English Advanced Placement*
Writing Instruction Series
The Open
Essay:
How to
Organize the Open Essay: Grades 9-12
and English
Literature and Composition AP
Directions:
The following outline explains how to organize the writing of a timed essay
question that requires an analysis of a specifically defined element of
fiction. Notice how this is not a formula that you force on any question,
but a formula that changes based on the play or novel chosen.
Introduction:
1.
Use the first sentence or two to begin to identify how the element specifically
defined in the question functions in the chosen novel or play. Allude
to something here that will be finished in the conclusion.
2.
In the next sentence or two, explain with clarity and precision how the
author manipulates the language to portray the nature of the specifically
defined element and the implication that this has for the meaning of the
work as a whole.
3.
Include the following three items in your thesis:
A. Real Subject:Name the subject of your novel as directed by the
question.
B. Inference: What is your opinion (interpretation) about this
subject?
C. Causations: What are the shifts in meaning based on your
inference
about the subject? These become the subdivisions of your essays.
These become the topics for the topic sentences of each of the body
paragraphs. It is important here to show the ambiguity of the task
in the way you define these causations.
Body:
4.
The topic sentence should define what the writer/speaker does first to
advance the element specifically addressed in the question and now stated
in the thesis).
5.
Find evidence in the part of the novel where the author advances the element
specifically addressed in the question, previously stated in the thesis,
and now mentioned in the evidence. This evidence should do
the following: analyze what the author does and how the author does
it. Name or define the literary choices made by the author to advance the
element. Remember that the question always directs you to do two
things: show the function of the element and the implications it
has for the meaning of the work as a whole.
End each
paragraph with an interpretation that addresses the significance of the
author's purpose and evaluate his literary choices.
6.
Switch paragraphs when there is a shift in the second way in which the
author chooses to advance to element. Continue the same strategy
as above for the next paragraph.
7.
Remember that the question always directs you to do two things: show
the function of the element and the implications it has for the meaning
of the work as a whole. The previous examples show how the element
functions in the work. The next paragraph analyzes the implications
it has for the meaning of the work as a whole.
8.
The last body paragraph seems to continue the same strategy of the previous
paragraph.
Conclusion:
7.
State your thesis in the form of a conclusion resulting from the evidence
previously examined.
8.
Tie up the loose ends established in the introduction by making a conclusions
about how the message of the work just analyzed applies to the overall
human experience.
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