Writing a close reading paper on Hansel and gretel

You will choose one passage (no more than 5 or so lines from a poem, drama, or sentences from a short story) that builds on an argument that you find relevant to the piece of literature and set this idea up in the introduction of the paper. You will claim something about the selected passage from the text, and the argument will explain how this is present, and why this is present. Your paper will consist of your analysis of this passage step by step. For example, a thesis might look like this: In the second stanza of “My Papa’s Waltz,” Roethke builds tension through reserved diction, tortured syntax, an unexpected punctuation in order highlight the tension of living with an alcoholic parent, something that is present as a theme in the poem. The successive paragraphs would support each of the points I made in the claim (one for diction, one for syntax, one for punctuation) with the last paragraph before the conclusion proving how these elements together mimic the tension of the family (the so what of your paper).

I will evaluate your paper on the basis of analysis as well as structure. Absolutely essential to a good argumentative paper is a thesis which is contained in the introduction, which is strongly and clearly stated, which contains an answer to the reader’s implied question of “So what?” (why it matters) and with which it is possible to agree or disagree. Every paragraph that follows should back that thesis up, and every sentence in the paragraph should back up that paragraph’s topic sentence.