Rough Draft

Here's the thesis for one of the rough drafts I read this weekend for my English literature class: "In two of his [Charles Dickens] most famous works, A Christmas Story [sic] and Oliver Twist, there are many similarities between the two if one takes the time to look a little below the surface."

Aside from the fact that this thesis has no specific focus, which is a significant problem, it suggests that every similarity must be discussed. Right? You'd expect a litany of similarities to follow, lots and lots of details from both works that are common.

What actually follows is one-and-a-half pages that, basically, point out that there's a little boy in "A Christmas Carol" and there's also a boy in Oliver Twist.

Shocking. That wouldn't seem at all obvious to someone who has read either work or even to someone who has never read the works but only heard of them.

Then there is a paragraph with two sentences about the moral endings of the two works. There are no specific details or examples from either work to support this assertion.

Attached to the second and last page of this exhaustive analysis is a Post-It with this message: "I got stuck on what else I could say. Could I do differences as well?"

Sigh. How can you advise a writer who feels exhausted after writing so little? Is this the future of literary studies?