Write an essay about the poem “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” by T. S. ELIOT. Make sure you include how the poet uses form, diction, and syntax as well as other poetic devices to create meaning or approach a particular theme.
For example, if you were to write about Walt Whitman’s poem, “Song of Myself” (not in the book), your thesis could be something along the lines of, “Whitman uses the combination of nature imagery and imagery of the self, colloquialism, and incantation-style rhythm as a scaffolding for his parallel messages of personal self-reliance and the American spirit.” See below for more about writing explications.
BEFORE YOU WRITE:
1. Review pp. 1919-1950, “Elements of a Literature Essay.” This will guide you by way of form, diction, and what kinds of things to do with the content.
2. Also look over the sample explication essay attached here. This will give you a model of exactly what an explication of a poem is like. This sample is 1600 words long. Notice how carefully the student examines the poem, the way they introduce and explain evidence, and how they bring everything back to proving their thesis. This sample does not contain the mandatory MLA formatting. Also be aware you do not have to include a copy of the poem with your essay. Additionally, this sample does use “I” once. Don’t do that in your essay.
Things to remember:
Academic writing is always in the present tense. Do not use past tense.
Academic writing disallows contractions. Spell everything out. The only time to use apostrophes is to show posession.
Make sure you have formulated your thesis, topic sentences, and explanations of evidence precisely. Each body paragraph should have YOUR first support as a topic sentence, an explanation of that sentence, evidence, explanation of the evidence and its relevance, and then move onto your next point in support of the topic sentence.
Make sure you review the grading rubric so that you know what is expected of you.
Make sure you parenthetically cite correctly and precisely.
Refer to the MLA sheet for your works cited page and other formatting instructions.
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