A literary analysis looks closely at one story element of a text. Remember, the story elements we looked at in this workshop are character, setting, plot, and theme.
For a one-paragraph essay:
For a one-paragraph essay:
- Write a hook that grabs the reader's attention.
- Write a topic sentence that has the type of text, title, and author of the text you are writing about. For example, In the short story "The Fall of the House of Usher" by Edgar Allan Poe,...
- Finish the topic sentence with what you will write about (character, setting, plot, theme) and how it is used in the text (the character Madeline makes the story thrilling to the reader; the creepy setting of the house of Usher makes the story terrifying; the creepy plot of the short story creates suspense; the theme "Isolating yourself from the world can cause mental problems" makes the story interesting.
- Do this TWO or THREE times: write a detail that supports your topic sentence. Then write a sentence that uses a direct quotation from or paraphrases words that are in THE TEXT!
- Write a concluding sentence that wraps up the paragraph by RESTATING (same ideas, different words) your topic sentence.