how to structure a critical essay and get to writing!
Once you figure out where a certain critic is coming from, you should be able to discern what other types of critics are likely to disagree with this critic, and most importantly, decide whether or not you agree with their respective views vis-a-vis the text you’re analysing.
It may sound counterintuitive, but often, the best way of using lit crit is to disagree with it. Because most of the time, it’s only by challenging someone’s view do we really get to consider our own stance. Agreeing with a critic’s view is much less interesting – and there’s only so much we can say if we agree. Of course, that’s not to say we must always seek to be contrarian, but a good approach is to conduct an imaginary discussion with multiple critics who hold different viewpoints, and to consider that if we disagree with a critic’s view, why that is and make our case, and if we do happen to agree with another critic’s view, what else we can add to it based on our own interpretation of the text. In general, if all we do is say ‘this is what I think and prominent critic so-and-so also says this’, we run the risk of coming across insipid and uninspired in our arguments, or worse, that we’re just parroting the critic’s ideas and repurposing it as our own. Even for critics who don’t come from a specific theoretical discipline, they still have an agenda – for instance, if a critic focuses only on what’s presented in the text – the language, form, devices – ignoring whatever contextual influences that may have gone into the writing of the text, then that makes them a textualist or . In literary scholarship, this is referred to as Practical Criticism, otherwise known as close reading, which is the approach that most schools tend to teach. But for someone like Stephen Greenblatt, who I believe is one of the best Shakespearean critics alive, he sees the witches as playing a more metaphysical function, and argues that Shakespeare uses these Weird Sisters to interrogate the limits of theatre: by presenting on stage in concrete form what’s supposedly taboo, supernatural and therefore, unreal, the bard confuses the line between truth and imagination, and in a way, doesn’t so much suggest witchcraft and potions as a great source of danger, as it is perhaps that drama and language are a great source of power, having the capacity to make ‘real’ what’s not – like magic. It's important to remember that an examiner is much more interested in what you think rather than what a critic has already said. So don't just write down a critical opinion or quote without expanding on it further. You need to show how a critic's argument has helped you to form your own. A good way to do this is to use a critic's opinion as a starting point for your paragraph and then develop it. So, if a critic has argued that romantic love is the central motivation of 'Romeo and Juliet', but you believe it is a combination of familial and romantic love, you can structure a paragraph around this. Start by saying 'critic x has argued that romantic love is the central motivation of R and J. Back this up with a short piece of evidence e.g. 'this can be seen in the scene where ... '. Now comes your main argument: 'however, it is romantic and familial love combined that form the main motivation of the characters in R and J.' Follow this with more detailed evidence e.g. 'this is seen when... .’ You should give a couple of examples here; you need to support the key idea in your paragraph well. The main thing to remember with using critics is not to just memorise and quote criticism but to analyse and develop critical ideas to form your own arguments.
This is an essay. But what makes it one?
Once upon a time when I first came to know about lit crit, I was so enchanted with the seeming sophistication of it all I would turn my essays into an echo chamber of everyone else’s opinions on a text, in the process completely neglecting to express my own thoughts.
Alexander Pope, “An Essay on Criticism” (1711).
A Critical Reflection (also called a reflective essay) is a process of identifying, questioning, and assessing our deeply-held assumptions – about our knowledge, the way we perceive events and issues, our beliefs, feelings, and actions. When you reflect critically, you use course material (lectures, readings, discussions, etc.) to examine our biases, compare theories with current actions, search for causes and triggers, and identify problems at their core.Critical reflection isnota reading assignment, a summary of an activity, or an emotional outlet.Rather,the goal isto change your thinking about a subject, and thus change your behaviour.
/ Students Critique a ChatGPT Essay
They say that the first rule of fight club is that you don’t talk about fight club. Well, I say the first rule of using literary criticism is that you don’t focus on the literary criticism. Because at the end of the day, it’s your analysis and your essay, so your view on the novel, play, or poem is the point – not the critic’s.
The 10 Essays That Changed Art Criticism Forever
Tip: Critical reflections are common in coursework across all disciplines, but they can take very different forms. Your instructor may ask you to develop a formal essay, produce weekly blog entries, or provide short paragraph answers to a set of questions. Read the assignment guidelines before you begin.
Criticism is often different than what people perceive.
Develop a clear argument to help your reader understand what you learned. This argument should pull together different themes from your analysis into a main idea. You can see an example of a thesis statement in the sample reflection essay at the end of this resource.