in this task, you will write a fictional or nonfiction narrative of about 750 to 1000 words on a theme that is present in some of the selections from victorian literature that you read in this unit. below are a few themes involving difficult childhood circumstances and ill-fated love, both of which figured in this unit’s readings. in developing your own narrative, you can choose one of these themes, create a variation on one of them, or use another theme in consultation with your teacher:

a child who does not fit well into his or her social circumstances
a child who is perceived as bad when he or she is actually good, or vice versa
an orphan or displaced child who faces struggles similar to those of oliver twist, kim, or heathcliff
two people who are attracted to one another but are prevented from uniting due to social norms or related personal conflicts
you can write your narrative in any style. for example, you could write in a modern style or imitate the style of one of the authors whose works you examined in this unit. your narrative can be about real events and people, it can be fictionalized, or it can be a mix of real and fictional events and people.

a narrative can be a full-fledged story or an anecdote that mainly conveys key events and conflicts. some narratives take the form of a case study that describes the circumstances of a person's situation from a sociological point of view.

regardless of what type of narrative you are writing, it will be richer and more enjoyable to read if it includes many of the elements of fiction. before writing, you should decide which literary elements to develop most fully.