Rachel S. answered • 10/06/23
BA in English and 7+ Years of Tutoring Experience
Hi Souvik,
When approaching an assignment of this scale I would highly recommend breaking it down into smaller parts. Essays like this can be overwhelming and it's important to start with making the assignment more manageable which will, in turn, also help your essay feel more organized. In my experience, the best way to do this is by fully understanding the assignment; brainstorming and outlining; writing; and then finally making edits.
First, understand the requirements of the assignment. A 1200 to 1500 word essay will be around 3 pages single spaced or 5/6 pages double spaced, so you will need multiple paragraphs to fully explain your answer. Then, you can determine the contents of these paragraphs by identifying the different parts of the prompt. In this case, there are two texts, "Of Revenge" and "Jew of Malta" for which you are being asked to explore the ideas of revenge and how their genres frame these ideas.
This is where you enter the brainstorm phrase. I would start by making a Venn diagram with each text in its own circle and their commonalities in the overlapping center space. Then reread the texts and place quotes from the text where they belong in the Venn diagram as well as any notes or annotations of your own thoughts on the relevance to their respective genre.
This brainstorm exercise then becomes your outline, with each piece of the Venn diagram as its own paragraph. Note that there are no wrong ways to organize the paragraphs in the essay as long as they make the most sense to you, that way it can flow smoothly. It's also okay to change the order of your paragraphs after you've written them during the editing phase. While it's tempting to edit before you write, try to keep your brainstorm and writing phases a "judgement free zone" to let the ideas flow smoothly.
Once you've determined your outline you can then write your essay. For the body paragraphs, I highly recommend using the "S.E.E." model, "summary", "evidence", "explanation" to thoroughly explain your points. You should also start with a topic sentence explaining your argument for each paragraph and then a transition to explain how it leads you to your next paragraph. While it is a good idea to have a vision for your thesis during your outlining phase, I highly recommend writing your thesis after you've written your body paragraphs. This way you can read over your writing and ensure that you're arguing what you intended to. Instead of forcing your evidence to fit your original idea, let your evidence lead you to your conclusion! Then, you can write your conclusion paragraph and reflect on the journey your essay has taken the readers on.
Finally, edit your essay. Reread the prompt to make sure you have checked off all of the requirements of the assignment. I also highly recommend reading your essay aloud so you can hear how it sounds and more easily catch typos and other awkward phrasing that can be otherwise missed. As mentioned earlier, don't be afraid to change the order of your sentences or even paragraphs to let the ideas flow smoothly.
I hope this answer helps give you more confidence when approaching an assignment like this. Please do not hesitate to reach out and schedule a session as each essay has it's unique complications and there are many more tips and tricks I can share to help you tackle them!
Best wishes,
Rachel
