ENG 320: Foundations of American Literature I: Being There Journal

Diaries were an important early form of American writing. This is a creative assignment in which you will write a diary adopting the persona of a person living at a particular time period under study and reacting to an historical event that shaped the literature of the period. For example, you might want to be an onlooker at the Salem Witchcraft Trials,  someone who is harboring an escaped slave, someone who met Frederick Douglass and heard him give one of his many antislavery speeches, or you might even be someone who just met Edgar Allan Poe after hearing him perform one of his stories or poems, or you might be a correspondent of Emily Dickinson’s.  

Whatever persona and time period you choose, you should immerse yourself in the period, adopt the language of the time, and refer to people and places appropriate to the period. The diary should reflect your knowledge of the time and the figure/writer as appropriate. You may find it better to write a series of short entries or one long one, based on a particular occurrence. Either way, the diary should be between 500-750 words. Due dates for this assignment will vary since you can select any time period/work to base your diary. When you have completed the assignment, just hand it in. However, you must turn in this assignment no later than 11/29. Approx. length: 3-5 pages.