QUOTATIONS IN A LITERATURE ESSAY

Quotations are essential in a literature essay and must be accurate. They may be brief.  There are two ways of introducing them:
1) Short ones may be run into your sentence, enclosing them in quotation marks:
After hearing that Malcolm is to be Prince of Cumberland, Macbeth sees it as a threat: "That is a step/On which I must fall down, or else o'erleap". The end of the line is shown by a forward slash.
If you need to change the pronoun to make the quotation fit your sentence, use square brackets: Macbeth fears that this is a step, "On which [he] must fall down, or else o'erleap."
2) Longer quotations should start on a new line. Do not use quotation marks but indent the passage.
Macbeth hears that Malcolm is to be made Prince of Cumberland and falls into private thoughts:
        The Prince of Cumberland! - That is a step
        On which I must fall down, or else o'erleap,
        For in my way it lies.

(Act I, sc. iv, line 48 - you do not need to give these references)

COURTLY LOVE

This is a retrospective term used by modern readers to denote a code of practice of love in Medieval times. It was probably more aspirational and fictional than actually practised. In the idealised form, a man loves a disdainful woman from afar and she may be married as well as superior to him in rank.  He serves her, pines for her and, in hyperbolic language, may threaten to die for her because of his torment of unrequited passion.
Chaucer's "Knight's Tale" is an example of this where the two men, Palamon and Arcite, fight over Emelye, who barely knows they exist.
Click here to see my analysis of this Tale on my literary website.

DRAMATIC IRONY

This is most common in plays but can occur in novels: it happens when we, as audience, have knowledge which one (or more) of the characters does not possess and this gives some of their words a twist as we are aware they are in error in a significant way. Another character may also share this information.
Much of Shakespeare's, Othello, depends on tragic dramatic irony as we see that Iago is a villainous liar and that Desdemona is innocent of adultery. When Othello says: "I found not Cassio's kisses on her lips", he means that he was then ignorant of her infidelity but we and Iago know that she never kissed Cassio and that the traces of them were simply not there.
The mode can be used for comic purposes also in classic and popular works.

VERBAL IRONY

In verbal irony the words as printed or spoken do not carry the meaning they have on the surface: the underlying significance may be the exact opposite as in the cruder form called sarcasm. There is usually a trigger word or phrase which alerts the reader or listener to the presence of irony and the duality of intention.
The opening sentence of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice is a famous example:
"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife."
What the author means is that it is hoped, by wishful thinking, in this small community, that a rich bachelor will marry one of the spinsters available.
The trigger word is "universally" as no truth is accepted by everyone and so it must refer to a few people in this particular setting. Doubt is therefore cast on their deluded, optimistic and self-centred expectations. We assume comedy will follow.

IRONY OF SITUATION

This form of irony can occur in life as well as literature: a person or character performs an action with a definite intention but the outcome turns out to have an opposite and significant effect. It produces a sense of "ouch" in the observer, such as when someone superstitious steps into the road to avoid the bad luck following walking under a ladder and is then knocked down. There is often a feeling that the result is fated although it can be comic or tragic. In Jane Austen's Emma, Emma persuades her friend Harriet Smith to look in a higher social rank to find a marriage partner and Harriet, because of this, chooses Mr Knightley, thus making Emma realise that she herself loves him.

IRONY

Irony is a wide term which refers to a tone created by discrepancy and may be simplified into three basic modes:
1) an intention has an unexpected outcome; 2)  words do not mean what they say; 3) a character in a play says something which we know to be misguided or wrong. It always involves a twist which we feel to be significant and may be either comic or tragic
These are known as: 1) irony of situation; 2) verbal irony;
3) dramatic irony. All can produce a sense of satisfaction in the reader or member of the audience who feels sufficiently intelligent to have perceived its use.
I intend to deal with each separately over the next couple of weeks.

SPELLING TIPS

No English word ends in j
No English word ends in v except spiv
No English word ends in i except taxi (and ski and some other foreign imports* such as spaghetti)
Never write vv
Never write uv - write ov even if sound is uv
q never stands alone - write qu
w makes or say er: worm

*There is some controversy about some words finishing in i and whether they are now considered English or foreign but the rule holds: i is not a natural English ending - think hard and check before you write it at the end of a word..

DISCREET and DISCRETE

Discreet is used of a person who can keep a secret or is reliably cautious in conversation: He is very discreet and I can confide in him safely.
Discrete means separate or distinct: She has many friends but never sees them all together; she keeps them in discrete groups.

LITOTES

This term is pronounced with three syllables and long vowels and means understatement. It is often used with a negative: he is not a generous man - meaning he is very mean.
This idiom is common in Chaucer who says of the Clerk of Oxford ; "he nas nat [was not] right fat ", indicating that the man was extremely thin.
(Note that double or even triple negatives do not cancel each other out in late Middle English; they merely emphasize.)

AMBIVALENT and AMBIGUOUS

Ambiguous is used of a speaker or writer who does not make his or her meaning clear, possibly deliberately to give two meanings.: His sentence was ambiguous and nobody knew which way to take it.
Ambivalent is used of a person having contradictory feelings: I was ambivalent about the matter, partly supporting him and partly rejecting his message.

SOLILOQUY

This is a speech uttered when a character is alone on the stage or is addressing the audience rather than the other players. Its function is usually to reveal inner thoughts and the apron-fronted stage of an Elizabethan theatre lent itself to this purpose.
For my analysis of the famous soliloquies in Hamlet visit: http://www.classicsenglishliterature.com

ALTAR AND ALTER

These two words are pronounced the same but have very different meanings:
Altar is the holy table in a church: you can remember it by thinking that marriage has ar in it also.
Alter means to change something.

THE DOUBLING RULE NUMBER TWO

This rule deals with words of more than one syllable ending in one vowel and one consonant:
a) if the word ends in l double it; label labelling
b) if the stress in the word falls on the final syllable of the base word double the consonant:
begin beginning
c) do not double if the stress falls earlier; garden gardening
N.B. prefer preferring preferred preference
Tip: put the back of your hand underneath your chin to sense the stress

This is a difficult rule to master but worth the effort as it covers a large number of useful words and has few exceptions.

THE DOUBLING RULE NUMBER ONE

This is sometimes called the 1-1-1 rule because you are dealing with words of:

one syllable - one vowel - ending in one consonant;  hop
Double the final consonant hopping
but do not double x y w

(The reason for the rule is that the vowel in the ending cannot get back past a double consonant to make the vowel long (as it does in hoping meaning wishing for or in jumping where there is already a double consonant).
Remember: I was hoping for a sunny day and hopping up and down with with impatience.

METADRAMA

The term metadrama is used when a play draws the attention of the audience to the fact it is a drama and a fiction. It occurs when the Chorus in Henry V refers to "this wooden O" or, more loosely, when Hamlet says: "The play's the thing/Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king" meaning the Mouse-trap but reminding us that we are, at that moment, watching a play.
The device is sophisticated as it does counteract the "willing suspension of disbelief" normally required of an audience but it distances us for a while so that we may return in our emotions more intensely afterwards.
See more on this on Hamlet pages of: Classics of English Literature:essays by Barbara Daniels

THE 'LE' RULE

Le is a very common ending in English but it never follows n m r v w and so never write: nle mle rle vle wle
A way to remember is by this sentence: Nine mice run very well

EPONYMOUS

This word is used strictly and correctly when a character in a book has the same name as the title: King Lear; Emma etc
If you recall the rule that titles of complete works are put into italics you might write a sentence like this:
Hamlet is the eponymous hero of Hamlet.

USE OF ITALICS IN LITERATURE ESSAY

It is a convention, when writing about literature, to use italics for the titles of whole works. The titles of chapters, sections or individual poems are enclosed in double inverted commas.
In Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales, one of the most popular is "The Wife of Bath's Tale."

If you are handwriting an essay, use underlining to represent italics.

ANACOLUTHON

This term is used when the speaker ends a sentence with a different grammatical construction from the one at the start. It is obviously common in everyday chat but is also a rhetorical device to indicate, usually, high emotion as when King Lear says:
     I will have such revenges on you both
     That all the world shall - I will do such things,
     What they are, yet I know not ... (Act II scene iv lines 277-279)
The dash in this Arden edition indicates the break in syntax.

C and G

The consonants c and g make a soft sound (s and j) when they are followed by e, i or y.
Remember these phrases: city centre cyclist; gentle giant in the gym.
This rule becomes important when suffixing because you need to make sure that you keep the c or g soft by keeping the e: manageable, noticeable. You can drop the e when an i does the work: managing, noticing.

Some words have a u to stop the e making the g soft: guest, league.
Some words with a sh sound change the e to i: vicious.

SYMPATHETIC: two uses of the word

We normally use this word to mean that someone is kindly and understanding towards another person: Mrs Jennings is sympathetic towards Marianne in Sense and Sensibility.
We could also write: Mrs Jennings is a sympathetic character. This would mean that we, as readers, sympathise with her, warm to her and like her.

For more on this character and novel, see my website: Classics of English Literature: essays by Barbara Daniels

PARAPHRASE

This word means an attempt to rephrase a poem or piece of prose in your own words without shortening it. If it is reduced in the number of words it is called a precis (with an acute accent on the e.)

MINUSCULE

Note the spelling of this word (often used colloquially) which means extremely small: minuscule with a u in the middle.
A good way to remember is to see the word minus at the beginning..

METONYMY

Metonymy is device by which the attributes of an item connected to a person are transferred to that person. It has become popular recently in critical terminology and seems to have moved away from its earlier more limited use whereby the crown refers to the King or Queen more like a simple emblem.
An example would be that in Chapter 24 of Jane Austen's Emma when Frank Churchill is buying "sleek, well-tied parcels" of gloves and we feel that he is also smooth and covering something up.
See my analysis on my website Classics of English Literature: essays by Barbara Daniels

The y rule

Change the y to i when adding a suffix (syllable at the end of a word) if the word ends in a consonant plus y. party becomes parties.
BUT not if you are adding ish, ing or ist. (You never use ii in English except when skiing.)
If the base word ends in a vowel plus y keep the y: donkey donkeys
To sum up: change the y to i unless there is a vowel before it or an i after it.

CHRONIC and ACUTE

These are medical words: chronic means a long-lasting condition and acute means one which is short-lived and flares up suddenly: chronic rheumatism but an acute attack of 'flu.

Chronic has spread into general usage as in chronic disrepair and in colloquial speech it can mean very bad as in: the book was chronic, though this now seems somewhat outdated.
Acute is also used outside medicine as in: I was acutely aware or: He felt an acute sense of guilt where it means sharply or piercing..

i before e

This is a commonly quoted rule but a vital part of it is often omitted. It should read:
i before e except after c but only when the ie sound says ee.
e.g. chief, field but deceive, receive
Exceptions are: seize, protein

When the ie sound does not say ee, the e can go before the i: weight, height.

This rule has one very useful application: Internet fraudsters can rarely spell receive correctly!

Outside

The expression is outside the shop never outside of the shop.

The APOSTROPHE of possession

This is the apostrophe that shows that someone/something owns something. You add it to a noun which otherwise does not indicate ownership: boy for example.  You do not add it to a word which already suggests ownership: hers.

There is one technique for knowing where to put it that covers ninety-nine per cent of cases and you can avoid the others by re-wording your sentence.

Turn the phrase around so that it reads: the ... of the ...  the books of the boy. Add the apostrophe and s at the end of this new phrase. Then turn the phrase back again: The boy's books
Similarly: the books of the boys. Add the apostrophe and s at the end and turn it back: the boys' books.

There is a knottier problem with the name of someone like Keats which ends in an s. Best to simply add it to the name: Keats' or leave your phrase as the poetry of Keats. Just be sure you do not put it between the t and the s or else you are calling him Keat!

THROUGH, THOROUGH and THREW

Through is a preposition which can make a phrase with a noun: through the window.
Thorough means in detail, complete, with care. His work was always thorough.

A good way to remember is that thorough is a longer word and it suggests taking a long time over something.

Threw is the past tense of throw. She threw the jewel across the room.  Remember this sentence and the two ew syllables.

UNINTERESTED and DISINTERESTED

Uninterested means not interested.  The audience was uninterested in his boring speech.
Disinterested means impartial or not taking sides. The umpire remained disinterested despite the argument between the players over his decision. This means that the umpire did not side with anyone but still would have been interested in the argument.

Recently this precise use has become confused with uninterested but it is better in written or formal English to keep the meanings separate.

SOS

This stands for Simultaneous Oral Spelling: it is useful way of learning spellings, particularly for anyone with mild dyslexia.
It means that you write down the spelling, saying each letter as you write it.
It is known as a multi-sensory method as you are using your visual, auditory and kinaesthetic senses to implant the word.

SUBJECTIVE and OBJECTIVE

Subjective means that the view taken of something is subject to the emotions and opinions of the viewer.
Objective means that the object in question is being looked at without feeling. (Some would say this is impossible.)
A writer might look at a flower and feel its beauty subjectively, pondering on the fact that it will soon die, whereas a gardener might think objectively about the best conditions for its growth.

CONTINUOUS and CONTINUAL

Continuous means without a break: The noise from his lawn-mower was continuous.
Continual means repeated frequently but with pauses between.  He received continual
bad reports.
A good way to remember is that continuous noises often make you angry and want to hiss:
continoussssss.

SILENT 'E' RULE

This is sometimes called magic or lazy e.
Drop the final e before a vowel suffix: like liking.
BUT keep it before a consonant suffix: like likely

ing is a vowel suffix because it begins with a vowel and ly is a consonant suffix because it starts with a consonant.

The reason is that the vowel in the new ending will keep the first vowel long just as the e did. Drop the e when you do not need it.  N.B. manageable where the e keeps the g soft.
Exceptions: vicious, artificial, racial etc.  The i here does not lengthen the first vowel because it forms a sh sound which alerts you to the exception.

EMBLEM

An emblem is similar to a symbol except that it is more limited in its meaning and often has a direct reference to just one object. Whereas the conch in Lord of the Flies has many significances: civilisation, order, comradeship, leadership etc., the daffodil, as emblem of Wales, means just that country. It also carries its reference with it: a daffodil indicates Wales to anyone, whereas a conch means civilsation only within the novel. A literary example would be the violet in the seventeenth century which was widely accepted as an emblem of faithful love and truth.

TO, TWO and TWO

To is the simplest: it is a preposition and often forms a phrase with a noun: She went to the shops.
Two is the spelling for the number: two eggs.  A good way to remember is that there is a w in it just as there is in twice.
Too is the spelling when something is too much.  Think of yourself saying it in a dramatic way: "It is all toooooo much" and then you will remember that there is more than one o.

Symbol

A symbol is an object which develops deeper meanings, sometimes during the course of a literary work. In "Lord of the Flies" the conch becomes a symbol of civilisation and order. Yet it is a "real" shell present in the narrative also.
In simile or metaphor the compared object is not real or present. If we speak of her "shell-like ears" there is no shell present in the discourse. Similarly in: "He retreated into his shell", there is no real shell.

Hopefully

There is only one safe rule about using the word hopefully and that is: avoid it.
Hopefully is an adverb and should describe a verb: in the sentence, "Hopefully the parcel will arrive tomorrow", the parcel itself is almost hoping it will arrive.
To avoid it, say, "I hope the parcel will arrive tomorrow."

YOU'RE and YOUR

You're means You are with the apostrophe signalling the missing letter a.
Your means belonging to you.

A good way to remember is that your includes the letters that spell our. Your.

WHETHER ... OR

Whether should always be followed by or. 
I will go whether it is wet or fine.

If there is no obvious alternative, simply add or not.
I do not know whether to go or not. 

METAPHOR

A metaphor compares two things which are not usually considered similar and finds something in common between them.  It does not use the words like or as.
Example: After the storm we were cocooned in our caravan.
The caravan is not a cocoon but it is warm, protective and cosy like a cocoon.
Some metaphors are so overused that they become dead metaphors: She is a bright girl. The girl's intelligence is compared to a light but it is not a fresh way of saying this.

SIMILE

A simile is a comparison between two differing objects which requires a leap of the imagination to see the similarity.  The comparison is made obvious and explicit usually by  the use of the words: as or like:
"Her eyes were as blue as a cornflower." Eyes and cornflowers are very different things, apart from their being blue.  If you were to say: "Her eyes are blue like her sister's," you are not using simile as the two sets of eyes are similar and no imagination is needed to see what they have in common.
The word simile is often wrongly spelled: think of it as having the same number of syllables as metaphor and do not omit the middle i.  Or you can think of it as being like the word similar and you will not forget the spelling.

LOSE and LOOSE

Lose is a verb: "I am afraid I may lose my new mobile."
Loose is an adjective: "My shoelace has come loose."

A good way to remember is to think of yourself shouting out, exaggerating the vowels: "My shooooooelace has come loooooose!"  This tells you that the word has a long sound but, of course, only two letters o.

LY as a SUFFIX

A suffix is a small group of letters (here just two) which you tack on to the end of a word to change its usage or meaning.
Ly changes an adjective (which describes a noun) into an adverb (which describes a verb.)
You simply add it on without altering the original word - do not take any letters off and do not attach any new ones. Therefore sincere becomes sincerely, truthful becomes truthfully and so on.
The main exception is true which becomes truly.

With many of these rules there are other minor exceptions but, if you learn the main ones, you will have improved your performance in an examination or in a letter.

BLANK VERSE

Blank verse is not the same as free verse which has no set rules.
Blank verse is unrhymed iambic pentameters.
Unrhymed means that there is no rhyme at the end of the lines, although Shakespeare frequently adds rhyme at the end of a scene to show that it is the end.
Iambic means that each foot (little bit of the rhythm) reads like the word again.with a weak stress followed by a strong stress.
Pentameter means that there are five of these feet in each line
Therefore a line of blank verse reads as though you are saying the word again five times:
Again, again, again, again, again.

YOUR and YOU'RE

You're means you are.  The apostrophe shows a missing letter.
YOUR means belonging to you.

Think of your as including the word our.

NEITHER .. NOR

Neither ...nor takes a singular verb.  Neither my brother nor my sister likes tennis.

If you are not sure what the right verb is, try using just one of the people concerned: my brother likes tennis.  Although this sentence does not mean what you want to say, it does give you the correct form of the verb

PRACTICE and PRACTISE

Practice is a noun. We went to the football practice.
Practise is a verb.  You must practise the piano.

The best way to remember is to think of advice and advise where you can hear the difference.

THEY'RE, THEIR and THERE

They're means they are. The apostrophe here tells you that there is a missing letter.
Their means belonging to them. It does not need an apostrophe because it is a possessive adjective.
There means in the place being pointed out: over there. A good way to remember it is to see the word here in it as those meanings are, in a way, opposites.

IMPLY and INFER

The writer implies.
The reader infers.
Sherlock Holmes infers.

To imply means to hint or suggest.
To infer means to work out or deduce.
Remember it by thinking that there is an r in read and in infer.

IT'S and ITS

It's means it is.  It's raining now. The apostrophe shows a missing letter.
Its means belonging to it. The dog wagged its tail.

You do not need the apostrophe in its tail because its is a possessive adjective and shows possession, that the tail beongs to the dog, without any apostrophe.