"Taken-for-Granted" Writing Practice

The below sample was a book report project or "taken-for-granted writing practice where, at age 15, I created a mock interview with the author of the text I was reading. I was assigned to read Tales of the Alhambra by Washington Irving and so I decided to interview Irving as if he were alive. The purpose of the exercise was seemingly aimed to help students set the context of the work they were reading, to research biographical information, and to demonstrate that they read the assigned text: