essay, and he will, as a consequence, have been writing all along an essay of greater significancethan his more conventional brother. At the beginning, therefore, while you are still followingconventional modes of analysis, make sure that you use your concluding paragraphs to interpret:relate the aspect of the work that has been the object of your attention to the other aspects of thework, especially to theme.A critical essay that is truly valuable for the writer as well as for the reader, then, informs thereader about the contents of a literary work, just as would an ordinary expository essay; but itinforms the reader only incidentally, as an automatic by-product of analyzing the work.Similarly, a good critical essay persuades the reader that the writer’s opinion is correct, just aswould an ordinary expository essay; but it persuades the reader incidentally, as an automatic byproductof interpreting the work. The writer of a good critical essay will seem to be achievingspontaneous, intuitive insights into the working operation of a book, and such insights are morepersuasive, again, than the arguments in a debate could be. As a student learning how to writecritical essays, you ought to aim to elicit from your teacher a comment like this: “You haveachieved some genuine insights into this work. Congratulations:”A WARNING ABOUT PLAGIARISM: The policy of the <strong>English</strong> Department is to give astudent 0 when it can be indisputably proven that even in a single instance he has presented ashis own the language or thought of another person.Make sure that at least two thirds of what you write is your own. Quotations or paraphrases ofany kind, from primary or secondary sources, ought to form no more than a third the length ofyour paper. You can best insure that your essay has the proper degree of originality if you makeyour own notes on the book you are writing about the first thing you do. Then make a tentativeoutline or even a first draft of your essay before you look at any secondary sources. When youmake notes on secondary sources, keep a scrupulous record at the time of the pages and booksfrom which you are gathering ideas or quotations. Such a record will not only get you around theproblem of trying at the last moment to remember where things come from; it will also get youaround the problem of trying to distinguish which ideas are your own and which those of a critic.DO NOT LET YOUR SECONDARY SOURCES CROWD YOU OUT OF YOUR OWNESSAY.It is our aim to promote the enjoyment of literature first and foremost, and after that to promoteindependent thinking about it. Don’t allow yourself, then, somehow to become dependent onwhat a certain writer says about a book; instead, use what he says by arguing against him, byquoting him briefly to corroborate what you have thought out for yourself, or by extending hisargument with detail you have extracted from the work in question. Do not assume either that heis right: after all, his essay merely expresses his opinion, just as yours expresses your opinion.If you are having trouble handling secondary sources, go to your teacher for advice—but don’twait until the last moment. It sometimes appears that people plagiarize out of desperation.Having waited until the night before the essay is due, they copy someone else’s work. Thesepeople deny themselves the “higher” kind of enjoyment of literature that writing a critical essayis intended to promote, the intense pleasure of having discovered what a book is about, a joy akinto that of the experimental scientist or to that of the creator of the work in question. What theplagiarist does, beyond this denial of creativity, is to destroy his own trust in himself as a moral5
eing. If you really cannot remain independent of the critics, do not consult them. Both you andyour teacher will respect that decision far more than its opposite.6
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