Golden Age of TV

Which of these quotes best explains Hamid’s advice to novelists?

• “And the novel needs to keep changing if it is to remain novel.”

• “In the future, novelists need not abandon plot and character, but would do well to bear in mind the novel’s weirdness.”

• “It must, pilfering a phrase from TV, boldly go where no one has gone before.”

• “The novel should only do what the serial drama could never do.”

Hamid’s purpose in the following passage (paragraph 14) is mainly .

"Television is not the new novel. Television is the old novel."

• to argue that writers of novels should do new and interesting things

• to argue that television is not the new novel

• to argue that television is more expensive

• to show that he has neutral feelings about the difference between television and the novel

Which of these inferences about novels is best supported by the passage below (paragraph 6)?

Spectacle and melodrama remain at the heart of TV, as they do with all arts that must reach a large audience in order to be economically viable. But it is voice, tone, the sense of the author’s mind at work, that are the essence of literature, and they exist in language, not in images.

• Novels are unique because they can express ideas and emotions that images cannot.

• Voice and tone are important characteristics of literature.

• Novels are not economically viable.

• Novels do not contain melodrama.

Which of these inferences about is best supported by the passage below (paragraph 1)?

Television was so bad for so long, it’s no surprise that the arrival of good television has caused the culture to lose its head a bit. Since the debut of “The Sopranos” in 1999, we have been living, so we are regularly informed, in a “golden age” of television. And over the last few years, it’s become common to hear variations on the idea that quality cable TV shows are the new novels. Thomas Doherty, writing in The Chronicle of Higher Education, called the new genre “Arc TV” — because its stories follow long, complex arcs of development — and insisted that “at its best, the world of Arc TV is as exquisitely calibrated as the social matrix of a Henry James novel.”

• The quality of television has declined.

• he quality of television has increased so much that it has created a new genre.

• Television continues its long history of quality, complicated story-telling.

• The quality of television has increased, which is clearly demonstrated by high viewership ratings.

Read the sample prompt for a short response below.

COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS: In these texts, both authors explore the ways in which TV shows and novels are similar and different. Which do you text's arguments do you find more convincing, and why? In your response, compare the authors' use of related information and claims to develop their arguments.

Which statement most accurately paraphrases the prompt?

• I need to analyze how the authors compare novels and TV shows.

• I need to decide which article has the strongest evidence and explain which article I agree with the most.

• I need to decide which arguments are the best developed, and make an argument of my own about whether I prefer TV shows or novels, using evidence from the text.

• I need to determine how the authors compare TV shows and novels, decide which argument I find most convincing, and compare the author’s use of information and claims to develop their arguments.

In which quotation does Kirsch explain a specific example that supports his argument about the difference between novels and television?

• Indeed, one criticism that could be leveled against quality cable TV is that it is not nearly as formally adventurous as Dickens himself. Its visual idiom tends to be conventional even when its subject matter is ostentatiously provocative.” (paragraph 4)

• “Televised evil, for instance, almost always takes melodramatic form: Our anti-heroes are mobsters, meth dealers or terrorists.” (paragraph 5)

• “But this has nothing to do with the way we encounter evil in real life, which is why a character like Gilbert Osmond, in “The Portrait of a Lady,” is more chilling in his bullying egotism than Tony Soprano with all his stranglings and shootings.” (paragraph 5)

• “Spectacle and melodrama remain at the heart of TV, as they do with all arts that must reach a large audience in order to be economically viable.” (paragraph 6)

Identify the meaning of the word in ALL CAPS.

Lori harbored AMBIVALENCE when her extended family came to visit.

• large in capacity

• to stir into action

• uncertainty

• an extravagant comedy in which action is more important than characterization

Identify the meaning of the word in ALL CAPS.

The small-looking purse was surprisingly CAPACIOUS.

• miniscule

• large in capacity

• uncertainty

• to stir into action