Essay writing tips

In Standard Grade English, you will produce several different types of writing. As well as creative writing such as short stories, poems and drama scripts, you will also write essays of various sorts. These will include discursive essays, in which you will discuss a contentious issue or persuade your reader of a point of view, and critical essays, in which you answer a question about a literary text.

What is a criticial essay?

~ An organised collection
~ of YOUR IDEAS
~ in answer to a question
~ about literary texts
~ well written in formal language and professionally presented

Your ideas
This is what we are looking for. Without any interesting ideas of your own, you cannot get any marks.


Structure

~ Your essay should have a main idea or argument, with several sub-themes which support the main one.

~ You must clearly answer the question throughout the whole of your essay.

~ The first paragraph, or introduction, should clearly answer the question. You should set out what you intend your main points to be.

~ You can include a short plot summary after the introduction, but make sure that you don't include plot details which do not relate to the point of the essay.

~ The last paragraph, or conclusion, must not say anything new, or include any evidence. You should simply sum up your main points and answer the question again.

The paragraph
~ Quite long: no one-sentence paragraphs
~ Start with a topic sentence.
~ Try to link or contrast the first sentence with the last sentence of the previous paragraph.
~ Opinion differs about whether you can write “In this essay I will…”. It’s probably safest to find another way of doing it.
~ Make each paragraph a solid unit.


Using evidence

~ You must use evidence from the text to back up your arguments.
Mostly these will be quotes, but can also be references to things that happen in the plot (eg "when Curley's wife seems to flirt with the men in the bunkhouse").

~ Use quotations to show evidence of characterisation, setting, style or other techniques. Do not use quotes just to show that something happens in the story; you might as well just tell your reader that it happens.

~ If it’s a short quotation, insert it into the text. If it’s a longer quotation then indent it.

Never write:
X “a quote which shows this is…”
X “this proves…”
X “this piece of evidence…” / “this quote…”

These phrases are clunky, and you should think of better ways to integrate your evidence into your discussion.


Analysis

Analysis is the area where you will gain the most credit in your critical essay. It is the tool that you use to show how your evidence backs up your argument. If you don't analyse your evidence, and show that it relates to the question, your evidence is almost worthless.

Remember that you are writing about how and why the author has written the text in the way that they have. For this reason, you should refer to the author fairly frequently.

Useful phrases for analysis
♥ “This works particularly well (to / in that / because / as)…”
♥ “The author achieves this (effect) by…”
♥ “Here we see…”
♥ “Here, the reader is encouraged to…”
♥ “On balance…”


Presentation

☺ Think of your reader. Present your work in a way that is easy to read, and strictly according to guidelines. Word processing not only makes the checking of spelling and grammar easy, but also makes your writing easy to read. Crucially, it also allows you to easily redraft and improve your work.

It saddens me to write this, but it is an unfortunate fact that if you produce work that is misspelled and/or badly punctuated and/or ungrammatical, however good the ideas are, people will tend to take a negative view of you and your writing. If you tend to have trouble with spelling, grammar or punctuation, take extra time to check your work. Make a note of any mistakes in your writing, and check for them in future. With the exception of spelling in the case of dyslexia, making a mistake more than once is evidence of carelessness.