How do I structure an English literature essay at A-Level?

Structure is integral to achieving the top marks, and can make all the difference between writing a good essay and writing a great essay. At A-Level you have probably learnt to structure your essay into three parts: Introduction Body Conclusion However, this can sometimes seem a little general. Students often find themselves questioning ‘what exactly should go into the introduction?’, or ‘what constitutes the body of the essay?' or ‘is my conclusion just a condensed version of the body of the essay?’. So, let’s break it down. I like to think of an essay as like a textile. In that, like a textile, an essay is constructed from different threads of arguments that each connect and weave together in order to make a grander picture. This is what we want. We want our essay to weave an argument together that is structured in such a way that provides a clear picture of your response at the end. Let’s try applying this approach to the three-part structure. Introduction: The introduction is key to setting the tone of your essay. This is the first encounter your reader will have with your work so you need it to be concise and clear. You want to imagine the introduction as a taster of what your essay is going to unveil. Or, using the metaphor of the textile, you need to show what threads you will be using and what the ultimate picture will be. So, in your introduction you want to make sure that you’re answering the question right away and giving the reader an overview of how you will qualify your answer, including a very brief description of what analytical tools or points you will be using to justify your response. You want to isolate the key areas of analysis that are going to set up the deeper investigation that take place through the body of the essay. The Body: This is by far the most lengthy part of your essay. A good method for arranging your thoughts into a coherent structure is to dedicate a paragraph to each individual idea or point. You may have anywhere between 3 to 6 different areas that you want to cover in your essay to illustrate your response. Each of these then need to be divided into paragraphs and broken down further into: Point: The point you’re making. Example: An example from the text whether a quotation, observation or a piece of acute analysis. Explanation: What the quotation or observation can tell us. An explanation of how the evidence you have used explains your point. Returning once more to the textile metaphor, this is the part of the essay in which you take the threads of the argument you have mentioned in your introduction and flesh them out to make part of the picture. Conclusion: At A level you are not required to write a long conclusion, really it only needs a couple of lines. However, summarizing and qualifying your argument is essential for a good essay. A good conclusion, leaves the reader with a sense of closure- it’s the moment that we move out of the intricacies of the threads to see the big picture of the final textile. The metaphor of the textile has always helped me to structure my essays, but there may be other metaphors that help you to think through the structure. You might imagine an essay as a piece of detective work in which we have to find evidence in the text to explain a particular idea, or you may imagine it as a puzzle. Whatever your approach, the more you practice writing good essay plans the better your structure will be!