i

Christophe Den Tandt

Professeur
Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB)
Guidelines for Research Papers and Theses

GERM-B-425; MEMO-B-500

These notes were compiled with the help of Patrick Lennon and Gregory Watson
 i

GUIDELINES FOR RESEARCH PAPERS AND THESES

A. Introduction: Academic English ................................................................ 1

@1 FORMATTING CONVENTIONS OF ACADEMIC ENGLISH ............................................... 1
@2 CHOOSING A STYLE SHEET: THE MLA HANDBOOK .................................................... 1
@3 EMULATING APPROPRIATE MODELS .......................................................................... 1

B. Grammar and Sentence Structure: Recurrent mistakes

and frequently asked questions ........................................................................ 2

@4 GRAMMATICAL CORRECTIONS .................................................................................. 2

@5 THE LIST OF CORRECTION SYMBOLS .......................................................................... 2
@6 PUNCTUATION .......................................................................................................... 2
@7 PUNCTUATION IN WORD-PROCESSED DOCUMENTS .................................................... 3
@8 COMMAS [,] .............................................................................................................. 3
@ 9-12 SEMICOLONS [;] ........................................................................................................ 4
@ 13-16 QUESTION MARKS [?] ............................................................................................... 4
@ 17 EXCLAMATION MARKS [!] ........................................................................................ 5
@ 18 CONTRACTED FORMS ................................................................................................ 5
@ 19-20 VERB TENSES IN PLOT SUMMARIES ........................................................................... 5
@ 21 VERB TENSES IN SUMMARIES OF OTHER AUTHORS’ ARGUMENTS .............................. 6
@ 22 VERB TENSES IN CROSS-REFERENCES TO PASSAGES OF ONE’S OWN TEXT ................. 6
@ 23-25 VERB TENSES IN BIOGRAPHICAL AND HISTORICAL NARRATIVES ............................... 7
@ 26 USING THE FIRST PERSON IN ACADEMIC PROSE ......................................................... 8
@ 27-30 GENDER NEUTRALITY .............................................................................................. 8
@ 31 FRAGMENTS ............................................................................................................. 8
@ 32 RUN-ON SENTENCES ................................................................................................. 9

C. Mechanics of Writing ................................................................................... 11

@ 33 TYPING AND WORD PROCESSING............................................................................. 11
@ 34 KEEPING FORMATTING AS SIMPLE AS POSSIBLE ...................................................... 11
@ 35 FONT TYPE AND SIZE .............................................................................................. 11
@ 36 EMPHASIS ............................................................................................................... 12
@ 37 MARGINS ................................................................................................................ 12
@ 38 SPACING ................................................................................................................. 12
@ 39 CAPITALIZATION IN TITLES ..................................................................................... 12
@ 40 ITALICS, UNDERLINING, AND INVERTED COMMAS ................................................... 13
@ 41 ITALICS / UNDERLINING: WORKS PUBLISHED
AS SEPARATE VOLUMES OR ARTIFACTS ................................................................... 13
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@ 42 INVERTED COMMAS: WORKS PUBLISHED IN COLLECTIONS

OR AS PART OF OTHER ARTIFACTS ........................................................................... 14

D. Paragraphs....................................................................................................... 15
@ 43-46 BASIC PRINCIPLES: UNITY, DEVELOPMENT, COHERENCE ......................................... 15
@ 47-54 SAMPLE OF A UNIFIED, WELL-DEVELOPED, AND COHERENT PARAGRAPH ................ 15
@ 55-63 PARAGRAPH WRITING: CORRECT LAYOUT............................................................... 16

E. Quotes and reported Speech ...................................................................... 21

@ 64 ACADEMIC PROSE AS A DIALOGUE AMONG CRITICS ................................................ 21
@ 65-66 ACKNOWLEDGING OTHER AUTHORS PROPERLY ....................................................... 21
@ 67-72 INDIRECT SPEECH ................................................................................................... 23
@ 73-74 QUOTATIONS / “QUOTES” ....................................................................................... 25
@ 75-77 LONG QUOTES / “BLOCK QUOTES” .......................................................................... 25
@ 78 OVERQUOTING ....................................................................................................... 27
@ 79-83 SHORT QUOTES ...................................................................................................... 27
@ 84-87 DOCTORING QUOTES PROPERLY ............................................................................. 29
@ 88-90 QUOTING POETRY ................................................................................................... 30
@ 91-93 QUOTES AND PUNCTUATION ................................................................................... 31

F. Bibliographical references .......................................................................... 32

@ 94 LOCATING CRITICAL SOURCES ................................................................................ 32
@ 95 PRIMARY AND SECONDARY SOURCES ..................................................................... 32
@ 96 THE BIBLIOGRAPHICAL APPARATUS ........................................................................ 32
@ 97 AVOIDING PLAGIARISM .......................................................................................... 32
@ 98 SPECIFIC FEATURES OF THE MLA STANDARD
FOR BIBLIOGRAPHICAL REFERENCES ....................................................................... 33
@ 99-115 THE THREE BASIC FUNCTIONS
OF THE BIBLIOGRAPHICAL APPARATUS ................................................................... 33
@ 116-18 FORMATTING THE LIST OF WORKS CITED:
BOOKS AND ARTICLES ............................................................................................. 37
@ 119-29 FORMATTING THE LIST OF WORKS CITED:
OTHER TYPES OF ENTRIES ....................................................................................... 38
@ 130-31 OVERALL STRUCTURE OF THE
LIST OF WORKS CITED ........................................................................................... 40
@ 132 OTHER BIBLIOGRAPHICAL STANDARDS ................................................................... 45
@ 133 THE AUTHOR-DATE SYSTEM ................................................................................... 45
@ 134 THE UNREVISED MLA STANDARD .......................................................................... 45

G. How to Handle Secondary Literature.................................................... 46

@ 135-42 POSITIONING ONE’S VOICE
AS A CRITIC AMONG CRITICS ................................................................................... 45
@ 143-47 ACADEMIC ORIGINALITY, PUBLIC KNOWLEDGE,
AND INTERPRETIVE COMMUNITIES .......................................................................... 51
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H. Structuring an MA Thesis
@ 148 DEFINING A MANAGEABLE CORPUS ........................................................................ 53
@ 149 PRIMARY SOURCES, “CORE” CRITICAL MATERIAL,
“AUXILIARY” CRITICAL MATERIAL ......................................................................... 53
@ 150 TEXT MANAGEMENT: THINKING FROM THE POINT OF VIEW
OF ONE’S INTENDED READERS................................................................................. 53
@ 151-54 STRUCTURING PRINCIPLES ...................................................................................... 54
@ 155-58 STRUCTURING AN MA THESIS:
PRACTICAL TIPS ...................................................................................................... 54
@ 159 HANDING IN AN OUTLINE OF THE THESIS TO YOUR SUPERVISOR ............................. 58

H. List of Correction Symbols ........................................................................ 59

@ 160 CORRECTION SYMBOLS .......................................................................................... 58

@ 161 PROOFREADING SYMBOLS ...................................................................................... 59
@ 162 SYMBOLS FOR GRAMMATICAL CORRECTIONS ......................................................... 62
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GUIDELINES FOR RESEARCH PAPERS AND THESES

Numbers in the margin preceded by “@” refer to items relevant to specific

mistakes appearing in your own drafts. You may easily access the relevant items
by means of the search function (e.g. for item @ 12, search “@ 12”).

A. Introduction: Academic English

@1 FORMATTING CONVENTIONS OF ACADEMIC ENGLISH
If you read a book of literary criticism or an article in a university journal, you will
realize that these texts resort to technical features (notes, bibliographies, quotes) that
are usually not encountered elsewhere—in general-interest journalism, for instance.
Indeed, academic writing is a genre (a mode of discourse) in its own right: it follows
its own set of norms. For the composition of your research papers and of your thesis
(mémoire), we expect you to achieve a good command of these conventions.

@2 CHOOSING A STYLE SHEET: THE MLA HANDBOOK

Several standards (or “style sheets”) exist for the writing of academic prose. For papers
and theses focusing on literatures in English, the teaching staff of Modern Languages
and Literatures at the ULB wish you to follow the conventions set out in the MLA
Handbook (Eighth Edition). Information about the MLA style sheet is also available
on the following web sites:

https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/mla_style/mla_formatting_and_
style_guide/mla_works_cited_page_books.html

@3 EMULATING APPROPRIATE MODELS

You will probably find some of these academic rules unfamiliar and burdensome. Yet
they are meant to ensure clear, complete, and unambiguous communication. Overall,
if you want to find proper models for your academic papers, you must use academic
texts of the same type as the one you are writing (articles or books of literary criticism,
papers on linguistics, etc.). Specifically, imitating journalists, reviewers, or novelists
can be misleading, because the latter writers tend to apply other conventions than
those used by academics. This implies, of course, that you should become used to
reading literary criticism, if you have not already done so. Note that even course notes
like the present volume should not be used as models for your academic papers. The
typography used in course notes—and in the present Guidelines, in particular—is
appropriate only for study aids: It is meant to make studying (underlining, highlighting,
summarizing) easier. Paradoxically, it does not fit academic conventions for research
papers.
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B. Grammar and Sentence Structure: Recurrent mistakes and

Frequently Asked Questions
@4 GRAMMATICAL CORRECTIONS
There is of course no room in the present textbook to go over all the grammatical points
BA3 or MA students may still find difficult to master. In the next section, you will find
items and questions that, as previous experience indicates, have proved specifically
problematic for students writing research papers. For all other grammatical issues, we
refer you to the textbooks recommended for your English language classes. In addition
to these, the following volumes may prove useful if you feel your English needs some
grammatical boost:

Thomson, A. J. and A. V. Martinet. Practical English Grammar

Swan, Michael. Practical English Usage
Quirk, Randolph and Sidney Greenbaum. A University Grammar of English
Fowler, Ramsey H. and Jane E. Aaron. The Little, Brown Handbook

@5 THE LIST OF CORRECTION SYMBOLS

In practical terms, the manuscripts (i.e. the drafts) you hand in to your instructor will
be returned to you bearing specific correction marks in order to point out different
types of mistakes, including grammatical and formatting errors. In addition to detailed
comments, there are three types of correction signs I use when correcting drafts:

▪ Numbers referring to items in the present Guidelines: numbers preceded by

the @ sign refer to corresponding items in this very textbook. The passage of
the text requiring correction is circled, and the number appears next to it in the
margin.

▪ Proofreading symbols: see @ 161

▪ Signs and abbreviations relevant to grammatical issues not discussed in the

present Guidelines. You will find the key to these abbreviations in the list of
correction symbols inserted at the end of the present textbook (see @ 162).

@6 PUNCTUATION
Rules regulating punctuation can be tricky. For a full exposé of the matter, we refer
you to the textbooks mentioned above (The MLA handbook and The Little, Brown
Handbook have particularly useful sections devoted to punctuation). Here are a few
remarks about the most common problems encountered in BA3 and MA students’
papers.
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@7 PUNCTUATION IN WORD-PROCESSED DOCUMENTS

In English-language computer-generated texts, punctuation signs are always attached
to the word that precedes them and are followed by a space:

Incorrect:

There is , however , one principle I should like you to bear in mind .

Correct:

There is, however, one principle I should like you to bear in mind.

of primary importance,

of primary importance:

of primary importance;

of primary importance.

of primary importance?

of primary importance!

Otherwise, the text processing software will be unable to trigger adequate line returns,
and lines of your text might start with a free-floating full stop, comma, semi-colon,
parenthesis, square brackets, ellipsis points, etc. More information about punctuation
will be given in the section on quotes (see @ 91-93).

Note, however, that punctuation conventions for French academic prose differ from what we set forth
above. In French, several punctuation signs—colons, semi-colons, inverted commas—are separated
from the preceding word by a hard space.

@8 COMMAS [,]
Rules regulating the use of commas are particularly numerous. Do look them up in the
proper handbooks. However, this particular case is worth mentioning:

▪ Commas preceding relative clauses. A comma precedes the relative pronouns

“who,ˮ “whom,ˮ “whose,ˮ and “whichˮ when they introduce a nonrestrictive relative
clause—i.e. a clause that is not meant to help readers identify the antecedent among
other objects or persons:

Shakespeare, who probably knew Latin, never attended Oxford.

In this case, the antecedent is fully identified by his name, so that the following clause
is nonrestrictive. Remember also that restrictive relative clauses are introduced by
“that,ˮ which is not preceded by a comma (and is often omitted).
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@9 SEMICOLONS [;]

@ 10 ▪ Semicolons link two main clauses that are not linked by a coordinating conjunction
(“and,ˮ “or,ˮ “for,ˮ “soˮ). Note that in these cases, the two main clauses are often
syntactically similar.

I did not become a writer out of ambition; I thought I was just making an important

contribution to humankind.

@ 11 ▪ Semicolons separate items in complex enumerations, especially if some of the items

already contain commas.

To the winners, we give prizes; to the losers, consolation; and to the spectators, a good

show.

@ 12 ▪ Avoid overusing semicolons. In many cases, using a full stop is a better option.

@ 13 QUESTION MARKS [?]

@ 14 ▪ Question marks appear at the end of direct questions. They are never used after
indirect questions, however.

I wonder why he even tried.

@ 15 ▪ Avoid overusing questions and question marks in an academic text. Academic texts
are for the most part written in declarative prose. Above all, avoid using rhetorical
questions. They may be very useful in other types of texts, but sound awkward and
manipulative in an academic essay.

Not recommended:

Was Shakespeare a good hunter? Did he even spend any time in the countryside? We

would be so eager to know these small matters.

Recommended:

There is no evidence indicating that Shakespeare was a good hunter, or even that he spent

any time in the countryside.

@ 16 ▪ Question marks are never combined with punctuations signs such as full stops,
commas, exclamation marks, or other question marks.

Faulty:

I often ask myself, “Why am I even doing this?.ˮ

Corrected:

I often ask myself, “Why am I even doing this?ˮ

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@ 17 EXCLAMATION MARKS [!]

Avoid overusing exclamation marks. As indicated above, academic prose tends to be
objective and declarative. Therefore, there is little room in it for interjections or even
marks of surprise. The use of interjections in such texts may be interpreted as a sign of
naiveté on the part of the author or as a manipulative turn of phrase, trying to win over
readers to the author’s undocumented convictions. A proper academic is never
surprised and tries to convince readers by rational arguments properly backed up by
evidence.

@ 18 CONTRACTED FORMS
Do not use contracted forms (“isn’t,ˮ “doesn’t,ˮ “wouldn’tˮ) in an academic text.
These words have to be spelled out in their entirety: “is not,ˮ “would not.ˮ However,
if quoting a text that uses contracted forms (a literary text, for instance), you must
respect the spelling of the original.

@ 18.2 NUMBERS AND FIGURES

Figures from one to ninety-nine must be written out in full.

@ 19 VERB TENSES IN PLOT SUMMARIES

Literary papers often include summaries of literary works (see @ 152). In English (in
French too!), such summaries use the present as tense of reference, not the simple
past. Admittedly, most fictional works—including those wish to summarize—are
written in the simple past (this is a common convention for fiction). Yet your own
synopsis should be written mostly in the present. Of course, you may have to use the
past, present perfect, or future tenses to express time relations within the summary
itself. Yet the tense used by default should be the present, because using this tense (as
opposed to the simple past) indicates that you do not wish to be mistaken for the
author of the story. You do not assume the responsibility of the storyteller: you are
merely describing, reporting someone else’s story.

@ 20 Figure 1
Note how these principles are applied in the following example. In this passage of The
Aesthetics and Politics of the Crowd in American Literature, critic Mary Esteve
summarizes a short story by late-nineteenth-century writer Charles Chesnutt [since this
is the published version of the article and not a manuscript, the text is single spaced]:
 6

Most of the verb forms in the passage are indeed in the present ("decide"; "fends off";
"negotiates" ...). Yet, the author sometimes resorts to the past, or quotes the past tense
used by Chesnutt ("had sworn") in order to designate events that took place before the
present of enunciation.

@ 21 VERB TENSES IN SUMMARIES OF OTHER AUTHORS’ ARGUMENTS

Academic writers often have to summarize other authors’ ideas, either as support for
their own argument, or in order to manifest disagreement. Such summaries are usually
written in the present, even though the quoted text may have been published in the
distant past:

In The Republic, Plato argues that the world of appearances is just a veil of illusion,

masking the far more substantial world of ideas.

Edgar Allan Poe contends that poetry should primarily be concerned with the musicality

of language.

The present is used in those cases in order to signal that the cited author's ideas are still
relevant to the argument in which they are summarized. Accordingly, the past may be
used in order to indicate that given ideas are no longer relevant, for instance when
contrasting an early stage of an author's career with its later development:

In the Tractatus, Wittgenstein still clung to the hope of defining the conditions of a

universal language. His later work, however, dispels this illusion.

Yeats's early poems gave expression to the decorative world-weariness of the fin-de-

siècle spirit. His modernist works, by comparison, are far simpler and more powerful in

tone.

@ 22 VERB TENSES IN CROSS-REFERENCES TO PASSAGES OF ONE'S OWN TEXT

Academic writers sometimes must point their readers to other sections of their own
text. This is the case, notably, in a preface, where the author provides his or her reader
with a preview of the structure of his or her text. Such cross-references are usually
written in the present, not the past or the future, even if the sentence refers to a section
located earlier or later in the text.

Chapter 1 provides a detailed analysis of this novel.

Her poetry, which I analyze in Chapter 7, has been the object of only few critical

discussions.

This use of the present may be justified by arguing that, when the text is completed,
its different sections are always available to the reader's inspection. They coexist
temporally with the passage in which the cross-reference appears.
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@ 23 VERB TENSES IN BIOGRAPHICAL AND HISTORICAL NARRATIVES

Literary studies essays often contain passages devoted to biographical or historical
narratives (summarizing an author's life; describing a historical process). Such
historical and biographical narratives, contrary to plot summaries, require the simple
past or other past tenses, according to context.

Yeats spent most of his childhood in London, away from Ireland.

Joyce wrote most of his major works in France and Italy. At the time, he had been writing

for more than fifteen years.

@ 24 In such biographical or historical narratives, the use of the historical present, though
theoretically correct, is best avoided: it is a source of confusion, especially in passages
that inevitably contain dates referring to past events.

Not recommended:

In 1922, Joyce publishes Ulysses, a path-breaking experimental novel.

@ 25 Likewise, in biographical or historical narratives, the use of the future or the

conditional to refer to events occurring later than the moment of enunciation should
be avoided as well, because it disturbs the logic of narration. Those future and
conditional forms should, in the logic of biographical/historical narratives, be replaced
by verbs in one of the past tenses:

Not recommended:

At 23, he leaves the university, disgusted by the dullness of the curriculum. At the end of

his career, however, he will receive an honorary title from the same institution.

At 23, he left the university, disgusted by the dullness of the curriculum. At the end of his

career, however, he would receive an honorary title from the same institution.

Recommended:

At 23, he left the university, disgusted by the dullness of the curriculum. At the end of his

career, however, he received an honorary title from the same institution.

@ 26 USING THE FIRST PERSON IN ACADEMIC PROSE

By far one of the most frequently asked questions about the writing of essays and
research papers concerns the use of the first person in academic prose. May the author
of an academic text use the first person to refer to him- or herself, or should he or she
remain purely objective, writing the whole argument in the third person? There are
clear differences between the conventions of the natural sciences (physics, chemistry)
and the customs of the humanities in this matter. Authors of essays on physics,
 8

chemistry, or engineering insist on presenting their research as pure descriptions of

fact. The use of the third person is prohibited in this logic, for it would add an element
of parasitical subjectivity: the facts should speak for themselves ("Repeated tests
indicate that ..."). One of the results of this convention is the proliferation of awkward
turns of phrases meant to avoid at all cost the semblance of a subjective voice. Passive
verbs are often used (annoyingly) as substitutes for a first-person form: "It has been
shown that ..."

In the humanities, on the contrary, the use of the first person is allowed, though most
authors resort to it only sparingly. However, the first person is indispensable in
passages where the author must position him- or herself towards other authors,
signaling agreement or disagreement (see @ 135).

In the following developments, I have followed Bradley's classic reading of Hamlet.

I can, however, not endorse John Dover Wilson's reading of this passage.

In this sense, essays in the humanities are not purely objective in the strict meaning of
the term: authors must commit themselves to their own argument and interpretations.

@ 27 GENDER NEUTRALITY
In the last few decades, academic writers have developed techniques ensuring some
degree of gender neutrality in their writing practice. This means in particular that any
word, phrase, or pronoun designating persons in general, functions, or the whole of
humankind should not be expressed exclusively by masculine-identified words,
phrases, or pronouns.

@ 28 ▪ When referring to any author, any reader, or any person, avoid using masculine
pronouns or possessives such as “he,ˮ or “his.ˮ Several alternative options are possible:
using “he or she,ˮ using the plural (“theyˮ), or alternating the use of “heˮ and “sheˮ in
consecutive passages.

@ 29 ▪ Avoid using the term “manˮ to designate all human beings. Use “humankindˮ instead
of ˮmankind.ˮ

@ 30 ▪ Use gender-neutral terms for names of functions: “chairpersonˮ instead of

ˮchairman,ˮ “anchorpersonˮ instead of “anchorman,ˮ etc.

@ 31 FRAGMENTS
One of the most common grammatical mistakes in BA3 and MA students’ papers is
the use of what English grammarians call “fragments,” i.e. sentences made up only of
a subordinate clause, without a main clause:

James Joyce left Ireland because he could find no place in the local literary scene, which

was very conservative. And also because he always liked French food much better than

an Irish stew.
 9

As if Joyce did not know about the dangers of the high-cholesterol cuisine he would find

in cheap Paris restaurants.

The sentences quoted above are fragments: they are introduced by a subordinating
conjunction (“because,” “as if”) and have therefore the grammatical value of an
adverbial, without however being linked to any main verb. Such fragments can easily
be corrected by changes in punctuation, or by turning the subordinate into a main
clause by the addition of a verb. Note, for instance, that in the second example, a main
verb was added in order to restore proper syntax.:

James Joyce left Ireland because he could find no place in the local literary scene, which

was very conservative. Also, he always liked French food much better than Irish stew.

It is as if Joyce did not know about the dangers of the high-cholesterol cuisine he would

find in cheap Paris restaurants

@ 31.2 (Pseudo)-sentences qualify as fragments if they have no finite (conjugated) verb form,
but only a past participle, an infinitive, or a gerund. This is to be avoided. In English
prose, all sentences need a finite, conjugated verb (see @ 25.2).

@ 32 RUN-ON SENTENCES
A run-on sentence is the opposite of a fragment: it is made up of several badly
coordinated main clauses. It is as if the sentence ran beyond its expected limit, thus
distorting the grammatical and the semantic logic of the text. This faulty sentence
structure is often due to incorrect punctuation, misplaced coordinators, or lack of logic
in the use of pronouns and tenses:

In the Lestrygonians chapter of Ulysses, Joyce clarifies his views on food, he calls for a

more introspective spiritual discipline that would lead up to true epiphanies of modem

dieting.

This sentence can be set right by merely changing the comma into a full stop or a semi-
colon, thus splitting the run-on structure into two viable main clauses:

In the Lestrygonians chapter of Ulysses, Joyce clarifies his views on food. He calls for a

more introspective spiritual discipline that would lead up to true epiphanies of modem

dieting.

Here is another, more complex example:

When a fifty-year-old man, whom Stephen Dedalus does not know, enters the bar, it is

the past, the experience of the spiritual father that comes in, no longer the emptiness of

modernity, which had been represented up to now by the figure of the wayward son, the
 10

bride that he cannot find and by the siren-like barmaids, who stand for the world of

vacuous leisure, in which Stephen had been immersed up to now.

Correcting this is a little trickier; it requires splitting the sentence into different
segments and making some logical links more explicit:

With the entrance into the bar-room of this fifty-year-old man whom Stephen has never

met, we are witnessing the return of the past, of the spiritual father. This character

counterbalances the emptiness of modernity, which had been represented up to now by

the figure of the wayward son and by the characters associated with him—the bride he

cannot find, and the siren-like barmaids, who embody Stephen’s world of vacuous leisure.

@ 32.2 PLEONASTIC ENUMERATIONS

Avoid enumerations of near synonyms. In most cases, only one element of the
enumeration is genuinely useful to your argument.

Not recommended

T. S. Eliot’s letters contain information and elements about his early life.

Recommended

T. S. Eliot’s letters contain information about his early life.

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C. Mechanics of Writing
The mechanics of writing are the features of a text—font type and size, spacing,
capitalization, punctuation—that have a direct impact on typography.

@ 33 TYPING AND WORD PROCESSING.

Research papers should be handed in to teachers either in electronic form or as a print-
out document generated by word processing software. In this matter, follow your
instructor’s instructions. Many teachers still like to correct the paper based on the print-
out. Others insert comments directly into the computer file. You should, however;
avoid giving them the extra chore (and cost) of printing the document themselves.

While in the past teachers could not expect all students to have access to a computer
and a printer, we now assume that students master at least basic word processing skills
and work on their own machines. Note, however, that there is nothing magical about
word processing. Though present-day software and computers are far more reliable
and user-friendly than previously, glitches and delays of different sorts may still
happen. Printing a (long) text, for instance, is often less carefree than it might appear.
So, try to make sure in advance that you will have the opportunity to encode and to
print important papers and theses in good conditions (i.e., on a computer and software
you are thoroughly familiar with, and preferably not in a mad rush to meet the
deadline).

@ 34 KEEPING FORMATTING AS SIMPLE AS POSSIBLE

As a rule, try to keep formatting as simple and consistent as possible: do not add
useless formatting features. You will see below (see @ 35-39) that academic writing
demands—at least for drafts and manuscripts—extremely simple formatting
conventions, which do not appeal to the sophisticated features offered by word
processing systems.

Consistency in formatting procedures is essential: always use the same features in

similar circumstances. If a document is formatted consistently, it can easily be
reformatted by using the software’s automated functions (“search and replace,” e.g.).
Consistency in word processing is achieved, for instance, by using the software’s
“styles” function, which offers automated formatting models for paragraphs, headings,
etc. It is possible (indeed recommended) to learn how to generate and edit your own
customized “styles.” The pre-formatted styles offered by the software might not be
compatible with academic writing conventions<

@ 35 FONT TYPE AND SIZE:

Papers should be written in 12-point font, preferably using the Times New Roman
font type. The 12-point font and Times New Roman font type should be used
throughout, including in quotations, notes, and the List of Works Cited. This means
of course that your paper or thesis should feature no change in font size and type
whatsoever. The use of italics is strictly regulated in academic prose (see @ 40-41).
Bold-faced type is never used in the main text. It only appears in chapter headings or
titles of main text subdivisions.
 12

@ 36 EMPHASIS
Just as exclamation marks are frowned upon in academic prose (see @ 17),
emphasis—the practice of highlighting words or phrases in order to focus readers’
attention on them—is rarely used in university essays. Emphasis is only occasionally
resorted to for the purpose of disambiguation—in order to help readers understand a
statement properly. Emphasis is marked by italics (or underlining), never by means of
bold-faced type.

.... Faulty:

The tone he used was the main problem, not the meaning.

Corrected:

The tone he used was the main problem, not the meaning.

@ 37 MARGINS
The margins of your manuscript (left, right, top, and bottom) should be one inch long
(2.5 centimers). Margins are set in the word processor in the ‟layoutˮ menu. It is
recommended, though not compulsory, to use the text justification function of your
software, which automatically aligns the end of each line with the left margin.

@ 38 SPACING
Academic papers, like manuscripts submitted to publishers, are always double-spaced.
This means that you should use the 2.0 setting in the line spacing menu of your word
processing software. Double spacing applies to the whole document, including
quotations, notes, and the List of Works Cited. This academic convention is motivated
by the fact that papers and manuscripts are meant to be corrected, and that double-
spacing leaves room for correction signs. However, for the final version of a thesis
("mémoire"), you might choose to use the line-spacing standard recommended by the
Faculté de Lettres, traduction et communication, which is 1.5. Still, all papers or draft
chapters handed out to your supervisor should use 2.0.

@ 39 CAPITALIZATION IN TITLES
In academic English, most words within titles are capitalized (they begin with a capital
letter). In academic French, on the contrary, only the first word of a title is capitalized.

This involves a set of rather tricky rules:

▪ Always Capitalize the first and the last word of the title, whatever part of speech it is:

“What Americans Stand For

▪ Always capitalize the following words: nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs,
subordinating conjunctions.

Paradise Lost

A History of the World in 10 ½ Chapters

“There Was a Boy”

 13

“Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”

“The Harder They Come

Life As I Find It

▪ Capitalize all words in short titles:

All About Eve

▪ The following parts of speech, however, are generally not capitalized: articles (a, the)
(except, of course, if they are the first word in the title), prepositions, coordinating
conjunctions, the “to” preceding infinitives:

The Invention of Solitude

How to Be an Alien

@ 40 ITALICS, UNDERLINING, AND INVERTED COMMAS

In academic papers, titles of books, articles, poems are either italicized (italics),
underlined (underlining), or appear between inverted commas (“ ... ”). Underlining is
the equivalent of italics: it is used when italics are not available—on old mechanical
typewriters, for instance. It is therefore important to know what must be
italicized/underlined, and what comes in between inverted commas:

@ 41 ITALICS / UNDERLINING: WORKS PUBLISHED AS SEPARATE VOLUMES OR ARTIFACTS

The titles of all works that are (likely to be) published as separate volumes (or, in non-
literary media, as separate artifacts) must be italicized/underlined. This includes the
following categories of works:

▪ novels

Thomas Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49

▪ plays:

Shakespeare’s As You Like It

▪ long poems:

T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land

▪ book-length essays:

Sigmund Freud’s The Interpretation of Dreams

▪ musical albums:

The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band

 14

▪ periodicals:

American Literary History

▪ newspapers:

La gazette de l’Escaut

▪ magazines:

Newsweek

▪ movies:

Orson Welles’s Citizen Kane

@ 42 INVERTED COMMAS: WORKS PUBLISHED IN COLLECTIONS OR AS PART OF OTHER

ARTIFACTS (IN OTHER “CONTAINERS”)
The titles of all works that are not (likely to be) published in book form or as separate
artifacts appear between inverted commas. This includes the following categories of
works:

▪ short stories:

Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher”

▪ short poems:

Blake’s “The Tyger”

There is some ambiguity as far as poems go: how short do they have to be in order to
be mentioned between inverted comma (or, conversely, how long do they have to be
in order to be italicized)? When in doubt, check how their title is transcribed in official
bibliographies (in the Oxford Companion to English Literature, e.g., or in the critical
literature you have collected about the author you are dealing with).

▪ songs:

Jimi Hendrix’s “Voodoo Chile”

The Beatles’ “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” (i.e. the song itself, not the album

by the same title, which must be italicized [see above])

▪ scholarly articles:

“Postmodernism, Or the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism”

▪ articles in newspapers or in magazines:

‟America’s Debt Crisisˮ

‟Britney’s Skinhead Surpriseˮ

 15

D. Paragraphs
@ 43 BASIC PRINCIPLES: UNITY, DEVELOPMENT, COHERENCE
Academic prose is always written in paragraph form. This is a feature it shares with
many other types of discourse. Yet in academic writing, paragraph structure tends to
be more rigidly codified than in fiction, journalism, commercial correspondence,
course notes, etc. In this matter, never follow the example of non-academic writers
(see @ 3).

There are three basic principles for paragraph writing: paragraphs must be unified,
appropriately developed, and coherent.

@ 44 ▪ unified: they must develop one single point, the topic of the paragraph.

@ 45 ▪ developed: the topic of the paragraph should be backed by compelling evidence and
illustrations. This means notably that paragraphs require a certain length (for instance,
half or two thirds of a double-spaced page). By the same tokens, paragraphs always
contain several sentences. There is no such thing as a one-sentence paragraph: you
need to state the topic in one sentence, then demonstrate it in other sentences.

@ 46 ▪ coherent: logical links within the paragraph should be expressed clearly. The
argument should proceed smoothly. This requires the correct use of words
(conjunctions, adverbs, prepositions) expressing causal or logical relations.

@ 47 SAMPLE OF A UNIFIED, WELL-DEVELOPED, AND COHERENT PARAGRAPH

Here is a paragraph that meets these formal criteria. Numbers in parenthesis refer to
the remarks below (see @ 48-54). [Obviously, for clarity's sake, the following examples are
printed in a smaller font and with broader margins than the 12-point font and the 2.5 cm. margins
requested in your papers.]

(1) (2) The behavior of mammals represents only one aspect of Shakespeare’s

interest in the animal realm. (3) The great dramatist also had a life-long passion for bird

psychology. (3) Both in their imagery and dramatic structure, Shakespeare’s plays rely

on a varied cast of feathered creatures. (5) In Romeo and Juliet, the love-tryst of the

balcony scene is disturbed by the intrusion of a lark, and, one might add, by the rather

shameful defection of an otherwise friendly nightingale. (5) In Macbeth, the confrontation

between good and evil is enacted partly in the ill-fated struggle of the «temple-haunting

martlet» against the raven and the owl, which represent the forces of the night. (5) In The

Tempest, on the contrary, bird-imagery is much less prominent, except for a few cameo

appearances by seagulls, albatrosses and pelicans. (6) Fish imagery, however, is plentiful

there, and will be discussed in another section. (5) Shakespeare’s historical plays are

political in intent, and therefore privilege birds with a political connotation: eagles,
 16

hawks, vultures, hyaenas, and swallows. (7) Thus, if all birds were suddenly removed

from the Shakespearean texts, these plays would fall apart.

@ 48.1 ▪ (1) Indentation [alinéa]: paragraphs begin with an indentation. The latter is essential
in order to let the reader know where the paragraph begins.

@ 48.2 ▪ Paragraphs following a chapter heading or a title require no indentation, however.

@ 49 ▪ (2) Sentence of transition: links the new paragraph to what precedes.

@ 50 ▪ (3) Topic sentence: lays down the topic, the main idea developed in the paragraph.

@ 51 ▪ (4) Sentence of clarification: clarifies and paraphrases the topic sentence.

@ 52 ▪ (5) Evidence / examples

@ 53 ▪ (6) Text management: provides information about the structure of the whole paper,
of the whole argument.

@ 54 ▪ (7) Conclusion

Remarks:

▪ Sentences (2) and (4) are the indispensable elements of the paragraph (topic +
illustrations). Again, this demonstrates that there is no such thing as a one-
sentence paragraph: the topic must be stated in a separate sentence and
illustrations must follow in other sentences.

▪ The paragraph is unified: there is only one main idea (the role of birds in
Shakespeare’s plays), expressed in a topic sentence (2).

▪ The paragraph is developed: the topic sentence is illustrated by means of

examples (4). It is not too short. Length is a relative criterion, of course. Still,
if you compare your own paragraphs to those you read in academic books and
articles, you will probably find out that professional critics divide their texts
into units larger than you would spontaneously do.

▪ The paragraph is coherent: its ideas connect in a clear, logical fashion. Words
like “however,” “therefore,” “and,” “but,” “on the one/the other hand” foster
the coherence of your text.

@ 55 PARAGRAPH WRITING: CORRECT LAYOUT

Here is a (schematic) example of a correct paragraph layout (numbers in parenthesis
refer to the remarks below):

Shakespeare and the Non-Human world (2)

The behavior of mammals represents only one aspect of Shakespeare’s interest in the

animal realm. The great dramatist also had a life-long passion for bird psychology. Both
 17

in their imagery and dramatic structure, Shakespeare’s plays rely on a varied cast of

feathered creatures. In Romeo and Juliet, the love-tryst of the balcony scene is disturbed

by the intrusion of a lark, and, one might add, by the rather shameful defection of an

otherwise friendly nightingale. In Macbeth, the confrontation between good and evil is

enacted partly in the ill-fated struggle of the «temple-haunting martlet» against the raven

and the owl, which represent the forces of the night. In The Tempest, on the contrary,

bird-imagery is much less prominent, except for a few cameo appearances by seagulls,

albatrosses and pelicans. Fish imagery, however, is plentiful there, and will be discussed

in another section. Shakespeare’s historical plays are political in intent, and therefore

privilege birds with a political connotation: eagles, hawks, vultures, hyaenas, and

swallows. Thus, if all birds were suddenly removed from the Shakespearean texts, these

plays would fall apart.

(1) The behavior of mammals represents only one aspect of Shakespeare’s interest

in the animal realm. The great dramatist also had a life-long passion for bird psychology.

Both in their imagery and dramatic structure, Shakespeare’s plays rely on a varied cast of

feathered creatures. In Romeo and Juliet, the love-tryst of the balcony scene is disturbed

by the intrusion of a lark, and, one might add, by the rather shameful defection of an

otherwise friendly nightingale. In Macbeth, the confrontation between good and evil is

enacted partly in the ill-fated struggle of the «temple-haunting martlet» against the raven

and the owl, which represent the forces of the night. In The Tempest, on the contrary,

bird-imagery is much less prominent, except for a few cameo appearances by seagulls,

albatrosses and pelicans. Fish imagery, however, is plentiful there, and will be discussed

in another section. Shakespeare’s historical plays are political in intent, and therefore

privilege birds with a political connotation: eagles, hawks, vultures, hyaenas, and

swallows. Thus, if all birds were suddenly removed from the Shakespearean texts, these

plays would fall apart.

(1) The behavior of mammals represents only one aspect of Shakespeare’s interest

in the animal realm. The great dramatist also had a life-long passion for bird psychology.

Both in their imagery and dramatic structure, Shakespeare’s plays rely on a varied cast of

feathered creatures. In Romeo and Juliet, the love-tryst of the balcony scene is disturbed
 18

by the intrusion of a lark, and, one might add, by the rather shameful defection of an

otherwise friendly nightingale. In Macbeth, the confrontation between good and evil is

enacted partly in the ill-fated struggle of the «temple-haunting martlet» against the raven

and the owl, which represent the forces of the night. In The Tempest, on the contrary,

bird-imagery is much less prominent, except for a few cameo appearances by seagulls,

albatrosses and pelicans. Fish imagery, however, is plentiful there, and will be discussed

in another section. Shakespeare’s historical plays are political in intent, and therefore

privilege birds with a political connotation: eagles, hawks, vultures, hyaenas, and

swallows. Thus, if all birds were suddenly removed from the Shakespearean texts, these

plays would fall apart.

(3) Compared to birds, there are very few references to shellfish in Shakespeare’s

plays. The world of clams and mussels seems to hae been beyond the scope of the great

dramatist’s imagination. We might have expected the scenes of melancholy in Hamlet to

have contained rich shellfish imagery, but this is not the case. Only Pericles, Prince of

Tyre is based on a consistent network of allusions to giant conchs. Yet philological

evidence indicates that these passages were written by Middleton.

@ 56 ▪ (1) Each paragraph starts with an indentation (un alinéa): it is set back from the
left margin (four or five spaces will do, or one half-inch tab position). The indentation
signals to the reader that a new paragraph begins; it is therefore an essential feature of
the text.

@ 57 ▪ (2) Only paragraphs located right after a title need no indentation: there is no
ambiguity about the beginning of the paragraph in this case.

@ 58 ▪ (3) Extra spacing between paragraphs should be used only between sub-sections of
the text.

@ 59 PARAGRAPH WRITING: COMMON MISTAKES IN PARAGRAPH LAYOUT

Here are examples of the most frequent problems encountered with paragraph layout
(numbers in parenthesis refer to remarks below):
 19

Shakespeare and the Non-Human world

(1) The behavior of mammals represents only one aspect of Shakespeare’s interest

in the various aspects of the animal realm.

The great dramatist also had a life-long passion for bird psychology. Both in

their imagery and dramatic structure, Shakespeare’s plays rely on a varied cast of

feathered creatures. ln Romeo and Juliet, the love-tryst of the balcony scene is disturbed

by the intrusion of a lark, and, one might add, by the rather shameful defection of an

otherwise friendly nightingale. Shakespeare’s historical plays are political in intent, and

therefore privilege birds with a political connotation: eagles, hawks, vultures, hyenas, and

swallows. (2)

Conclusion (4)

Thus, if all birds were suddenly removed from the Shakespearean texts, these plays would

crumble.

(3)

(5) In addition, the morphology and the behavior of mammals represents only

one aspect of Shakespeare’s interest in the animal realm. The great dramatist also had a

life-long passion for bird psychology. In their dramatic structure, Shakespeare’s plays

rely on a varied cast of feathered creatures. (2)

ln Romeo and Juliet, the love-tryst of the balcony scene is disturbed by the intrusion of a

lark, and, one might add, by the rather shameful defection of an otherwise friendly

nightingale. Shakespeare’s historical plays are political in intent, and therefore privilege

birds with a political connotation: eagles, , vultures, hyenas, and swallows.

Final Conclusion (4)

Thus, if all birds were suddenly removed from the Shakespearean texts, these plays would

crumble.

@ 60 ▪ (1) The free-floating sentence or one-sentence paragraph: it is incorrect by virtue of

the very definition of the paragraph.

@ 61 ▪ (2) Probably the most common (and annoying) mistake: the false paragraph break.
Either you start a new paragraph (with an indentation) or you do not. If you do not,
 20

you must write to the end of the line even if you start a new sentence. False paragraph
breaks are the more confusing if your text is not typographically “justified,” that is if
the right margin is uneven: in that case, your readers can not always figure out whether
or not you have introduce a paragraph break.

@ 62 ▪ (3) Non-motivated or inconsistent extra spacing: do not use extra spacing that may
give readers the false impression you are starting a new subsection. In our example,
the extra spacing is followed by a paragraph without indentation, which is of course
incorrect.

@ 63 ▪ (4) Multiplying titles and subdivisions may be more confusing than helpful.
Sometimes, students feel compelled to invent a title for every single paragraph they
wrote. This indicates that they have no overall grasp of the continuity of their text or
of the paragraph structure that is most appropriate to it.

@ 63.2 ▪ (5) Weak or illogical transitions. Do not use unnecessary linking phrases or
connectors. These are often added regardless of the actual logical sequence of the text:

Thus, if all birds were suddenly removed from the Shakespearean texts, these plays would

crumble.

(1) In addition, the morphology and the behavior of mammals represents only

one aspect of Shakespeare’s interest in the animal realm. The great dramatist also had a

life-long passion for bird psychology. In their dramatic structure, Shakespeare’s plays

rely on a varied cast of feathered creatures.

In the example above, the connector “[i]n addition” (1) makes no logical sense, since
the sentence it introduces does not constitute an additional item in a pre-established
enumeration.
 21

E. Quotes and Reported Speech

@ 64 ACADEMIC PROSE AS A DIALOGUE AMONG CRITICS
Research papers, especially in literary criticism, are always implicitly structured as a
dialogue. To borrow Mikhail Bakhtin’s terminology, they are dialogical. The
interlocutors involved are the author of the paper (in this case, yourself), your primary
sources (or primary literature) and the authors of the secondary or tertiary literature
you are dealing with. In a literary paper, the primary literature is composed of the
novels, plays or poems you intend to analyze, while the secondary and tertiary
literature is made up of the literary criticism and the theory of literature on which your
argument relies. If you write on Shakespeare, the dramatist’s works will be your
primary corpus, a study of his plays would qualify as secondary literature, and an
analysis of the aesthetics of tragedy as tertiary.

In practice, this means that you will often find yourself summarizing or arguing in
favor—or against—someone else’s ideas. While providing an account of other critics’
analyses, or when you are analyzing a literary text in the light of another person’s
interpretation, you will have to use adequate patterns of indirect speech. A good
command of indirect speech will enable you to distinguish your own point of view
from that of other critics, or, in a more complex but frequent case, to report a critic’s
judgment of another critic’s ideas, while still making clear where you stand yourself.
If you fail to do so, the result will be confusion or plagiarism.

@ 65.1 ACKNOWLEDGING OTHER AUTHORS PROPERLY

If you summarize someone else’s argument, your source’s name must appear in each
paragraph, several times if necessary. Otherwise your reader will think that the ideas
developed there are your own—or worse, that you are trying to pass them off as your
own. The text in Figure 2 is a passage from a review essay (Michael Kreyling’s “The
Divine Mr. F.”), which compares a few monographs on William Faulkner. In the
passage quoted here Kreyling reviews a Faulkner study by Michel Gresset. Note that
Gresset’s name appears up to seventeen times in the same paragraph. Typically,
readers will not find this overly repetitive.
 22

@ 66 Figure 2. Properly acknowledging other authors: critic Michael Kreyling discusses an

essay by Michel Gresset [since this is the published version of the article and not a manuscript, the
text is single-spaced]:

@ 66.2 In the sequence of the text, the first occurrence of the source’s name should mention
the person’s first and last names. All later occurrences should mention the last name
only.

Cleanth Brooks has offered what passes for the definitive analysis of this poem. Brooks

adds that …

@ 66.3 Honorific or function titles such as “Dr.” or “Prof.” should not be mentioned when
citing a source, unless the title in question is of direct relevance to your argument.

Christophe Den Tandt point out that …

 23

Journalistic sources often locate the origin of rock and roll in the 1950s, yet academic

writers such as Prof. McRobbie argue for an earlier development of this musical genre

In the former case, the title is immaterial, whereas in the latter, it is mentioned because
the argument bears upon differences among non-academic and academic writers.

@ 66.4 In an essay on literary criticism, we assume by default that all sources cited are literary
critics or theoreticians. Their research field need therefore not be mentioned. If you
cite authors from another field—philosophers, historians, social scientists—it may be
useful to mention the source’s field of research if your argument requires it:

Cleanth Brooks famously demonstrated that …

French postmodernist philosopher Jean-François Lyotard argues that ...

@ 67 PATTERNS OF INDIRECT SPEECH

The articles printed in items 72 (from Michael Fisher’s “Perspectivism and Literary
Theory Today”) and 138 (from Susan V. Donaldson’s review of Frederick R. Karl’s
William Faulkner: American Writer) display many of the usual techniques for
reporting other people’s ideas. There are two main patterns of indirect speech used in
texts of this type:

@ 68 1. Rooney suggests that ...

(Or “argues that," "writes that," "contends that," "indicates that," "demonstrates that,"

"insinuates that," "objects that," "replies that," "concedes that... ”)

@ 69 1b. A useful variant of this pattern goes as follows:

From this dialectic, Karl argues, emerged a writer both quintessentially American ... and

resolutely modernist [...].

Faulkner, Karl claims, is a writer...

@ 70 2. In Rooney’s view ...

“ln R’s opinionˮ; “as R writesˮ; “from R’s point of viewˮ...”

@ 71 3. More complex cases:

“But Lorde warns, in a statement quoted by Rooney, that..”

“R objects to L that. . . ,”

“Against L’ s interpretation, R argues that... ”

 24

@ 72 Figure 3: Indirect speech in an academic essay (Michael Fisher, “Perspectivism and

Literary Theory Todayˮ). [Since this is the published version of the article and not a manuscript,
the text is single-spaced]
 25

@ 73 QUOTATIONS / ‟QUOTESˮ
The second main aspect of the dialogue that takes place in a paper of literary criticism
is the use of quotations (or ‟quotesˮ). Quotes are used as illustration and evidence;
they constitute the factual data of the literary critic. If you look up Figure 4 (item 74;
from Lynn Wardley’s “Woman’s Voice, Democracy’s Body and The Bostonians”),
you will see that there are two types of quotes—long quotes (“block quotesˮ) and short
quotes, each subjected to their own rules.

@ 74 Figure 4: long and short quotes in an academic essay (Lynn Wardley, “Woman’s
voice, Democracy’s Body and The Bostoniansˮ). [Note that this essay does not follow the
MLA format. Also, since this is the published version of the article and not a manuscript, the text is
single-spaced.]

@ 75 LONG QUOTES (‟BLOCK QUOTESˮ)

Long quotes (block quotes) should be used if you need to quote a passage longer than
three or four lines. Block quotes stand separately from the text. They are set off from
the left margin by one inch: this provides the best visual contrast. Like the rest of the
text, long quotes are double-spaced and printed in 12-point-size font. These quotes
have to be introduced appropriately. They are best inserted after a sentence that ends
with a colon.
 26

And indeed, there seem to be significant convergences, if we take the following definition

by Hutcheon as a point of reference:

Historiographic metafiction incorporates all three of these domains: that is, its

theoretical self-awareness of history and fiction as human constructs

(historiographic metafiction) is made the grounds for its rethinking and

reworking of the forms and contents of the past. (5)

It is not difficult to apply this concept to the three novels under discussion here, and thus

to link them to the ‘postmodern’ problematisation of the question of history.

Remarks:

@ 75.2 ▪ Long quotes are not introduced by inverted commas, unlike short quotes embedded
in your own text (see @ 79).

@ 75.3 ▪ Long quotes (like short, embedded quotes) are printed in normal fonts, not italics.
Journalistic texts, on the contrary, often italicize quotes; this is, however, not accepted
in academic documents.

@ 75.4 ▪ Unlike in short quotes (see @ 109.2), punctuation after a long quote—typically, a
full stop—comes at the end of the last sentence, before the parenthetical
bibliographical reference.

@ 76 ▪ Avoid linking up a block quote grammatically to the text that precedes it, as if it were
an extension of your own sentence:

Not recommended:

And indeed, Hutcheon argues that

[h]istoriographic metafiction incorporates all three of these domains: that is,

its theoretical self-awareness of history and fiction as human constructs

(historiographic metafiction) is made the grounds for its rethinking and

reworking of the forms and contents of the past. (5)

It is not difficult to apply this concept to the three novels under discussion here, and thus

to link them to the ‘postmodern’ problematisation of the question of history.

@ 77 ▪ Never link the block quote grammatically to the text that follows the quote:

Faulty:

And indeed, there seem to be significant convergences, if we take the following definition

by Hutcheon as a point of reference:

 27

Historiographic metafiction incorporates all three of these domains: that is, its

theoretical self-awareness of history and fiction as human constructs

(historiographic metafiction) is made the grounds for its rethinking and

reworking of

the past as it is defined in traditional historical sources (5). It is not difficult to apply this

concept to the three novels under discussion here,

@ 78 OVERQUOTING
Note, however, that style manuals for academic writing discourage authors of papers
and theses from inserting an excessive number of long quotes. Indeed, in addition to
raising copyrights issues, this might give readers the impression that you are leaving
to other authors the responsibility of developing your own argument. Symptomatically,
critics who wish to insert a particularly long quote in their text feel compelled to justify
their choice to their readers, using formulas such a ‟this is worth quoting at some
length.ˮ

@ 79 SHORT QUOTES (QUOTATIONS INTEGRAL TO THE SENTENCE STRUCTURE)

Short quotes (i.e., shorter than three or four lines) must be integrated within your own
sentences between double inverted commas. Such quotes are extremely useful and can
be as short as one word. Here’s an example of a short quote from p. 650 of an essay
by Lynn Wardley on Henry James’s novel The Bostonians:

Source text (original):

If from one perspective the suburbs threaten to enter Olive’s home, from another they are

safely framed within it, made a feature or its decor.

Short quote:

Lynn Wardley argues that the suburbs are “safely framedˮ within Olive Chancellor’s

world: they are ‟made a feature or its decor” (650).

Remarks

@ 79.2 ▪ The MLA format requires double inverted commas for short quotes. British style
sheets usually recommend single inverted commas.

@ 79.3 ▪ Words appearing between inverted commas in an academic essay are by definition
considered quoted material—excerpts from another source. Conversely, do not use
inverted commas for non-quoted material, in particular for phrases you regard as
unusual, improper, or lying outside your own linguistic register. These are called scare
quotes and should be avoided. If you wish to signal that a term or phrase lies outside
your own register, use a periphrasis, as illustrated below.
 28

Faulty:
From Wardley’s description, we gather that Oliver Chancellor was no “10.”

Correct:
From Wardley’s description, we gather that Oliver Chancellor was not what, in sexist

parlance, used to be called a 10.

@ 80 ▪ As you can tell from the previous examples, short quotes may be inserted in the
beginning, middle, or at the end of your sentence. You may also split the quote
(respecting proper syntactical divisions) and insert your own words in between the
quoted segments:

“If from one perspective the suburbs threaten to enter Olive’s home,ˮ Wardley argues,

‟from another they are safely framed within it, made a feature or its decor” (650).

@ 81 ▪ Keep in mind, when using short quotes, that the words from the source text must fit
grammatically within your own prose. When transposed to your text, the quotation
will fulfill a grammatical function that must be compatible with the author’s meaning.
Here’s an example of a gross misquotation:

Source text (original):

If from one perspective the suburbs threaten to enter Olive’s home, from another they are

safely framed within it, made a feature or its decor.

(Mis)quotation:

L. Wardley argues that the suburbs threaten Olive Chancellor’s home, but “from another

they are safely framed within it” (650).

This sentence both paraphrases the original and quotes it, yet it also completely
disregards the quoted sentence’s initial structure (“one perspective ... the other“). As
such, the quote makes no sense.

Corrected:

L. Wardley argues that the suburbs threaten Olive Chancellor’s home, but that, from

another perspective, “they are safely framed within it” (650).

@ 82 ▪ Do not integrate within your own sentences quotes that include several sentences of
the source text in one continuous segment.

Not recommended:

Joseph Gibaldi argues that the ‟accuracy of quotations is extremely important. They must

reproduce the original sources exactlyˮ (102).

 29

@ 83 ▪ You may solve this problem by splitting the two sentences into shorter segments and
connecting the latter with your own text:

Corrected:

Joseph Gibaldi argues that the ‟accuracy of quotations is extremely importantˮ and that

the latter ‟must reproduce the original sources exactlyˮ (102).

In this case, you might also have quoted only one half of the original segment and
paraphrased the other in your own words.

@ 84 DOCTORING QUOTES PROPERLY

In order to avoid some of the problems mentioned above, you may ‟doctor ˮ the quote
to some extent: you may adapt its features to fit your own sentence. The following
procedures are acceptable:

@ 85 ▪ Leaving out words that would not fit in your text. Cut the quotation in such a way
as to get rid of the words that might cause syntactical problems.

@ 86 ▪ Using square brackets [ ]. These are used to add interpolations, i.e. minor
corrections within the quote:

The crowd of men at the Burrages “feeding [or] helping others to feed… ”

▪ By using square brackets, you can change a capital letter to lowercase (“minuscule”)
if necessary:

“[t]he...,” instead of “The...ˮ

▪ You may change pronouns into nouns (and vice-versa, according to context):

“[Olive]” instead of “she...”.

@ 87 ▪ Using ellipsis points: “ ... .” If you wish to omit words from the source text, you
should use ellipsis points, i.e. a sequence of three periods preceded and followed by a
hard space:

“that the house ... is betrayed from within.”

 30

@ 88 QUOTING POETRY
Poetry may be quoted either as short or long quotes.

@ 89 ▪ Short quotes (no longer than three lines) may appear as integral segments of your
own sentence. The lines, in this case, appear in between inverted commas and are
separated by a slash with a space on each side ( / ).

Horrified, Yeats cries out ‟Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold; / Mere anarchy is

loosed upon the worldˮ (85).

@ 90 ▪ Long quotes (more than three lines of poetry) appear as block quotes: they are set off
from the margin by one inch and double-spaced. If possible, reproduce the
typography and the formatting of the source text.

In ‟The Second Coming,ˮ Yeats depicts modernity as an apocalyptic event:

Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-red tide is loosed, and everywhere

The ceremony of innocence is drowned; (85)

Given the historical context, the passage clearly alludes to the impact of the Soviet

revolution of 1917.
 31

@ 91 QUOTES AND PUNCTUATION:

Unlike in French, the MLA style sheet specifies that in English, full stops and commas
precede inverted commas at the end of a quote. Other punctuation marks—
semicolons, question marks, etc.—do not.

Eighteen years after Mick Jagger said, “I’d rather be dead than sing ‘Satisfaction’ when

I’m forty-five,” the pop charts are crowded with rock stars older than the president of the

United States. (“Jurassic Rockers,” Newsweek, Aug. 2, 1993)

Remarks:

@ 92 ▪ If the quote is followed by a parenthesis mentioning page numbers (a very frequent

case in the MLA format), punctuation follows the parenthesis whatever punctuation
sign is used:

And then, saddest of all, Miss Eckhart polices her own excess: “What were you playing,

though,” an onlooker asks. “I couldn’t say,” Miss Eckhart said, rising. “I have forgotten”

(58).

@ 93 ▪ The placing of punctuation around inverted commas varies according to the style
sheet authors must follow. You may find that the critical source you read use other
conventions. Additionally, conventions for other languages than English may be
different as well:

A la limite le Guide Bleu pourra écrire froidement: “La route devient très pittoresque

(tunnels)”. Peu importe qu’on ne voie plus rien, puisque le tunnel est devenu ici le signe

suffisant de la montagne.
 32

F. Bibliographical references
@ 94 LOCATING CRITICAL SOURCES
The sources (literature, criticism) you need in order to develop your paper’s argument
can be traced and collected by means of academic bibliographies. In the past,
bibliographical tools appeared mostly in print form— i.e. as reference books. You can
still find these in the University Library or at the Royal Library. The development of
online bibliographies (bibliographical resources on the Internet) has, however,
revolutionized this aspect of research, greatly facilitating students’ or authors’ task.
Note, however, that the use of online resources is trickier than it might look at first
sight: there is no guarantee that a single search by means of Internet search engines
(Google, e.g.) will give you access to an exhaustive listing. Also, electronic documents
on the Internet are not always reliable. For academic research, you should always favor
information obtained through academic web sites, sponsored by universities,
academic periodicals, or research societies.

@ 95 PRIMARY AND SECONDARY SOURCES

There are several types of sources: primary, secondary, and tertiary. The first
comprise novels, plays, films—in most cases the very texts your literary or cultural
paper is meant to analyze. The second comprise criticism, and the third theory.

@ 96 THE BIBLIOGRAPHICAL APPARATUS

Once you have collected primary, secondary, and tertiary sources, you need to
acknowledge these sources by means of bibliographical references. The
bibliographical apparatus—references in parenthesis, notes, list of works cited—is
meant to provide your reader with all the necessary information about your sources.
Bibliographical references offer essential data for your readers: the latter might be
interested in finding out what your sources are, and indeed consult them.

@ 97 AVOIDING PLAGIARISM
In a less idealistic perspective, bibliographical correctness is a guarantee against
plagiarism. Plagiarism occurs when you summarize or cite someone else’s ideas or
words without acknowledging the source. In academic writing, plagiarism is
considered a serious professional fault. In education, tolerance for plagiarism is even
more limited than in the past. Indeed, students are now able to find or buy ready-made
academic papers online. This has incited university departments to cancel students’
grades if there is compelling evidence of plagiarism. Above all, do not commit
plagiarism inadvertently, simply because you do not master bibliographical
conventions.

@ 98 SPECIFIC FEATURES OF THE MLA STANDARD FOR BIBLIOGRAPHICAL REFERENCES

Standards for the elaboration of bibliographies and notes vary. We request students
papers and theses on the literature and culture of English-speaking countries to be
formatted according to the MLA standard (or “style sheet”). The latter relies on
references in parenthesis and a list of works cited. The MLA standard is by now one
of the most commonly style sheets used in papers and books on literature and culture.
It has the advantage of being extremely concise. The MLA’s revised standard,
introduced more than twenty years ago, replaces an older system, which relied on
footnotes or endnotes. You will still encounter this older standard in quite a few articles
or books: the choice of the style sheet depends on the publisher’s or the review editor’s
 33

decision. In the physical and social sciences, researchers use the author-date system.
The author-date system might be the standard of choice for papers on linguistics

Bibliographical style sheets are regularly updated, partly to do justice to the

emergence of new types of sources—electronic documents, mainly. The examples
listed below conform to the eighth edition of the MLA style sheet. If in doubt about
the formatting of specific entries, do look up the latest version of the MLA style sheet
at the Purdue University web site:
https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/mla_style/mla_formatting_and_
style_guide/mla_works_cited_page_books.html

@ 99 THE THREE BASIC FUNCTIONS OF THE BIBLIOGRAPHICAL APPARATUS

Whatever the conventions used in a specific book or article, the bibliographical
apparatus performs three basic functions (three bibliographical gestures, as it were):
documenting sources, providing additional bibliographical information, and adding
comments to the main text.

@ 100 1. Documenting sources:

Source documentation designates the features of your text by which readers are
provided with information about the origin of the ideas or quotations to which your
argument refers. You will see below that the information you are expected to provide
about these sources must be quite accurate and exhaustive (author’s name, title, place
of publication, page number, etc.). In the MLA format, source documentation is
performed by two features of the bibliographical apparatus:

▪ Parenthetical references: some of the information is mentioned in parentheses,

page numbers, notably (see @ 131, figure 5).

▪ The list of works cited. The list of works cited mentions all the documents cited
in your text, with all the requisite publishing information. It appears at the very
end of the paper. The parenthetical references and the list of works cited are
interdependent: the former cannot properly be decoded without the latter.
Accordingly, the former cannot be compiled without taking the latter into
account (see @ 131, figure 5).

@ 101 2. Adding bibliographical information: bibliographical notes:

It is often useful in academic papers to refer your readers to sources—whether primary
or secondary—that are not cited explicitly in your main text. This is, on the one hand,
a service rendered to the reader. On the other hand, the possibility of adding extra
bibliographical information allows you to mention works that you have found helpful
for the writing of your paper, but that you have not cited explicitly. This gives your
readers a better idea of your mastery of the topic you have been working on. In the
revised MLA standard, additional bibliographical information appears in endnotes
(notes located at the end of the document, between the main text and the works cited).
Endnotes providing bibliographical information are called “bibliographical notes”
(see @ 131, figure 5).

@ 102 3. Adding comments: content notes:

It is also useful in an academic paper to add comments that would not fit in your main
text. In the revised MLA standard, such comments appear in endnotes, called “content
 34

notes.” Note that such comments have to be both relevant to the argument (they should
not be entirely digressive), but different enough from the topics covered by the main
text to justify their being treated as separate comments. In other words, they should
not give your readers the impression that the main gist of your argument is further
developed in the endnotes. Note that a single endnote can be both a bibliographical
and a content note: it can be used both to provide additional bibliographical data and
to add comments (see @ 131, figure 5).

@ 103 The three basic functions of the bibliographical apparatus: example

The following example shows how the three main features of the bibliographical
apparatus appear in an academic text formatted according to MLA norms. This
paragraph contains several bibliographical parentheses as well as two note numbers,
referring readers to the endnotes located after the main text. The list of works cited is
the last item of the text (in the present example, it lists only those works mentioned in
the paragraph).

Realism, Lukács indicates, never boils down to taking literary snapshots of

characters and settings. Its genuine task is instead the representation of the process by

which meaning manifests itself through phenomena (Lukács, Historical 43). This implies

that realist art cannot help but making hypotheses about the meaning of experience—

about the meaning of history, particularly. For Lukács, events qualify as facts in a realist

text because they are encased in a historical sequence stretching from the past into the

future—a chain of cause and effect that determines the significance of the present of

perception (Lukács, Meaning 55). This new realist practice should initially suspend its

judgment on the meaning of experience, yet its epistemological cautiousness should be

counterbalanced by the commitment to, as Jürgen Habermas puts it, “reach understanding

[...] with another person about something in the world” (Habermas 215). This

pragmatically oriented, metadiscursive, centripetal dialogism would manifest itself as a

hybrid of classical realism and postmodernism, or, in other words, as a discourse that

harmonizes the claims of Mikhail Bakhtin’s dialogism and Jürgen Habermas’s theory of

communicative action.1 The propagandistic component of realism manifests itself notably

through the practice that Roland Barthes, in Mythologies, calls the creation of a “pseudo-

physis” (Barthes 142).2 This term designates the strategy that covertly suggests that an

historically and ideologically contingent world view is “a natural image of reality” itself

(142; emphasis in original). Realism, as it deploys its pseudo-physis does not in any way

offer insights into nature. Instead, it allows ideology to become naturalized—to acquire

the status of self-evident fact.

 35

[...]

Notes

1. Pam Morris highlights the contribution of Habermas’s theory of communicative action

to the aesthetics of realism (149-51).

2. The articles collected in Barthes’s famous essay were initially serialized in the French

magazine L’express.

[...]

Works cited

Bakhtin, Mikhail. The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays by M.M. Bakhtin. Translated by Caryl

Emerson and Michael Holquist, edited by Michael Holquist, University of Texas Press,

1981.

Barthes, Roland. Mythologies. 1957. Translated by Annette Lavers, Hill and Wang, 1972.

Habermas, Jürgen. “Actions, Speech Acts, Linguistically Mediated Actions, and the Lifeworld.”

1988. On the Pragmatics of Communication, edited by Maeve Cooke, Polity Press, 1999,

pp. 215-56.

Lukács, Georg. The Historical Novel. 1962. Translated by Hannah and Stanley Mitchell, Penguin

Books, 1969.

Lukács, Georg. The Meaning of Contemporary Realism. Translated by John Mander, Merlin

Press, 1963.

Remarks:

@ 104 ▪ Concision: the information mentioned in parenthesis is very concise. It is sometimes

limited to mere page numbers. In other cases, a few extra words are added (see @ 111)
Therefore, the reader must always turn to the list of works cited in order to obtain
the full bibliographical information. This is the case even for sources cited the first
time, as well as for sources cited in the bibliographical notes.

@ 105 ▪ All references in parenthesis must match an entry in the list of works cited.
Conversely, the list of works cited may not contain titles not cited in the text or notes.

@ 106 ▪ Footnotes are never used in the MLA format. Only endnotes are accepted. If needed,
you may convert footnotes into endnotes by means of the appropriate tool in your word
processing software.

@ 107 ▪ Note numbers in the main text are superscripted: they are raised above the line.

@ 108 ▪ The number of notes should be kept to a minimum. Content notes, particularly, are
usually regarded as digressions.
 36

@ 109 FORMATTING PARENTHETICAL REFERENCES:

Full documentation in parenthesis normally includes the author's name, an abbreviated
title of the cited work, and page references.

▪ Parenthesis in the main text:

(Frye, Anatomy 178-85)

▪ Corresponding entry in the List of Works Cited:

Frye, Northrop. Anatomy of Criticism. Princeton UP, 1957.

In most cases, however, some of this information may be omitted, depending on

context. If the author's name is mentioned in the same sentence or in the same
paragraph, it need not appear in parenthesis. If in the course of the essay you cite only
one single work by a specific author, no title should be mentioned. Page numbers for
quotes are, logically enough, always required.

Remarks:

@ 109.2 ▪ In a sentence containing a short, embedded quote, sentence punctuation comes after
the bibliographical parenthesis:

In this work, Frye provides an extended discussion of genre theory (12, 27, 34-42).

@ 110 ▪ Do not use “fˮ or “ffˮ to document quotes printed across several pages in the original.
Full page numbers for such quotations should appear as follows: (178-85). Do not use
terms such as “op. cit.ˮ or “ibidem.ˮ In order to avoid these phrases, just use standard
references in parenthesis.

@ 111 ▪ Parentheses used for source documentation may include such terms and abbreviations
as “seeˮ (= “for more information, see ...ˮ) and “qtd. inˮ (for “quoted inˮ):

(see Frye 185)

(qtd. in Frye 185).

@ 112 ▪ When citing several passages by the same author, separate the page references by
commas:

(Frye 12, 27, 34-42).

@ 113 ▪ When citing several authors in the same passage or sentence, use only one parenthesis
and separate the references by semi-colons:

(see Frye 2; Morrison 27).

@ 114 ▪ For multivolume works, cite volume and page number:

(Daiches 2:538-89).
 37

@ 115 ▪ When citing classic literary works, references to books, scenes, and lines may be used
instead of page references. The references to each subdivision, for instance act, scene,
and line, are separated by full stops:

(Shakespeare, Macbeth 1.2.46)

@ 116 FORMATTING THE LIST OF WORKS CITED: BOOKS AND ARTICLES

Compiling the list of works cited is one of the most important technical tasks in an
academic paper. Each text must be documented accurately, according to very specific
conventions. The information mentioned in bibliographical entries concerns
publication data: by whom, where, and when was a book or an article published? Who
edited it? (The editor is the person who prepares the text for final publication; the
person who finances its publication is the publisher.) Who translated it? You should
be careful to copy this information accurately from the source itself. For articles in
periodicals, magazines, or newspapers, it is essential to mention in which volume of
the periodical or in which issue of the magazine the text was published.

Here is the structure of typical entries for books and articles in periodicals:

@ 117 ▪ Books:

Shaw, Harry B. Gwendolyn Brooks. Twayne, 1980.

Melville, Herman. Moby-Dick; or, The Whale. New York, Harper & Brothers, 1851.

Montand, Yves. La chansonnette: l’intégrale, edited by Pierre Saka, Paris, Librairie Générale

Française-Le Livre de Poche, 1995.

Which corresponds to:

Author’s name, Author’s first name. Title. [City of Publication,] Publisher, Date of Publication.

The data cited in the entry is usually mentioned on the cover of the book and in the
first pages, preceding the preface. Note that the city of publication is required only for
books published before 1900, for books published by publishing houses with offices
in several countries, and for publishers in unknown in North America or Britain.

@ 117.2 Books mentioned, yet not cited:

Books mentioned in passing—without any detailed discussion or quoting—need not
appear in the list of works cited: citing their date of publication in the main text is
considered sufficient.

@ 118 ▪ Articles in periodicals:

Brown, Martha and Marilyn Zorn. "GLR interview: Gwendolyn Brooks." Great Lakes Review 6

2 (1979): 48-55.

Author’s name, Author’s first name. “Title of article.” Title of Periodical Volume number.Issue

number (Year): Page numbers.

 38

Many academic periodicals are “quarterlies”: four issues are published each year.
These issues are usually bound together to form a yearly volume, which is stored in
academic libraries. Each volume has a number (Volume 1 corresponds to the first year
when the periodical was published). So, 6.2 in the entry above means that the article
was published in the second issue of Volume 6.

@ 119 FORMATTING THE LIST OF WORKS CITED: OTHER TYPES OF ENTRIES

Books and articles are, of course, not the only types of documents you may have to
include in the Works Cited. Therefore, the MLA (or other similar institutions) must
define rules for practically every type of document (dissertation, film, TV show,
interview) that can possibly be cited in a research paper. Accordingly, there are far too
many specific cases than can be reviewed here: the list below only covers some of the
more frequent cases. If you have any doubt about the formatting of a specific entry in
the List of Works Cited, do look up the MLA Handbook, or try to find the information
on the following web sites:

https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/mla_style/mla_formatting_and_
style_guide/mla_works_cited_page_books.html

@ 120 ▪ Books by Multiple authors:

Galambos, Louis, and Joseph Pratt. The Rise of the Corporate Commonwealth: U.S. Business

and Public Policy in the Twentieth Century. Basic Books, Inc., 1988.

Edens, Walter, et al., eds. Teaching Shakespeare. Princeton UP, 1977.

If there are more than three authors, you may mention only the first one, followed by
“et al.” (“and others”). Note also that in the second entry, the publisher’s name is
abbreviated: “UP” means University Press.

@ 121 ▪ Anthologies and compilations:

Gunn, Giles, editor. Literature and Religion. Harper, 1971.

The editor, in this case, is the person who collected the documents published in this
volume. Editors often write a preface or an introduction to the book.

@ 122 ▪ Translations:

Dostoevsky, Feodor. Crime and Punishment. Translated by Jessie Coulson, edited by George

Gibian, Norton, 1964.

@ 123 ▪ Republished books:

Wharton, Edith. The Custom of the Country. 1913. Penguin, 1984.

The date appearing right after the title is the original date of publication. The date
appearing at the end corresponds to the moment when the book was reprinted.
 39

@ 124 ▪ Reviews:

Edwards, R. Dudley. Review of The Dissolution of the Religious Orders in Ireland under Henry

VIII, by Brendan Bradshaw. Renaissance Quarterly, vol. 29, 1976, pp. 401-03.

The first name mentioned in the entry corresponds to the person who wrote the review.
The author of the book reviewed is mentioned after the title.

@ 125 ▪ Introductions, prefaces, forewords:

Doctorow, E. L. Introduction. Sister Carrie, by Theodore Dreiser, Bantam, 1982, pp. v-xi.

This means that E. L. Doctorow wrote an introduction to Theodore Dreiser’s Sister

Carrie, and that you have cited a passage from Doctorow’s introduction in your text.

@ 126 ▪ Articles in periodicals:

Brown, Martha and Marilyn Zorn. “GLR interview: Gwendolyn Brooks.” Great Lakes Review,

vol. 6, 1979, pp. 48-55.

@ 127 ▪ Articles from magazines and newspapers:

Beauvallet, J.D. “Politiquement incorrect.” Les Inrockuptibles, dec. 1982, pp. 74-79.

Collins, Glenn. "Single-Father Survey Finds Adjustment a Problem." New York Times, late ed.,

21 Nov. 1983, p. B17.

“B 17” means that the article was published on page 17 of the B section of the New York
Times (some newspapers are published in several bundles, labeled A, B, etc.).

@ 128 ▪ Films:

A bout de souffle [Breathless]. Directed by Jean-Luc Godard, performances by Jean-Paul

Belmondo and Jean Seberg, Beauregard, 1960.

Godard, Jean-Luc, director. A bout de souffle [Breathless]. Performances by Jean-Paul Belmondo

and Jean Seberg, Beauregard, 1960.

Films may be listed under their title or under their director's name. “Beauregard,” in
this case is the name of the film’s production company (cf. Miramax, Warner,
Twentieth-Century Fox.).
 40

@ 129 ▪ Electronic Documentation (web sites):

Landow, George. Victorian Web. Brown University, 1994,

www.stg.brown.edu/projects/hypertext/landow/victorian/victov.html. Accessed 23 April

2005.

Klein-Smith, Sarah. “Home page.” http://members.aol.com/~sklein2/. Accessed 6 Sept. 1998.

Electronic documents such as web sites are a bit of a headache for academic writers.
Not only do they contain information that is not necessarily reliable, but they are
regularly updated, or even disappear after a while. Besides, they do not always contain
the publishing information one usually finds in print sources. As a rule, bibliographical
entries for web sites or electronic documents should include the same information
(author, publisher, date of publication) as for their print equivalent, if available.
Obviously, the URL address (the web site’s electronic address) must be mentioned, as
well as the access date (i.e. the moment when you accessed the site yourself). The
access date (in the examples above: “6 Sept. 1998”) is required in order to tell your
reader which version of the site you are citing.

@ 130 OVERALL STRUCTURE OF THE LIST OF WORKS CITED:

@ 130.1 ALPHABETICAL ORDERING

In a list of works cited, entries are ranked alphabetically by authors’ names. In the
revised MLA format, the List of Works Cited cannot be divided into subsections
(Books, articles, primary literature, secondary literature, etc.): all documents have to
be ranked in strict alphabetical order, whatever their nature. This rule is justified by
the fact that the list of works cited is indispensable for readers who wish to understand
the references mentioned in the parentheses within the main text. If the list were
divided into subsections, readers would not know in which part of the bibliography
they might find the reference they are looking for.

So, if we collect all the entries mentioned above into a proper list of works cited, the
result would be as follows:

Works Cited

A bout de souffle [Breathless]. Dir. Jean-Luc Godard. With Jean-Paul Belmondo and Jean

Seberg. Beauregard, 1960.

Beauvallet, J.D. "Politiquement incorrect." Les Inrockuptibles Dec. 1982: 74-79.

Brown, Martha and Marilyn Zorn. "GLR interview: Gwendolyn Brooks." Great Lakes Review 6

(1979): 48-55.

Collins, Glenn. "Single-Father Survey Finds Adjustment a Problem." New York Times 21 Nov.

1983, late ed.: B17.

Doctorow, E. L. Introduction. Sister Carrie. By Theodore Dreiser. Bantam, 1982. v-xi.

 41

Dostoevsky, Feodor. Crime and Punishment. Translated by Jessie Coulson, edited by George

Gibian, Norton, 1964.

Edens, Walter, et al., eds. Teaching Shakespeare. Princeton UP, 1977.

Edwards, R. Dudley. Rev. of The Dissolution of the Religious Orders in Ireland under Henry

VIII, by Brendan Bradshaw. Renaissance Quarterly 29 (1976): 401-03.

Galambos, Louis, and Joseph Pratt. The Rise of the Corporate Commonwealth: U.S. Business

and Public Policy in the Twentieth Century. Basic Books, Inc., 1988.

Gunn, Giles, ed. Literature and Religion. Harper, 1971.

Klein-Smith, Sarah. Home page. 6 Sept. 1998 <http://members.aol.com/~sklein2/>

Shaw, Harry B. Gwendolyn Brooks. Twayne, 1980.

Victorian Web. Ed. George Landow. 1994. Brown University. 6 Sept. 1998

<http://www.stg.brown.edu/projects/hypertext/landow/victorian/victov.html>.

Wharton, Edith. The Custom of the Country. 1913.Penguin, 1984.

@ 130.2 OFFSETTING LWC ENTRIES

All entries in the List of Works Cited are formatted as suspended paragraphs. The
first line is offset to the left of the bulk of the entry by a few millimeters, typically five.
You may format such entries by means of the “paragraph” menu in your word-
processing software. Offsetting is meant to make authors’ names more visible. it
renders the LWC more legible:

Brown, Martha and Marilyn Zorn. "GLR interview: Gwendolyn Brooks." Great Lakes Review 6:

2 (1979): 48-55.

@ 131 Figure 5: an academic essay (Jay Clayton's “The Narrative Turn in Recent Minority
Fictionˮ) formatted according to the MLA standard, complete with bibliographic and
content notes. [Note that this is the published version of the text and not the manuscript, so that single
spacing is used throughout. Also, the typographical layout of the list of works cited—the use of
columns—differs from what is expected in a manuscript. Note also that the List of Works cited uses a
slightly older version of the MLA style sheet: punctuation within entries differs from that prescribed by
the 8th edition; cities of publication are mentioned for all entries. Entries in the LWC are not offset from
the margin.]
42
 43

[...]

[...]
 44

[...]
 45

@ 132 OTHER BIBLIOGRAPHICAL STANDARDS:

There are other bibliographical standards than the MLA’s. Each has its advantages and
disadvantages. Though we do not encourage you to use these other standards for your
papers, you should at least know how they work in order to be able to understand
documents that follow these conventions.

@ 133 THE AUTHOR-DATE SYSTEM

The author-date system is used widely in the social sciences or in linguistics. This
format differs slightly from the MLA. In the author-date system, parentheses include
the name of the author cited, the date of the work cited, and the page number (Tannen,
1993, p. 51). The date helps the reader identify the title, which is of course mentioned
in the list of works cited. This system requires a list of works cited in which the date
of publication immediately follows the authors’ names. The following entry is
formatted according to the conventions of the Publication Manual of the American
Psychological Association:

Tannen, D. (1993). Gender and conversational interaction. New York: Oxford University Press.

@ 134 THE UNREVISED MLA STANDARD:

In the unrevised MLA conventions, all bibliographical tasks (documenting sources,
bibliographical notes, comments) are carried out in footnotes (or endnotes). Note that
in this format, the list of works cited is not indispensable, since all the bibliographical
information is mentioned in the notes. However, in the absence of a list of works cited,
readers who wish to check specific bibliographical information without (re)reading the
whole essay have to skim through all the notes.
 46

G. How to Handle Secondary Literature

@ 135 POSITIONING YOUR OWN VOICE AS A CRITIC AMONG CRITICS
At least more than half of the text of a thesis on a cultural or literary topic should be
devoted to the interpretation of primary works (novels, poetry, films …). You cannot
limit yourself to compiling other critics’ arguments. This raises the issue of the
originality of your own contribution. When interpreting a literary text, you may find it
difficult at first to achieve a suitable balance between your own analysis and what you
read in other critics’ essays. In some cases—typically, in the first weeks of working
on a thesis—you may feel swamped with the secondary literature you have collected.
You may come to believe that everything bas been said on the topic, and that
professional critics use an idiom so forbiddingly technical that you cannot possibly
emulate it. Remember, though, that we do not quite expect you to master to perfection
technical skills that professional writers have been using and refining for years. For
our purposes, the whole issue of the relative originality of your textual analyses can in
fact be usefully rephrased as a problem of writing techniques. In the section on indirect
speech, I pointed out that what goes on in a critical argument (your own included) is a
dialogue between several voices. This dialogue can take several forms:

@ 136 ▪ A spontaneous interpretation: You may choose (or have to) disregard secondary
literature altogether, thus providing a spontaneous or—derogatorily put—naive
interpretation. This option is sometimes forced on you by the mere fact that you are
working on a topic about which very little has been written. From a purely educational
point of view, this format offers the advantage of giving your instructors a very clear
view of your abilities as a critical reader. Your voice rules the show—by default. Still,
there are limits to the naive approach: in many cases, the meaning of a literary text
cannot be divorced from the history of its critical reception. Who could boast that he
or she has seen Shakespeare’s Hamlet for the first time or has opened Joyce’s Ulysses
without having been influenced beforehand by other people’s interpretations? In more
general terms, our expectations about the meaning and the social function of literature
are shaped by previous readers’ insights. Thus, you cannot escape positioning your
writer’s voice with regard to other people.

@ 137 ▪ A review of the literature: In practice, we may distinguish two ways of dialoguing
with critics. According to the former, you limit yourself to reporting other critic’s
arguments. Indeed, whatever your research topic, you will at a certain stage of your
argument need to give an account of the critical tradition regarding a certain writer or
text. This is done in a review of the critical literature, which is usually located at the
beginning of a paper. In an analysis of a broader scope, it may also be necessary to
resort to this technique more or less explicitly in several chapters. The format for this
kind of discussion is the one used in review essays such as Michael Fisher’s
“Perspectivism” (see @ 72). In these cases, you might compare your own function to
that of a TV host in charge of a journalistic talk show. The TV host needs to present
to the public the opinions of a set of guests. In theory, the critics’ voices have
precedence over your own in such a context. Yet, notice that absolute neutrality is
neither possible nor even advisable on your part. After all, like the producers of the
TV show, you have the privilege of choosing the guests, and you have the opportunity
to slant their views as a function of your own critical agenda. Susan V. Donaldson’s
review essay of Frederick Karl’s book on Faulkner (see @ 138), e.g. is a particularly
polemic report on criticism: though her exposé of Karl’ s views takes up most of the
 47

text—thus making Karl’s voice quite present—Donaldson’s negative judgment is

expressed in very explicit terms.

@ 138 Figure 6: A critical review of another critical essay (Susan V. Donaldson, Review of
William Faulkner: American Writer, by Frederick R. Karl). [Note that this essay uses a
formatting standard slightly different from the MLA style sheet. Also, because this is the published
version of the text and not the manuscript, single spacing is used throughout.]
 48

@ 139 ▪ A close reading drawing on previous critical interpretations. Apart from

spontaneous literary interpretation and pure reviews of the literature, the segments of
your essay devoted to close readings of primary works often develop a critical
argument in the light—one might say in the shadow—of supposedly more experienced
critical readers. In this case, the principle of organization for your text should be the
logic of your own interpretation, to which other critics are made to contribute. In other
words, the best guarantee against plagiarism or uncertainty about the originality of
your contribution is for you to commit yourself to an interpretation of the text that is
in some way truly meaningful to you or at least that you can fully endorse. In order
to do so, ask yourself why exactly you would like to deal with the particular author(s)
you have selected. What is it exactly that appeals to you in those texts? Based on this
personal interest, you will be able to articulate the thesis of your essay, and thus to
assert your voice with regard to other critics. An interesting way of envisaging the
dialogue with secondary literature taking place in your argument is to picture yourself
as a lawyer making a case in court: you do have an original or at least personally
meaningful argument to develop, but you need evidence to back up your case. The
secondary literature provides this evidence: other critics provide the court exhibits
and the testimonies supporting an argument over which you have, one hopes, a fair
degree of control. The texts printed in figures 7, 8, and 9 (items 140-42) illustrate how
such an argument is constructed. You will see that in all these cases, the text is divided
between a review of critical literature—the writer summarizes, however succinctly,
the other critic’s argument—and the development of an interpretation that serves as
organizing principle throughout.

@ 140 Figure 7. This passage from Carroll Smith-Rosenberg’s Disorderly Conduct: Visions
of Gender in Victorian America shows how an academic writer may draw on
authorities in order to support a research agenda that she has already defined. Smith-
Rosenberg sets forth the problem that she had to solve, mentions the theorists that
helped her out (Douglas, Turner, Barthes), then gives a detailed account of the impact
of Douglas’s theories on her own thesis (“Douglas’s model radically altered my
understanding of...” ). Notice the use of the first person: it is not at all proscribed, in
academic texts, as students sometimes erroneously believe. On the contrary, using the
first person is in a few cases indispensable in order to signal where you stand in the
dialogue developed in your argument. [Note that this essay uses a formatting standard different
from the MLA format. Also, because this is the published version of the text and not the manuscript,
single spacing is used throughout.]
 49

@ 141 Figure 8. This passage from Peter Conn’s The Divided Mind: Ideology and
Imagination in America 1898-1917 offers an example of how a critic may use external
evidence to buttress a relatively simple point in a literary interpretation. Here, Conn
analyses the tower symbolism that crops up in a naturalist novel—Ernest Poole’s The
Harbor. The argument runs from the appeal to authorities (“As a number of literary
historians have shown...”) to the conclusion that Conn draws from the evidence he has
brought forth (“Thus, the distance...ˮ). [Note that this essay uses a formatting standard different
from the MLA format. Also, because this is the published version of the text and not the manuscript,
single spacing is used throughout.]
 50

@ 142 Figure 9. This passage from Rachel Bowlby’s Just Looking: Consumer Culture in
Dreiser, Gissing and Zola is a slightly more complex case. Bowlby first summarizes
another critic’s reading of Theodore Dreiser’s Sister Carrie—a naturalist novel
(“Walter Benn Michaels shows how... “). She then gives a positive appraisal of
Michaels’s contribution, but insists that her own agenda differs from his (“But while
it is broadly true ... the novel does not... “). [Note that this essay uses a formatting standard
different from the MLA format. Also, because this is the published version of the text and not the
manuscript, single spacing is used throughout.]
 51

@ 143 ACADEMIC ORIGINALITY, PUBLIC KNOWLEDGE, AND INTERPRETIVE COMMUNITIES

Admittedly, being able to position one’s voice with regard to others does not in itself
solve the problem of the originality of one’s own contribution. Here are a few
guidelines that may help you negotiate this tricky issue, however.

@ 144 ▪ Identifying what is public knowledge. At a basic level, you may have the feeling that
whatever has been printed in a text of secondary literature belongs to the critic in
question and should be acknowledged as such. This is of course never quite the case.
To take a simplistic example, suppose I’m working on Hamlet and I use John Dover
Wilson’s What Happens in Hamlet as a critical source. If Dover Wilson writes that
Shakespeare’s play is a tragedy in five acts taking place for the most part in Denmark,
I would be ill-advised to credit him with that commonplace remark: this is something
that anybody would notice. Therefore, we can conclude that there is an area of
commonsense interpretation of the literary text, an aspect of the interpretation that is
in the public domain, as it were, and that does not need to be credited to previous
readers. Let’s look at a more complex and more rea1istic case. Working on Hamlet
again, I have found an (hypothetical) article—by W. W. Muckraker, say—in which
Muckraker alludes to the oedipal tensions that, he claims, characterize the relations of
the Danish prince towards his parents. This was, unfortunately, a point I wanted to
develop in my own essay. Should I credit this to Muckraker or choose another topic
altogether? On second inspection, though, Muckraker may have mentioned the origin
of this insight in his text or in his notes. If you are not too fond of reading critics’ notes
or other aspects of the bibliographical apparatus—if they sometimes look like mere
appendages to you—, please bear in mind that these elements are essential in so far
as they indicate the critical tradition in which the interpretation fits. In this case,
Muckraker’s notes should reveal that the oedipal interpretation of Hamlet goes all the
way back to Freud—to The Interpretations of Dreams, where Freud defines the
workings of the Oedipus complex. The application of this theory to Hamlet was
developed more systematically by Freud’s disciple Ernest Jones. If Muckraker
acknowledges this, it is all the better for his honesty. If he doesn’t, he may be either
naïve, ill-informed, or he may have felt quite legitimately that this piece of information
was somehow in the public domain—that the sources of the oedipal interpretation of
Hamlet are so well known that, to competent Shakespearean critics at least, this
interpretation is common knowledge and no longer needs any referencing.

@ 145 ▪ Academic originality is measured by reference to the interpretive community for

which the text is intended. From what precedes, we may infer a principle that might
seem counterintuitive—namely that originality is relative, not absolute. There is
admittedly no academic consensus on this point: other academic writers may believe
that each piece of research—including students’ papers—should deal with topics that
have never been tackled at all. In practice, this is very rarely the case. Only in the
natural sciences, perhaps, does there exist structures (indexes of publications,
academic conferences, worldwide professional associations) allowing authors to verify
whether particular ideas have already been developed by other people. Otherwise, in
the humanities, different types of barriers—linguistic, geographical—make such
planetary-based management of knowledge impossible. Therefore, the originality of
any academic argument is measured with regard to the interpretive community—the
target audience, to borrow a commercial term—for which it is intended. Authors and
publishers have some prior knowledge of the audience for which a text is written, and
 52

they construct their argument according to this audience’s expectations and putative
horizon of knowledge. To take up the Hamlet example again, what is commonplace or
even public knowledge to professional Shakespearean scholars might still be a
revelation to other people, maybe even to non-Shakespearean critics.

@ 146 ▪ What is the interpretive community of BA3 research papers and MA theses?
Clearly, this interpretive community cannot be restricted to the actual people who will
read your prose (professors, assistants, members of the thesis jury): academic writing,
unlike personal letters, does not work on the assumption that its addressee is perfectly
defined in advance. A sensible attitude would be to define your audience as the set of
people—students and academics—who study English (or Spanish, Dutch, Italian,
German, Russian, etc...) literature in French-speaking countries. Bearing this in mind
may have a very concrete impact on the shape of your argument. Let us suppose that
you decide to write your thesis about a Spanish (or American...) writer who already
enjoys a fair critical reputation in his or her homeland, but is practically unknown over
here. Obviously, your essay will not be subjected to the same constraints as the thesis
of a fellow student at the University of Salamanca or Berkeley: from the point of view
of your French-speaking university readership, there is still room for a general
presentation of this writer’s work. Thus, you may still write a thesis whose very topic
consists in the analysis of the writer’s work as a whole. Your Spanish or American
counterparts, on the contrary, would have to devote their attention to a more specific,
specialized approach to the same corpus.

@ 147 ▪ Defining a topic against all odds. Now, what if I still want to write a paper or thesis
about the oedipal aspects of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, even though 1 have come to realize
that this critical gold mine has already run dry? If you do have a deep interest in the
topic you have selected, you will always find a compromise solution between your
initial expectations and the requirements of academic originality. The solution will
in many cases involve a slight change of approach—a modification in the primary
corpus, notably. Why not analyze the oedipal problematic not only in Hamlet but also
in other plays by Shakespeare where this issue has not been studied so thoroughly?
Why not examine how this topic has been handled in the movie versions of Hamlet?
Other aspects of psychoanalytical theory than the Oedipus complex might be relevant
to Shakespeare (narcissism, etc). You could also draw parallels with more
contemporary plays or movies (“The Hamlet theme in Quentin Tarantino’s Reservoir
Dogs,” e.g.). These are matters that should be discussed with your thesis adviser. He
or she is the person to consult when trying to make a final decision about the viability
and originality of a thesis topic.
 53

H. Structuring an MA Thesis
@ 148 DEFINING A MANAGEABLE CORPUS
Theses written for the Department of Modern Languages and Literature at the ULB
are expected to be 80 to 100 pages long. Structuring a text of this length will probably
be a new experience for you. Again, in this matter, we cannot lay down universal
principles, only the record of what has worked in the past for a large group of students.
Obviously, the structure of your thesis will be heavily determined by the specificity of
your topic. In literature, the following parameters will be essential:

▪ How many writers, if several?

▪ How many works?

▪ Does the topic require a lot of background information (sociological, historical)

or is intrinsic textual analysis sufficient?

▪ What will be the status of the secondary literature? Will you need chapters
devoted to history or theory exclusively?

▪ If working on types of discourse different from literature (film, theater), are

you familiar with the specific research methodology associated with these
disciplines?

@ 149 PRIMARY SOURCES, “COREˮ CRITICAL MATERIAL, “AUXILIARYˮ CRITICAL MATERIAL

As mentioned above, these questions—the definition of the primary, secondary, and
tertiary corpus, notably—lead to strategic decisions that often cannot be made in the
first weeks of research: making up your mind about all this requires a good grasp of
the topic and of the relevant secondary and tertiary literature. Still, we would like to
draw your attention to the fact that there are limits to what a 100-page-long essay can
accommodate. In most cases, it is difficult to provide an extensive close reading of
more than four or five novels or plays. For sheer reasons of space, the maximum
number of critics that are vitally useful for the interpretation of each text—we might
call this the core criticism—is limited too—five or six, say. By core criticism, I mean
the secondary literature whose argument you do address at length in your main text.
Auxiliary criticism might designate the secondary literature you mention in passing or
in your bibliographical notes. All this corroborates the idea that the structure of the
thesis revolves around the choice of the primary and the (core) secondary/tertiary
texts. In the course of writing, it is necessary to make adjustments between, on the one
band, your initial expectations about the scope of your research, which may be overly
ambitious, and, on the other hand, what can really be done in a text that remains, in
some respects, an administrative document.

@ 150 TEXT MANAGEMENT: THINKING FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF YOUR INTENDED READERS
Thinking from the point of view of your intended reader is also an important principle
in the general composition of your thesis. Putting yourself in the reader’s shoes implies
a reflection about the way information is channeled through your text, and it directly
determines what I have called the techniques of text management (internal cross-
references, making explicit one’s research agenda, etc.). For instance, you should at
all junctures decide what is public knowledge and what should be clarified, what is
 54

new to your reader and what should be repeated after an interval of several chapters.
In tangible terms, these strategies of text management will shape the very tone of your
voice as a writer—the way it is perceived by your reader. If you handle text
management inadequately, you are bound to sound disorganized. Yet, even if you have
a good command of it, you can still sound arrogant or patronizing. The former case
occurs when you seem to take for granted information that is not self-evident to your
readership or if you deliberately skip logical links. Do not forget that after several
months of immersion into a specialized topic, you easily end up knowing more about
it than your readers. On the contrary, your tone will sound patronizing if it gives
readers the impression you are belaboring the obvious.

@ 150.2 SYNOPSES OF TEXTS FROM THE PRIMARY CORPUS

Text management is an important concern in the composition of the synopses
(summaries) of the texts of your primary corpus. If you plan to analyze novels or short
stories, you are indeed expected to write short summaries of each work in order to
acquaint your readers with each text’s main narrative features (see @ 158). If you are
working on poetry, which is not necessarily organized around a structuring narrative,
you should at least provide a succinct overview of what the poems contain. Synopses
of narrative works should be relatively short—one double-spaced page; two pages at
the utmost. If not, they will give readers the impression that your whole analysis is
structured as a long paraphrase of the original. Still, synopses should mention most
of the narrative incidents your discussion focuses on, as well as, if necessary, elements
not discussed elsewhere in your argument. If you are working on extremely famous
primary texts—Shakespeare’s plays, Jane Austen’s novels—you still need to offer
synopses of these works, yet you should also make it clear that you are narrating stories
your readership is familiar with. Remember that the tense of reference for the
composition of synopses is the present, not the past (see @ 21).

@ 150.3 INTRODUCING CHARACTERS PROPERLY

The main characters featured in the novels, stories, and poems you deal with need to
be properly introduced: you should briefly specify the role they play in the narrative.
For main characters, this is best done in the novel’s or story’s synopsis. Introducing
characters at a later stage may prove awkward, like a last-minute reminder. Characters
should initially be referred to by their first and last name. For later occurrences, the
first name may suffice.

Elizabeth Bennet is the main protagonist of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. A bright,

vivacious personality, Elizabeth initially seems indifferent to the prospect of marriage.

@ 151 FINDING A PROPER THESIS OUTLINE: STRUCTURING PRINCIPLES

As far as the large-scale structure of literary theses go, we may suggest three widely
used principles of organization:

▪ A: A sequence of close readings (the “York Notes format”).

▪ B: An argument structured by issues, themes, or other aspects of literary

discourse (the “thematic” format”).
 55

▪ C (= A + B): A sequence of close readings, each focusing on a main issue or

theme

@ 152 ▪ A: The “York Notesˮ format:

The first pattern—the sequence of interpretations—might be called derogatorily the
“York Notesˮ (or “Cliff Notesˮ) format, after the familiar series of literary study aids.
In the “York Notes format,” after the necessary biographical and historical
introductions, your argument should run through each of the primary texts in sequence.
Each interpretation provides a synopsis of the work, then examines the characters, the
structure, the use of language and other issues specific to the work in question. If this
sounds a little unglamorous and mechanical, be assured that a fair majority of
monographs of literary criticism are structured as a sequence of interpretations—even
if the writing skills of the author may attenuate the mechanical aspect of such a format.
It would indeed be quite natural to expect a critical study of, for instance, Toni
Morrison’s novels to deal with each of the writer’s works in chronological sequence.
The great advantage of this format consists in offering a clear and effective
management of information. For our purposes, the “York Notes format” has the
additional advantage of discouraging students from structuring their textual analyses
as mere paraphrases of the original work: this format at least requires that different
aspects of the text such as characterization, language, and structure be treated
separately. However, the main drawback of this format is its repetitiveness: you may
end up dealing with the same issues and themes in several of your chapters, since
writers often revisit the same thematic concerns or use the same literary techniques
from work to work.

@ 153 ▪ B: The thematic format:

The “thematic” format offers a chapter-by-chapter analysis of issues relevant to a
corpus of several works. For instance, if I decide to investigate the social aspects of
American literary realism at the turn of the century, I might choose to write an essay
that contains a chapter about the representation of social classes, followed by a study
of the issues of racism and ethnicity, and finally by an analysis of the construction of
gender relations. Such a format offers the obvious advantage of doing away with the
repetitiveness that often characterizes a sequence of interpretations. Also, because it is
directly aimed at the issues of interest to you as a critic, it might be better suited for a
thesis that does not present an account of an author’s overall achievement, but that
revolves around a specific topic: A New Look at Oedipal Relations in Shakespeare’s
Plays, The Imagery of Entrapment and Liberation in Shelley’s Poetry—to take a few
hypothetical examples. Because it allows you to deal with several texts wholesale (as
a group), the thematic format may be particularly useful for the analysis of short texts
such as poems and short stories. A sequence of close readings of fourteen poems by
the same author might indeed be a little tiresome and repetitive.

The drawback of the thematic format is that it may make it difficult for your readers
to perceive what the primary works in your corpus represent as separate texts. In my
hypothetical thesis on Shakespeare, for instance, I might entirely omit such important
characters as Fortinbras and Horatio, because, I might argue, they do not belong to
Hamlet’s family circle and are therefore irrelevant to the oedipal problematic. Yet, in
the play, these are significant figures that cannot be passed over in silence. This implies
that, in each thesis, whatever your specific interest, you are expected to provide
evidence that you have a basic interpretative grip of most of the aspects of each text
 56

you are dealing with. This is why you should insert proper synopses of these texts
within your argument (see above @ 150).

@ 154 ▪ C: A sequence of close readings, each focusing on a main issue or theme:

A workable compromise between the “York Notes” and the thematic format consists
in structuring your text as a sequence of issues-oriented interpretations. In this case,
the successive readings of the primary works are meant to focus on a specific topic.
For instance, if I choose to investigate Interpersonal Relations in Virginia Woolf’s
Fiction, I may decide to explore, on the one hand, Woolf’s representation of the family
in To the Lighthouse and The Years, and, on the other hand, extra-familial social
relations in The Waves and Mrs. Dalloway. This is an elegant format that 1 would
recommend for most literary essays.

@ 155 STRUCTURING AN MA THESIS: PRACTICAL TIPS

At the risk of being somewhat normative, let us set forth a sample outline that might
prove appropriate to many literary studies theses.

▪ Sample outline: Let us assume I plan to write a (purely hypothetical) thesis entitled
The Representation of Mental Disorder in Shakespeare’s Main Tragedies. The corpus
for my thesis includes four plays—Othello, Hamlet, Macbeth, and King Lear—each
of which is crowded with scenes of mental alienation. For the reasons of clarity
mentioned above, I choose to structure it according to the third option mentioned in
the previous list: each textual analysis focuses on a specific issue. These are the various
sections one would normally expect to find in a thesis of this type:

1. “Prefaceˮ or “Introductionˮ (3 to 5 pages long).

This section provides a preview—a concise depiction—of your topic, of your corpus, of
the methodology you mean to adopt, and of the overall structure of your text.

2. One chapter dealing with general issues (20-25 pages).

This section deals with the historical and theoretical issues relevant to the topic—in short,
all generalities required to discuss the topic adequately.

3. Textual analysis # 1 / Issue # 1 (15-20 pages)

4. Textual analysis # 2 / Issue # 2 (15-20 pages)

5. Textual analysis # 3 / Issue # 3 (15-20 pages)

6. Textual analysis # 4 / Issue # 4 (15-20 pages)

7. Conclusion (3-5 pages)

(Total: 85-105 pages)

Let us fill in this schematic outline with headings relevant to the topic mentioned
above:
 57

1. “Prefaceˮ or “Introductionˮ
Preview of the topic, corpus, methodology, and of the overall structure of the text.

2. Literature, theater, mental disorder, and psychiatry

Historical survey of the links between literature and mental disorder
A classification of mental disorders
Shakespeare’s biography: to what extent was the Bard particularly interested in mental
alienation?

3. Paranoia in Othello

4. Manic depression and the borderline personality in Hamlet

5. Schizophrenia and megalomania in Macbeth

6. Senile dementia in King Lear

7. Conclusion

Remarks:

Being able to write down such an outline means, of course, that most of the research
has been properly done and that conclusions have been reached as far as the
interpretation of the texts is concerned. Here are a few issues you might have to solve
in order to be able to finalize the outline:

@ 156 ▪ One single issue might prove relevant to several texts in the corpus and therefore to
several chapters in the thesis. For instance, there are traces of schizophrenia in Hamlet,
Macbeth, and King Lear. In this case, it might still be better for clarity’s sake to address
the issue of schizophrenia under one heading only—in the discussion of Macbeth, for
instance, where it is possibly most important. The chapters devoted to Hamlet and King
Lear might include cross-references indicating that the elements of schizophrenia
occurring in these two plays will be dealt with in the chapter on Macbeth.

@ 157 ▪ The author’s biography. Literary theses often require one or several sections devoted
to the biography of the author(s) discussed in the argument. If the thesis focuses on
only one author, his or her biography will probably appear close to the beginning of
the thesis (note that, in our example, we placed it at the end of the second section). If
you deal with several authors, it might be best to insert these biographies in the
beginning of each chapter devoted to textual analysis. Such biographies should not run
on too long (5 pages maximum). Indeed, this is a section of your text that is almost
entirely based on (a limited number of) critical sources. There is some danger that it
might read like a mere copy-and-paste chapter borrowed from other sources.

@ 158 ▪ Summaries / synopses of literary texts. In order to make your literary interpretations
intelligible, you should write synopses of the primary texts. The latter cover
succinctly—typically, in a few pages—the different points that the reader needs to
know in order to follow your argument and also in order to become generally
acquainted with the primary works. A good synopsis is usually not a mere summary,
but also a brief interpretation. For instance, it is particularly easy to discuss the
structure of a literary work in the course of its synopsis. Contrary to appearances, the
function of these “summaries” does not exclusively consist in channeling new
information to your reader (otherwise, in the example above, I might argue that most
 58

of my readers have read Shakespeare’s tragedies anyway, or that they should have):
the synopsis constitutes an essential structural feature of your argument. Indeed, it is
in the synopsis of a text that you will be able to mention information that will find no
place in any other section (Horatio, Fortinbras, in my reading of Hamlet, e.g.).
Likewise, you will be able to refer to the information mentioned in the synopsis later
in your argument: these elements will already have been explained and will need no
further definition. In this way, the synopsis may help you tighten the internal
consistency of your overall interpretation.

@ 159 HANDING IN AN OUTLINE OF THE THESIS TO YOUR SUPERVISOR

In the early stages of your research, you will probably be asked to present an outline
(a plan, a prospectus) of your essay to your adviser. A good outline—i.e. one that
means something to people other than yourself—should be structured as in the
examples above (see @154): it should consist of a chapter-by-chapter breakdown of
your argument. The outline should also list the primary and secondary works used
in each section, and provide a very brief account of what you intend to argue at each
stage.

From our point of view, an outline of this type only provides an indication that you
have given some thought to the topic and that you have done some bibliographical
research. It is therefore a much-needed guarantee that you are at work. As far as the
whole assignment goes, however, the outline is a mere promise—more a blank check
than a representative sample. It is impossible to evaluate the quality of a student’s
thesis based on outlines, however detailed. Such a diagram tells us nothing, for
instance, about the possible problems you might still have in linguistic proficiency,
style, and composition. Thus, if you want to know what your work is worth, you must
hand in drafts of your first chapters, however poorly written or incomplete they may
seem to you. Most people tend to have an exaggeratedly low opinion of their first
attempts—or an unrealistically high estimate of our standards. So, do not wait until the
last minute before having us read the first pages of your thesis. Optimally, your drafts
should be as carefully formatted as possible in terms of layout and bibliographical
references, so we can figure out where you really stand on these matters too. Finally,
remember that any kind of writing skill develops slowly, often over several years.
 59

I. List of Correction Symbols

@ 160 CORRECTION SYMBOLS

You will find three types of correction symbols in your manuscripts:

▪ Figures in the margin preceded by the at sign (“@ˮ) correspond to items in

the present Guidelines for Research Papers and Theses: @ 18, for instance,
means that a correction is required involving the issues described in item @
18. The text affected by the correction is circled accordingly.

This isn’t appropriate.

▪ Proofreading symbols signaling small changes to be added to the text. These

symbols are standardized: the same symbols are used by many different editors
(see @ 161).

This isn’t appropriate.

▪ Symbols signaling grammatical and formatting corrections. This is a

customized list based on the predictable errors encountered in students’ essays.
These symbols are preceded by a dot in order to distinguish them from other
comments (see @ 162).

This isn’t appropriate.

▪ Comments in parenthesis, bearing upon general issues.

This isn’t appropriate.

@ 161 PROOFREADING SYMBOLS

Proofreading correction symbols often come in pairs: one symbol is inserted within
the text. Another is added in the margin, clarifying which type of correction is required.
60
61
 62

@ 162 GRAMMATICAL CORRECTIONS

¶ coh Faulty paragraph coherence

¶ dev Faulty paragraph development

¶ unit Lack of paragraph unity

. add title Add a title.

. adj Error involving an adjective

. adv + adj Use an adverb before the adjective.

. adv synt Misplaced adverb

. adv Error involving an adverb

.agr Error in verb agreement

. art Error in the use of articles

. as/like Confusion between “asˮ and “like”

. cliché This is a cliché.

. coll Excessively colloquial

. comp Error involving a comparative

. contin Use the continuous form.

. dict Inappropriate diction (linguistic register)

. fragm Fragment

. gen Use the genitive.

. ger Use the gerund.

. inf cl Use an infinitive clause.

. irreg Faulty irregular verb

. logic Faulty logic

. mod Faulty modal auxiliary

. much/many Confusion between “muchˮ and ˮmanyˮ

 63

. no contin Do not use the continuous form.

. no gen Do not use the genitive.

. no ger Do not use the gerund.

. no title Suppress the title.

. no pass Do not use the passive voice.

. no vb inv Do not use the verb / subject inversion.

. p (rel) Faulty punctuation with relative pronoun

.p Faulty punctuation

. part Error involving a participle

. pass Use the passive voice.

. pl Use the plural.

. pleon Pleonasm

. prep Error involving a preposition

. pron ref? Pronoun reference unclear

Q (block) Change into a block quotation.

Q Error involving a quotation

REFs Error involving the bibliographical apparatus

. rel (nonrestr) Use a nonrestrictive relative pronoun.

. rel (restr) Use a restrictive relative pronoun.

. rel Error in relative pronoun

. run-on Run-on sentence

. sent str Error in sentence construction

. sg Use the singular.

. since/for Use the present perfect with “sinceˮ an “for.ˮ

source? Bibliographical references required

64
 65

. spell Incorrect spelling

. split Split the sentence

. subj Use the subjunctive

. superl Error involving a superlative

. t seq Faulty tense sequence

.t Faulty verb tense

. trans vb Transitive verb

. transit? Faulty transition / transition required

. unclear Argument unclear

. uncount This noun is an uncountable

. V3 Third person of the indicative

. vb pat Faulty verbal pattern (verb + preposition)

. vb Error involving a verb

. vb inv Error involving the verb / subject inversion

. voc Incorrect or inaccurate vocabulary