- An analysis (analytical essay) is not a summary. Though this may seem obvious in theory, it's more difficult in practice. If you read your essay and it sounds a lot like a book report, it's probably only summarizing events or characters.
- One way to figure out if you're summarizing instead of analyzing is to look at your support. Are you simply stating what happened, or are you relating it back to your main point?
- Analytical essays usually concentrate on how the book or essay was written-for example, how certain themes present themselves in the story, or how the use of metaphor brings a certain meaning to a poem.
- In short, this type of essay requires you to look at the smaller parts of the work to help shed light on the larger picture.
- An example of a prompt could look like this:Analyze Stephen King's analogy of the "toolbox" with writing. (please use this topic)
- Remember that the thesis tells the reader your opinion / point of view / interpretation of the subject under discussion:
What to know
- This essay should attempt to develop a literary argument, examining the narrative elements of the memoir.
- This essay must be typed (12-point Times New Roman font), double-spaced, with a correctly formatted MLA Works Cited Page.
- The text of the essay (not including the Works Cited Page) should fall between 800 and 1000 words. Students are asked to include a word count in their heading.
- The essay should be grammatically correct, free of errors in mechanics, grammar, usage, spelling, and documentation, and will be evaluated according to the following Model for Evaluation of Student Writing.
- This essay must use a minimum of three authoritative sources, including one primary source (the text discussed) and at least two reputable critical or scholarly secondary sources (books OR articles; I suggest one source per text).
- Essays must contain quotations from or other references to your sources, and these references should be used to support your assertions about the texts and be properly documented (utilizing MLA-Style Citations for documentation).
- If students doubt the academic validity of any source they acquire, they should contact me as soon as possible.
On writing - A memoir of the craft - Stephen king