Michelangelo and the Pope’s Ceiling
Michelangelo and the Pope’s Ceiling: Essay Guidelines
Length: 1500-1700 words
The points for the paper will be allocated as follows: 50 points for a thoughtful informative introduction; 100 points for the effective use of examples; 50 points for clarity of expression
Due: See Moodle
You should consider this an extended response paper. Consider:
1. How might you give an overview of the book to someone who is curious about it?
2. What does, King seek to do and how he goes about it.
3. Which parts of the book did you find especially interesting. Discuss them in some detail, asking yourself:
a. Why did you find them interesting? Was it the subject matter? Was it the way the narrative was structured?
b. Were you able to make fruitful connections with other art historical readings we have done, and if so, describe these connections.
c. Were there aspects of the book that you wished King had expanded on, and if so, which?
4. How did he introduce the book, and how conclude it? This would be useful to consider, because writers often find introductions and conclusions hard to do well.
The suggestions above need not be followed like a recipe, but your completed paper will probably need to consider most of them. You should be aiming for a paper that an intelligent reader with good general knowledge would be able to follow and profit from. You might model it on book reviews in magazines like The New Yorker.
Here is a checklist I have adapted from guidelines for writing exhibition reviews:
Is the title of your paper informative and engaging?
Do the opening paragraphs give the reader enough background? Do they give one an idea of your thesis or focus? Note that it is a very good idea to rework your introduction after you have drafted the whole paper.
Do you provide essential information on the author?s approach, the scope of his book, the broad divisions within it?
Do you focus on significant issues in his book, or are you diverted by the trivial or the sensationalistic? (For example, in class discussions students often wonder at the corruption of the papacy, the brutality of leaders and the sexual license of priests. We will have established that the values of 16th-century Italy are in some respects very different from our own.
Lingering over these matters and moralizing about them would not give your reader an accurate idea of the artistic achievements that King covers in depth.)
If you make value judgments about the book are these supported by evidence?
Is the tone of your essay appropriate? Do you avoid glibness, sarcasm or slang? For further information on the standards expected and the grading rubric, review the relevant sections in the guidelines for the paper on the Renaissance use of space.