1. Use MLA formatting.

2. Introduce your poems and authors in the opening paragraph in a compelling way. Build up to the thesis statement, which should be the last sentence in your introduction. Your thesis statement will make an argument about the poem(s) you have selected, in terms of a literary element.

Example:

Sylvia Plath’s “Daddy” and Robert Hayden’s “Those Winter Sundays” relate deeply held emotions of an adult child toward a parent through vivid and personal imagery of the parent.

Then, in your body paragraphs, you will provide evidence for the thesis.

You will offer detailed analysis with examples (quotations, paraphrases, and summaries) from the primary text(s) and from critical sources as needed. While critical sources are not strictly required for this paper, I strongly encourage you to “get your feet wet” by practicing using them now, so you will be better at it by the time you start the research paper. Also, the research you do now will pay off because you will have less to do later.

In your conclusion, you will restate the thesis in a fresh and emphatic way.

A tutor can help with all of these steps, and I strongly recommend that you work with one. I’m going to provide an example paper without any critical sources by Dr. Gary Light, and you’ll see the kind of in-depth analysis that is possible. I also provide separately some examples of how I would supplement the paper with critical (secondary) sources.

If you use sources, you must cite them parenthetically and on a Works Cited page, in MLA format.

This paper should be a minimum of 3-4 pages.