Gothic Romanticism & Transcendentalism One-Pager Activity

One-pagers are often seen as more elementary activities for analysis, but the reality is that the complexity of the activity parallels the complexity of the text at hand. For my 11th grade American Literature students, this asks them to play with the impact of the visuals and symbolism iconic to either Gothic Romanticism or transcendentalism. Some students will gravitate toward drawing Whitman on his black stallion, or an evening at Walden Pond...others will sketch the clanging clock at Prince Prospero's party or THE raven cawing words of doom. This is a stellar assignment for reaching various student interests, assessing literary analysis and understanding of literary movements, and fostering a creative intersection between literature, arts, personal reflection, pop culture, historical research, and more! Feel free to edit this to match any literary subject you are facing with your students--I use a similar assignment for my 9th grader's study of Shakespearian sonnets of their choice (the entire sonnet needs to be written on the page), so the possibilities are endless!