The deadline for the Common Read Essay Contest is about a month away – still plenty of time to finish Ready Player One and write a short essay about it! As mentioned earlier, this year, as part of the Common Read, NSO is sponsoring a voluntary Essay Contest, open to all incoming first-year students. Here is the Fall 2012 Common Read Essay Prompt:
At the heart of Ready Player One is a treasure hunt, full of puzzles to solve, villains to vanquish, and opponents to out-score. And yet unlike a lot of “fantasy” fiction, the book often feels quite realistic, as if it were set in our world, only a few decades into the future. Write an essay in which you connect the book to issues or problems relevant to you today. Use examples from the book to support your analysis.
The contest rules are as follows:
- All fall 2012 incoming first-year students at UMass Amherst are eligible to enter.
- Essays should be between 2-4 pages long, or about 500-1,000 words, typed, double-spaced, with 1-inch margins and 12-point type.
- Quotations from Ready Player One should be appropriately marked and cited, with page numbers in parentheses.
- The first page of the essay should include your name, campus address, phone number, UMass email address, and title.
- Essays should be submitted electronically as an email attachment (either PDF or Word) to commonread@acad.umass.edu.
- Essays must be received no later than Monday, August 20, 2012, 5:00 pm EST.
Winners will be announced at New Students Convocation on August 31. First-, Second-, and Third-Place winners will receive gift cards from the University Store and have a chance to meet author Ernest Cline.
Questions about the contest should be directed to Prof. David Fleming, English Department, UMass Amherst, at dfleming@english.umass.edu; or call NSO at 413-545-2621.