Self Assessment 2

During this quarter we have studied three texts: Glengarry Glen Ross, A Doll’s House,

and the Lying Life of Adults. Each of these books were very new to me, as two were translated

from different languages and two were plays. I had never read these types of books before, (other

than Persepolis which is a translated book as well), and so my experience as a reader and writer

developed over the course of our studies. First, I adapted to a new way of taking in the text. For

the plays, I had to read between the dialogue for the unspoken messages the actors would

portray. For the translated text, I had to remember the culture and practices of the place it

originated from, and understand that literature is different across the world. Second, when

writing about these texts I had to approach my topic from a new perspective, and allow the

differences of the books to influence my work. This allowed my writing to improve as I

expanded my understanding of how to decipher and process the texts.

As these books were different from what I read before, I was quick to compare them to

what we have read previously in the class. Before, we read literary criticisms, novels, graphic

novels, and poetry, genres of books that are, although, different to what we have before, show me

the variety of texts we are studying. By reading plays and translated books my understanding of

literature is improving, because though it is impossible to cover every aspect of literature,

exploring the class in this way gives me an insight into the diversity of genres and types of texts.

However, though my perspective on literature has matured over the course of this quarter

and the past semester, I am still in need of proper essay writing and processing skills. Now that I

understand the texts and can make connections to other narratives, cultures, and aspects of even

my own life, I need a proper structural way of communicating what I know. So for this next
quarter, I need to work on my communication skills in terms of writing. I will achieve this by

writing more essays, and though that sounds too simplistic, I know that the more I write the

better I will become. With the help of the lessons I am already learning in the class and future

assignments to come, I have a good feeling that my skills will develop over the course of the

next year and beyond.