Paragraph Plan


  1. Introduction: Introduce both texts, including author, time period, form, genre, comparison and literary terms. Discuss question and steer. Must be able to have next paragraph lead on from this - introduce debate. 
  2. Paragraph One: Traditional stereotype that women must be married. Compare the character of Emma to Daisy - Emma, not desiring marriage but ending up happily married to Mr Knightley; Daisy, desiring marriage but ending up in an unhappy marriage to Tom whilst inlove with Gatsby. Both characters attempt to marry off other characters. 
  3. Paragraph Two: Double standard in male and female characters of the time. Tom having an affair with Myrtle but not allowing Daisy to have an affair with Gatsby. Frank Churchill flirting with Emma whilst secretly engaged to Jane Fairfax. Critical quote about female independence being undesirable - Context.
  4. Paragraph Three: Difference in society and class. Poorer women have no choice in marriage whilst richer women have more freedom of choice. Compare the characters of Harriet and Myrtle - both lower class. Myrtle cannot leave her husband for Tom. Harriet rejects Robert Martin under Emma's insistance that she can do better - ends up engaged to Robert Martin anyway. Talk about how they both have their lives defined by people of a higher class. Critical quote about Tom breaking Myrtle's nose.
  5. Paragraph Four: Discuss how women are 'cute but essentially helpless' and fall into other negative stereotypes. Emma and Daisy are both 'cute but essentially helpless' - Daisy more so. They both subvert this stereotype throughout their texts. Daisy becomes an 'eternally dissatisfied shrew' in her marriage and Emma becomes an 'immoral and dangerous seductress' in the engagement of Jane Fairfax and Frank Churchill due to her flirtation with him. 
  6. Paragraph Five: Both of these texts are mimetic of the real world. Showing the type of stereotypes that were expected of women at the time. Talk about authorial intent. Use critic quote about Austen's 'feminine cynicism' and how this is reflective in the character of Emma - Context.
  7. Conclusion: Answer the question, using points from argument to back up decision. Do women characters in the texts use or subvert traditional stereotypes? What is the effect of this? Why do the authors do this?