Literary Analysis are written in the third person point of view in present tense. Do not use the words I or you in the essay. Your instructor may have you choose from a list of literary works read in class or you can choose your own. Follow the required formatting and instructions of your instructor.
Writing & Analyzing process
First step: Choose a literary work or text. Read & Re-Read the text or short story. Determine the key point or purpose of the literature
Step two: Analyze key elements of the literary work. Determine how they fit in with the author's purpose.
Step three: Put all information together. Determine how all elements fit together towards the main theme of the literary work.
Step four: Brainstorm a list of potential topics. Create a thesis statement based on your analysis of the literary work.
Step five:search through the text or short story to findtextual evidence to support your thesis. Gather information from different but relevant sources bothfrom the text itself and othersecondarysources to help to prove your point.All evidence found will bequotedand analyzed throughout your essay to help explain your argument to the reader.
Step six: Create and outline and begin the rough draft of your essay.
Step seven: revise and proofread. Write the final draft of essay
Step eight: include a reference or works cited page at the end of the essay and include in-text citations.
When analyzing a literary work pay close attention to the following:
Characters:Acharacteris a person, animal, being, creature, or thing in a story.
- Protagonist:The main character of the story
- Antagonist:The villain of the story
- Love interest:the protagonist’s object of desire.
- Confidant: This type of character is the best friend or sidekick of the protagonist
- Foil– A foil is a character that has opposite character traits from another character and aremeant to help highlight or bring out another’s positive or negative side.
- Flat– A flat character has one or two main traits, usually only all positive or negative.
- Dynamic character: A dynamic character is one who changes over the course of the story.
- Round character:These characters have many different traits, good and bad, making them more interesting.
- Static character: A static character does not noticeably change over the course of a story.
- Symbolic character: A symbolic character represents a concept or theme larger than themselves.
- Stock character: A stock character is an ordinary character with a fixed set of personality traits.
Setting:Thesettingis the period of time and geographic location in which astorytakes place.
Plot: aliteraryterm used to describe the events that make up a story
Theme:a universal idea, lesson, or message explored throughout a work ofliterature.
Dialogue:any communication between two characters
Imagery:aliterarydevice that refers to the use of figurative language to evoke a sensory experience or create a picture with words for a reader.
Figures of Speech:Aword or phrase that is used in a non-literal way to create an effect.
Tone: Aliterarydevice that reflects the writer's attitude toward the subject matter or audience of aliterarywork.
rhyme or rhythm:Rhymeis aliterary device, featured particularly inpoetry, in which identical or similar concluding syllables in different words are repeated.Rhythm can be described asthe beat and pace of a poem
Point of view:thenarrative voice through which a story is told.
- Third person:the narrator is describing what’s seen, but as a spectator.
- Limited – the narrator sees only what’s in front of him/her, a spectator of events as they unfold and unable to read any other character’s mind.
- Omniscient –narrator sees all. He or she sees what each character is doing and can see into each character’s mind.
- Limited Omniscient – narrator can only see into one character’s mind. He/she might see other events happening, but only knows the reasons of one character’s actions in the story.
- First person: You see events based on the character telling the story
- Second person: The narrator is speaking to you as the audience
Symbolism:a literary device in which a writer uses one thing—usually a physical object or phenomenon—to represent something else.
Irony:a literary device in which contradictory statements or situations reveal a reality that is different from what appears to be true.
Ask some of the following questions when analyzing literary work:
- Which literary devices were used by the author?
- How are the characters developed in the content?
- How does the setting fit in with the mood of the literary work?
- Does a change in the setting affect the mood, characters, or conflict?
- What point of view is the literary work written in and how does it effect the plot, characters, setting, and over all theme of the work?
- What is the over all tone of the literary work?How does the tone impact the author’s message?
- How are figures of speech such as similes, metaphors, and hyperboles used throughout the text?
- When was the text written? how does the text fit in with the time period?
