Centre for Open Education

MACQUARIE UNIVERSITY
NSW 2109 AUSTRALIA

ASSIGNMENT COVER SHEET

(For Open Universities Australia students)
Office Use Only
**

Unit Code

CLT340

Assignment No.

Assignment Title

Genre Writing

Due Date

24/12/2014

Contact Info

Phone:0403424484

Unit Name

Genre Writing

COE USE ONLY

Date Received

Email:joseph.zizys@gmail.com

Word Count:

Turnitin No.:

(If Applicable)

(If Applicable)

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By placing my name in this document I declare that:

This assessment is my own work, based on my personal study and/or research;

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material generated in the course of my employment;
If this assessment was based on collaborative preparatory work, as approved by the teachers of the unit, I
have not submitted substantially the same final version of any material as another student;
Neither the assessment, nor substantial parts of it, have been previously submitted for assessment in this
or any other institution;
I have not copied in part, or in whole, or otherwise plagiarised the work of other students;
I have read and I understand the criteria used for assessment;
The assessment is within the word and page limits specified in the unit outline;
The use of any material in this assessment does not infringe the intellectual property / copyright of a third
party;
I understand that this assessment may undergo electronic detection for plagiarism, and a copy of the
assessment may be retained in a database and used to make comparisons with other assessments in
future. Work retained in a database is anonymous and will not be able to be matched to an individual
student;
I take full responsibility for the correct submission of this assessment in the appropriate place with the
correct cover sheet attached and I have retained a duplicate copy of this assessment

This declaration is a summary of the University policy on plagiarism. For the policy in full, please
refer to Student Information in the Handbook or http://www.mq.edu.au/academichonesty
Student Name:

Family Name Zizys

Student Number:

42351979

Date:

24/12/2014

Given Name Joseph

Genre exercise.

by Joseph Zizys

400 words: A poem in Spencerian sonnet form that mixes the genres of allegory and fantasy.

I
Proud Jack and faithful Jill climb ever high
They seek the waters of the magic well
Atop the highest hill whereat it lies
Hid fulsome well by misty veil and dell
Jack ever looks ahead to spy the tell
That shew him where the hidden path doth rise
Amongst the misty grassed mounds that swell
And loom out of the fog before his eyes
And cloak the way ahead in dark disguise
To fill the pale that signifies their troth
They climb the veiled hill toward the sky

As to a flame is called the lonely moth

That seeks to cast off earthly matter low
And into heavens bright embrace go.

II
But now the ground conspires cruelly
To turn Jacks heal upon a cursed stone
A stone of blue called Lupus Lazuli
That by a dark magician has been thrown
A false snare laid for noble Jack alone
Of color made to hide in plainest sight
Within a black magical cauldron grown
To turn true Jack the seeker from the light
Inside the stone the magus hid a wight
That drew the mist and darkness all about
And with intention made of purest spite
Set out to bring dire straights to Jack most stout
For to win for its dark master; black archmage
The golden crown atop Jacks head arrayed.

III
Poor Jill looks on aghast at Jacks dire fall
She lost in wilderness without a guide
And beset on every side by wild beasts all
Sent by dark magus for to rend her side
She cannot climb the summit with no guide
She cannot pick the path back down again
For without Jack she is like unto blind
Caught tween bright heaven and the world of men
She turns and spies an outcropped rock and then
In sadness climbs out onto windswept ledge
Surveying naught but mist beyond her ken
She hurls herself over the craggy edge
And falls like Jack down to the black abyss
Never to drink the blessed drink of bliss.

200 words: An exegesis that describes and defends the critical and intertextual apparatus on which the
work draws.

I tried to write a sequence of three sonnets in the Spencerian form, relating a version of the story of Jack
and Jill that exemplified the style of the Faerie Queen and also the genre and tropes of the modern
genre of fantasy. My interest was in the family resemblance (Chandler 1997 p2) between the
Spencerian subject and 20th century fantasy as exemplified by Tolkien etc. I was also interested in
suggesting an allegory or metaphor, in this case for the seeking of spiritual fulfilment within the context of
a sexual relationship, recalling the neoplatonic allegory within the faerie queen. I think in this I was much
less successful, but I tried. I think I have succeeded in mixing the genres of fantasy, religious allegory
and poetry, and also of feeling out the complexity of Spencers use of genre and admixture of romance,
philosophical allegory, and fantasy.
I guess that if historical pastiche is a genre then I have also written something in that genre. The genre or
genres of my piece depend on how you would like to classify the work. Is it primarily an aping of
Spencer? then it is pastiche. Is it basically a fantasy story with magic and wights etc, then it is fantasy. In
as much as it is successful in suggesting a kind of sexual alchemical quest, then it is allegory.

Bibliography:

Chandler, Daniel (1997): 'An Introduction to Genre Theory' [WWW document] URL
http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/intgenre/chandler_genre_theory.pdf

Spencer, Edmund (1968): The Faerie Queen Book One in Edmund Spencers Poetry Norton Critical
Edition Hugh Maclean. Ed. Norton