DO NOT CREATE A THESIS THAT DOES NOT RELATE TO THE ASSIGNMENT!
4 pages double-spaced. No less. Minimum of two outside sources using M.L.A. parenthetical citations within your paper and a Works Cited sheet at the end. Your two outside sources should be in the form of a quote or two from critics TO BACK UP YOUR VOICE/YOUR INTERPRETATION. DO NOT FASHION YOUR WHOLE ESSAY ALONG THE LINES OF ANOTHER’S ARTICLE. I don’t need biographical information about the author in your introduction. Any works that you read and learn from, but do not cite in your paper should go in a Bibliography.
Be sure that the first sentence of your introduction refers to the author and the piece you are analyzing. For example, “In Robert Frost’s “Desert Places,” and “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” he reveals…… etc. During the body of your essay, there’s no need to keep referring to the author. If need be, refer to the speaker of the poem, but there’s little need for that. Give 3-4 lines of general background information about the poem(s), and then your thesis statement. No generalized people/humans statements please! I should know immediately, from your thesis, what aspect/theme of the poem you will be discussing/analyzing. You may then give a brief summary of the poem in the paragraph after the intro. After that, there is no more re-telling, only discussion/analysis/expansion of the poem’s words to develop your thesis. YOUR PAPER SHOULD NOT JUST BE A PARAPHRASE OF THE POEM, it should be an INTERPRETATION, in other words, you expand on the meaning of the words. Please talk to me about this if you don’t understand. I am expecting MANY short quotes from the poem, and your analysis of these. No Floating Quotes! Divide your paper up into clear paragraph topics – each topic relates to an aspect of your thesis.
Then end with a conclusion paragraph. Please also read my notes below these topics to help you with your essays. Note: Do not confuse the speaker of the poem with the author – in other words, the speaker is often a character created by the author, and the poem is not necessarily autobiographical.
2. Emily Dickinson: “I heard a Fly buzz when I Died” (710). Write an explication of this poem but be sure that you do it in such a way that your essay has unity – i.e. formulate a thesis statement with a single claim about the poem and discuss/develop that claim through close explication of the words of the poem. Your discussion should address the central conflict of the poem – human immortality (the King) versus mortality (the fly).
^ Analysis about the poem I would like in the essay!
