A commentary provides analysis and interpretation of a text through observations and comments on specific details. It expresses the writer's opinion, insights, and reactions. In contrast, a critique formally evaluates and analyzes a text or work, including both a summary and the reviewer's assessment. When writing commentaries or critiques, writers should carefully read the source text multiple times to understand implicit meanings, outline the main points, and follow a general structure with an introduction, overview, detailed analysis, and conclusion.

1. What is a COMMENTARY?
A commentary is an explanatory interpretation or
series of notes and comments in a form of
observation of a text. Writing commentary means
giving your opinion, interpretation, insight, analysis,
explication, personal reaction, evaluation or
reflection about a concrete detail in an essay. Simply,
you are "commenting on" a point you have made.
The purpose of publishing a commentary is to
provide a forum where different perspectives can be
discussedon a certain topic.

2. What is a CRITIQUE?
A critique is a formal analysis and evaluation of a
text, production, or performance—either one's own
(a self-critique) or someone else's. It starts out with
a summary of the topic of the paper but differs from
a straight summary because it adds the reviewer's
analysis.

3. Commentary VS Critique
As nouns, the difference between critique and
commentary is that critique is the art of criticism
while commentary is a series of comments or
annotations. They are two different things but they
have one common function that is to evaluate a
piece thus, most writers use them interchangeably.

4. Things to Do Before Writing a
Commentary/Critique:
1. Prepare before writing.
2. Outline the main points.

5. 1. Prepare before writing.
To have a clear understanding of the text, you
may have to read it multiple times. Read each word
and sentence carefully to understand the read
between lines that the author wants to convey. You
will be able to develop an analytical mindset by
reading the text slowly.

6. 2. Outline the main points.
Once you have read the text several times and
highlighted the words, you can create an outline of
your commentary. This is a general way to prepare a
commentary, unlike an essay which requires a thesis
statement. Generally, it should have an introduction
which identifies the important points.

7. Steps on How to Write and Present a
Commentary
There are no fixed rules for writing a commentary,
but a general structure will be suggested. You
should always PLAN your commentary before you
start writing it and following these guidelines are
always necessary. Remember also to write each part
in a paragraph form.

8. Introduction

9. Overview

10. Detailed Analysis

11. Conclusion