Victoria Pierce -- Women in Flatland

  After you get started (see below), your essay does a reasonably good job of 
  describing what the Square says about the women in Flatland.  But you haven't 
  addressed the question of whether you think Abbott meant those statements to 
  be taken literally as a representation of his own thinking or whether the book 
  was intended as a satire.  

  I think it's pretty clear that this is a satire and it is the exaggerated ways 
  that Abbott expresses some of the negative attitudes about the women that 
  shows he is not being literal.  Look at the paragraph in the middle of page 
  12, for instance.  The Square says "For as they have no pretensions of an 
  angle, being inferior in this respect to the very lowest of the Isosceles, they 
  are consequently wholly devoid of brain power ... "  The tone in phrases like
  "no pretension of an angle" and "the lowest of the Isosceles" is "over the top."  
  That should be a pretty clear signal to the reader that Abbott is engaging in satire.  
  
  It might be hard to appreciate for students today, but the kinds 
  of things A. Square says are also not all that far from things one
  used to hear all the time.  Look at the first seasons of the TV show 
  "Mad Men" (set in the early 1960's) for an pretty realistic example of this. 
  Similarly, when I was growing up I remember hearing serious discussions 
  from "talking heads" about how women were too emotional and unstable to 
  be trusted with the sorts of decisions a President would have to make.    
  So while he is making fun of those attitudes, this is also really serious,
  and that's another aspect of satire.  He's trying to show how ridiculous
  the attitudes of his own society about women are.

  As far as the writing goes, I think you mostly say things in a very direct
  way and that is usually good.  But there are also times when I'm not sure you knew
  exactly what you wanted to say.  The prime example of that is your opening
  paragraph: (my comments after the >'s)
  
  Flatland being a basis for how geometry is taught encourages logical thinking 
  and a particular kind of mathematics.   

  > Really?  Who said Flatland was a basis for how geometry should be taught??

  And although “Flatland” by Edwin A. Abbott has many dimensions in a mathematical 
  sense these are not the only kind. It also discusses a romance of many dimensions, 
  meaning it is a far fetched idea that is not realistic as a portrayal of life. 

  > As we said in class, that is more or less the meaning I think we should take
  for the word "romance" in the subtitle.  However, that is separate from the
  "many dimensions" aspect.  So what you are trying to say is not very clear.

  The book is far removed from anything we have ever experienced. 

  > This is is pretty much a repetition of the idea in the previous sentence.

  There is a social structure in the book between social classes and specifically 
  between women and men. 
 
  > Still really can't tell where you are going here, and that statement is 
  so general that it would apply to almost any story.  

  It seems as if Abbott portrayed the women lower than everyone else in this novel. 
  He portrayed them as weaker in terms of knowledge, education, and he even went so 
  far that you could not tell the women were present at times. 

  > This is finally getting to your topic, but it's a very weak version of
  the way women are portrayed and the way their place in the society is actually
  described.  Plus it doesn't get at the question about satire from the prompt
  for the assignment.

  It's OK if you use the process of writing to try to figure out what you think
  about a question.  But that's not usually the version you hand in for a writing
  assignment. 

  Content:  B-
  
  Mechanics: B