Example Close Reading or Critical Analysis of The Little Match Girl

Close reading or critical analysis is a key skill in reading but how do we do it? Students often ask for examples so here goes … a simple example of how to do a close reading of a text. The … Read More

How can I work out what Romantic poetry means? Help!

Getting to Grips with Romantic Poetry: What are Wordsworth and Coleridge saying and how can we work it out? I had a lovely email from a clearly hard-working and enthusiastic A’ level student in the UK who is studying Romantic … Read More

Othello Lecture: storms, star crossed lovers & that handkerchief!

Idealistic lovers from different backgrounds, scheming politicians. What could go wrong? Here’s a clue: it involves a handkerchief. I’ve just tidied up an old lecture on Othello, which I’ve published in the hope that it might help some of you … Read More

How do I write an essay on Macbeth as Hero?

How do we approach essay questions when we feel stuck? Trying to launch into writing an essay from a blank page or screen is always going to be difficult because you have no foundation or building blocks to start with. … Read More

Exam Myths

Bullet Points If I run out of time it’s ok – I can just write lots of bullet points and the examiner will take out the bits that are relevant and give me good marks. If you have had a … Read More

What is ‘Textual Analysis’ or ‘Close Reading’?

So your lecturer has asked you for a ‘close analysis’ of a piece of text. You have no idea what that means. What do you do? Panic. Not good – panic breeds paralysis and you no doubt have a deadline. … Read More

Student Problems: ‘I’m lost and the set texts make it worse’

‘I don’t really know what’s relevant – I just get lost and the set texts don’t help because they’re too complicated’. There are two issues here: you find the set texts difficult to read and you’re not sure how to … Read More

Student Problems: ‘I can’t cope with big books!’

“I’m hitting a text wall – I read a page over and over and the words just swim in front of me – nothing goes in.” Sounds like you’re having to mark too many exam scripts 🙂 . I’m tempted … Read More

What is Plagiarism & Why is it Bad?

What is Plagiarism? Plagiarism is the deliberate unacknowledged use of someone’s else’s material ie passing off someone else’s ideas as your own. That’s why we have referencing systems 🙂 . Plagiarism is NOT repeating a point that your lecturer made … Read More

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