The
concrete detail - Paraphrase
the gist of the actual textual information as CONCISELY
as possible. It is important for your reader to understand
what you're talking about, but only as an illustration for
your own ideas.
The
interpretation - Go
back to the questions you've asked yourself during the close
reading. What answers have you found that you can explain
here? As always, remember that good interpretation avoids both
summary and opinion - your arguments must be original but
crafted from actual evidence.
Example:
"Coleridge opens his poem with an immediate
statement of locale: ‘In Xanadu’. This fable-like
invocation makes the reader immediately conscious of
distance, as well as the mystical connotations of the Orient
in the context of Victorian imperialism. By choosing a
setting with such dual reverberations of reality and
fantasy, Coleridge creates a landscape parallel to his view
of the imagination - vast in breadth, yet potently
accessible."
Note
how very little textual detail was necessary to come up
with quite a bit of interpretation.
Keep
an eye on the big picture -
As tempting as it is to fill space with any interesting idea
you come up with, do not put a single thought onto the page
that you cannot relate directly to the proving of your topic
sentence.
Remember,
your paper must act as the impetus for an idea, not merely a
description of your sources, however subtle that description
might be.
Integrating
quotes - Sometimes the textual details you include will
necessarily take the form of direct quotation, particularly
when analyzing language. It is always best to do so as
inconspicuously as possible. The quotes should serve only to
prove your ideas, not to supplant them. Rather than using big
block quotations, wherever possible include only that which is
specifically necessary to your point, within the framework of
your own sentence.
Bad
Integration: Keats describes the Grecian urn
as follows: "Thou still unravish'd bride of
quietness; Thou foster child of silence and slow time;
Sylvan historian who canst express; The flowery tale more
sweetly than can rhyme.".
Good
Integration: Keats begins by personifying the
urn in terms of human innocence, as an "unravish'd
bride" and a "foster child of silence and
slow time".
TERM PAPER HELP
