American Lit Essay

  1. Create a thesis and choose the texts. Or,Choose the texts and create a thesis.

The thesis should say something about the theme. You may alter the thesis as your essay develops.

Theme, the most noticable abstract idea that emerges from a literary work's treatment of its subject-matter; or a topic recurring in a number of literary works. While the subject of a work is described concretely in terms of its action (e.g. 'the adventures of a newcomer in the big city'), its theme or themes will be described in more abstract terms (e.g. love, war, revenge, betrayal, fate, etc.). The theme of a work may be announced explicitly, but more often it emerges indirectly through the recurrence of *MOTIFS (Motifs: a situation, incident, idea, image, or character-type that repeats in a text).

Our themes might be: “loss” or “dealing with loss can break some people but inspire others”

You might be general in your thesis: “The two stories, “Story 1” and “Story 2” explore themes of loss.”

Then your supporting paragraphs could be about any aspect of loss:

Paragraph #1: “The main character of “Story 1” deals with loss by trying to ignore its effects.”

He stops speaking

He makes fun of the new person in his life since he is the result of the lost marriage/father

He______bllankety blank blank (you get the gist, I’m not writing it for you)

  • You would describe key moments and quote the text to prove each statement you make here
  • Analyze the language (STYLE) of the quote.

Paragraph #2 “The main character of “Story 2” deals with loss by adapting.” (Repeat process from P1)

Paragraph #3 “The two stories show that loss can deeply effect people but that the best way to deal is….”

Show the negative outcome of one character’s reaction to loss and explain why it happened/why it’s negative, etc.

Show the positive outcomes of the other’s and explain…

Conclusion—we’ll talk about this later.

  1. Start to work on your essay. Either:
  2. Create an outline (like mine, above, but with details and ideas for supporting passages and quotes).
  3. Start with any of the body paragraphs. Introductions are best/more easily written after you know more about what, exactly you are introducing. Also, you can’t sit around trying to craft a great “hook” for an hour instead of getting to the meat of the essay.
  1. How to write about STYLE

Sample student essay:

Use of quotes/ discussion of style/discussion of theme/ connection between style and theme

How point of view develops theme:

The unfortunate relationship between an artist and the audience is thematically written of

in Franz Kafka’s “The Hunger Artist”. The protagonist of the story is a ‘hunger artist,’ one who

fasts as a form of art, during a time when the popularity of that art has “declined considerably”

(1). The audience only watches him to see if he will lapse from starvation, and eat, but the

hunger artist never does. “Naturally, none of the watchers understood that. Sometimes there were

nightly groups of watchers who carried out their vigil very laxly, deliberately sitting together in a

distant corner and putting all their attention into playing cards there, clearly intending to allow

the hunger artist a small refreshment, which, according to their way of thinking, he could get

from some secret supplies. Nothing was more excruciating to the hunger artist than such watchers. They depressed him. They made his fasting terribly difficult” (1). In this quote it is evident that the narrator of this short story is omniscient, meaning they are aware of the motives and sentiments of all the characters. Kafka writes with this ostensibly to provide insight on how the artist is true in his actions while the watchers are more dubious. The overarching theme of the short story is the isolation that is predisposed when one is an artist. Art is what connects the artist and the audience, yet simultaneously disconnects them by the inherent different perspectives.

Tone and syntax (two of the “difficult”elements of style)

Consider this quote: “he sat there on scattered straw—spurning a chair—in a black tights, looking pale, with his ribs sticking out prominently, sometimes nodding politely, answering questions with a forced smile, even sticking his arm out through the bars to let people feel how emaciated he was, but then completely sinking back into himself, so that he paid no attention to anything, not even to what was so important to him, the striking of the clock, which was the single furnishing in the cage, merely looking out in front of him with his eyes almost shut.” This is a part of an excruciating run-on sentence that depicts the life of this hunger artist. The description of him and his actions (“pale” “forced smile” “sinking back into himself”) paint a pathetic yet compassionate man. The reader immediately sympathizes with the hunger artist and wants to understand his plight so that a solution may be formed. But Kafka never provides a solution, instead letting the hunger artist rot away in a cage until his fragile body takes it’s last breath. His style of writing is nightmare-ish and forces the reader to feel disgusted in the audience yet know that, in some ways, they are the audience.

How to determine theme and how to incorporate quotes are in Power Points on Schoolwires