Literary Essay Introduction

LITERARY ESSAY INTRODUCTION

A guideline to follow is that your introduction should contain at least five significant sentences including your thesis statement.

1. HOOK

Let’s start with a general statement about writing (a hook statement), one that begins to deal with a topic directly yet hasn’t addressed the specific novel or the thesis statement.

The hook statements say something general to draw readers in:

Experimental writers can subvert the traditional form of the story by refusing to use a chronological plot line.

2. MENTION THE NOVEL AND THE WRITER (And important novel details)

You may also want to include background information relevant to your upcoming thesis and necessary for the reader to understand the position you are taking.

Experimental writers can subvert the traditional form of the story by refusing to use a chronological plot line. Lena Coakley’s Mirror Image is not narrated chronologically from Alice’s brain transplant to her eventual self-acceptance. Instead, it is told in a series of flashbacks interspersed with the turmoil of Alice’s present.

3. FINALLY, YOU ADD YOUR THESIS:

Experimental writers can subvert the traditional form of the story by refusing to use a chronological plot line. Lena Coakley’s Mirror Image is not narrated chronologically from Alice’s brain transplant to her eventual self-acceptance. Instead, it is told in a series of flashbacks interspersed with the turmoil of Alice’s present. Coakley mirrors the fragmentation of her protagonist’s life through the novel’s non-linear structure.

DON’T INCLUDE EMPTY SENTENCES: Empty sentences have no other purpose than to take up space.

Literature often portrays characters who have many conflicts. (DUH!)

Lena Coakley is good author. (UGH, You’re not a NY times critic)

She writes about teenagers and people who have had transplants. (This may be true but is NOT relevant to thesis)

In this powerful novel (UGH again, Not NY times critic)

Mirror Image is a good story with many issues relevant to literature. (Critic again and not relevant)

THERE IS NO NEED TO BREAK DOWN YOUR THESIS IN YOUR INTRODUCTION:

Coakley mirrors the fragmentation of her protagonist’s life through the novel’s non-linear structure, specifically through her use of flashback, stream of consciousness, and the third person point of view.

You may have been taught to spell out your thesis in detail as part of your introduction. However, this is completely unnecessary. It may be important for you to know exactly how you’re going to break down your paragraphs, but it not necessary to include it for the reader. Think, for example, what you’ll do in University when they ask you to write a 3,000 word essay that has fifteen paragraphs. Will you map it out then for your reader in the introduction?