RESEARCH IS INSPIRING!!!

But...only if you allow yourself the freedom to explore different topics and ideas. The more inspired you are by your topic, the better your paper will be.

READING AND READERS:

• Are teenagers reading less or more today?  Why are/aren’t they?
• What are the reasons for the growing number of non-fiction readers?  
• Why are more people drawn to memoir writing nowadays than years past?
• Does novel reading truly make someone more empathetic?  If so, why?
• How are most novels stylistically and structurally different from 40 years ago?

• How have young female protagonists of young adult literature evolved over time, and why has that evolution taken place?

• What is the best way to teach children to read – whole language, phonics, or something else?

• How has technology negatively affected or benefitted the way students read and/or appreciate fiction?

POETRY AND POETS

•  Is the poetry of John Donne still relevant today?

• Is Slam poetry as legitimate as “traditional” poetry?

•  Is there any scientific evidence proving that some people are more adept at analyzing poetry than others?

• Which confessional poet resonates with contemporary readers?

• Which poet best represents the ideals of English Romanticism?

•  Who is one of the most revered American writers today?  Why?

SCIENCE FICTION, DYSTOPIAS, AND SPECULATIVE FICTION

•  How are contemporary science fiction writers (writers of speculative fiction) utilizing technology in their works?
• What is the impact of dystopian fiction in contemporary literature?
• To what extent have past writers of speculative fiction (science fiction) made accurate predictions?
•  Which dystopian writer has had the most impact and why?
• To what extent does science fiction inspire and/or affect scientific innovation?
• Why are many teens so enraptured by fantasy fiction?
• What societal factors have contributed to the growth of dystopian works?

WRITERS , STYLES, AND NOVELS 

• Which novelist has had the most success with movie adaptations of their books?  Why?
• Who is one of the most cinematic novel writers?
• How does Shakespeare influence contemporary fiction?
• Which female novelist / writer is / was the most groundbreaking?  Why?
• To what extent- if any - do true crime writers exploit victims and their loved ones?
• What is the impact of true crime nonfiction on popular culture?
• Are graphic novels just as legitimate as traditional novels?  How might they even be better? Worse?

LITERARY MOVEMENTS

• How is the Beat movement a precursor to the rebelliousness and free love movement of the 1960s? 
• What inspired the Gothic movement in literature?

LITERATURE IN THE WORLD

•  Is race / politics affecting the publishing industry today in a positive or negative way?
• Is it truly possible to discern the truth today in a world featuring so much fake news and misinformation?
• How do different translations of a written work alter / affect our understanding of a written work?
• Will AI signal the death of originality in works of art – movies, books, painting, etc.? 
• Which philosophical movement is most helpful in navigating contemporary society?  Why?
• What are the current trends in young adult fiction today and why is this the case? 

Literary Periods 

From the Poetry Foundation: The English Renaissance (1495-1644) - Ornamented and lyrical verse, poetic dramatic works, metaphysical poetry.

Representative Writers: William Shakespeare, Christopher Marlowe, John Donne, John Milton, Edmund Spenser

From the LLHS Library Guide: The Enlightenment (1650- 1789) – Neoclassical era: emphasis on reason, harmony, and balance.

Representative Writers: Daniel Defoe, John Locke, Samuel Johnson, Alexander Pope, Jonathan Swift.  

From the Common Lit/Poetry Foundation: The Romantic Era: (1789 – 1830) America/Britain- Focus on subjective experiences, emotion, and nature as source for inspiration.  

Representative Writers:  William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, William Blake, John Keats, Lord Byron, Mary Shelley, Percy Bysshe Shelley. In America, the Transcendentalists: Henry David Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson.   American: Edgar Allan Poe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Washington Irving. 

From the Poetry Foundation: The Victorian Period (1832-1901) – Period of growth and change. The reaction to industrialization; people flocking to cities, poverty and social ills.

Representative Writers: Charles Dickens, Thomas Hardy, H.G. Wells, Charlotte Bronte, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Robert Louis Stevenson

From Master Class: Modernism (1902 – 1950) Social Commentary and criticism inspired by two wars and the Great Depression. Women’s right to vote.  Dystopian themes and the emergence of science fiction. American: The Harlem Renaissance (1920’s – 1930’s) Zora Neale Hurston, Langston Hughes, and others.

Some Representative Writers: T. S. Eliot, Katherine Mansfield, Virginia Woolf, George Orwell, D. H. Lawrence, James Joyce, George Bernard Shaw, Dylan Thomas, Aldous Huxley

From The Library of Congress: Contemporary Period:  (1950-now)

Beat poets like Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Jack Kerouac; poet Seamus Heaney.  Playwrights such as Harold Pinter and Tom Stoppard and novelists such as Toni Morrison, Margaret Atwood and so many more.