This document provides instructions and assignments for an English 102 class. It includes readings from essays, instructions for journal entries, and discussion of clustering topics. Students are asked to write a 250-word rough draft on why they want to be Harpo Marx, using the criteria of avoiding the obvious, taking the less usual side, and slipping out of abstraction. For journal 2, students must answer questions about Martin Luther King Jr.'s "Letter from Birmingham Jail" and choose an essay to answer writing strategy questions and use the ideas for writing section. The document ends by wishing students good luck on their rough draft.

1. Readings:
Essays from our reading
Journal 1: Example
MAJOR ONE: Topics?
“Harpo Marx”
Class Exercise
Assignment: Journal 2

2. EN 102--5593
 Page 625; Paul Roberts’ essay “How To Say Nothing In
500 Words.”
 Tone? Is he mocking or serious?
 Lesson One: Avoid the Obvious Content.
 Lesson Two: Take the Less Usual Side
 Lesson Three: Slip Out of Abstraction

3. EN 102--5593
 Turn to page 613 in Composition of Everyday Life
 “Sex, Lies, and Conversation” by Deborah Tannen
 Discuss: what is the idea behind this essay? State it in
One sentence.
How does Tannen follow Robert’s rules from “500”?

4. EN 102--5593
CLUSTERING: TOPIC GENERATION
men
Mutual
verb Ms. M’s Understanding
Context Context
women
Elements The “Way” Goal
By looking at both perspectives, we have a goal we
can (occasionally) reach.

5. EN 102--5593
 Journal 1 Exercise:
 Come up and Grab “Autumn 1995”
 A Little Bit about Interviews & Interviewing
 MLA Citation

6. EN 102--5593
 NEXT: “Hero” Example
 WHO has already chosen their topic?
 In one sentence, what could your heroes’ thesis say?
 Continuing On…
 What “sensory” details or scenes are pivotal to our
understanding of this person?

7. EN 102--5593
 Watch the videos presented: take down any details
that would help you create a “picture” of Harpo’s
character.
 While going over my “Wikipedia” source material, make
a note about details that might be interesting to a
reader.

8. EN 102--5593
Harpo Marx: Info
In January 1910, Harpo joined two of his brothers, Julius (later "Groucho") and Milton (later "Gummo"), to form
"The Three Nightingales". Harpo was inspired to develop his "silent" routine after reading a review of one of their
performances which had been largely ad-libbed. The theater critic wrote, "Adolph Marx performed beautiful
pantomime which was ruined whenever he spoke."
Harpo gained his stage name during a card game at the Orpheum Theatre in Galesburg, Illinois. The dealer (Art
Fisher) called him "Harpo" because he played the harp.[2][3] (In Harpo's autobiography, he says that mother Minnie
Marx sent him the harp.) Harpo learned how to hold it properly from a picture of an angel playing a harp that he saw
in a five-and-dime. No one in town knew how to play the harp, so Harpo tuned it as best he could, starting with one
basic note and tuning it from there. Three years later he found out he had tuned it incorrectly, but he could not have
tuned it properly; if he had, the strings would have broken each night. Harpo's method placed much less tension on
the strings.[citation needed] Although he played this way for the rest of his life, he did try to learn how to play correctly,
and he spent considerable money hiring the best teachers. They, however, spent their time listening to him,
fascinated by the way he played.[3] In his movie performances he played the harp with his own tuning.
In his autobiography Harpo Speaks (1961), Harpo recounts how Chico found him jobs playing piano to accompany
silent movies. Unlike Chico, Harpo could play only two songs on the piano, "Waltz Me Around Again, Willie" and
"Love Me and the World Is Mine", but he adapted this small repertoire in different tempos to suit the action on the
screen. He was also seen playing a portion of Rachmaninoff's "Prelude in C# minor" in A Day at the Races and
chords on the piano in A Night at the Opera, in such a way that the piano sounded much like a harp, as a prelude to
actually playing the harp in that scene.
Harpo had changed his name from Adolph to Arthur by 1911. This was due primarily to his dislike for the name
Adolph (as a child, he was routinely called "Ahdie" instead). Urban legends stating that the name change came
about during World War I due to anti-German sentiment in the US or during World War II because of the stigma
that Adolf Hitler imposed on the name are groundless.[4]

9. EN 102--5593
Harpo appeared without his brothers in Too Many Kisses, four years before the brothers' first widely-released film,
The Cocoanuts (1929). In Too Many Kisses, Harpo spoke the only line he would ever speak on-camera in a movie:
"You sure you can't move?"[citation needed] Fittingly, it was a silent movie, and the audience only saw his lips move and
saw the line on a title card.
Harpo became famous for prop-laden sight gags, in particular the seemingly infinite number of odd things stored in
his topcoat's oversized pockets. In the film Horse Feathers (1932), Groucho, referring to an impossible situation,
tells Harpo that he cannot "burn the candle at both ends." Harpo immediately produces from within his coat pocket a
lit candle burning at both ends. Earlier in the film a man on the street asks him for money for a cup of coffee, and he
subsequently produces a steaming cup complete with saucer, from inside his coat.
Harpo often used facial expressions and mime to get his point across. One of his facial expressions, which he used in
every Marx Brothers film and stage play, beginning with Fun in Hi Skule, was known as "the Gookie." Harpo
created it by mimicking the expression of Mr. Gehrke, a New York tobacconist who would make a similar face
while concentrating on rolling cigars.
Harpo further distinguished his character by wearing a "fright wig". Early in his career it was dyed pink, as
evidenced by color film posters of the time and by allusions to it in films, with character names such as "Pinky." It
tended to show as blonde on-screen due to the black-and-white film stock at the time. Over time, he darkened the
pink to more of a reddish color, again alluded to in films with names such as "Rusty."
His non-speaking in his early films was occasionally referred to by the other Marx Brothers, who were careful to
imply that his character's not speaking was a choice rather than a disability. They would make joking reference to
this part of his act. In later films Harpo was put into situations where he would repeatedly attempt to convey a vital
message to another person, but only did so through nonverbal means. These scenes reinforced the idea that the
character was unable to speak.

10. EN 102--5593
 Read “Why I Want To Be Harpo Marx”: Evaluate.
 Use Roberts’ three criteria:
 1) AVOID the obvious
 2) TAKE the less usual side
 3) SLIP out of abstraction
 WHAT Details in the essay are accurate? WHAT ELSE
could the essay say? WHAT is the THESIS?
 DUE WEEK THREE: 250 Word count ROUGH DRAFT

11. EN 102--5593
FOR JOURNAL 2:
DUE: January 30, (EOD) /10 points
Word Count: 625 Microsoft Word (.doc, .rtf,) 12 pt.
DBL Space

12. EN 102--5593
Read “Letter From A Birmingham Jail” by Martin Luther King Jr. and answer the questions:
1) MLK makes a case for his non-violent protests to eight fellow clergymen, and makes
several points about right and wrong, patriotism, moderation, and law. What points
extend beyond the 1960’s? How does MLK’s rhetoric make a connection between then
and now?
2) King defines two kinds of law: just and unjust. Provide an example of each, and then
answer: What law should be broken (if any) because it is unjust?
3) What is, in King’s words, showing the “highest respect for the law”? Are there
examples of this happening today? Give a specific example.
NEXT: Choose an essay from Chapter 1, 2, 3 or 4: answer “Writing Strategies”, and
“Exploring Ideas” questions from your chosen essay. Then, use the “Ideas for Writing”, and
write an essay from one of the suggestions.

13. EN 102--5593
Good luck on the rough draft, and I hope it goes swiftly….

14. I was going to say something witty here, but couldn’t 
WEEK TWO

15. EN 102--5593
And also the obligatory “Star Wars” meme….