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English 152 Literature Writing Guidelines
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These guidelines for writing papers about literature are organized into four sections: general guidelines, fiction guidelines, poetry guidelines, and drama guidelines. To view each section, click on the links at the left of your screen. You may also click on the links to read the primary sources (the literature featured in the examples.) Thesis
Statement (Drama)
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Quoting From Primary Sources (Literary Texts: Drama)
In a direct quotation, a passage from a text is inserted verbatim (i.e., word for word) in an essay. Be sure to enclose direct quotations within double quotation marks. The only changes that are permitted in direct quotations are the following:
•
Adding a brief explanatory word or phrase enclosed in brackets. (See # 2 below.)
•
Omitting a portion of text, indicated with an ellipsis (i.e., three dots). (See
# 4 below.)
•
Changing a lower case letter to a capital or a capital to a lower case letter.
(See # 4 below.)
1. Whenever possible, introduce the quotation with a coherent introductory phrase.
Example: |
Nora explains to Christine that eventually she may tell Helmer about the money she borrowed from Krogstad: “Yes—some time, perhaps. Years from now, when I am no longer pretty” (Ibsen 1305). Note: Quotations from “A Doll's House” and from critic Michael Meyer can be found in An Introduction to Literature (Twelfth Edition) by Sylvia Barnet et al., published by Longman, New York, 2001. |
Explanation: The introductory phrase describes the context for a particular line of dialogue. |
2. Enclose the quotation in quotation marks. A brief explanatory word or phrase may be enclosed in brackets.
Example: |
Nora: “When a wife leaves her husband’s house, as I’m doing now, I’m told that according to the law [in nineteenth-century Denmark] he is freed of any obligations towards her” (Ibsen 1347). |
Explanation: The explanatory phrase shown in brackets briefly clarifies Nora’s reference to laws of nineteenth-century Denmark. Note that squared brackets, not parentheses, are used to enclose the added information. |
3. Follow the quotation with a parenthetical citation identifying the author, if his or her name is not included in the introductory phrase, and the exact page location of the quotation.
Example: |
The author emphasizes Dr. Rank’s desire to live despite his deteriorating health: “However miserable I sometimes feel, I still want to go on being tortured for as long as possible” (Ibsen 1307). |
Explanation: Note that the period at the end of the sentence follows the parenthetical citation. |
4. If you omit a portion of the original text, use an ellipsis (i.e., three dots) to indicate the omission.
Example: |
Nora explains to Christine that because Helmer is jealous of her mentioning “any of my old friends back home…” (Ibsen 1319). |
Explanation: Be sure that the words you retain from the author’s original sentence read coherently and help create a complete and grammatical sentence. Note that if the text omission occurs at the end of a sentence, as shown here, the final period is placed in its standard end position—after the parenthetical citation. |
5. If an error exists in the quoted text, you must still quote accurately, but you should indicate the error with the Latin word “sic” (thus) in brackets immediately after the error.
Example: |
Krogstad: “Are you aware that this is a dangrous [sic] confession?” (Ibsen 1347). |
| Explanation: The bracketed “sic” indicates that “dangerous” is misspelled. |
6. Short quotations can be incorporated into the text of your essay.
Examples: |
Nora: “When a wife leaves her husband’s house, as I’m doing now, I’m told that according to the law he is freed of any obligations towards her” (Ibsen 1347). |
Explanation: When a quoted passage involves one character’s relatively brief dialogue, there is no need to separate the quotation from the normal paragraph structure of your essay. |
7. Long quotations (i.e., quotations that are more than three or four lines long) should be presented in the indented form.
Example: |
Nora’s husband chastises her for suggesting that they borrow money:
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Explanation: Note that the final period in an indented quotation precedes the parenthetical citation. |
8. Quotations from poetic dramas should be presented in a slightly different format from the format shown above. Some dramas, particularly those of ancient Greece (e.g., Oedipus the King) and medieval or Renaissance Europe (e.g., Hamlet) are written in poetic format. Like all plays, poetic dramas present characters speaking and interacting; however, the dialogue is shaped into poetic lines that contain figurative and metrical devices. When quoting lines from poetic dramas, follow the principles for quoting from dramatic literature shown above; however, in the parenthetical citation, instead of a page number, show the play section (act and/or scene number, if shown in the text) and the line number(s) for each quoted passage.
Example: |
Example 1: When Oedipus discovers his true identity, he laments, “I stand revealed at last/cursed in my birth, cursed in marriage,/cursed in the lives I cut down with these hands!” (Sophocles, lines 1308-10). |
Explanation: In this passage from Sophocles’ tragedy, Oedipus the King, cite the line numbers in Arabic numerals. Note that when a play contains no sections and you cite only line numbers, in the first such citation, use the word line(s) to define the meaning of the numbers. Punctuate with a comma, as shown. In subsequent citations, you can omit both the name of the author and the word line(s), showing only the line numbers themselves, e.g. (1316-20), if you are certain that there would be no confusion with nearby citations for other sources. |
| Example 2: The ghost addresses Hamlet with immediate assurance of its identity: “I am thy father’s spirit/Doomed for a certain term to walk the night…” (Shakespeare 1.5.9-10). |
| Explanation: In this passage from Shakespeare’s Renaissance tragedy, Hamlet, the act number (1), the scene number (5), and the line numbers (9-10) are shown. Note that when you include standard items, such as these, in the citation, periods, not commas, are used to separate the items. |
Quoting From Secondary Sources (Critical and Biographical Works)
1. Limit the use of verbatim quotations when you are using secondary sources.
Explanation: Use direct quotation of secondary sources only for a few exceptionally well-phrased critical statements. Use summary or paraphrase for most references to critical or biographical sources. |
2. Just as with a primary source quotation, introduce a secondary source quotation with a coherent introductory phrase, and enclose the quotation in quotation marks.
Example: |
In a biography of Ibsen, Michael Meyer notes that “the play is not so much about women’s rights as about the need of every individual to find out the kind of person he or she really is, and to strive to become that person” (qtd. in Barnet et al 1348). |
For additional information about adding brief explanatory insertions to quotations, identifying errors within quotations, or indenting long quotations, see “Quoting from the Primary Text” above.
For specific information about quoting correctly from other literary genres, see the Fiction and Poetry sections of this tutorial.
Paraphrasing and Summarizing From Secondary Sources (Critical or Biographical Sources)
While verbatim quotations are important in a literary essay, students should take care not to quote excessively. Another useful method for bringing sources into a literary essay is to use paraphrased information from sources. A paraphrase is a restatement in your own words of a secondary source. When paraphrasing, follow these general guidelines:
location of the quotation.
1. Introduce any paraphrased ideas that you obtain from secondary sources with an appropriate and coherent introductory phrase, and follow each paraphrased idea with a parenthetical citation.
Example: |
Michael Meyer emphasizes that Ibsen is primarily concerned about the rights of each person to find his or her individuality, rather than about feminist issues (1348). |
Explanation: The introductory phrase and the parenthetical citation show your reader where the paraphrased information begins and ends. Without this framework, paraphrased ideas will be difficult for your reader to identify. Note that paraphrased passages are not enclosed in quotation marks; only word-for-word quotations are placed in quotation marks. |
2. Identify the author in your parenthetical citation if his or her name is not included in the introductory phrase.
Example: |
One critic emphasizes that in A Doll's House, Ibsen is primarily concerned about the rights of each person to find his or her individuality, rather than about feminist issues (Meyer 1348). |
Explanation: Note that even though Meyer’s name is not shown until the parenthetical citation, there is an appropriate lead-in phrase, “One critic emphasizes that…” to mark the beginning of the paraphrase. |
3. Be sure to paraphrase or summarize secondary sources accurately; never misrepresent a critic’s ideas.
Example: |
One critic emphasizes that in A Doll's House, Ibsen is primarily concerned with human rights, rather than strictly feminist issues (Meyer 1348). |
Explanation: In a summary of Meyer’s idea, it’s important to convey the author’s neutral tone. Offering a summary that implies that Meyer is making an anti-feminist statement (“One critic emphasizes that in A Doll's House, Ibsen rejects Nora’s feminist actions but applauds her human rights struggle” would be a distortion of both his words and intentions. |
4. Be sure to introduce every paraphrased idea, and follow it with a parenthetical citation. Adding a parenthetical citation at the conclusion of several paraphrased sentences is not adequate because you must acknowledge every idea that you obtain from a source.
Example: |
According to Michael Meyer, Nora should be perceived not as a feminist but rather as a human being searching for her identity (1348). Thus, her decision to leave her husband and family becomes a fundamental human rights issue instead of a somewhat focused gender struggle (Meyer 1348). |
Explanation: Even though the two paraphrased ideas from Meyer are presented consecutively, for the sake of clarity, it is best to cite each one separately, as shown. |
For specific information about paraphrasing correctly from other specific literary genres, see the Fiction and Poetry sections of this tutorial.
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Draft a literary analysis (as you would draft any other type of essay) by identifying your working thesis and informally outlining your main sub-topics.
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Begin your first draft with your own ideas about the literary selection that you are analyzing.
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After you have drafted your own ideas, support those ideas with specific details from the text of the selection—details about characters, setting, images, symbols, plot, or other relevant information. (DO NOT JUST SUMMARIZE THE PLOT, HOWEVER!) You should also support your ideas with specific quotations from the text of the selection. See specific directions for “Quoting from Primary Sources” above.
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Once you have provided your own analysis, add supporting information from the critical or biographical sources that you have consulted. See specific directions for “Quoting from Secondary Sources” and “Paraphrasing from Secondary Sources” above.
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Revise and edit the first draft of your essay before you write the final draft.
Drafting the Essay Introduction
After you have formulated your essay’s thesis, develop your introductory paragraph. You may capture the reader’s interest in one of a variety of ways. Consider writing a provocative question, using an attention-getting quotation from the literary text itself, or discussing one of the text’s major themes, such as Nora Helmer’s desperate struggle for freedom in Ibsen’s drama, A Doll's House. After your introductory sentences, state your thesis clearly and precisely at the conclusion of the introductory paragraph. (See the General, Fiction or Poetry sections of this web site for additional instructions on drafting literary essays.)
Sample Introduction for A Doll's House: |
How can a young wife and mother possibly consider abandoning her husband and children in order to find herself? Surely, nothing could be more important to her than her responsibility to her family. Yet, in Henrik Ibsens’s A Doll's House, that is precisely what the heroine must do. (Thesis) Although Nora Helmer suffers severe emotional turmoil and financial deprivation by leaving Torvald and the children, she must separate herself from them in order to become a mature, independent woman. |
Explanation: The introduction begins with a provocative question to stimulate the reader’s interest about what is to follow. In addition, in order to interest the reader even further, it presents a contrast between Nora’s actual behavior and the expectations of society. The two opening sentences of the introduction lead naturally to a statement of the thesis, the main idea to be developed in the body of the essay. |
Drafting Body Paragraphs Using Both Primary and Secondary Source Synthesis
After the opening paragraph, including the thesis statement, has been presented, body paragraphs, such as the one below, develop the essay’s argument that Nora Helmer’s struggle for independence is an essential step in her movement toward self-realization. Note how quotations from the primary source (Ibsen’s play) and Meyer’s critical biography of Ibsen are both synthesized into this body paragraph.
Example: |
In the nineteenth century, strict social codes prohibited women from voicing their opinions, instructing them instead to defer to the “superior” intellectual abilities of their husbands and fathers. Early in the play, Torvald Helmer scolds his wife Nora when she presumes to suggest that borrowing money may provide a way out of debt: “Oh, Nora, Nora, how like a woman! No, but seriously, Nora, you know how I feel about this. No debt, no borrowing” (Ibsen 1298). Torvald’s strong words echo the Victorian belief that, because women were intellectually inferior to men, a husband’s judgments were to be obeyed without question. Although Nora’s desperate struggle to free herself of such restrictive ideas often is seen as a feminist statement, critic Michael Meyer asserts that Nora’s behaviors are not as much “about women’s rights as about the need of every individual to find out the kind of person he or she really is, and to strive to become that person” (Qtd. in Barnet et al 1348). Ultimately, Meyer’s representation of Nora’s actions as a universal quest for human rights authenticates her decision to abandon home and family in search of self. |
Explanation: This body paragraph begins to develop the thesis that Nora Helmer has no viable chance at self-realization unless she leaves her home and family to establish an independent personality. The paragraph’s development opens with cultural and historical information to demonstrate the position of women in Victorian society, continues with a quotation from the primary source to illustrate the presence of that historical context in the play, and concludes with a quotation from a secondary source (a critical biography) to guide readers in responding to Nora’s motives and behaviors. |
Preparing the Works Cited Page
1. Begin a new page that you name Works Cited.
2. In alphabetical order, list all of the sources that you have quoted or paraphrased, using the author’s last name or the first important word of the title (if no author is listed). Do not number the entries on the Works Cited page.
3. Provide all of the required information about a publication, whether the publication is a book, a periodical, or an electronic source.
4. Use correct MLA form for each entry. Follow the models given in your MLA handbook or use the following link: http://lib.ocean.edu/the_source/MLA.htm
5. Double space all lines on the Works Cited page.
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