Writing a Literary Analysis A 3 paragraph beginning essay

The Introduction Begin with a sentence of the keyword from your prompt. My examples will be from Of Mice and Men. “Hope is a thing with feathers” write Emily Dickinson, and hope can be a fragile thing. Any time you are writing about literature you MUST include the title and author of the work The idea of hope plays a major role in the lives of the characters in John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men. The LAST sentence of your paragraph will be your thesis statement. For this assignment that will be a statement about the symbol of sin. Each of the men believes that things can be better in their lives and holds on to the hope that things will get better even though the present looks bleak.

The thesis statement Consider what you know of the idea of sin/evil in “The Minister’s Black Veil.” Why is the veil black? Why does he wear it all the time; what is he trying to prove to his congregation? Form your sentence in two parts which answer these questions The black veil represents……. which symbolizes…. Use this sentence as the framework for your essay. Prove this sentence in your body paragraph.

The body of the essay This is where you develop your proof. Here you will need to use ONE quote WITHIN a sentence and elaborate on or explain how this quote proves what you have said about the symbol of sin. Begin with a topic sentence which tells what the paragraph will be about. The topic sentence must support the thesis. For example (from OMM) For Lennie the hope for the future is the rabbits that he will one day have. After the topic sentence you will give your example, from the reading, to support or explain your claim in the topic sentence. Here you want to incorporate your quote/textual support. All Lennie talks about is tending the rabbits. He tells everyone who will listen how he and George are, “gonna have a little house an’ a garden and a place for alfalfa…and then [he] take[s] it to the rabbits.” (89)

Look at how the quote is used All Lennie talks about is tending the rabbits. He tells everyone who will listen how he and George are, 1 “gonna have a little house an’ a garden and a place for alfalfa2…and then 3[he] take[s] it to the rabbits4.” 5(89) The quote is worked into the sentence, not added on to the sentence or as a sentence by itself. I didn’t use the whole, long quote because all of it was not needed to prove my point. I use only what I need and use ellipsis (…) to show I have left some part of the sentence out. The original word here in the text is I; however, the word I won’t fit into my sentence. I can change any words in the quote in order for them to work with the sentence by putting brackets [ ] around them to show the word has been changed. I did the same when I had to add an S to take in order for it to agree with the subject of the sentence. The period goes INSIDE the quotation mark. That is always true for the period and the comma. I included the page number in parenthesis ( ) at the end of the sentence. Quoting without giving the source is plagiarism.

The rest of the body paragraph For Lennie the hope for the future is the rabbits that he will one day have. All Lennie talks about is tending the rabbits. He tells everyone who will listen how he and George are, “gonna have a little house an’ a garden and a place for alfalfa…and then [he] take[s] it to the rabbits.” (89) Lennie’s dream of tending rabbits is 1 symbolic of the dreams all the men on the ranch had of a better life. 2The dream ranch would give the men a place to call home, a place to put down roots, and a place to build a future. Tending rabbits made Lennie happy. 3 The hope of a future with something they could call their own, whether it is rabbits or a ranch, is what each of the men thinks will make him happy. Relate the idea of the text (tending rabbits) to the keyword (hope). Explain the relationship between the idea of the text and keyword. Summarize the ideas in the paragraph and bring the paragraph to a close.

The Conclusion Conclusions do not have to be long; in fact, it is sometimes better to just end the paper than destroy it by writing a lengthy, odd conclusion. Try for two sentences in your conclusion. First, restate your thesis-NOT word for word. You can do this in two ways: Start at the end of the sentence and flip your ideas. Though their future is grim, the men continue to hope for a better tomorrow. State your sentence in the same way using synonyms, especially for your key words. George and Lennie hold on to their hopes and dreams of a ranch and a future even though their present lives seem hopeless Finish the conclusion with an If, then statement. If they give up on this hope, then their lives would be miserable and not worth living.

The whole essay “Hope is a thing with feathers” write Emily Dickinson, and hope can be a fragile thing. The idea of hope plays a major role in the lives of the characters in John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men. Each of the men believes that things can be better in their lives and holds on to the hope that things will get better even though the present looks bleak. For Lennie the hope for the future is the rabbits that he will one day have. All Lennie talks about is tending the rabbits. He tells everyone who will listen how he and George are, “gonna have a little house an’ a garden and a place for alfalfa…and then [he] take[s] it to the rabbits.” (89) Lennie’s dream of tending rabbits is symbolic of the dreams all the men on the ranch had of a better life. The dream ranch would give the men a place to call home, a place to put down roots, and a place to build a future. Tending rabbits made Lennie happy. The hope of a future with something they could call their own, whether it is rabbits or a ranch, is what each of the men thinks will make him happy. George and Lennie hold on to their hopes and dreams of a ranch and a future even though their present lives seem hopeless. If they give up on this hope, then their lives would be miserable and not worth living.

Directions for your essay On the top left-hand side of your paper write Your name (not those words, your actual name) Your class name The date Center a title for the essay Write your 3 paragraphs in blue or black ink or type it on your phone or other device and send it to me. If you are handwriting, do not write on the back of your paper.

Rubric for your essay 20 points: All words are capitalized correctly. 25 points: At least one quote is included and written/punctuated correctly. 10 points: The title of the short story is included and punctuated correctly. 10 points: The essay is divided into three paragraphs which are indented. 25 points: The body paragraph includes a topic sentence which supports the thesis, a book idea or claim and supporting details or elaboration for that claim. 10 points: All directions have been followed. Total writing points for this assignment: 100