! You have deepened your understanding
about our lessons. This time, it is a challenge for you to do the next
tasks. Good luck!

Task 4: Guess how

Directions: Find out how the writer reveals the character in the given situations. The
choices are given below.
A. By describing directly the person’s traits, or special qualities
B. By appearance
C. By actions and speech
D. By private thoughts
E. By the responses of other characters
1. Janet sneered, “I can’t stand Esmeralda. She’s such a snob.”
2. Esmeralda always wore gray. In fact, she looked like a small gray mouse.
3. Esmeralda rarely smiled and could be found every afternoon in the library,
taking notes on some worthwhile subject--- but she sometimes looked
dreamily out the window. Yesterday she lost her composure. “Can’t you
tell those squealing roller skaters to play somewhere else?” the librarian
was shocked.
4. Esmeralda wondered why she wasn’t like other kids her age. Why did she
sit poring over a book, while others were laughing and skating in the sun?
5. Esmeralda was the most serious person in school. She longed for fun, but she
was afraid of disappointing her aunt, who was also very serious.

Task 5: Collaborative Reading

Directions: From the given nonfictional texts, analyze/critique the theme and
techniques used by the writer. Connect to a classmate to discuss theme and specific
technique/s. Get ready to share your answers to your classmate through fb or text.
Justify your points. Kindly consider questions from your chosen literary criticism or
approach. Choose questions from it and discuss to your classmate. Remember, you
do not need to answer all questions in every approach. You may choose which is
appropriate to answer your points or arguments.
READING TEXT
The Hot Zone, by Richard Preston – Excerpt

The Hot Zone captures the terrifying true story of an Ebola outbreak that
made its way from the jungles of Africa to a research lab just outside of Washington,
D.C. In the excerpt below, author Richard Preston describes the symptoms of this
deadly virus as they appeared in one of its first known human victims.
The headache begins, typically, on the seventh day after exposure to the
agent. On the seventh day after his New Year’s visit to Kitum Cave, January 8, 1980;
Monet felt a throbbing pain behind his eyeballs. He decided to stay home from work
and went to bed in his bungalow. The headache grew worse. His eyeballs ached,
and then his temples began to ache, the pain seeming to circle around inside his
head. It would not go away with aspirin, and then he got a severe backache. His
housekeeper, Johnnie, was still on her Christmas vacation, and he had recently
hired a temporary housekeeper. She tried to take care of him, but she really didn’t
know what to do. Then, on the third day after his headache started, he became
nauseated, spiked a fever, and began to vomit. His vomiting grew intense and turned
into dry heaves. At the same time, he became strangely passive. His face lost all
appearance of life and set itself into an expressionless mask, with the eyeballs fixed,
paralytic, and staring. The eyelids were slightly droopy, which gave him a peculiar
appearance; as if his eyes were popping out of his head and half closed at the same
time. The eyeballs themselves seemed almost frozen in their sockets, and they
turned bright red. The skin of his face turned yellowish, with a brilliant starlike red
speckles. He began to look like a zombie. His appearance frightened the temporary
housekeeper. She didn’t understand the transformation in this man. His personality
changed. He became sullen, resentful, angry, and his memory seemed to be blown
away. He was not delirious. He could answer questions, although he didn’t seem to
know exactly where he was.
When Monet failed to show up for work, his colleagues began to wonder about
him, and eventually they went to his bungalow to see if he was all right. The black-and-
white crow sat on the roof and watched them as they went inside. They looked at Monet
and decided that he needed to get to a hospital. Since he was very unwell and no longer
able to drive a car, one of his co-workers drove him to a private hospital in the city of
Kisumu, on the shore of Lake Victoria. The doctors at the hospital examined Monet, and
could not come up with any explanation for what had happened to his eyes or his face or
his mind. Thinking that he might have some kind of bacterial infection, they gave him
injections of antibiotics, but the antibiotics had no effect on his illness.
The doctors thought he should go to Nairobi Hospital, which is the best private
hospital in East Africa. The telephone system hardly worked, and it did not seem worth
the effort to call any doctors to tell them that he was coming. He could still walk, and he
seemed able to travel by himself. He had money; he understood he had to get to
Nairobi. They put him in a taxi to the airport, and he boarded a Kenya Airways flight.
A hot virus from the rain forest lives within a twenty-four hour plane flight from
every city on earth. All of the earth’s cities are connected by a web of airline routes.
The web is a network. Once a virus hits the net, it can shoot anywhere in a day:
Paris, Tokyo, New York, Los Angeles, wherever planes fly. Charles Monet and the
life form inside him had entered the net.
The plane was a Fokker Friendship with propellers, a commuter aircraft that
seats thirty-five people. It started its engines and took off over Lake Victoria, blue and
sparkling, dotted with the dugout canoes of fishermen. The Friendship turned and
banked eastward, climbing over green hills quilted with tea plantations and small
farms. The commuter flights that drone across Africa are often jammed with people,
and this flight was probably full. The plane climbed over belts of forest and clusters
of round huts and villages with tin roofs. The land suddenly dropped away, going
down in shelves and ravines, and changed in color from green to brown. The plane
was crossing the Eastern rift valley. The passengers looked out the windows at the
place where the human species was born. They say specks of huts clustered inside
circles of thorn bush, with cattle trails radiating from the huts. The propellers
moaned, and the Friendship passed through cloud streets, lines of puffy rift clouds,
and began to bounce and sway. Monet became airsick.
The seats are narrow and jammed together on these commuter airplanes, and
you notice everything that is happening inside the cabin. The cabin is tightly closed, and
the air recirculates. If there are any smells in the air, you perceive them. You would not
have been able to ignore the man who was getting sick. He hunches over in his seat.
There is something wrong with him, but you can’t tell exactly what is happening.
He is holding an airsickness bag over his mouth. He coughs a deep cough
and regurgitates something into the bag. The bag swells up. Perhaps he glances
around, and then you see that his lips are smeared with something slippery and red,
mixed with black specks, as if he has been chewing coffee grounds. His eyes are the
color of rubies, and his face is an expressionless mass of bruises. The red spots,
which a few days before had started out as star-like speckles, have expanded and
merged into huge, spontaneous purple shadows: his whole head is turning black-
and-blue. The muscles of his face droop. The connective tissue in his face is
dissolving, and his face appears to hang from the underlying bone, as if the face is
detaching itself from the skull. He opens his mouth and gasps into the bag, and the
vomiting goes on endlessly. It will not stop, and he keeps bringing up liquid, long
after his stomach should have been empty. The airsickness bag fills up to the brim
with a substance known as the vomito negro, or the black vomit. The black vomit is
not really black; it is a speckled liquid of two colors, black and red, a stew of tarry
granules mixed with fresh red arterial blood. It is hemorrhage, and it smells like a
slaughterhouse. The black vomit is loaded with virus. It is highly infective, lethally
hot, a liquid that would scare the daylights out of a military biohazard specialist. The
smell of the vomito negro fills the passenger cabin. The airsickness bag is brimming
with black vomit, so Monet closes the bag and rolls up the top. The bag is bulging
and softening threatening to leak, and he hands it to a flight attendant.
When a hot virus multiplies in a host, it can saturate the body with virus
particles, from the brain to the skin. The military experts then say that the virus has
undergone "extreme amplification." This is not something like the common cold. By
the time an extreme amplification peaks out, an eyedropper of the victim’s blood may
contain a hundred million particles. In other words, the host is possessed by a life
form that is attempting to convert the host into itself. The transformation is not
entirely successful, however, and the end result is a great deal of liquefying flesh
mixed with virus, a kind of biological accident. Extreme amplification has occurred in
Monet, and the sign of it is the black vomit.
He appears to be holding himself rigid, as if any movement would rupture
something inside him. His blood is clotting up and his bloodstream is throwing clots, and
the clots are lodging everywhere. His liver, kidneys, lungs, hands, feet, and head are
becoming jammed with blood clots. In effect, he is having a stroke through the whole
body. Clots are accumulating in his intestinal muscles, cutting off the blood supply to his
intestines. The intestinal muscles are beginning to die, and the intestines
are starting to go slack. He doesn’t seem to be fully aware of pain any longer
because the blood clots lodged in his brain are cutting off blood flow. His personality
is being wiped away by brain damage. This is called depersonalization, in which the
liveliness and details of character seem to vanish. He is becoming an automaton.
Tiny spots in his brain are liquefying. The higher functions of consciousness are
winking out first, leaving the deeper parts of the brain stem (the primitive rat brain,
the lizard brain) still alive and functioning. It could be said that the who of Charles
Monet has already died while the what of Charles Monet continues to live.
The vomiting attack appears to have broken some blood vessels in his nose
and he gets a nosebleed. The blood comes from both nostrils, a shining, clotless,
arterial liquid that drips over his teeth and chin. This blood keeps running, because
the clotting factors have been used up. A flight attendant gives him some paper
towels, which he uses to stop up his nose, but the blood still won’t coagulate, and the
towels soak through.
When a man is ill in an airline seat next to you, you may not want to embarrass
him by calling attention to the problem. You say to yourself that this man will be all
right. Maybe he doesn’t travel well in airplanes. He is airsick, the poor man, and
people do get nosebleeds in airplanes, the air is so dry and thin. . . and you ask him,
weakly, if there is anything you can do to help. He does not answer, or he mumbles
words you can’t understand, so you try to ignore it, but the flight seems to go on
forever. Perhaps the flight attendants offer to help him. But victims of this type of hot
virus have changes in behavior that can render them incapable of responding to an
offer of help. They become hostile, and don’t want to be touched. They don’t want to
speak. They answer questions with grunts or monosyllables. They can’t seem to find
words. They can tell you their name, but they can’t tell you the day of the week or
explain what has happened to them. (Source: https://www.pbs.org)

REFLECT & SHARE

CONGRATULATIONS! You have accepted the challenge. Try
to share your experience and thoughts as you did those tasks.
Whatever you will share in task 6 is highly appreciated.

TASK 6: I Believe
Directions: Complete the given statement with your viewpoints/reflections.

Reading creative nonfiction gives me opportunities to __________________

__________________________________________________________________.
 ENRICH YOUR LEARNING

Great Job! Let’s read and be inspired with the great experience of our next writer.

TASK 7: Let’s Celebrate

Directions:
1. Read the text “A Celebration of Grandfathers”
Memoir by Rudolfo A. Anaya
* copy is also available online like in this link https://www.alvordschools.org

2. Answer the following questions. You may choose only 2 questions.

▪
What enduring truth is revealed in the theme of this work?
▪
How are the actions of the protagonist rewarded and the actions of the
antagonist punished?
▪
Do you think the things Anaya learned from his grandfather are relevant
to your life today? Why or Why not?
 PUT YOUR KNOWLEDGE
TO THE TEST

CONGRATULATIONS! You have successfully finished all of the given

tasks. You may check your answers in the answer sheet at the last part of this
module. Do not worry if your score is not so good. You have a great chance to
prove how much you have learned our lessons. Try to do Task 8. You may
listen/read others’ ideas to validate your understanding in our memoir read.
Since this memoir is a great read, there are many people sharing their thoughts
about it online. You may read their ideas but you must be careful in giving them
credits. GOOD LUCK! GOD BLESS.

TASK 8: At LAST!

Directions: Present an analysis/critique of the text you read ----“A

Celebration of Grandfathers” Memoir by Rudolfo A. Anaya.

You may refer to the suggested questions in the given approaches except
from the moral/philosophical approach that we used in the previous activity.
Consider an approach and choose questions to discuss in your critique.

You may consider the following points in writing your analysis:

Introduction- present the article and source, writer, thesis statement of the
article/major points of the writer, and your opinion about the text
Body- the writers main ideas and your arguments----- that is your review and
evaluation to the credibility, quality, accuracy, and methods used in
presenting information
Conclusion- state whether you agree with the writer, back up your
statements with your reasons, give general opinion

RUBRIC FOR YOUR OUTPUT-- MY SUGGESTED - YOUR SUGGESTED

POINTS (50) POINTS
Content 30
Organization 10
Mechanics 10
Sample critique of student considering New historicism approach

The Economics of Paranoia in Nadine Gordimer’s “Once Upon a Time”

By: Kylie Felker

In the short story” Once Upon a Time” Nadine Gordimer resists the
dominant discourses of South African apartheid by examining the ways in
which its social and economic machinery corroded and deformed the lives of
the white upper class as much as it did the black and immigrant underclasses.
She critiques the dominant political belief that black and white people under
apartheid were free to develop separately but equally in their own homelands
and examines the ways in which the economic system underlying apartheid
created isolation, paranoia, and violence not only for native Africans and
immigrants but for the white ruling class that ostensibly benefitted the most
from the system.

Like most of Godimer’s writings, “Once Upon a Time” can only be

understood against the historical backdrop of South African apartheid. This
collection of policies and laws was a massive social and political experiment
that stretched roughly from 1948 to 1990 in the four southernmost provinces
of Africa, which have come to be known collectively as South Africa….
… Ultimately, “Once Upon a Time” is a fable about loneliness, isolation,
fear and the way in which the economic and social policies of apartheid
annihilated human connection. The narrator lurks in her fragile house,
worrying about burglar bars and knifings and unseen landslides that may bury
the migrant workers and shatter her home like a wineglass…. Their fears, in
the form of their aggressive security systems and alarms, grow increasingly
powerful until they turn inward. Gordimer’s story points out that under
apartheid the line between the brutalized and the brutalizer is a thin one. The
members of the dominant social class have material goods, but they mutilate
their own children out of sheer terror.
 GLOSSARY
The following terms used in this module are defined as follows:

Creative nonfiction also called literary nonfiction or narrative nonfiction uses

literary styles and techniques to create factually accurate narratives.
Critique is a systematic way of objectively reviewing a masterpiece to highlight
both its strengths and weaknesses and its applicability to practice.
Literary techniques or literary devices include the rules, conventions, and
structures of different literary pieces.
Memoirs focus on an individual’s subjective reflection about events that
he/she experienced.

REFERENCES
Applebee, Arthur N., et al. (2000). The language of literature: United States of
America: McDougal Littell Inc.
Daniel, Kathleen, et al. (2000). Elements of literature: United States of America:
Holt, Rinehart and Winston

Dobie, Ann B. (2015). Theory into practice: An introduction to literary criticism. 4th
edition. United States of America: Cengage Learning
https://docplayer.net/2101047-literary-criticism-an-overview-of-approaches.html or
https://academia.edu

Layout and Illustrations: Rico, Geriza R.

Prepared by:

CYNTHIA ILAO- LONTOC

Master Teacher II
Domingo Yu Chu National High School
Division of Oriental Mindoro
Evaluated by:

MARY ROSE D. DILAY JOSEPH F. JAMBALOS, Ed.D.

SHS Master Teacher II Education Program Supervisor
Baco NHS Schools Division of Oriental Mindoro