English
112] [ Sample
Primary Source Paper] [ Schedule]1. Formulate a limited, specific thesis based on a close reading of a story in the class textbook. The thesis should lead you and your readers to a clarification of the main theme(s) of the work(s) you write on. The thesis should also contain a clear "essay map," the points of which will correspond to the Roman numeral headings in the outline.
2. Prepare a two-level outline with headings that correspond to the paragraphs in the paper. Follow outline conventions.
3. Write an interesting introduction that both hints at least at the main theme(s) of the work(s) you will discuss and also leads up to the thesis statement, which will appear near the end of the introduction and which will often need to be rephrased from the way it appears on the outline page.
4. In writing the body of the paper, compose full, specific, well-organized paragraphs that contain clear but varied topic sentences.
5. Refer directly to the text of the work to support your analysis of it. Include relevant, brief quotations (words, phrases, clauses). Use in-text documentation, i.e., page numbers in parentheses. Punctuate quotations carefully. If you must quote a long passage that will be more than four lines long in your paper, indent it (and do not add quotation marks, but retain any that appear in the original). When you indent long quotations, the parenthetical documentation goes after the period.
6. Write a conclusion in which you give the paper a definite sense of finality and in which you clearly relate your analysis to the main theme(s) of the story discussed.
7. Invent a title of your own (it may be imaginative, but should not be merely clever); do not use only the title(s) of the work(s) discussed. The title(s) may appear in your own title.
8. Use a computer and print on only one side of the paper. Follow the other guidelines for format (e.g., margins).
9. Treat this assignment as practice for the research paper, with respect not only to format, but also to documentation form. These will be the parts of your paper (see sample paper):
a. Outline page, including title and thesis with attached essay map
b. Text of paper, with in-text documentation
c. Work(s) cited page (double spaced): In this case there will probably be only one work listed, as in this example, which must be adapted to your class textbook (remember to indent every line but the first one in each bibliographical entry):
O'Connor, Flannery. "Everything That Rises Must Converge." Forty Short Stories: A Portable
Anthology. Ed. Beverly Lawn. 2nd ed. Bedford, 2004. 334-48.