Literary Analysis Essay Writing

A literary analysis essay is an assignment, which requires a writer to provide a detailed description of a literary piece by means of discussing characters, main theme, plot, as well as other important elements used by the author in his story. The paper of such type helps readers understand the message of the book or poem better. Literary analysis should be based on covering key elements of the story in order to explain it, as well as the most important information the author wanted to convey to the readers. This paper can also be aimed at explaining what the author was intended to show and tell the audience.  

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Purpose of Analysis Writing

The purpose of writing literary analysis papers is to show why the author used specific characters, approaches, settings, etc. in his story and what his/her efforts were directed at. In order to provide a good literary analysis essay the writer has to choose a topic, which reflects some important theme depicted in the story and investigate what literary devices were used to cover that theme. The task of writing analysis essay is usually assigned for the students with the purpose of helping them apply and develop their skills of critical thinking. In the process of writing such papers they tech to look deeper into the meaning of a literary piece and uncover meaning that lies beyond the obvious.

A Literary Analysis Essay: Effective Writing in 5 Steps

Analysis essay writing can be a real problem for the students at first. However, if you learn specific rules related to this process and follow some simple steps, it will become much easier with time.  Here is a short guide on how to improve your skills of literary analysis writing. 

• Concentrate on Your Topic

In order to come up with a good topic, you need to read the literary piece at first and analyze it properly. Make sure you understand the story, novel, poem, etc. yourself and only then start looking for a theme that could be interesting to the audience. However, in order to provide a good essay, you need to be interested in what you do too. For this reason, think about the aspects you would like to work with. Brainstorming is a good tool at this stage of writing. 

• Gather Supportive Data

Research is the best friend of every student. Making a research will help you find facts and materials you did not know about and make your paper even better. Make sure you work with credible sources. 

• Introduction 

The aim of every introduction is to make a positive impression on a reader. Literary analysis paper is not an exception. First of all, it should provide general information on the piece of writing that is analyzed, which includes name of author, title, etc. After that, you should provide a shot summary of what is going to be discussed in the paper. Traditionally, thesis should serve as a culmination of introduction and describe the main point of the essay. 

• Main Body of a Literary Analysis Paper

Main body is the biggest part of the paper, which deals with actual description of the chosen topic. The paragraphs of the main body should be written according to the generally accepted standard: it begins with topic sentence, provides evidences and ends with a concluding statement. Besides, it is important to make sure that each paragraph should support thesis statement. 

• Conclusion 

Final part of the analysis paper is conclusion. It summarizes the main point of your paper and indicates the relation between the topic of an essay and the literary piece in general. It is important not to provide new ideas in conclusion as it can lead to lower mark.

Formatting 

Even though a literary essay is usually written in MLA, it is necessary to clarify the formatting style, as it may depend on preferences of your professor.

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