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4 pages/≈1100 words
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Style:
MLA
Subject:
Literature & Language
Type:
Essay
Language:
English (U.S.)
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Topic:

Tess of the D'urbervilles (Literature & Language Essay)

Essay Instructions:

this essay should be about the novel Tess of the D'urbervilles, the topics are travel generations, and community
You must “put a spin” on your chosen topic—find an interpretive focus. Everything in your essay must be
interpretive. Remember: no summary or generalization. Do not fall into the trap of merely
describing/recounting what happens in the novel. Assume you are addressing a reader who is familiar with
the book—there is no need to recount any part of the story.
Your essay must contain an introduction that ends with your thesis statement, four substantial body
paragraphs that begin with interpretive topic sentences, and a conclusion. Body paragraphs should be
thoroughly developed with numerous quotations from various parts of the novel
Each body paragraph should begin with a clear, specific topic sentence. A topic sentence
must contain an interpretive idea; it must do more than merely state a detail from the story.
In comparative essays, the topic sentences should address both of the works in question and
express a clearly comparative idea.
• A topic sentence is the statement of a main point designed to prove your thesis. Therefore,
each topic sentence should relate directly to your thesis.
• The topic sentence limits the subject of your paragraph. The entire paragraph should address
material that is directly related to the topic sentence.
• You should support your topic sentence with clear, specific supporting evidence and you
should discuss this evidence, indicating how it demonstrates your point. There should be a
substantial amount of evidence in every body paragraph.
• You must say something about your evidence. Explain its significance. How does it prove
the idea in your topic sentence? Explore and elaborate on your evidence and your ideas.
• If you follow the two previous points, you should be writing substantial body paragraphs.
Refer to the example paragraphs you’ve seen as a rough guideline for paragraph length. The
paragraph examples tend to be at least two hundred words long. You need at least that much
to prove an idea convincingly.
• Be specific. Refer directly to the literature throughout your essay and use quotations and
specific references to the literature throughout.
• Reduce the length of your quotations. Many students have the tendency to quote complete
sentences when all they need is a single word or phrase. Quote only what is necessary.
Remember: if you quote, you should discuss what you have quoted. Its relevance should be
clear.
• This point is related to the one above. If you reduce quotations to single words or phrases (as
you should), you must integrate your quotations gracefully into your own sentences. Here is
an example of a sentence with nicely integrated, brief quotations: The “round hard balls”
(20) that Dr. Reefy keeps in his pockets are reminiscent of his “extraordinarily large”
knuckles, which are “like . . . wooden balls” (16). In this example, only the necessary words
are used and they are integrated into the sentence.
• You may use longer quotations if necessary, but they should also be appropriately presented.
Often, when quoting a full sentence or more, you need to introduce the quotation with a colon
(:). Here is one example: Huck creates a sense of intimacy by addressing the reader directly:
“You don’t know about me without you have read a book by the name of The Adventures of
Tom Sawyer” (11). Remember: don’t use longer quotations unless they’re truly necessary.
• Note the method of citation in the examples above. Follow this example. Do not write
“page” or “p.” before the page number, but do write the author's last name if you are writing
about more than one work and the author's name is not mentioned in your sentence.
Example: While Angel considers Tess "divine" (Hardy 16), Captain Wentworth believes Anne
"has her feet on the ground" (Austen 73).
• Remember this rule: Don’t say what happened, say why it happened. You are discussing the
meaning a work, not its plot. If you find yourself constantly summarizing the plot, it is
probably because your thesis (or one of your topic sentences) is too general. Go back and
make your argument clearer. Say something about the story or novel. Assume that you are
addressing a reader who is familiar with the work in question.
• Pay close attention to transitions. There should be a clear logical flow between your
sentences and between your paragraphs. Topic sentences of body paragraphs often contain a
transition from the previous body paragraph that emphasizes the flow of the argument.
Although transitional terms are sometimes necessary, do not use them gratuitously.
• Do not enumerate your body paragraphs ("Firstly," "Secondly," etc.).
• YOUR WHOLE ESSAY SHOULD BE UNIFIED BY THE THESIS STATEMENT AT
THE END OF THE INTRODUCTORY PARAGRAPH. EVERYTHING IN THE ESSAY
SHOULD ULTIMATELY RELATE TO YOUR THESIS.

Essay Sample Content Preview:
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Tess of the D’Urbervilles
Tess of the D’Urbervilles is a tragic novel by Thomas Hardy, famous for critical realism and connecting his characters with their environment and community. The text revolves around an innocent girl, Tess, getting maturer with each opening chapter in the story. The author seems to paint her stranded in a network of community ideals leading to her tragic fate through a series of misfortunes. While exploring relief from one adversity, she is ultimately caught by another, leaving her no choice to survive. She becomes the example of victim sufferers from low class in need of economic independence, just laws, and social reforms. Tess’s tragedy shows the plight of a low-class female in a community supporting marginalization, hypocritical outlooks, unjust laws, and depression of Capitalism, intensifying the outcry for justice and equality.
Tess, as the protagonist of the novel, represents two-folded marginalization in English society. First, her status as a woman throws her into a marginalized group in a male-dominant society. When she has an illegitimate baby, she loses the villagers' community to reside in the corner of society, while the male counterpart, who was accountable for this happening, stays safe and respectable in the community (Hardy 54). She leaves a community for another seeking job as a woman and meets Alec, who has no respect for women. On another level, she symbolizes the marginalized minority of the lower class. She loses her place in her parents’ residence, and even village, more than once in the novel to fill her belly (Hady, “Tess of the D'Urbervilles” 473). After her marriage, she cannot establish a community with her in-laws for being a weak woman of labor class ( Hardy, “Tess of the D'Urbervilles” 490). Her fleeing to Sandbourne is a margin of the heath that transcribes the miseries of unprivileged people, whom criminal law and social law equivalently hold guilty without any recession (Hardy, “Tess of the D'Urbervilles” 540). Tess loses community in many other instances in the novel, like Talbothays and her restriction to only her lodgings in Flintcombe-Ash (Hardy 70). One of the most realistic lines in the novel, contributing to the author’s remarks on women of the society, is “what every woman says, some women may feel” (Hardy, “Tess of the D'Urbervilles” 112). This line, utter by Tess, transcribes the lower class women's dilemma in an affluent-oriented and male-dominant society.
Hardy exposes hypocritical outlooks of the Victorian Age through Angel and Hardy's past confession and its result. The love marriage of Tess and Angel immediately fails when both open their past before each other. Tess’s forgiveness of her husband’s past and Angel’s proposed punishment for his wife depict the double standards of Victorian Age in English society in which the story was set. Tess “agrees to the conditions” because she considers that her husband has authority on what her “punishment ought to be” (Hardy, “Tess of the D'Urbervilles” 370). It depicts the diseased psyche of not only men but als...
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