"I Know Why the Caged Bird Cannot Read"

     Francine Prose discusses literature and complains about the complexity of the reading skills of high school students. The subject of her piece of literature is the education curriculum about English. She bases her argument from evidence she gathered from high school reading lists, and quotes from intelligent professionals. The article was published during the September of 1999, on Harper’s magazine. This magazine was famous at the time, and a lot of people read it. Prose wanted people to read her viewpoints, and understand what is wrong with the high school curriculum. Even though the article was published in a magazine and any person could read it, the main and intended audience was English teachers. Prose hoped that English schoolteachers would understand her and therefore change their curriculum of teaching. Her purpose of writing this is to inform and to persuade the people. The speaker is Francine Prose. She believes, and proves with evidence that the curriculum now is wrong, and persuades them to take action. Throughout her essay, her tone is critical, informative, persuasive, superior, and professional. She knows and believes that her point of view is right, but does not directly criticize. Prose writes professionally, making her more believable. 

     SOAPST makes it easy for the reader to understand a piece of literature. All the things are laid out for them, making it easy for the reader to dig deep into the piece, examining all the important parts. This allows the person to not have to reread the piece over and over, but instead look at the SOAPST they created. Due to Prose’s professional and persuasive tone, her article was effective.