This document provides a guide for students on how to analyze literature. It begins by explaining that literary analysis resembles an argument where the writer makes a claim about the work and supports it with evidence from the text and reasoning. Unlike reviews, the focus of literary analysis is on interpreting and analyzing the text rather than evaluating its merits. It discusses how literary analysis differs from other types of writing about literature students may have done, such as reviews. It emphasizes developing a clear thesis and using evidence from the text to support one's interpretation.
BOOK REVIEWS How to write a book review There are two .docxmoirarandell
BOOK REVIEWS: How to write a book review
There are two approaches to book reviewing:
Descriptive reviews give the essential information about a book. This is done with description and
exposition, by stating the perceived aims and purposes of the author, and by quoting striking passages
from the text.
Critical reviews describe and evaluate the book, in terms of accepted literary and historical standards,
and supports this evaluation with evidence from the text. The following pointers are meant to be
suggestions for writing a critical review.
Basic requirements
To write a critical review, the reviewer must know two things:
Knowing the work under review: This demands not only attempting to understand the author's purpose
and how the component parts of the work contribute to that purpose, but also knowledge of the
author: his/her nationality, time period, other works etc.
Requirements of the genre: This means understanding the art form and how it functions. Without such
context, the reviewer has no historical or literary standard upon which to base an evaluation.
Reviewing essentials
Description of the book. Sufficient description should be given so that the reader will have some
understanding of the author's thoughts. This account is not a summary. It can be woven into the critical
remarks.
Discuss the author. Biographical information should be relevant to the subject of the review and
enhance the reader's understanding of the work under discussion.
Appraise the book. A review must be a considered judgment that includes:
a statement of the reviewer's understanding of the author's purpose
how well the reviewer feels the author's purpose has been achieved
evidence to support the reviewer's judgement of the author' achievement.
While you read:
Read the book with care.
Highlight quotable passages.
Note your impressions as you read.
Allow time to assimilate what you read so that the book can be seen in perspective.
Keep in mind the need for a single impression which must be clear to the reader.
The review outline
A review outline gives you an over-all grasp of the organization of the review, to determine the central
point your review will make, to eliminate inessentials or irrelevancies, and to fill in gaps or omissions.
Examine the notes you have made and eliminate those with no relationship to your central
thesis.
By organizing your discussion topics into groups, aspects of the book will emerge: e.g., theme,
character, structure, etc.
Write down all the major headings of the outline and fill in the subdivisions.
All parts should support your thesis or central point.
First draft
Opening paragraphs set the tone of the paper. Possible introductions usually make a statement about
the:
Thesis
Authorial purpose
Topicality of the work or its significance
Comparison of the work to others by the same author or within the same genre.
Academic writing on literature (from Gocsik’s Writing About World Literature)Amanda Preston
The document discusses several key aspects of scholarly writing, including conventions, analysis, and thesis statements. It notes that scholarly writing conforms to certain expectations, including analysis, interpretation, and using evidence from texts. Writers must consider the ongoing academic conversation and audience expectations. A strong thesis statement makes an arguable claim and sets the scope of the argument to follow. Supporting details and examples from the text must then be provided to back up the thesis.
Literary AnalysisWhat distinguishes literature from other forms o.docxSHIVA101531
Literary Analysis
“What distinguishes literature from other forms of knowledge is that it cannot be understood unless we understand what it means to be human.” (J. Bronowski)
There are many ways to interpret, analyze, and evaluate literature. Perhaps you’ve already been asked to make an observation or take a position about a work of literature (whether a poem, short story, novel, play, or film) and examine such elements as plot, characters, theme, setting, conflict, structure, point of view, imagery, or symbolism. When you are asked by a teacher to write an interpretation, a critique, or a literary analysis, you are being asked to figure out what is going on in a work of literature. Much more complicated than merely summarizing a piece or writing a personal reaction to it, literary analysis requires that you read between the lines of a text and discover something meaningful there. Why does a specific image recur throughout a poem? How does a novel relate to a social issue facing the author at the time it was written? Do you recognize a pattern or perceive a problem with a character’s behavior in a play? How is the role of women significant in a movie? Answers to all of these questions can be determined only through critical thinking and the synthesis of your ideas.
· An interpretation—explains a text’s overall meaning or significance, explaining your reasoning for this interpretation with supporting evidence from the text.
· A critique—also called a critical response or a review, it provides your personal judgment about a text, supported by reasons and references to the work of art and often secondary sources.· A formal analysis—different from a critique in that examines a work of art by breaking it down into various elements to discover how the parts interrelate to create meaning of effect.
· A cultural analysis—examines a work of art by relating it to the historical, social, cultural, or political situations in which it was written to show how the author was influenced by personal experiences, events, prevailing attitudes, or contemporary values.
How can I persuade readers that my view or interpretation is reasonable?
First, be sure that your view or interpretation asserts a debatable claim.
For instance, if you were to say that “Antigone is a play about a young woman who questions authority,” you wouldn’t be saying much beyond a summary. But if you said that, “Antigone’s punishment is well-deserved because she violates the laws of the king,” that is debatable. Another student could just as easily argue that Antigone’s punishment is not well-deserved and that she should be commended for respecting the higher laws of the gods over the laws of the king.
Because you are essentially arguing that your perspective is a valid one, you have to support it effectively with reasons, evidence from the piece (direct references to specific quotations, lines, passages, scenes, etc.), and—if required—secondary sources (articles and bo ...
The document discusses reading and interpreting literary texts. It outlines three key aspects or "sovereignties" to consider: the writer, the literary work itself, and the reader. The writer's life experiences and cultural context influence the work. When interpreting the work, readers should analyze stylistic elements, characters, themes and deeper meanings. Considering these different perspectives leads to a richer understanding and appreciation of literature. The lesson aims to teach students to critically analyze texts from various interpretations rather than simply understanding surface meanings alone.
The document provides guidance on writing a literature review. It explains that a literature review discusses and synthesizes published sources on a particular topic rather than providing personal opinions. It should have an organizational structure and combine both summary and analysis of sources. The document advises clarifying the assignment with the instructor, finding example literature reviews, narrowing the topic, considering source currency, and developing an organizational structure like chronological, thematic, or methodological. It provides tips for writing like using evidence from sources, keeping your own voice, and revising thoroughly.
Literature ReviewsWhat this handout is aboutThis handout w.docxjesssueann
Literature Reviews
What this handout is about
This handout will explain what literature reviews are and offer insights into the form and construction of literature reviews in the humanities, social sciences, and sciences.
Introduction
OK. You’ve got to write a literature review. You dust off a novel and a book of poetry, settle down in your chair, and get ready to issue a “thumbs up” or “thumbs down” as you leaf through the pages. “Literature review” done. Right?
Wrong! The “literature” of a literature review refers to any collection of materials on a topic, not necessarily the great literary texts of the world. “Literature” could be anything from a set of government pamphlets on British colonial methods in Africa to scholarly articles on the treatment of a torn ACL. And a review does not necessarily mean that your reader wants you to give your personal opinion on whether or not you liked these sources.
What is a literature review, then?
A literature review discusses published information in a particular subject area, and sometimes information in a particular subject area within a certain time period.
A literature review can be just a simple summary of the sources, but it usually has an organizational pattern and combines both summary and synthesis. A summary is a recap of the important information of the source, but a synthesis is a re-organization, or a reshuffling, of that information. It might give a new interpretation of old material or combine new with old interpretations. Or it might trace the intellectual progression of the field, including major debates. And depending on the situation, the literature review may evaluate the sources and advise the reader on the most pertinent or relevant.
But how is a literature review different from an academic research paper?
The main focus of an academic research paper is to develop a new argument, and a research paper will contain a literature review as one of its parts. In a research paper, you use the literature as a foundation and as support for a new insight that you contribute. The focus of a literature review, however, is to summarize and synthesize the arguments and ideas of others without adding new contributions.
Why do we write literature reviews?
Literature reviews provide you with a handy guide to a particular topic. If you have limited time to conduct research, literature reviews can give you an overview or act as a stepping stone. For professionals, they are useful reports that keep them up to date with what is current in the field. For scholars, the depth and breadth of the literature review emphasizes the credibility of the writer in his or her field. Literature reviews also provide a solid background for a research paper’s investigation. Comprehensive knowledge of the literature of the field is essential to most research papers.
Who writes these things, anyway?
Literature reviews are written occasionally in the humanities, but mostly in the sciences and social scienc.
Reading and Writing Skills Q4 LAS 5.docxBlueBarrido
The text summarizes and analyzes the children's book "The Little Prince" by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. It discusses the timeless nature of the story and its lessons about caring for others and childhood. It highlights how the story teaches that the time spent caring for something is what makes it important. The text is an example of a positive book review, as it identifies the title, author, main ideas and themes of the story, provides an analysis of these elements, and recommends the book for readers of all ages.
BOOK REVIEWS How to write a book review There are two .docxmoirarandell
BOOK REVIEWS: How to write a book review
There are two approaches to book reviewing:
Descriptive reviews give the essential information about a book. This is done with description and
exposition, by stating the perceived aims and purposes of the author, and by quoting striking passages
from the text.
Critical reviews describe and evaluate the book, in terms of accepted literary and historical standards,
and supports this evaluation with evidence from the text. The following pointers are meant to be
suggestions for writing a critical review.
Basic requirements
To write a critical review, the reviewer must know two things:
Knowing the work under review: This demands not only attempting to understand the author's purpose
and how the component parts of the work contribute to that purpose, but also knowledge of the
author: his/her nationality, time period, other works etc.
Requirements of the genre: This means understanding the art form and how it functions. Without such
context, the reviewer has no historical or literary standard upon which to base an evaluation.
Reviewing essentials
Description of the book. Sufficient description should be given so that the reader will have some
understanding of the author's thoughts. This account is not a summary. It can be woven into the critical
remarks.
Discuss the author. Biographical information should be relevant to the subject of the review and
enhance the reader's understanding of the work under discussion.
Appraise the book. A review must be a considered judgment that includes:
a statement of the reviewer's understanding of the author's purpose
how well the reviewer feels the author's purpose has been achieved
evidence to support the reviewer's judgement of the author' achievement.
While you read:
Read the book with care.
Highlight quotable passages.
Note your impressions as you read.
Allow time to assimilate what you read so that the book can be seen in perspective.
Keep in mind the need for a single impression which must be clear to the reader.
The review outline
A review outline gives you an over-all grasp of the organization of the review, to determine the central
point your review will make, to eliminate inessentials or irrelevancies, and to fill in gaps or omissions.
Examine the notes you have made and eliminate those with no relationship to your central
thesis.
By organizing your discussion topics into groups, aspects of the book will emerge: e.g., theme,
character, structure, etc.
Write down all the major headings of the outline and fill in the subdivisions.
All parts should support your thesis or central point.
First draft
Opening paragraphs set the tone of the paper. Possible introductions usually make a statement about
the:
Thesis
Authorial purpose
Topicality of the work or its significance
Comparison of the work to others by the same author or within the same genre.
Academic writing on literature (from Gocsik’s Writing About World Literature)Amanda Preston
The document discusses several key aspects of scholarly writing, including conventions, analysis, and thesis statements. It notes that scholarly writing conforms to certain expectations, including analysis, interpretation, and using evidence from texts. Writers must consider the ongoing academic conversation and audience expectations. A strong thesis statement makes an arguable claim and sets the scope of the argument to follow. Supporting details and examples from the text must then be provided to back up the thesis.
Literary AnalysisWhat distinguishes literature from other forms o.docxSHIVA101531
Literary Analysis
“What distinguishes literature from other forms of knowledge is that it cannot be understood unless we understand what it means to be human.” (J. Bronowski)
There are many ways to interpret, analyze, and evaluate literature. Perhaps you’ve already been asked to make an observation or take a position about a work of literature (whether a poem, short story, novel, play, or film) and examine such elements as plot, characters, theme, setting, conflict, structure, point of view, imagery, or symbolism. When you are asked by a teacher to write an interpretation, a critique, or a literary analysis, you are being asked to figure out what is going on in a work of literature. Much more complicated than merely summarizing a piece or writing a personal reaction to it, literary analysis requires that you read between the lines of a text and discover something meaningful there. Why does a specific image recur throughout a poem? How does a novel relate to a social issue facing the author at the time it was written? Do you recognize a pattern or perceive a problem with a character’s behavior in a play? How is the role of women significant in a movie? Answers to all of these questions can be determined only through critical thinking and the synthesis of your ideas.
· An interpretation—explains a text’s overall meaning or significance, explaining your reasoning for this interpretation with supporting evidence from the text.
· A critique—also called a critical response or a review, it provides your personal judgment about a text, supported by reasons and references to the work of art and often secondary sources.· A formal analysis—different from a critique in that examines a work of art by breaking it down into various elements to discover how the parts interrelate to create meaning of effect.
· A cultural analysis—examines a work of art by relating it to the historical, social, cultural, or political situations in which it was written to show how the author was influenced by personal experiences, events, prevailing attitudes, or contemporary values.
How can I persuade readers that my view or interpretation is reasonable?
First, be sure that your view or interpretation asserts a debatable claim.
For instance, if you were to say that “Antigone is a play about a young woman who questions authority,” you wouldn’t be saying much beyond a summary. But if you said that, “Antigone’s punishment is well-deserved because she violates the laws of the king,” that is debatable. Another student could just as easily argue that Antigone’s punishment is not well-deserved and that she should be commended for respecting the higher laws of the gods over the laws of the king.
Because you are essentially arguing that your perspective is a valid one, you have to support it effectively with reasons, evidence from the piece (direct references to specific quotations, lines, passages, scenes, etc.), and—if required—secondary sources (articles and bo ...
The document discusses reading and interpreting literary texts. It outlines three key aspects or "sovereignties" to consider: the writer, the literary work itself, and the reader. The writer's life experiences and cultural context influence the work. When interpreting the work, readers should analyze stylistic elements, characters, themes and deeper meanings. Considering these different perspectives leads to a richer understanding and appreciation of literature. The lesson aims to teach students to critically analyze texts from various interpretations rather than simply understanding surface meanings alone.
The document provides guidance on writing a literature review. It explains that a literature review discusses and synthesizes published sources on a particular topic rather than providing personal opinions. It should have an organizational structure and combine both summary and analysis of sources. The document advises clarifying the assignment with the instructor, finding example literature reviews, narrowing the topic, considering source currency, and developing an organizational structure like chronological, thematic, or methodological. It provides tips for writing like using evidence from sources, keeping your own voice, and revising thoroughly.
Literature ReviewsWhat this handout is aboutThis handout w.docxjesssueann
Literature Reviews
What this handout is about
This handout will explain what literature reviews are and offer insights into the form and construction of literature reviews in the humanities, social sciences, and sciences.
Introduction
OK. You’ve got to write a literature review. You dust off a novel and a book of poetry, settle down in your chair, and get ready to issue a “thumbs up” or “thumbs down” as you leaf through the pages. “Literature review” done. Right?
Wrong! The “literature” of a literature review refers to any collection of materials on a topic, not necessarily the great literary texts of the world. “Literature” could be anything from a set of government pamphlets on British colonial methods in Africa to scholarly articles on the treatment of a torn ACL. And a review does not necessarily mean that your reader wants you to give your personal opinion on whether or not you liked these sources.
What is a literature review, then?
A literature review discusses published information in a particular subject area, and sometimes information in a particular subject area within a certain time period.
A literature review can be just a simple summary of the sources, but it usually has an organizational pattern and combines both summary and synthesis. A summary is a recap of the important information of the source, but a synthesis is a re-organization, or a reshuffling, of that information. It might give a new interpretation of old material or combine new with old interpretations. Or it might trace the intellectual progression of the field, including major debates. And depending on the situation, the literature review may evaluate the sources and advise the reader on the most pertinent or relevant.
But how is a literature review different from an academic research paper?
The main focus of an academic research paper is to develop a new argument, and a research paper will contain a literature review as one of its parts. In a research paper, you use the literature as a foundation and as support for a new insight that you contribute. The focus of a literature review, however, is to summarize and synthesize the arguments and ideas of others without adding new contributions.
Why do we write literature reviews?
Literature reviews provide you with a handy guide to a particular topic. If you have limited time to conduct research, literature reviews can give you an overview or act as a stepping stone. For professionals, they are useful reports that keep them up to date with what is current in the field. For scholars, the depth and breadth of the literature review emphasizes the credibility of the writer in his or her field. Literature reviews also provide a solid background for a research paper’s investigation. Comprehensive knowledge of the literature of the field is essential to most research papers.
Who writes these things, anyway?
Literature reviews are written occasionally in the humanities, but mostly in the sciences and social scienc.
Reading and Writing Skills Q4 LAS 5.docxBlueBarrido
The text summarizes and analyzes the children's book "The Little Prince" by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. It discusses the timeless nature of the story and its lessons about caring for others and childhood. It highlights how the story teaches that the time spent caring for something is what makes it important. The text is an example of a positive book review, as it identifies the title, author, main ideas and themes of the story, provides an analysis of these elements, and recommends the book for readers of all ages.
Writing an essay about books poses several challenges. There are countless books across genres, time periods, and cultures to consider. Crafting a compelling analysis requires a deep understanding of literary techniques to dissect themes, characters, and writing styles. Additionally, the essayist must balance personal opinions with objective evidence from the text. Presenting a fresh perspective is difficult when many scholars have already explored the topic. In conclusion, writing about books is an intellectually rigorous task that demands navigating the vast world of literature and offering original thought.
This document discusses different types of book reviews. It defines a scholarly book review as a critical assessment published 6 months to 2 years after a book, summarizing its content and evaluating it. Literary book reviews assess themes, characters, and relationships in creative works, or the thesis, analysis, and contribution to scholarship of critical studies. Scholarly book reviews are published in journals or cultural magazines and written by experts with advanced degrees. They provide context and identify key scholars for researchers.
This document provides guidance on how to write an academic book review. It explains that the purpose is to inform fellow scholars about the quality, purpose, and arguments of a book and how it fits within the current literature. The document outlines the typical parts of a book review, including a summary of the main arguments, analysis of the book's significance and relevance, discussion of methodology and sources, and a critique and recommendation. It also provides an annotated example of an academic book review to demonstrate how to incorporate these elements.
Eng 112 responding and reacting to literatureEnglish83R
The document discusses close reading and responding and reacting to literature. It defines close reading as a careful re-reading of a text that pays attention to linguistic, semantic, structural, and cultural elements to understand the author's meaning and nuances. Responding involves conveying personal thoughts and feelings about a text through reflection, while reacting analyzes how literary elements like character and theme work individually and together to create effects. The document encourages asking questions about patterns, images, contradictions, and more when reading to uncover insights for a literary analysis.
This powerpoint introduces literature circles and provides guidance on implementing them in the classroom. Literature circles involve small groups reading and discussing the same book, with student-led conversations. They promote a love of reading, critical thinking, and collaboration. The presentation outlines how to form groups, select books, establish expectations, and assess student learning during literature circles.
This document provides guidance on writing a literature review. It explains that a literature review critically evaluates relevant academic sources and demonstrates how the research relates to existing work. It recommends choosing sources carefully based on importance and relevance. Various techniques are described for finding sources, such as using reference lists, databases, and subject librarians. The document also offers tips for critically evaluating sources, managing references, structuring the review, and writing it to fill gaps and relate the research to prior work. Academic Skills Enhancement at Queen Mary University of London provides additional resources and support for developing academic skills.
Assignment InstructionsWrite a 500-750 word essay on one of the fo.docxsimba35
Assignment Instructions
Write a 500-750 word essay on one of the following topics. The word count does not include formatting or the works cited page.
Write a critical analysis of one of the works from weeks 1 or 2. An overview of approaches can be found
here
, but many are quite straightforward. Psychological, gender, sociological, biographical, and historical are all approaches that many use naturally in viewing a work. However, if your interest lies elsewhere, feel free to choose another approach.
Compare and contrast two of the stories from weeks 1 and 2. Be sure that you have isolated a strong and debatable thesis on which to build the essay. Simply pointing out the differences is not analysis. Toward that end, you may want to focus on a specific element of the stories.
If there's an aspect of the stories from these two weeks that particularly interests you, you may choose your own topic, but you must run it by me first to be sure it is headed in an analytical direction.
Your essay should be formatted in
MLA style
, including double spacing throughout. All sources should be properly cited both in the text and on a works cited page. As with most academic writing, this essay should be written in third person. Please avoid both first person (I, we, our, etc.) and second person (you, your).
In the upper left-hand corner of the paper, place your name, the professor’s name, the course name, and the due date for the assignment on consecutive lines. Double space your information from your name onward, and don't forget a title. All papers should be in Times New Roman font with 12-point type with one-inch margins all the way around your paper. All paragraph indentations should be indented five spaces (use the tab key) from the left margin. All work is to be left justified. When quoting lines in literature, please research the proper way to cite short stories, plays, or poems.
You should use the online APUS library to look for scholarly sources. Be careful that you don’t create a "cut and paste" paper of information from your various sources. Your ideas are to be new and freshly constructed. Also, take great care not to plagiarize.
Whatever topic you choose you will need a debatable thesis. A
thesis
is not a fact, a quote, or a question. It is your position on the topic. The reader already knows the story; you are to offer him a new perspective based on your observations.
Since the reader is familiar with the story, summary is unnecessary. Rather than tell him what happened, tell him what specific portions of the story support your thesis.
Formalist Criticism:
This approach regards literature as “a unique form of human knowledge that needs to be examined on its own terms.” All the elements necessary for understanding the work are contained within the work itself. Of particular interest to the formalist critic are the elements of
form
—style, structure, tone, imagery, etc.—that are found within the text. A primary goal for formalist critic ...
The document provides guidance on how to write a book review in 3-6 sentences. It outlines identifying the book, author, and yourself. It explains that a review should describe the content, analyze how the book achieved its purpose, and express reactions. Reviews can be short summaries or longer critical analyses. The reviewer should consider the book's purpose and audience when writing.
This document discusses various theories and strategies related to reading, literature, and engaging students. It provides summaries of key ideas from Rosenblatt's reader response theory, including her concepts of efferent and aesthetic reading. It also outlines strategies for close reading a text and engaging with literature at different levels, and discusses how poststructuralism, frames of reference, and intertextuality can be applied when analyzing texts.
riting About LiteratureGenerally, the essays you write in litera.docxdaniely50
riting About Literature
Generally, the essays you write in literature courses attempt to answer interesting questions about works of literature. These questions are interesting for at least two reasons: a) their answers are not obvious, and b) their answers (or at least the attempt to answer them) can enrich other readers’ understanding and experience of those works of literature. Often works of literature seem to be intentionally posing these questions to us; they require us to do some work to get them to work.
Readers have asked many different types of questions of works of literature, for example:
What did the author want to communicate in this work?
What does the work reveal about the author’s feelings, opinions, or psychology?
What does the work reveal about the society in which it was written?
What can we learn from this work about the issues or topics it deals with?
What motivates the characters in the work to behave as they do?
How are literary devices used in the work?
How does the work create emotional or intellectual experiences for its readers?
Is this work good or bad?
Is this work good or bad for its readers?
Some of these questions require information from outside the text itself; for example, to argue that a work reveals a writer’s psychological condition, it would be helpful to have some other evidence of that condition to corroborate your interpretation of the work of literature. Some of these questions ask about the world outside the work—about the author, his/her society, or our own society, for example—while others try to focus more on the features of the work itself.
Analyses which try to make statements about the work itself
is often called
formalist
criticism: it attends more to the structures and strategies employed in the work. Ultimately, such arguments generally do try to move beyond the work, to claim, for instance, that it is likely to create certain effects in its readers, or that readers will understand the writer’s intent more clearly if they pay attention to its formal characteristic.
In LIT 100, we are going to be paying attention primarily to these formal features of literary works. In fiction, some of these features include tone, point of view, setting, character, etc. We will be paying less attention to extra-textual features, such as the author’s biography or the historical contexts in which the literature was produced and/or read; these elements are not less important than formal features, but they naturally vary greatly from one work to another and often require in-depth study to truly appreciate. To understand how Shakespeare’s social situation in London in the 1590s might have been reflected in his plays would require a whole course in Elizabethan history. On the other hand, the formal features we will be studying in this course can be found in literature of all eras and genres, though they may often be used to different effect by different writers at different times. Almost all fict.
What is a literature review A literature review is NOT.docxphilipnelson29183
What is a literature review?
A literature review is NOT a book review; it is a review of the literature. THE literature, in this
case, means all of the research you have collected. Your secondary sources only. The
scholarship.
So, why am I doing this?
Because good researchers—good writers—do it. You may be tempted to just jump directly from
gathering materials to writing an essay (or you may have been tempted to skip the research part
altogether); however, before you can write an essay, you need to identify a purpose for your
writing and develop a plan for using your sources. You need to synthesize; the lit review is that
synthesis. This is also an important step in proving your expertise before I allow you to edit and
annotate a fairy tale.
So, what am I looking for?
Basically, you are looking for patterns of association; you want to look at the body of scholarship
(the literature) you have collected and decide how it all works together. You need to see the
literature as a body of research rather than separate pieces. The scholarship is written by real
scholars who are familiar with one another’s work and sometimes know each other personally; it
is a kind of elaborate conversation. You are listening to that conversation, waiting for a good
opportunity to jump in.
So, I have six pieces of literature to review, right?
Well, you have AT LEAST six pieces. It will actually be easier to write a lit review of more
sources; eight or ten sources would be a good number. This does require more research and more
time for reading, but the payoff is greater expertise and more to discuss in the review.
Okay, so what do I do first?
First, make sure you have gathered the literature. For this assignment, I am only permitting you
to use the CSCC Library databases to gather your sources. Specifically, you will look at the
Academic Search Complete, MLA International Bibliography, and Literary Reference Center
databases; if these don’t turn up 6-10 good sources for you, then you can search other databases
(and I have posted a video showing you how to do this research, so make sure you watch it). You
are NOT permitted to locate web based sources, even via Google scholar. And I am asking you
not to use books, simply to save time.
And then?
Once you have all of the literature, you should read it and understand it. It isn’t absolutely
necessary to pore over each page of each source—this would likely be hundreds of pages of
difficult reading. Use your reading skills—the first two or three pages usually contain the thesis
and main arguments—the last couple of pages will often contain some kind of summary or
conclusion. Look for important headings in between. I strongly suggest highlighting the thesis
(probably more than a single sentence) and the main points (topic sentences) and any interesting
passages you may want to reference later.
But how do I write the lit review?
You should begin by grou.
An annotated bibliography provides brief summaries of citations for books, articles, and documents on a topic. Each citation is followed by a 150 word descriptive and evaluative paragraph (annotation) that informs readers about the source's relevance, accuracy, and quality. Annotations go beyond abstracts by including the author's point of view, clarity of expression, and authority. To create an annotated bibliography requires concisely summarizing sources and analyzing their usefulness and perspectives on the topic.
Writing an essay on a book poses several inherent complexities that require navigating a vast amount of literature to extract meaningful insights. First, one must decide which book to focus on from the diverse range of options. Next, a deep understanding of literary techniques and skills in analytical thinking are needed to dissect narrative style, themes, and historical context beyond just summarizing plots. Additionally, thorough research enriching the essay with critical analyses and theories is demanded. Finally, crafting a compelling essay involves mastering persuasive language skills to engage readers while conveying objective analysis balanced with subjective interpretation. Successfully meeting these multifaceted challenges results in an essay that does justice to the chosen book and contributes to broader literary discourse.
Interested in providing betters Readers' Advisory service to your teen patrons? Check this presentation for information on how books make our teen patrons "feel" and matching those feelings to the right book.
T H E W R I T I N G C E N T E R Academic Services • .docxAASTHA76
T H E W R I T I N G C E N T E R
Academic Services • Phone: 962-7710
www.unc.edu/depts/wcweb/
How to Write a Literature Review
What This Handout is About…
This handout will explain what a Literature Review is and offer insights into the form and
construction of a Literature Review in the Humanities, Social Sciences, and Sciences.
Introduction
OK. You’ve got to write a literature review. You dust off your world literature
anthology book, settle down in your Ebert and Roper at the Movies theatre chair with
your popcorn and soda in hand, and get ready to issue a “thumbs up” or “thumbs down”
as you leaf through the pages. “Literature Review” done. Right?
Wrong! The “literature” of a literature review refers to any collection of materials on a
topic, not necessarily the Great Literary Texts of the World. “Literature” could be
anything from a set of government pamphlets on British colonial methods in Africa to
scholarly articles on the treatment of a torn ACL. And a review does not necessarily
mean that your reader wants you to give your personal opinion on whether or not you
liked these sources.
What is a literature review, then?
A literature review discusses published information in a particular subject area, and
sometimes information in a particular subject area within a certain time period.
A literature review can be just a simple summary of the sources, but it usually has an
organizational pattern and combines both summary and synthesis. A summary is a recap
of the important information of the source, but a synthesis is a re-organization, or a
reshuffling, of that information. It might give a new interpretation of old material or
combine new with old interpretations. Or it might trace the intellectual progression of the
field, including major debates. And depending on the situation, the literature review may
evaluate the sources and advise the reader on the most pertinent or relevant.
But how is a literature review different from an academic research
paper?
While the main focus of an academic research paper is to support your own argument, the
focus of a literature review is to summarize and synthesize the arguments and ideas of
others. The academic research paper also covers a range of sources, but it is usually a
select number of sources, because the emphasis is on the argument. Likewise, a literature
review can also have an “argument,” but it is not as important as covering a number of
sources. In short, an academic research paper and a literature review contain some of the
same elements. In fact, many academic research papers will contain a literature review
section. But it is the aspect of the study (the argument or the sources) that is emphasized
that determines what type of document it is.
Why do we write literature reviews?
Literature reviews provide you with a handy guide to a particular topic. If you have
limited time to conduct res.
A Guide To How To Analyze Literature With Special Thanks To Professor Erick...Aaron Anyaakuu
This document provides a guide for analyzing literature through 6 topics: the author, plot, characters, themes, quotes and dialogues, and symbolism. It suggests beginning by researching the author's background and historical context to better understand their perspective. It then advises analyzing the plot by summarizing chapters and identifying the beginning, middle, and climax. Characters should be understood by compiling notes on their traits and how they influence the story. Themes are perspectives the text can be analyzed through and should relate to the author's context. Quotes and dialogues provide evidence to support analyses. Symbolism represents abstract ideas and requires close attention to details with deeper meanings. The overall aim is to equip students with approachable techniques for literary analysis
The document discusses how to conduct an effective literature review. It explains that a literature review analyzes and synthesizes previous research rather than reporting original work. It emphasizes being organized around a research question, synthesizing both agreed upon and controversial findings, and identifying areas for further study. The document advises asking questions about the scope and quality of the review as well as critically evaluating each source to understand its perspective, framework, and relationship to the topic. The goal is to produce a cohesive analysis rather than a list of summaries.
The document provides an overview of how to conduct a literature review. It begins by defining a literature review as an interpretation and synthesis of published work on a topic. It then outlines the main reasons for conducting a literature review, including finding a research problem worth studying and contextualizing one's own research. The document discusses when a literature review should be conducted, primarily early on to establish context and confirm the research focus. It provides details on how to conduct a literature review through identifying topics, locating sources, reading, analyzing, and organizing the literature. The document also offers tips on how to present a literature review and concludes by listing additional resources for conducting literature reviews.
Critical thinking | interogatting the textNazish Jamali
The document discusses six techniques for interrogating texts: 1) Previewing the text to understand its structure and scope, 2) Annotating by taking notes and writing in the margins, 3) Outlining, summarizing, and analyzing to understand the key ideas, 4) Noting repetitions and patterns in language, 5) Contextualizing the text by considering its time period and audience, and 6) Comparing and contrasting different texts on similar topics. The goal of interrogating texts is for students to actively engage with readings and develop strong reading comprehension skills.
Cara Menulis Angka Dengan Kata Dalam Bahasa Inggris LMichele Thomas
The document provides instructions for creating an account and submitting requests for paper writing help on the HelpWriting.net site. It is a 5-step process: 1) Create an account with an email and password. 2) Complete a request form with instructions, sources, and deadline. 3) Review bids from writers and select one. 4) Review the paper and authorize payment if satisfied. 5) Request revisions until fully satisfied, with a refund option for plagiarism. The process aims to ensure high-quality, original content that meets the customer's needs.
Critical Essay Short Persuasive Text ExamplesMichele Thomas
The document discusses the history of ballet dance, beginning with its origins in 15th century Italian Renaissance stage performances incorporating song and costumes. It later evolved in the 1700s under Jean Geogores Noverre to become more dramatic narratives. Today the same traditions and techniques are used, with a typical ballet class consisting of a warmup, center work, exercises at the barre, jumping and turning combinations, and concluding with a reverence. Safety is essential during classes.
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Writing an essay about books poses several challenges. There are countless books across genres, time periods, and cultures to consider. Crafting a compelling analysis requires a deep understanding of literary techniques to dissect themes, characters, and writing styles. Additionally, the essayist must balance personal opinions with objective evidence from the text. Presenting a fresh perspective is difficult when many scholars have already explored the topic. In conclusion, writing about books is an intellectually rigorous task that demands navigating the vast world of literature and offering original thought.
This document discusses different types of book reviews. It defines a scholarly book review as a critical assessment published 6 months to 2 years after a book, summarizing its content and evaluating it. Literary book reviews assess themes, characters, and relationships in creative works, or the thesis, analysis, and contribution to scholarship of critical studies. Scholarly book reviews are published in journals or cultural magazines and written by experts with advanced degrees. They provide context and identify key scholars for researchers.
This document provides guidance on how to write an academic book review. It explains that the purpose is to inform fellow scholars about the quality, purpose, and arguments of a book and how it fits within the current literature. The document outlines the typical parts of a book review, including a summary of the main arguments, analysis of the book's significance and relevance, discussion of methodology and sources, and a critique and recommendation. It also provides an annotated example of an academic book review to demonstrate how to incorporate these elements.
Eng 112 responding and reacting to literatureEnglish83R
The document discusses close reading and responding and reacting to literature. It defines close reading as a careful re-reading of a text that pays attention to linguistic, semantic, structural, and cultural elements to understand the author's meaning and nuances. Responding involves conveying personal thoughts and feelings about a text through reflection, while reacting analyzes how literary elements like character and theme work individually and together to create effects. The document encourages asking questions about patterns, images, contradictions, and more when reading to uncover insights for a literary analysis.
This powerpoint introduces literature circles and provides guidance on implementing them in the classroom. Literature circles involve small groups reading and discussing the same book, with student-led conversations. They promote a love of reading, critical thinking, and collaboration. The presentation outlines how to form groups, select books, establish expectations, and assess student learning during literature circles.
This document provides guidance on writing a literature review. It explains that a literature review critically evaluates relevant academic sources and demonstrates how the research relates to existing work. It recommends choosing sources carefully based on importance and relevance. Various techniques are described for finding sources, such as using reference lists, databases, and subject librarians. The document also offers tips for critically evaluating sources, managing references, structuring the review, and writing it to fill gaps and relate the research to prior work. Academic Skills Enhancement at Queen Mary University of London provides additional resources and support for developing academic skills.
Assignment InstructionsWrite a 500-750 word essay on one of the fo.docxsimba35
Assignment Instructions
Write a 500-750 word essay on one of the following topics. The word count does not include formatting or the works cited page.
Write a critical analysis of one of the works from weeks 1 or 2. An overview of approaches can be found
here
, but many are quite straightforward. Psychological, gender, sociological, biographical, and historical are all approaches that many use naturally in viewing a work. However, if your interest lies elsewhere, feel free to choose another approach.
Compare and contrast two of the stories from weeks 1 and 2. Be sure that you have isolated a strong and debatable thesis on which to build the essay. Simply pointing out the differences is not analysis. Toward that end, you may want to focus on a specific element of the stories.
If there's an aspect of the stories from these two weeks that particularly interests you, you may choose your own topic, but you must run it by me first to be sure it is headed in an analytical direction.
Your essay should be formatted in
MLA style
, including double spacing throughout. All sources should be properly cited both in the text and on a works cited page. As with most academic writing, this essay should be written in third person. Please avoid both first person (I, we, our, etc.) and second person (you, your).
In the upper left-hand corner of the paper, place your name, the professor’s name, the course name, and the due date for the assignment on consecutive lines. Double space your information from your name onward, and don't forget a title. All papers should be in Times New Roman font with 12-point type with one-inch margins all the way around your paper. All paragraph indentations should be indented five spaces (use the tab key) from the left margin. All work is to be left justified. When quoting lines in literature, please research the proper way to cite short stories, plays, or poems.
You should use the online APUS library to look for scholarly sources. Be careful that you don’t create a "cut and paste" paper of information from your various sources. Your ideas are to be new and freshly constructed. Also, take great care not to plagiarize.
Whatever topic you choose you will need a debatable thesis. A
thesis
is not a fact, a quote, or a question. It is your position on the topic. The reader already knows the story; you are to offer him a new perspective based on your observations.
Since the reader is familiar with the story, summary is unnecessary. Rather than tell him what happened, tell him what specific portions of the story support your thesis.
Formalist Criticism:
This approach regards literature as “a unique form of human knowledge that needs to be examined on its own terms.” All the elements necessary for understanding the work are contained within the work itself. Of particular interest to the formalist critic are the elements of
form
—style, structure, tone, imagery, etc.—that are found within the text. A primary goal for formalist critic ...
The document provides guidance on how to write a book review in 3-6 sentences. It outlines identifying the book, author, and yourself. It explains that a review should describe the content, analyze how the book achieved its purpose, and express reactions. Reviews can be short summaries or longer critical analyses. The reviewer should consider the book's purpose and audience when writing.
This document discusses various theories and strategies related to reading, literature, and engaging students. It provides summaries of key ideas from Rosenblatt's reader response theory, including her concepts of efferent and aesthetic reading. It also outlines strategies for close reading a text and engaging with literature at different levels, and discusses how poststructuralism, frames of reference, and intertextuality can be applied when analyzing texts.
riting About LiteratureGenerally, the essays you write in litera.docxdaniely50
riting About Literature
Generally, the essays you write in literature courses attempt to answer interesting questions about works of literature. These questions are interesting for at least two reasons: a) their answers are not obvious, and b) their answers (or at least the attempt to answer them) can enrich other readers’ understanding and experience of those works of literature. Often works of literature seem to be intentionally posing these questions to us; they require us to do some work to get them to work.
Readers have asked many different types of questions of works of literature, for example:
What did the author want to communicate in this work?
What does the work reveal about the author’s feelings, opinions, or psychology?
What does the work reveal about the society in which it was written?
What can we learn from this work about the issues or topics it deals with?
What motivates the characters in the work to behave as they do?
How are literary devices used in the work?
How does the work create emotional or intellectual experiences for its readers?
Is this work good or bad?
Is this work good or bad for its readers?
Some of these questions require information from outside the text itself; for example, to argue that a work reveals a writer’s psychological condition, it would be helpful to have some other evidence of that condition to corroborate your interpretation of the work of literature. Some of these questions ask about the world outside the work—about the author, his/her society, or our own society, for example—while others try to focus more on the features of the work itself.
Analyses which try to make statements about the work itself
is often called
formalist
criticism: it attends more to the structures and strategies employed in the work. Ultimately, such arguments generally do try to move beyond the work, to claim, for instance, that it is likely to create certain effects in its readers, or that readers will understand the writer’s intent more clearly if they pay attention to its formal characteristic.
In LIT 100, we are going to be paying attention primarily to these formal features of literary works. In fiction, some of these features include tone, point of view, setting, character, etc. We will be paying less attention to extra-textual features, such as the author’s biography or the historical contexts in which the literature was produced and/or read; these elements are not less important than formal features, but they naturally vary greatly from one work to another and often require in-depth study to truly appreciate. To understand how Shakespeare’s social situation in London in the 1590s might have been reflected in his plays would require a whole course in Elizabethan history. On the other hand, the formal features we will be studying in this course can be found in literature of all eras and genres, though they may often be used to different effect by different writers at different times. Almost all fict.
What is a literature review A literature review is NOT.docxphilipnelson29183
What is a literature review?
A literature review is NOT a book review; it is a review of the literature. THE literature, in this
case, means all of the research you have collected. Your secondary sources only. The
scholarship.
So, why am I doing this?
Because good researchers—good writers—do it. You may be tempted to just jump directly from
gathering materials to writing an essay (or you may have been tempted to skip the research part
altogether); however, before you can write an essay, you need to identify a purpose for your
writing and develop a plan for using your sources. You need to synthesize; the lit review is that
synthesis. This is also an important step in proving your expertise before I allow you to edit and
annotate a fairy tale.
So, what am I looking for?
Basically, you are looking for patterns of association; you want to look at the body of scholarship
(the literature) you have collected and decide how it all works together. You need to see the
literature as a body of research rather than separate pieces. The scholarship is written by real
scholars who are familiar with one another’s work and sometimes know each other personally; it
is a kind of elaborate conversation. You are listening to that conversation, waiting for a good
opportunity to jump in.
So, I have six pieces of literature to review, right?
Well, you have AT LEAST six pieces. It will actually be easier to write a lit review of more
sources; eight or ten sources would be a good number. This does require more research and more
time for reading, but the payoff is greater expertise and more to discuss in the review.
Okay, so what do I do first?
First, make sure you have gathered the literature. For this assignment, I am only permitting you
to use the CSCC Library databases to gather your sources. Specifically, you will look at the
Academic Search Complete, MLA International Bibliography, and Literary Reference Center
databases; if these don’t turn up 6-10 good sources for you, then you can search other databases
(and I have posted a video showing you how to do this research, so make sure you watch it). You
are NOT permitted to locate web based sources, even via Google scholar. And I am asking you
not to use books, simply to save time.
And then?
Once you have all of the literature, you should read it and understand it. It isn’t absolutely
necessary to pore over each page of each source—this would likely be hundreds of pages of
difficult reading. Use your reading skills—the first two or three pages usually contain the thesis
and main arguments—the last couple of pages will often contain some kind of summary or
conclusion. Look for important headings in between. I strongly suggest highlighting the thesis
(probably more than a single sentence) and the main points (topic sentences) and any interesting
passages you may want to reference later.
But how do I write the lit review?
You should begin by grou.
An annotated bibliography provides brief summaries of citations for books, articles, and documents on a topic. Each citation is followed by a 150 word descriptive and evaluative paragraph (annotation) that informs readers about the source's relevance, accuracy, and quality. Annotations go beyond abstracts by including the author's point of view, clarity of expression, and authority. To create an annotated bibliography requires concisely summarizing sources and analyzing their usefulness and perspectives on the topic.
Writing an essay on a book poses several inherent complexities that require navigating a vast amount of literature to extract meaningful insights. First, one must decide which book to focus on from the diverse range of options. Next, a deep understanding of literary techniques and skills in analytical thinking are needed to dissect narrative style, themes, and historical context beyond just summarizing plots. Additionally, thorough research enriching the essay with critical analyses and theories is demanded. Finally, crafting a compelling essay involves mastering persuasive language skills to engage readers while conveying objective analysis balanced with subjective interpretation. Successfully meeting these multifaceted challenges results in an essay that does justice to the chosen book and contributes to broader literary discourse.
Interested in providing betters Readers' Advisory service to your teen patrons? Check this presentation for information on how books make our teen patrons "feel" and matching those feelings to the right book.
T H E W R I T I N G C E N T E R Academic Services • .docxAASTHA76
T H E W R I T I N G C E N T E R
Academic Services • Phone: 962-7710
www.unc.edu/depts/wcweb/
How to Write a Literature Review
What This Handout is About…
This handout will explain what a Literature Review is and offer insights into the form and
construction of a Literature Review in the Humanities, Social Sciences, and Sciences.
Introduction
OK. You’ve got to write a literature review. You dust off your world literature
anthology book, settle down in your Ebert and Roper at the Movies theatre chair with
your popcorn and soda in hand, and get ready to issue a “thumbs up” or “thumbs down”
as you leaf through the pages. “Literature Review” done. Right?
Wrong! The “literature” of a literature review refers to any collection of materials on a
topic, not necessarily the Great Literary Texts of the World. “Literature” could be
anything from a set of government pamphlets on British colonial methods in Africa to
scholarly articles on the treatment of a torn ACL. And a review does not necessarily
mean that your reader wants you to give your personal opinion on whether or not you
liked these sources.
What is a literature review, then?
A literature review discusses published information in a particular subject area, and
sometimes information in a particular subject area within a certain time period.
A literature review can be just a simple summary of the sources, but it usually has an
organizational pattern and combines both summary and synthesis. A summary is a recap
of the important information of the source, but a synthesis is a re-organization, or a
reshuffling, of that information. It might give a new interpretation of old material or
combine new with old interpretations. Or it might trace the intellectual progression of the
field, including major debates. And depending on the situation, the literature review may
evaluate the sources and advise the reader on the most pertinent or relevant.
But how is a literature review different from an academic research
paper?
While the main focus of an academic research paper is to support your own argument, the
focus of a literature review is to summarize and synthesize the arguments and ideas of
others. The academic research paper also covers a range of sources, but it is usually a
select number of sources, because the emphasis is on the argument. Likewise, a literature
review can also have an “argument,” but it is not as important as covering a number of
sources. In short, an academic research paper and a literature review contain some of the
same elements. In fact, many academic research papers will contain a literature review
section. But it is the aspect of the study (the argument or the sources) that is emphasized
that determines what type of document it is.
Why do we write literature reviews?
Literature reviews provide you with a handy guide to a particular topic. If you have
limited time to conduct res.
A Guide To How To Analyze Literature With Special Thanks To Professor Erick...Aaron Anyaakuu
This document provides a guide for analyzing literature through 6 topics: the author, plot, characters, themes, quotes and dialogues, and symbolism. It suggests beginning by researching the author's background and historical context to better understand their perspective. It then advises analyzing the plot by summarizing chapters and identifying the beginning, middle, and climax. Characters should be understood by compiling notes on their traits and how they influence the story. Themes are perspectives the text can be analyzed through and should relate to the author's context. Quotes and dialogues provide evidence to support analyses. Symbolism represents abstract ideas and requires close attention to details with deeper meanings. The overall aim is to equip students with approachable techniques for literary analysis
The document discusses how to conduct an effective literature review. It explains that a literature review analyzes and synthesizes previous research rather than reporting original work. It emphasizes being organized around a research question, synthesizing both agreed upon and controversial findings, and identifying areas for further study. The document advises asking questions about the scope and quality of the review as well as critically evaluating each source to understand its perspective, framework, and relationship to the topic. The goal is to produce a cohesive analysis rather than a list of summaries.
The document provides an overview of how to conduct a literature review. It begins by defining a literature review as an interpretation and synthesis of published work on a topic. It then outlines the main reasons for conducting a literature review, including finding a research problem worth studying and contextualizing one's own research. The document discusses when a literature review should be conducted, primarily early on to establish context and confirm the research focus. It provides details on how to conduct a literature review through identifying topics, locating sources, reading, analyzing, and organizing the literature. The document also offers tips on how to present a literature review and concludes by listing additional resources for conducting literature reviews.
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The document discusses six techniques for interrogating texts: 1) Previewing the text to understand its structure and scope, 2) Annotating by taking notes and writing in the margins, 3) Outlining, summarizing, and analyzing to understand the key ideas, 4) Noting repetitions and patterns in language, 5) Contextualizing the text by considering its time period and audience, and 6) Comparing and contrasting different texts on similar topics. The goal of interrogating texts is for students to actively engage with readings and develop strong reading comprehension skills.
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The research articles investigated nine aspects of the relationship between board size and firm
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The document discusses the Big Bang theory, which is an scientific theory that attempts to explain what happened at the very beginning of our universe. It notes that discoveries in astronomy and physics have demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that our universe did have a beginning, prior to which there was nothing. The passage indicates that the Big Bang theory seeks to provide an explanation for what occurred at the moment when our known universe came into existence.
it describes the bony anatomy including the femoral head , acetabulum, labrum . also discusses the capsule , ligaments . muscle that act on the hip joint and the range of motion are outlined. factors affecting hip joint stability and weight transmission through the joint are summarized.
This presentation was provided by Steph Pollock of The American Psychological Association’s Journals Program, and Damita Snow, of The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), for the initial session of NISO's 2024 Training Series "DEIA in the Scholarly Landscape." Session One: 'Setting Expectations: a DEIA Primer,' was held June 6, 2024.
This presentation includes basic of PCOS their pathology and treatment and also Ayurveda correlation of PCOS and Ayurvedic line of treatment mentioned in classics.
Chapter wise All Notes of First year Basic Civil Engineering.pptxDenish Jangid
Chapter wise All Notes of First year Basic Civil Engineering
Syllabus
Chapter-1
Introduction to objective, scope and outcome the subject
Chapter 2
Introduction: Scope and Specialization of Civil Engineering, Role of civil Engineer in Society, Impact of infrastructural development on economy of country.
Chapter 3
Surveying: Object Principles & Types of Surveying; Site Plans, Plans & Maps; Scales & Unit of different Measurements.
Linear Measurements: Instruments used. Linear Measurement by Tape, Ranging out Survey Lines and overcoming Obstructions; Measurements on sloping ground; Tape corrections, conventional symbols. Angular Measurements: Instruments used; Introduction to Compass Surveying, Bearings and Longitude & Latitude of a Line, Introduction to total station.
Levelling: Instrument used Object of levelling, Methods of levelling in brief, and Contour maps.
Chapter 4
Buildings: Selection of site for Buildings, Layout of Building Plan, Types of buildings, Plinth area, carpet area, floor space index, Introduction to building byelaws, concept of sun light & ventilation. Components of Buildings & their functions, Basic concept of R.C.C., Introduction to types of foundation
Chapter 5
Transportation: Introduction to Transportation Engineering; Traffic and Road Safety: Types and Characteristics of Various Modes of Transportation; Various Road Traffic Signs, Causes of Accidents and Road Safety Measures.
Chapter 6
Environmental Engineering: Environmental Pollution, Environmental Acts and Regulations, Functional Concepts of Ecology, Basics of Species, Biodiversity, Ecosystem, Hydrological Cycle; Chemical Cycles: Carbon, Nitrogen & Phosphorus; Energy Flow in Ecosystems.
Water Pollution: Water Quality standards, Introduction to Treatment & Disposal of Waste Water. Reuse and Saving of Water, Rain Water Harvesting. Solid Waste Management: Classification of Solid Waste, Collection, Transportation and Disposal of Solid. Recycling of Solid Waste: Energy Recovery, Sanitary Landfill, On-Site Sanitation. Air & Noise Pollution: Primary and Secondary air pollutants, Harmful effects of Air Pollution, Control of Air Pollution. . Noise Pollution Harmful Effects of noise pollution, control of noise pollution, Global warming & Climate Change, Ozone depletion, Greenhouse effect
Text Books:
1. Palancharmy, Basic Civil Engineering, McGraw Hill publishers.
2. Satheesh Gopi, Basic Civil Engineering, Pearson Publishers.
3. Ketki Rangwala Dalal, Essentials of Civil Engineering, Charotar Publishing House.
4. BCP, Surveying volume 1
Main Java[All of the Base Concepts}.docxadhitya5119
This is part 1 of my Java Learning Journey. This Contains Custom methods, classes, constructors, packages, multithreading , try- catch block, finally block and more.
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Exploiting Artificial Intelligence for Empowering Researchers and Faculty, In...Dr. Vinod Kumar Kanvaria
Exploiting Artificial Intelligence for Empowering Researchers and Faculty,
International FDP on Fundamentals of Research in Social Sciences
at Integral University, Lucknow, 06.06.2024
By Dr. Vinod Kumar Kanvaria
How to Make a Field Mandatory in Odoo 17Celine George
In Odoo, making a field required can be done through both Python code and XML views. When you set the required attribute to True in Python code, it makes the field required across all views where it's used. Conversely, when you set the required attribute in XML views, it makes the field required only in the context of that particular view.
Reimagining Your Library Space: How to Increase the Vibes in Your Library No ...Diana Rendina
Librarians are leading the way in creating future-ready citizens – now we need to update our spaces to match. In this session, attendees will get inspiration for transforming their library spaces. You’ll learn how to survey students and patrons, create a focus group, and use design thinking to brainstorm ideas for your space. We’ll discuss budget friendly ways to change your space as well as how to find funding. No matter where you’re at, you’ll find ideas for reimagining your space in this session.
How to Build a Module in Odoo 17 Using the Scaffold MethodCeline George
Odoo provides an option for creating a module by using a single line command. By using this command the user can make a whole structure of a module. It is very easy for a beginner to make a module. There is no need to make each file manually. This slide will show how to create a module using the scaffold method.
2. ANALYZING LITERATURE: A GUIDE FOR STUDENTS
Thinking about the Genre...............................................................................................................................1
Strategies for Reading a Work of Literature ...............................................................................................4
Terms for Analyzing Literature.....................................................................................................5
For Practice .......................................................................................................................................................7
“Yours” by Mary Robison ...............................................7
For Critical Inquiry........................................................................................................................................10
Working Together..........................................................................................................................................10
“To Have Sex or Not to Have Sex” by Krista Williams ........................................................11
Looking at the Genre....................................................................................................................................12
Analysis ...........................................................................................................................................................23
For Critical Inquiry........................................................................................................................................23
Call to Write: Responding to Literature....................................................................................................24
Writing Assignment.......................................................................................................................24
Invention..........................................................................................................................................................24
Exploring Your Topic ..................................................................................................................24
Exercise ..........................................................................................................................................24
Exercise ..........................................................................................................................................25
Cultural and Historical Perspectives..........................................................................................25
Other Perspectives for Analyzing Literature............................................................................26
Exercise ..........................................................................................................................................27
Going On-Line................................................................................................................................................27
Planning...........................................................................................................................................................27
Developing a Claim.....................................................................................................................27
Exercise .........................................................................................................................................28
Arranging Your Material...........................................................................................................................28
Exercise .........................................................................................................................................28
Exercise .........................................................................................................................................29
Working Draft.................................................................................................................................................29
Paragraph Development: Sandwiching Information...............................................................29
Citing from Literary Texts ...................................................30
Peer Commentary...........................................................................................................................................34
Revising...........................................................................................................................................................35
Connections and Coherence.........................................................................................................................36
Writing a Literary Analysis Paper as an In-Class Assignment ..............................................................37
Preparing to Write.........................................................................................................................37
Writing a Good In-Class Literary Analysis...............................................................................37
Sample Essay by Carolyn Chipperfield......................................................................................38
“After Apple Picking” by Robert Frost......................................................................................40
“To Autumn” by John Keats.........................................................................................................41
“Because I could not stop for Death”.....................................................................................43
Exercise............................................................................................................................................44
Looking at the Genre of In-Class Literary Analysis................................................................44
Writing Inventory...........................................................................................................................................45
Closing Note ...................................................................................................................................................45
3. 1
ANALYZING LITERATURE: A GUIDE FOR
STUDENTS
THINKING ABOUT THE GENRE
Literary analysis is a genre that in many ways resembles an argument: you
make a claim about the work and support your claim with evidence from
the text as well as reasoning and analysis. The purpose of a response to
literature is to persuade the readers that your analysis and interpretation of
the work are valid, reasonable, and logical.
When you write about literature, you participate actively in the
construction of knowledge about the text. That is to say, the text itself
creates only part of its message. The writer of the work has done his or
her part to convey its meaning by using symbols, language, setting, plot,
character, foreshadowing, and the like, to suggest the text’s message.
Unlike “hard sciences,” however, literature cannot be empirically tested in
the laboratory; its meaning comes from its readers. In fact, literature begs
for readers to read, react to, think about, and interpret the text. Having
engaged in those steps, the process continues with another step:
communicating to others the meaning you, as a reader, have constructed
from the text. Your interpretation and analysis, then, add to the body of
meaning about the text.
Most likely, you have been asked to write about literature before: perhaps
you’ve read a book and written a report or review of it for your junior high
English class; perhaps you’ve studied an author and researched his or her
life and work; perhaps you’ve read a piece of literature and answered
essay questions about it on an essay exam. Because literature is a focus of
many English classes, it is likely that you have had some experience with
reading and responding to literature in your past academic life; in the
university, you will also read and respond to literature—even if you’re not
planning to major in English. Since many colleges and universities
require their students to take a literature or humanities elective, you will
probably continue reading and responding to literature in college.
4. 2
As a genre, literary analysis differs from other types of writing you may
have done about literature, such as an evaluation. For instance, as an
assignment for school, you may have watched a play or read a story and
had to write a review of it. A review calls upon the writer to make an
evaluation, to describe and analyze the work in question. The purpose of
writing a review is to persuade the readers that your evaluation, which is
based on criteria, is a sound assessment of the work. (“Don’t read this
book because it lacks a clear plot.”) For example, you can find reviews of
books and music printed at online bookstores such as Amazon.com. Here
people who have read the book (or listened to the CD) provide their
evaluation of the work to potential book or music buyers to help them
make informed decisions.
With literary analysis, however, the focus is not on offering your opinion
about the work; rather, the focus is to interpret and analyze the text.
Certainly, you offer your informed opinion of the text’s interpretation, but
you do not assess the merits of the text or tell readers whether or not you
liked the work. Literary analysis, then, tends to be more objective than a
review might be. For that reason, literary analyses are written using third
person pronouns. Other features of literary analysis include a clearly
stated thesis (often called a claim) that is supported by reasons and
evidence from the text. Writers use present tense verbs to discuss the
work rather than past tense.
Why do schools put emphasis on literature? First, literature is a way to
experience a way of life, a time period, a culture, an emotion, a deed, an
event that you are not otherwise able, willing (as, say, in the case of
murder), or capable of encountering in any other manner. Literature, then,
opens doors to new and different life experiences.
Second, the critical reading skills that you bring to reading short stories,
poems, novels, plays, as well as non-fiction, are the same types of critical
reading strategies that serve you well in any other type of reading that you
do—whether it be reading a computer manual, a biology text, a legal
document, or the like. In order to write well about literature, you must be
able to read the text closely, looking at its structure, the words the author
has chosen, the characters’ motivations, the patterns of language and
literary devices. Certainly, you don’t read a biology text looking for
5. 3
literary devices and uses of language; rather, you read that text searching
for an understanding of the structure of the interaction within an organism,
how the organism relates to other organisms, the biochemical pathways
involved in those interactions. However, in either case—reading a piece
of literature or a technical document—you read closely and carefully,
looking at not only what the writer is saying, but also looking at why it’s
being said and how it’s being said. Furthermore, the critical reading
strategies that you employ in reading literature heighten your sense of
observation and draw upon your life skills. For instance, as you read a
literary text and notice the characters, you have to think about and respond
to each character’s motivation. (Why did she do that? What makes her
“tick”?) Reading literature, then, enhances your critical reading skills.
Likewise, being able to write about literature demonstrates your ability to
read critically and engage in the higher level thinking skills of analysis and
interpretation. However, it is unlikely that you will write a literary
analysis paper outside of a classroom. Literary analyses tend to be only a
“school” assignment for most people (unless you work for The New
Yorker or other literary type magazines). On the other hand, the skills that
you bring both to analyzing literature and writing about it are applicable to
situations outside the classroom and to other writing assignments within
the classroom. Being able to construct a reasonable claim, supported by
evidence and logic, is essential to many other types of expository writing
tasks (as you can see from the types of writing in this text). Regardless of
the writing task or audience, it is essential to be able to communicate your
ideas clearly and effectively, whether you’re writing a feasibility report for
your boss or a literary analysis paper for your teacher.
Often, students are intimidated when it comes to writing about literature
because they feel that they do not know enough about literature to write
about it or that the author is surely hiding some meaning in the text that
they just can’t find. It is important, though, to keep in mind that readers
are integral to making meaning with literary texts. Readers complete the
writer’s work, bringing their own life experiences and ideas to it to make
meaning. Sometimes students feel as if the whole purpose of writing
about literature is to be critical of the work—and that’s difficult to do if
you happen to really like the work. Responding to literature, however,
does not have to be intimidating if you read carefully and critically,
6. 4
keeping your mind set on thinking about and analyzing the text, and if you
write about an aspect of the work that sparks your interest, whether
positively or negatively.
STRATEGIES FOR READING A WORK OF LITERATURE
Like other types of reading assignments, reading literature in an effort to
respond to it requires more than just a quick read-through. In other words,
reading literature for a course or for the purpose of responding to it is
much different than reading the latest John Grisham novel while on
vacation at the beach. Reading with the intent of writing about the work
requires multiple readings of the text. When reading the Grisham novel at
the beach, we usually read the text only once and often quickly. The
following strategies offer suggestions for reading a story, poem, play, or
novel for coursework:
1. When reading through the work for the first time, read as you would at
the beach: get the “gist” of the plot (yes, poems often have a plot, too),
the characters, and a general idea of the meaning of the piece. Enjoy
the work and don’t be stressed out about any upcoming writing
assignment!
2. During the second read, pay particular attention to words that you do
not know and look up those words in the dictionary. If a word has
multiple meanings listed, consider each of the meanings. Often writers
will use antiquated or secondary meanings of words. You may find it
helpful to write the meanings of the words in the margin of the text or
on a separate note card, so that you can easily refer to them when
reading, writing, and thinking about the work. Paying attention to
word choice is especially important when reading poetry. Because
poems are often short, every word counts, which means that poets
select their words very carefully. Often in poetry, words may have
dual meanings, each of which makes sense within the poem but offers
differing interpretations.
3. Think about the setting of the work and its culture. Is the work set in
the 20th century or another time? Is it set in the U.S. or another
country? In what region of the U.S. or world? What are customs,
traditions, and lifestyles like in that particular region? What is the
socioeconomic status of the characters—are they rich, middle class,
7. 5
poor? What is the ethnicity of the characters? Considering these
issues gives valuable insight into the work’s meaning and perspective.
4. During subsequent readings, methodically begin to pay attention to
how characters interact with one another, how the writer uses words to
convey meaning, how the characters speak, who is telling (or
narrating) the story, the kinds of images the writer uses, or any other
aspect of the text that seems important to you. Ask yourself along the
way what you think about each aspect and why you think that way.
Many students find it helpful to keep a reading journal, as well, when
they read through a text. In a reading journal, you can record your
thinking about the work. As you continue analyzing the text, add to
your notes.
5. Annotating the text (by underlining or circling passages and writing in
the margins) is helpful because your annotations can refer you to
particular sections of the work later. Since you will need to draw the
evidence for your interpretation from the work itself, having already
marked sections of the work will aid you in garnering your evidence
when writing the paper later.
Terms for Analyzing Literature
Literary critics and scholars use discipline-specific terms to talk about a
work of literature. These terms make it easier for writers of literary
analyses to communicate with each other. By using the same “jargon” or
language, literary critics do not have to define common ideas constantly.
The following are terms (the definitions of which have been simplified)
that may help you as you read and write about literature:
• Character: A character is a “person” in a literary work. Characters
have moral and psychological features that make them human in some
way or another. We often think of characters as being either flat or
round. Flat characters are one-dimensional; they act stereotypically
or expectedly. Round characters, on the other hand, are more complex
in their make-up; they may act in contradictory or unexpected ways.
• Drama: This term actually has several meanings; however, in this
unit, drama refers to plays, works of literature that can be read and
performed on stage.
8. 6
• Fiction: Work that comes from a writer’s imagination is considered
fiction. Types of fiction include short stories, novels, fairy tales,
folklore, and fables.
• Foreshadowing: Foreshadowing uses either action or mood to
prepare the reader for something that will happen later in the work of
fiction or drama. It is often helpful to think of foreshadowing as clues
that a detective might follow when solving a mystery. The writer
leaves hints along the way to set the stage for what is to come later.
• Narrator: The narrator of a literary work is the person who tells the
story. Sometimes the person who tells the story is a character within
the work; we call this person a first person narrator. Other times, the
story is told by someone who is not part of the action; this type of
narrator is called a third person narrator. A third person narrator can
know everything about the characters—their history, their minds, their
emotions—in which case, the narrator is considered an omniscient
narrator (“all-knowing”). An omniscient narrator can also move back
and forth through time and space. A third person narrator who has
only limited knowledge of the events and characters, or who only
knows the minds of some characters and not others, is a limited
omniscient narrator.
• Personification: Giving animals or inanimate objects human
characteristics is personification.
• Plot: The term plot refers to the action or “story line” of the literary
work. Drama and fiction have plots, but sometimes poems do also.
Plot usually involves conflict between two or more characters or
between a character and himself or herself. Traditionally, the plot of
drama or fiction follows a particular pattern, which includes the
exposition (where the conflict or action begins), the rising action (the
events that promote the conflict), the climax (the point of greatest
emotional tension in the work), and the resolution or denoument
(where the loose ends are wrapped up). However, literary works do
not have to follow this pattern.
• Setting: Setting is where the action takes place and includes both the
physical location as well as the time period.
• Symbolism: Writers use symbolism so that a person, object, or event
can create a range of emotional and intellectual responses in the
readers. For example, using a flag as a symbol might conjure patriotic
feelings in one person, anti-patriotic feelings in another, or perhaps,
9. 7
like a warning flag, a sense of danger. By using symbols, the writer
can evoke a wide body of feelings.
FOR PRACTICE
Read the following short story by Mary Robison and practice the reading
strategies offered in this section.
Mary Robison
“Yours” c. 1983
Allison struggled away from her white Renault, limping with the weight of
the last of the pumpkins. She found Clark in the twilight on the twig-and-
leaf-littered porch behind the house.
He wore a wool shawl. He was moving up and back in a padded glider,
pushed by the ball of his slippered foot.
Allison lowered a big pumpkin, let it rest on the wide floorboards.
Clark was much older—seventy-eight to Allison’s thirty-five. They were
married. They were both quite tall and looked something alike in their
facial features. Allison wore a natural-hair wig. It was a thick blonde
hood around her face. She was dressed in bright-dyed denims today. she
wore durable clothes, usually, for she volunteered afternoons at a
children’s daycare center.
She put one of the smaller pumpkins on Clark’s long lap. “Now, nothing
surreal,” she told him. “Carve just a regular face. These are for the kids.”
In the foyer, on the Hipplewhite desk, Allison found the maid’s chore list
with its cross-offs, which included Clark’s supper. Allison went quickly
through the daily mail: a garish coupon packet, a bill from Jamestown
Liquors, November’s pay-TV program guide, and the worst thing, the
funniest, an already opened, extremely unkind letter from Clark’s relations
up North. “You’re an old fool,” Allison read, and, “You’re being cruelly
deceived.” There was a gift check for Clark enclosed, but it was
uncashable, signed as it was, “Jesus H. Christ.”
10. 8
Late, late into this night, Allison and Clark gutted and carved the
pumpkins together, at an old table set on the back porch, over newspaper
after soggy newspaper, with paring knives and with spoons and with a
Swiss Army knife Clark used for exact shaping of tooth and eye and
nostril. Clark had been a doctor, an internist, but also a Sunday
watercolorist. His four pumpkins were expressive and artful. Their
carved features were suited to the sizes and shapes of the pumpkins. Two
looked ferocious and jagged. One registered surprise. The last was serene
and beaming.
Allison’s four faces were less deftly drawn, with slits and areas of
distortion. She had cut triangles for noses and eyes. The mouths she had
made were just wedges—two turned up and two turned down.
By one in the morning they were finished. Clark, who had bent his long
torso forward to work, moved back over to the glider and looked out
sleepily at nothing. All the lights were out across the ravine.
Clark stayed. For the season and time, the Virginia night was warm.
Most leaves had been blown away already, and the trees stood unbothered.
The moon was round above them.
Allison cleaned up the mess.
“Your jack-o-lanterns are much, much better than mine,” Clark said to her.
“Like hell,” Allison said.
“Look at me,” Clark said. Allison did.
She was holding a squishy bundle of newspapers. The papers reeked
sweetly with the smell of pumpkin guts.
“Yours are far better ,” he said.
“You’re wrong. You’ll see when they’re lit,” Allison said.
11. 9
She went inside and came back with yellow vigil candles. It took her a
while to get each candle settled, and then to line up the results in a row on
the porch railing. She went along and lit each candle and fixed the
pumpkin lids over the little flames.
“See?” she said.
They sat together a moment and looked at the orange faces.
“We’re exhausted. It’s good night time,” Allison said. “Don’t blow out
the candles. I’ll put new in tomorrow.”
That night, in their bedroom, a few weeks earlier than had been predicted,
Allison began to die. “Don’t look at me if my wig comes off,” she told
Clark. “Please.”
Her pulse cords were fluttering under his fingers. She raised her knees
and kicked away the comforter. She said something to Clark about the
garage being locked.
At the telephone, Clark had a clear view out back and down to the porch.
He wanted to get drunk with his wife once more. He wanted to tell her,
from the greater perspective he had, that to own only a little talent, like
his, was an awful, plaguing thing; that being only a little special meant
you expected too much, most of the time, and liked yourself too little. He
wanted to assure her that she had missed nothing.
He was speaking into the phone now. He watched the jack-o-lanterns.
The jack-o-lanterns watched him.
FOR CRITICAL INQUIRY
Although this story shows only one day in the life of this couple, what
does the story reveal about their lives? What specific details in the story
lead you to this interpretation?
12. 10
1. Allison and Clark are of different ages. When you first read of their
age difference, what did you expect to happen in the story? Why did
you think they were together? How does our culture feel about
couples with such an age difference? By the end of the story, how do
their ages work differently than you perhaps expected?
2. Why does the story begin and end with pumpkins? How are the
pumpkins transformed from the beginning of the story to the end?
What ideas or feelings do you usually associate with pumpkins? How
might your associations work with the theme of the story? What
specific details of the story can you use to justify your thinking?
3. Why is the title of the story “Yours”? In what way does the title give
clues to the meaning of the story? What evidence from the story backs
up your analysis?
4. Why does a narrator and not one of the characters tell the story? How
would the story be different if told from the point of view of Clark?
Of Allison?
WORKING TOGETHER
Working with two or three classmates, discuss your answers to the
questions about “Yours.” Compare and contrast your thinking about the
story with that of your classmates. Did your group members have
different answers to the questions? Are their answers and yours
reasonable and valid? Why or why not?
After discussing and thinking about your different interpretations of the
story, think about why three people could read the same story and come up
with different, albeit reasonable, answers to the same questions. Together,
write a paragraph explaining your thinking.
LOOKING AT THE GENRE
Krista Williams’s essay compares and contrasts the attitudes toward
sexual relationships of the main characters of two novels, The House on
Mango Street and The Catcher in the Rye. She wrote this essay in an
Honors English course which focused on American culture. In her essay,
Williams compares and contrasts Esperanza’s and Holden’s views of sex
and relates those views to each characters’ upbringing and cultural
background.
13. 11
Krista Williams
December 8, 1997
Sharon McGee
Essay #5, Final Draft
To Have Sex or Not to Have Sex:
That is the Issue
“A boy once held me so hard, I swear, I felt the grip and weight of
his arms, but it was a dream” (Cisneros 73). Esperanza, from The House
on Mango Street, dreams about having intimate relationships with men,
but she cannot make these relationships real because of legitimate fears
about the consequences of sexual relationships. Holden Caufield of The
Catcher in the Rye also has this problem of wanting to have sex while
fearing the implications of having meaningless sexual relationships. He
can’t even hire a prostitute without feeling bad about having sex: “It
made me feel sort of sad when I hung [her dress] up” (Salinger 96). Later,
he lies to the prostitute and tells her that he can’t sleep with her because of
a supposed injury to his “clavichord.” Esperanza and Holden share a
similar confusion about whether or not they want to engage in sexual
14. 12
relationships and this confusion is brought about by exposure to different
environments and by unique perceptions of these environments.
Esperanza is a young Hispanic-American girl growing up in a very
poor area of Chicago. Most of the women she encounters on Mango
Street play very domestic, repressed roles in which their only power
comes in the form of sexual appeal. Esperanza is unsure about what she
wants her life to be like, because she wants to have the sexual appeal that
she sees displayed all around her, but she doesn’t want to have to deal
with the consequences of a sexual life. She wants to have intimate
relationships with men, but she doesn’t want to lose her independence and
self-respect. For instance, in one part of the novel, Esperanza tells the
reader about a boy named Sire who had exchanged deep, “hard” stares
with her. She says, “It made your blood freeze to have somebody look at
you like that” (73). From this statement, the reader can infer that
Esperanza’s experience with Sire was frightening. However, this
experience also causes her to say, “I want to sit out back at night, a boy
around my neck and the wind under my skirt. Not this way, every evening
talking to the trees, leaning out my window, imagining what I can’t see”
(73). However, Esperanza knows that if she gives in to her desires, she
15. 13
will become a sex-object and a possession. Thus, she wants to have a
sexually-oriented relationship, but she can’t allow herself to do this
because she doesn’t want to become dependent upon men like most of the
women she has observed.
Esperanza wants to wield her sexual power without losing her
strength and independence. She wants to emulate the image of the
“beautiful and cruel” woman portrayed in the media who “drives the men
crazy and laughs them all away. Her power is her own. She will not give
it away” (89). Unfortunately, Esperanza is not able to do this because she
isn’t confident about her physical appearance, and because men are
extremely frightening to her in sexual situations.
Experanza’s beliefs stem directly from her experiences on Mango
Street. She is aware of a domestic trap which exists for the women of
Mango Street in which women get married to escape from the homes of
their parents but are dependent upon their husbands for the rest of their
lives. Esperanza recognizes that sexual relationships lead to marriage, and
that marriage leads to a long, domestic, dependent life. Because she wants
to avoid such a life, Esperanza avoids sexual relationships. She tries to
help her friends avoid this trap as well, but she is unsuccessful because her
16. 14
friends don’t recognize the consequences of sexual relationships. At one
point in the novel, Esperanza’s friend, Sally, agreed to kiss some boys so
that they would give her keys back to her. Esperanza was angry at the
boys and wanted to defend her friend, so she “ran back down the three
flights to the garden where Sally needed to be saved. [She] took three big
sticks and a brick and figured this was enough” (Cisneros 97). However,
Esperanza was very confused when she arrived to find out that Sally didn’t
want to be saved. Sally was entering the trap of domesticity and there was
nothing Esperanza could do to stop her. Later, Sally married an abusive
marshmallow salesman who never let her out of the house and was trapped
for life. This example shows the reader what life might have been like for
Esperanza if she had not avoided sexual relationships.
Esperanza was lucky enough not to end up like her friend.
Unfortunately, there were some instances when she was unable to avoid
sexual encounters, and these experiences were very violent and frightening
for her. The first man who ever kissed her passionately was an old
Oriental man who befriended her at work and then grabbed her when she
agreed to give him a birthday kiss. Later, Esperanza was raped by an
older boy when she went to a carnival with Sally. Because of the violence
17. 15
and violation involved in these first sexual encounters, it is reasonable to
assume that Esperanza doesn’t want to be a part of similar experiences.
Thus, it is very difficult for Esperanza to come to terms with the kinds of
sexual relationships which she wants and the kinds of relationships which
she has experienced. She wants to have an intimate relationship, but
doesn’t want to be vulnerable.
Holden Caufield’s confusion with sex in The Catcher in the Rye is
very similar to that of Esperanza, but his confusion stems from a very
different problem. Holden likes women and wants to have sex with them,
but he feels bad about his desires because he feels that it’s wrong to sleep
with women that he doesn’t care about. At one point, Holden tells the
reader, “I think if you don’t really like a girl, you shouldn’t horse around
with her at all” (62). However, most of the women he has sexual relations
with give him a “pain in the ass” (Salinger 63). Thus, he’s caught in the
confusion of wanting to be sexually active but not wanting to do anything
“crumby.” For example, to demonstrate how much he doesn’t understand
sex, he states the following: “I keep making these sex rules for myself,
and then breaking them right away. Last year I made a rule that I was
going to quit horsing around with girls that, deep down, gave me a pain in
18. 16
the ass. I broke it, though” (63). Holden really wants sex to be part of an
intimate, emotional relationship, but he usually just ends up in
relationships with girls that he doesn’t really care about. This confuses
and depresses him.
Holden is so caught up in the romantic ideals of sex that he is
repulsed by its realities. He wants to exist in a fantasy world with the girls
he’s romantically tied to, so he makes up ridiculous plans about running
away with his former girlfriend, Sally (who he doesn’t even like), living in
the mountains together, and chopping firewood for her. This is also why
he thinks about his old friend, Jane, so much. Jane is the only girl who he
has ever respected and felt emotionally attached to, so throughout the
book, he’s preoccupied with thoughts of her. More specifically, Holden
repeatedly mentions the fact that Jane “keeps all her kings in the back
row” when playing checkers (Salinger 42). This detail is included to
illustrate how much Holden cares about her, since the reader knows that
he appreciates her personality quirks and her innocence instead of only
appreciating her body.
Holden thinks it’s “crumby” to sleep with a girl that he’s not
particularly attached to because of the social mythology that sex is a part
19. 17
of romantic, caring relationships. Unfortunately, the only girl he actually
cares about (Jane) supposedly has sex with Stradlater, Holden’s roommate
from Pencey Prep. This makes Holden very angry. He feels like his
meaningful relationship with Jane has been violated by Stradlater, so he
picks a fight with him. Later, Holden looks for sexual relationships with
other women, but is unable to follow through with them because he sees
himself as violating the principles in which be believes.
Holden’s ideas about sex come indirectly from exposure to an
environment very different from Esperanza’s world on Mango Street.
While Esperanza lives in a very poor, low-class neighborhood, Holden
Caufield comes from an affluent part of New York City and has attended
several expensive boarding schools on the East Coast. Holden’s upper-
class environment has severely depressed him because he perceives
himself to be surrounded by “phony” people and inconsistent social
conventions. Throughout the novel, he searches for something real that he
can admire and emulate. It is this quest for reality which makes Holden
unhappy and confused about most areas of his life, including the area of
sexual relationships. Holden’s society has projected an image of sex as
part of a relationship between people who love each other deeply, and
20. 18
marriage is usually involved in this. However, most of the sexual
relationships which he observes are very superficial. This double standard
of society depresses Holden just as much as all the other double standards
he observes, so he can’t have sexual relations with a girl without
becoming unhappy and confused.
Perhaps this common confusion of Holden and Esperanza stems
from similar struggles that both characters participate in. Holden and
Esperanza want to give in to their sexual desires, but neither character
wants to become a part of his or her adult world. Because Esperanza is
trying to avoid the traditional life and duties of a grown woman, her
struggle with her sexual desires can be seen as a fight to retain the
innocence of childhood. Similarly, Holden doesn’t want to become a part
of the conventional adult life which is filled with double-standards,
responsibilities, and uncertainties. Through his frequent admiration of
children and their activities, Holden indicates that he wants to remain
childlike and innocent. He always seems to be looking for sex, but the
reader knows that he remains a virgin throughout the novel. Because
virginity is often associated with innocence, perhaps Holden’s sexual
confusion is a continuation of his struggle to maintain his childlike
21. 19
innocence in a “phony” adult world. Thus Holden and Esperanza want to
keep their innocence and avoid living lives similar to those of the adults
around them.
Both Holden and Esperanza are looking for meaningful sexual
relationship in their lives, but neither knows how to find one. Esperanza is
afraid of becoming a sexual possession and Holden is afraid of becoming a
part of the phony world which disgusts him. However, both characters’
ideas about sex have been derived from observations about their respective
environments and from the decisions which they have made to
differentiate themselves from those environments. Neither character
wants to be like the people who they observe in their everyday lives, so
they avoid having sex, even though they both have strong sexual desires.
Perhaps when Holden comes to terms with his phony world, he will be
able to have a meaningful relationship with a woman without feeling
guilty about the implications of sex. Similarly, when Esperanza finally
escapes Mango Street, she won’t have to view sex and marriage as
domestic traps, and will be able to find fulfillment in her life.
22. 20
Works Cited
Cisneros, Sandra. The House on Mango Street. New York: Vintage
Books, 1984.
Salinger, J.D. The Catcher in the Rye. Boston: Little, Brown and
Company, 1951.
23. 21
ANALYSIS
Krista Williams’s essay begins by setting up the contrast between
Esperanza and Holden, then proceeds to discuss each character’s view of
sex separately. She writes her essay in third person, without using “I,” and
she uses present tense verbs when talking about the text, which are
common features of literary analyses. Although she does not cite from
outside sources, Williams uses plenty of evidence from the texts to support
her argument about each character’s sexual issues, and she connects those
views to the characters’ cultural perspective. Especially important to note
is the fact that Williams does not rely on plot summary to tell us about the
complete story of Esperanza and Holden; rather she brings in appropriate
background detail only to support the point she is making. She assumes,
then, that the essay’s readers will have some familiarity with the texts.
FOR CRITICAL INQUIRY
1. Literary analyses make an argument about a text (or texts, as in this
case) and support that claim with evidence. In your own words,
summarize Williams’s argument in this essay. Now consider the
evidence that she uses to support her claim. How many times does
Williams quote directly from each text? How often does she
paraphrase or summarize information from the texts? Why does she
choose to quote particular passages and paraphrase or summarize
others? How do quotations support her claim differently than
summaries?
2. Develop a detailed outline of Williams’s essay. How does each
paragraph function in the essay? In other words, how do the
paragraphs work together to create an argument?
3. You may have noticed how Williams integrates quoted material into
her paragraphs. For instance, in paragraph 2 she writes: “However,
this experience also causes her to say, ‘I want to sit out bad at night, a
boy around my neck and the wind under my skirt. Not this way, every
evening talking to the trees, leaning out my window, imagining what I
can’t see.’ (73).” Why does Williams connect the quoted material to
the paragraph in such ways? How does this integration of quoted
material help the overall flow of the essay?
24. 22
CALL TO WRITE: RESPONDING TO LITERATURE
Writing Assignment
For this assignment, write about a piece of literature you’ve been assigned
to read for your course. Your essay should be an argument that provides
your interpretation/analysis of the work and supports that claim with
appropriate and sufficient details (evidence) from the work. Unless your
instructor specifies otherwise, your interpretation should come from your
own reading and thinking about the work—not from critical or literary
analyses you have read about it.
INVENTION
Exploring Your Topic
To get ready to write your analysis, it may help you to examine what you
already think about the text after your initial reading.
Exercise
In your reading journal or notebook, write about your initial reaction to the
text you’ve selected. Doing so will give you a place to begin further
analysis of the work. When you write, don’t worry if your answers seem
incomplete or insufficient; however, try to respond to these questions with
as much detail as you can at this point. As you review your writing,
though, and re-read the text, keep in mind the gaps in this crash-through
writing. Those gaps will provide clues to particular points in the text that
you will want to analyze further. Consider the following questions as
points of departure for your crash-through journal writing:
• What is my “gut reaction” to this text? Do I like the work? What,
specifically, do I like or dislike about it?
• Do I like the characters? Why? Are there any characters that I
dislike? Why?
• How are the experiences of this character (or these characters) like or
unlike my own experiences? Does the difference in our experience
make the work more difficult to understand? Does the similarity in
our experience make me connect with the character(s) more closely?
• What is the setting of the work? What do I know about this setting?
How is it like or unlike my own experience?
25. 23
• What recurring images or objects did I notice in the work? What
might they mean? Do those objects have any cultural significance?
• What is the title of the work and why did the author choose that title?
What alternative titles might the author have chosen and why?
• Who is “telling” the story? Why did the author select this character to
tell the story? How would the story be different if told from someone
else’s point of view?
• Why might the author have written this work?
Exercise
After your initial reading, follow the reading strategies outlined previously
as you read through the work several more times to prepare for your
writing assignment
Cultural and Historical Perspectives
One way to analyze literature is to think about the cultural and historical
perspectives of the piece. When literary work that was either written
several years, decades, or even centuries ago, it is often easy for us to
forget to place that particular piece of literature in a specific historical
framework. It is easy to forget that the world was not as advanced as it is
today. It’s easy to overlook the fact that cultural and societal mores have
changed. For example, if we’re reading Harper Lee’s novel To Kill a
Mockingbird, we might be appalled at the way the townspeople treated
African-Americans in their community. We might wonder why the jury
consisted of all white men, no women or African-Americans. To
understand the novel, though, it is important to investigate the cultural and
historical moments of the text. In other words, we might need to research
civil rights in the South during the 1950s to begin to understand why this
particular text was so important in its time and why that impact is still felt
today. For another example, Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle, a novel about
horrible working and sanitary conditions in the meat-packing industry in
Chicago early in this century, may seem bizarre to us when we currently
have strict government regulations regarding the handling and processing
of food products as well as “labor laws” to protect the worker. However,
at the time Sinclair wrote the novel, those regulations were not in place.
Workers were not guaranteed any safety or health controls in the
workplace. No government regulations existed concerning the processing
26. 24
of food products. However, as a result of the book, many of these issues
came into the forefront of American thinking and changes resulted.
Other Perspectives for Analyzing Literature
Other than exploring the historical and cultural perspectives of the work,
there are other ways to analyze literature, including psychological,
Marxist, biographical, and feminist. These methods are often employed
by literary critics who want to revisit texts with new frameworks or lens to
understand the text in new and different ways. It is beyond the scope of
this guide to give you background into these varied ways of reading a text.
However, one of the more traditional ways to analyze a text is by using a
formalist perspective.
In the formalist perspective, the text is viewed to be a complete unit that
stands on its own without consideration to external issues such as history,
economics, biography, and the like. When using a formalist perspective,
you will focus on the text itself and its use of literary devices, tone, and
language. Formalist critics examine how the text works as a whole unit:
how, for instance, do language and characterization create a unified text.
The formalist perspective is often called a “close reading” because, with
this method of analysis, you pay close attention to what’s in the
work—not what’s outside it.
Exercise
Choose one element (such as characters, tone, or symbols) of one literary
work you’ve been assigned to read for your course. Think critically about
this element. Why might the writer have opted for this particular
character, tone, or symbol? How many possible reasons can you come up
with? How would the work be different if he or she had chosen a different
character, tone, or symbol? How does the element make the text “work”?
GOING ON-LINE
The Internet can be a resource for discussing your literary text with others.
Perhaps your instructor has arranged a class listserv in which you and your
peers can share ideas about your texts. You may also be able to find
forums at other universities in which you can discuss your thoughts about
27. 25
the work. For example, using an Internet search on The Catcher in the
Rye, you might come across a website based at Palo Alto College in which
Palo Alto students as well as other “surfers” can participate in a forum on
the novel. The web site, which is currently under construction at the time
of this publication, also has links to other resources about the novel; in
addition, the site plans to post student papers about the novel so that you
can see what other students have to say about The Catcher in the Rye.
You can browse this website at http://lonestar.texas.net/~mseifert/salinger.html.
PLANNING
Developing a Claim
A strong literary analysis requires a central, controlling claim—the main
argument you plan to support in your essay. Literary critics, academics in
the field of literary studies, may or may not state their claim early in the
essay; nevertheless, they have a claim in mind when writing. Without a
clear claim, the essay goes nowhere—it rambles, making points that seem
unrelated.
Exercise
Review the notes that you have taken while reading the text you’ve
chosen. As you reflect on these notes, what strikes you as an interesting
issue about the text? What idea do you keep thinking about or coming
back to in your notes? Most likely, what interests you will interest your
audience as well. Write your claim as a complete sentence, keeping in
mind that you should state it in third person.
Arranging Your Material
To build your argument you need to garner effective and appropriate
evidence from the text to support your claim. Linking that evidence
together as a chain is also important. A chain of evidence often relies
upon “mini-claims,” or smaller ideas that build upon one another to create
a solid wall of argument. Notice how Williams builds her mini-claims in
the first part of her essay:
• Paragraph 2: Esperanza sees women in her neighborhood playing
subservient roles to men; she sees them as powerless. They use sex as
a weapon.
• Paragraph 3: Esperanza wants power, strength, and independence.
28. 26
• Paragraph 4: Esperanza fears sex because she sees sex as a way
women become entrapped in dependent relationships with men.
• Paragraph 5: Esperanza encounters sexual relationships with men that
leave her vulnerable. These experiences reinforce her views of sex
and power.
Each paragraph takes one aspect of the total argument, supports it with
details/evidence from the text, and offers the writer’s analysis of the point.
Together, the paragraphs create a unified argument: each point builds on
the previous one.
Exercise
Above you see the first part of an outline for Williams’s paper. Continue
developing an outline for the remaining part of the paper, particularly on
her discussion of Holden. Write the mini-claims she uses to build her
case.
Writers of literary analyses often use one of the following types of
arrangement:
• Chronological.
• Comparison and contrast.
• Least important to most important or most important to least
important.
Exercise
To begin, write the mini-claims you will need to make in each paragraph
in order to build your argument. Then, consider the evidence from the text
that you can use to support each mini-claim. Do you have any gaps
without evidence? If so, review your notes and search the text for
anecdotes that bolster your claim.
WORKING DRAFT
Using the working outline you have developed, write a draft of your
literary analysis. While you are writing, you may want to consider the
issues raised in Paragraph Development and Citing from Literary Texts.
29. 27
Paragraph Development: Sandwiching Information
One technique for developing paragraphs in a literary analysis paper is to
link your mini-claim to solid textual evidence. Since a strong literary
analysis relies on evidence from the text itself, this is a helpful strategy to
follow. In addition, though, you must be sure to connect your evidence in
your own words to the point that you are making. You cannot assume that
your reader will see the connection between the evidence you cite and the
claim you are making. Notice in Krista Williams’s essay how she states
her mini-claim, explains it, supports it with information that is either
quoted directly or paraphrased from the text, explains the paraphrase or
quote, then brings in more evidence. This explanation of material is
sometimes called a “sandwich effect”: You tell the reader what the quote
or paraphrase means to the overall argument. The sandwich effect does
not imply that your readers are stupid. However, since we all read
material different ways and since you are taking the paraphrase or quote
out of the entire context of the work, your explanation helps the reader
understand how you are interpreting the citation. Think of the sandwich
effect as the mortar between bricks in a wall: it fills in any gaps that the
reader may have and makes for a solid argument.
Along with paraphrases and quotes, you may want to summarize sections
of the text for the readers; however, you want to avoid a plot summary in
which you summarize the entire plot for the reader. When you use a
summary in a literary analysis, you will want to summarize only a section
of the text, picking out the main idea and relating it to your purpose or
claim. Another way to use a summary in a literary analysis is to
summarize events leading up to a particular quote that you want to use. In
this case, your summary will be very brief, perhaps one or two sentences,
and simply will set the stage for the quote. Review “Paragraph
Development: Using Summaries” in Chapter 8 of the main text for help
with how and when to summarize.
Citing from Literary Texts
When quoting from literature, it is important to keep in mind MLA
conventions. (Most literary analyses use the MLA documentation system
instead of APA.) Refer to Chapter 17 for a detailed discussion of MLA
format. The following sections address particular concerns for citing from
literary works.
30. 28
Citing from Novels or Short Stories
When quoting from novels or short stories, if the quote is four typed lines
or less, you can integrate the quote into the paragraph by placing it in
quotation marks. If it is necessary to include a parenthetical page number,
put the page number in parentheses followed by a period.
“In walks these three girls in nothing but bathing suits,” begins John
Updike’s short story “A & P.”
Sometimes you may just want to quote words or a phrase, not a complete
sentence, from a text. In this case, you simply put the word or phrase in
quotation marks.
In order to execute his revenge on the King and his court, Poe’s disabled
character Hop Frog “encased [them] in tight-fitting stockinet shirts and
drawers. They were then saturated with tar.” Later, Hop Frog sets them
ablaze.
Notice, also, in this example that it was necessary to add the pronoun
“them” in brackets in order for the sentence to make sense. At times, you
find it necessary to add a pronoun, insert a missing word, or even change
the tense of a verb. When you do so, place the added word or amended
parts of a word in brackets.
If you are quoting material that is more than four typed lines long, you
begin the quote on a new line, indented one inch from the margin. Each
line of the quote is also indented one inch. Do not use quotation marks
with an indented quote. You can either use a colon to introduce the quote
or no punctuation. Double space throughout the quote. Unlike quotes that
occur within the text, with an indented quote, the parenthetical reference
occurs after the period at the end of the quote; it is not followed by a
period.
In Toni Cade Bambera’s short story “The Lesson,” the main character
31. 29
begins contemplating the consequences of the expensive toys she saw
while on a field trip to FAO Schwartz. She thinks
Thirty-five dollars could buy new bunk beds for Junior and
Gretchen’s boy. Thirty-five dollars and the whole household
could go visit Granddaddy Nelson in the country. Thirty-five
dollars would pay the rent and the piano bill too. Who are these
people that spend that much for performing clowns and $1000
for toy sailboats? What kind of work they do and how they live
and how come we ain’t in on it? We are is who we are, Miss
Moore always pointin out. But it don’t necessarily have to be that
way, she always adds then waits for somebody to say that poor
people have to wake up and demand their share of the pie and
don’t none of us know what kind of pie she talking about in the
first place. (4)
Although she begins to contemplate the social and economic plight of
her family, in the end, she brushes off this realization.
Citing from Poetry
You may quote one to three lines of poetry by placing the line(s) in
quotation marks within the text of your paper. Separate lines of poetry
using a slash mark (/). Leave a space on each side of the slash. In
parentheses place the line numbers of verse you’ve quoted.
Emily Dickinson begins her poem “The Brain—is wider than the Sky—“
with her characteristic use of punctuation and capitalization: “The
Brain—is wider than the Sky-- / For—put them side by side-- / The one
32. 30
the other will contain” (1-3).
When citing more than three lines of poetry, begin the verse on a new line,
indented one inch. Double-space the indented quote. As with novels and
short stories, do not use quotation marks and place the parenthetical
reference with line numbers after the period or other mark of punctuation.
Reproduce the lines as they appear in the poem, breaking for a new line as
the poem does even if there is more space left on your line. If the line of
poetry is too long to fit, you continue on the next line, but indent an
additional three spaces. When beginning the following line, come back to
your original one-inch indention. If you begin your quote somewhere in
the line other than the beginning, indent the first line the approximate
number of spaces to replicate where in the line you are beginning.
Poet Langston Hughes broke with African-American poetic tradition by
writing about jazz and racial issues and by using the language of the
common person instead of lofty literary language. These lines from his
work “Lenox Avenue: Midnight” reflect both his choice of topic and his
use of language:
The rhythm of life
Is a jazz rhythm,
Honey.
The gods are laughing at us. (1-4)
If the poem uses unusual spacing, try to replicate that spacing as close as
possible in your indented quotation.
Poet Nazik Al-Mala’ika uses unusual spacing to structure his poem “I
Am.”
The night asks me who I am
33. 31
Its impenetrable black, its unquiet secret
I am
Its lull rebellious. (1-4)
Citing from Drama
If you quote from a play, you will most likely be quoting dialogue from
two or more characters. After indenting one inch, you must include each
character’s name in all capital letters followed by a period. Start the
speech on the same line. Begin each subsequent line of the character’s
speech indented an additional three spaces. When a new character begins
speaking, return your indention to the original one-inch indention mark
and follow the same process as before, indenting subsequent lines three
spaces. Other formatting follows those outlined in short stories and
poetry.
Willy Loman, the protagonist of Arthur Miller’s Death of Salemsan, loses
his travelling salesman job, beginning Willy’s downward spiral:
WILLY. Howard, are you firing me?
HOWARD. I think you need a good long rest, Willy.
WILLY. Howard—
HOWARD. And when you feel better, come back, and we’ll see
if we can work something out.
WILLY. But I gotta earn money, Howard. I’m in no position to--
PEER COMMENTARY
Exchange the working draft of your paper with a classmate or with a peer
group. Respond to these questions fully in writing.
1. Read through the draft once for a first impression. What is your
overall impression of this draft after your initial reading?
34. 32
2. Now read through the text again more slowly. In your own words,
summarize the author’s main claim. Does the author “prove” his/her
point by the end of the essay? Is this claim reasonable and logical
given your understanding of the original literary text? Explain. Does
the claim seem outrageous or completely off base? If so, why?
3. Does the writer use effective evidence from the story to support his/her
claim? Are there places where more evidence is needed to support the
claim? If so, note those places. Has the writer used the evidence
appropriately? In other words, has the writer accurately reflected the
text author’s intent? Have any quotes been taken out of context?
Does the writer provide sufficient context for the quoted material to
make sense?
4. Is the paper organized logically? Do the points lead smoothly from
one to the next? Are there any big leaps of logic that the writer
makes? If so, where are they?
5. Has the writer integrated quotes into the text appropriately? If not,
note spots where the writer needs to do more.
6. Did the writer strike an effective balance between providing context
for the evidence and plot summary? (Remember, an effective literary
analysis does not rely on plot summary.)
7. Has the writer followed MLA documentation appropriately?
8. What suggestions do you have for this writer to improve the literary
analysis?
REVISING
Before revising your literary analysis, reflect on your essay now that
you’ve had some distance from it. What do you think is the strongest part
of your literary analysis? Why? What do you think is the weakest part?
Why? Think about your claim: Is it reasonable and logical? Are you
making a point you believe in or are you just trying to fulfill the
assignment? Are you making the argument you want to make? If not,
how can you revise your claim to reflect this new idea?
Now read through the peer commentary carefully. Do you agree with the
critique your peer responder provided? What areas do you think need the
most revision? Do you disagree with your peer responder on any points?
Why?
35. 33
Consider the following points as you revise:
• Is your claim clearly understood by the readers? How can you make
your claim clearer?
• Is your essay organized logically? Are your points connected with
strong transitions to help the reader follow your argument?
• Do you use sufficient evidence to support your claim? Do you need
more evidence?
• Have you integrated your quoted material smoothly into the text?
• Did you follow proper MLA format?
• Read your essay aloud. Are there any sentences that seem difficult to
get through or confusing?
CONNECTIONS AND COHERENCE
As you revise your essay, you’ll want to pay attention to the coherence of
your argument: Does the argument “hang together”? One technique for
examining the coherency of your literary analysis is to write down the first
and last sentence of each paragraph on a piece of paper. Now look at each
“paragraph.” Do the first and last lines of each paragraph relate in some
way to one another? Does the last sentence of one paragraph advance or
lead into the idea of the following paragraph? If there are gaps at any
point along the way, you’ll want to examine that particular paragraph in
more detail. Perhaps you’ll need to revise the ending sentence of the
paragraph, or perhaps the paragraph is out of order and should be moved
elsewhere in the essay. You can also use this technique to look for
connections or transitions between paragraphs. You may want to rely on
techniques discussed throughout this textbook in the “Connections and
Coherence” sections for ways to transition from one idea to another.
36. 34
WRITING A LITERARY ANALYSIS PAPER AS AN IN-CLASS
ASSIGNMENT
So far this chapter has talked about how to write an out-of-class literary
analysis, one on which you will work for several days, planning, drafting,
and revising. However, sometimes you will be asked to write a literary
analysis paper under pressure, either in-class or as part of an essay exam.
Many of the strategies discussed in this chapter apply to writing an in-
class literary analysis: You will still need a strong claim supported by
evidence from the text, effectively organized and presented. If you are
writing an in-class paper, though, you most likely will not have access to
the literary text about which you are writing. How do you incorporate
specific evidence from the text into your analysis? How do you write an
effective paper in such a short period of time? This section will offer
strategies for writing an in-class literary analysis.
Preparing to Write
In order to write a strong in-class literary analysis, you will still need to
engage in the reading strategies discussed earlier in this chapter. Just as
for any exam or pressure situation, you must be prepared. If you have
read carefully, taken notes, and thought about the text ahead of time, you
should be familiar with and prepared for any question that your instructor
may provide you. It is also important that you read the exam carefully and
answer the question or prompt that you have been given.
Likewise, you should approach the in-class paper much the same way you
would prepare for an essay exam. Review the chapter in your text on how
to prepare for an essay exam for tips and strategies for successfully
approaching an essay exam.
Writing a Good In-Class Literary Analysis
To write an in-class literary analysis, follow the guidelines for writing any
essay exam. The most important points to keep in mind are:
• Get to your thesis quickly and efficiently.
• Provide plenty of specific details from the text to support your claim.
• Write a conclusion—even a brief one—to tie your main points
together.
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The following student sample was written by Carolyn Chipperfield. The
question she was given was to compare/contrast the theme of death in
three poems that had been read in class. This essay was written as part of
a longer exam for a class. In total, she had 75 minutes to complete the
entire exam. Since the essay portion counted 50 points (out of 100 total),
she budgeted her time so that she spent approximately half of her time on
the essay portion. This was a closed-book exam, which means that she
could not use her book or notes.
Everyone seems to have a different interpretation of death. Some think it is a
depressing time due to the loss, and others feel it is a joyous time because of
heaven and life after death. These many different perspectives on death are
discussed very well in Frost’s “After Apple Picking,” Keats’s “To Autumn,” and
Dickinson’s “Because I Could Not Stop for Death.” Through images, diction,
symbolism and other literary devices, these poets show death in different views.
Frost conveys one of his themes, being the fragility of life, in his poem, “After
Apple Picking.” In this poem he shows a person who has “tired feet” from apple-
picking. He is ready to quit. This symbolizes that he is accepting death and is
ready to go on to better things. It talks about how he has picked “thousands and
thousands of apples,” thus showing the many things that he has done throughout
his lifetime. However, there are yet a few things that he needs to do, “and there
may be two or three apples left to pick,” before he dies. It also mentions how
there is one bucket left to fill. However, the narrator doesn’t seem too concerned
to get that bucket filled; he is ready to quit. The narrator also mentions about the
cellars full of cider stored up for winter. I think that this is symbolizing that the
narrator has done many things in his lifetime to lay up treasures in heaven. He is
ready to go on to better, more restful things. In the winter, there is no apple
picking that has to be done. Similarly, in the winter, or death time of the
narrator’s life, he doesn’t have to do anything, because he has already lived and
done “thousands and thousands” of things. The image of the apples is a very
good image for this poem also. Apples symbolize opportunity and knowledge,
which the narrator has.
“To Autumn” by Keats is also a poem that shows a person who is very accepting
about death and old age. Autumn is the maturing, or old age, time of life, which
is personified in this poem as a beautiful and friendly old man. The narrator is
talking about the beauty of autumn and old age. “The plump gourds and
blooming hazelnuts,” are some images that are used to show this. The narrator
says how he loves to watch the cider oozing from the trees. Overall, he is saying
how old age is a glorious time of life that everyone should enjoy. It is a relaxing
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time. There are many people who don’t see the beauty of the “green leaves
falling off the trees,” but the narrator here is living this time of his life to the fullest.
There is also a feeling of acceptance in Dickinson’s “Because I Could Not Stop
for Death.” In the beginning of the poem, Dickinson portrays death as a kind
gentleman who is picking her up in a carriage to go for a nice ride. Along with
personifying death, she also personifies Immortality, which is riding along with
them. “Death” and “Immortality” are both capitalized to imply these human-like
characteristics. She talks about how Death took her past the “school children”
and the “gazing grain” and the “setting sun.” This shows a very peaceful and
enjoyable ride through the different stages of life. However, Dickinson switches
her view about death towards the end of the poem. All of a sudden she realizes
that he is taking her with him to the grave, “the house in the ground.” This
causes her to start fearing Death. Images that convey this tone that Dickinson
uses in her poem are “for only Gossamer my gown” and on “only Tippet my
Tulle.” She suddenly realizes that her gown is very thin and she probably feels
naked and helpless. At the end of the poem she says that it was a long time ago
that death nearly took her, but it feels like only a day. I believe that this shows
again that it was a very memorable experience that she couldn’t forget very
easily. It was both wonderful and frightening to her.
It is very evident in these three poems that the speakers had their own individual
perspectives of death and old age. Through images and symbolism, these
aspects are revealed to us. Both Keats and Frost showed the acceptance of
death, while Dickinson shows both acceptance and fear of it. Death is a very
inevitable thing that everyone must face at some time in their life. Therefore, I
believe that the acceptance of death is a wonderful and needed viewpoint.
Now read the three poems on which she based her exam.
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Robert Frost
“After Apple-Picking” c. 1914
My long two-pointed ladder’s sticking through a tree
Toward heaven still,
And there’s a barrel that I didn’t fill
Beside it, and there may be two or three
Apples I didn’t pick upon some bough.
But I am done with apple-picking now.
Essence of winter sleep is on the night,
The scent of apples: I am drowsing off.
I cannot rub the strangeness from my sight
I got from looking through a pane of glass
I skimmed this morning from the drinking trough
And held against the world of hoary grass.
It melted, and I let it fall and break.
But I was well
Upon my way to sleep before it fell,
And I could tell
What form my dreaming was about to take.
Magnified apples appear and disappear,
Stem end and blossom end,
And every fleck of russet showing clear.
My instep arch not only keeps the ache,
It keeps the pressure of a ladder-round.
I feel the ladder sway as the boughs bend.
And I keep hearing from the cellar bin
The rumbling sound
Of load on load of apples coming in.
For I have had too much
Of apple-picking: I am overtired
Of the great harvest I myself desired.
There were ten thousand thousand fruit to touch,
Cherish in hand, lift down, and not let fall.
For all
That struck the earth,
No matter if not bruised or spiked with stubble,
Went surely to the cider-apple heap
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As of no worth.
One can see what will trouble
This sleep of mine, whatever sleep it is.
Were he not gone,
The woodchuck could say whether it’s like his
Long sleep, as I describe it coming on,
Or just some human sleep.
John Keats
“To Autumn” c. 1819
I
Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the mossed cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For summer has o’er-brimmed their clammy cells.
II
Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting carelessly on the granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reaped furrow sound asleep,
Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cider-press, with patient look,
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Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.
III
Where are the songs of spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,--
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river swallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft,
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.
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Emily Dickinson
“Because I could not stop for Death” c. 1863
Because I could not stop for Death—
He kindly stopped for me—
The Carriage held but just Ourselves—
And Immortality.
We slowly drove—He knew no haste
And I had put away
My labor and my leisure too,
For his Civility—
We passed the School, where Children strove
At Recess—in the Ring—
we passed the Fields of Gazing Grain—
We passed the Setting Sun—
Or ratherHe passed Us—
The Dews drew quivering and chill—
For only Gossamer, my Gown—
My Tippet—only Tulle—
We paused before a house that seemed
A Swelling of the Ground—
The Roof was scarcely visible—
The Cornice—in the Ground—
Since then—‘tis Centuries—and yet
Feels shorter than the Day
I first surmised the Horses’ Heads
Were Toward Eternity
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Exercise
Read through Chipperfield’s essay again. This time underline specific
references to each poem that she used. How do the references (either
paraphrases, quotes, or summaries) support her argument?
Looking at the Genre of In-Class Literary Analysis
Because she didn’t have the text in front of her when she wrote the paper,
Chipperfield had to rely on her memory to provide the specific support for
the essay. However, she does use many details from each poem to add
support to her claim. It makes sense that she didn’t directly quote entire
lines from the poems because that would be hard to do without the text.
Likewise, she did not have to cite line numbers for the poems. As you can
see, though, she did refer specifically to poems in many places. For
instance, in the second paragraph, she mentions the speaker’s “‘tired feet’
from apple picking,” how he is “ready to quit,” because he “has picked
‘thousands and thousands of apples’.” She mentions the bucket left to fill
before the speaker stops apple picking. These are specific details because
they come directly from the poem itself.
Look at the following re-write of the first part of Chipperfield’s second
paragraph:
Frost conveys one of his themes, being the fragility of life, in his
poem “After Apple Picking.” In this poem, he shows a speaker
who is tired from the job that he has been doing. He is ready to
quit. This symbolizes that he is accepting of death and is ready to
go on to better things. He has harvested much, which shows what
he has done in his lifetime. However, there may be a few things
that he needs to do before he dies.
How does this re-write differ from the original? It is certainly much less
specific; all of the references from the text have been omitted or barely
mentioned. As a reader, do you get a sense that the writer has read and
thought about the poems? Do you accept the claim being made? It is
much more difficult to buy into the claim since the writer is not using any
specific details from the poem to show that her position is valid and
reasonable. It is for this reason that it is important to have specific details
in your in-class paper; otherwise, you have not proved your claim.
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Remember that an in-class or essay exam is to demonstrate your mastery
of the material. In order to show that you have a grasp on the material,
you must refer to it in your writing.
WRITING INVENTORY
The assignments that have been described here ask you to take on the role
of literary critic as you offer your own interpretation and analysis of a
literary text. Reflect back to you reading journal or notes. What ideas
seem to creep up time and again about the work you’ve chosen? Why did
this idea or point interest you in the first place? What did you find
particularly engaging about this story? Did you focus your essay around
this idea? Why or why not? How might you weave this interest into your
paper if you haven’t already?
A CLOSING NOTE
Certainly, it is not fair to say that your literary analysis is of the same level
as a literary critic who has spent years studying texts, their production, and
interpretation. However, as a novice literary critic, your voice is still
important to the on-going conversation about the text. After all, literature
requires readers. Together with your class, consider posting your essays
to a website or beginning your own chat room to discuss the work(s)
you’ve read. These are two accessible forums for adding interpretations to
conversations.